Personal Investing Advice

Review: Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies

Buy it now $29.95

Corporate executives are struggling with a new trend: people using online social technologies (blogs, social networking sites, YouTube, podcasts) to discuss products and companies, write their own news, and find their own deals. This groundswell is global, it s unstoppable, it affects every industry and it s utterly foreign to the powerful companies running things now.

When consumers you ve never met are rating your company s products in public forums with which you have no experience or influence, your company is vulnerable. In Groundswell, Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff of Forrester, Inc. explain how to turn this threat into an opportunity.

Using tools and data straight from Forrester, you ll learn how to:

-Evaluate new social technologies as they emerge

-Determine how different groups of consumers are participating in social technology arenas

-Apply a four-step process for formulating your future strategy

-Build social technologies into your business including monitoring your brand value, talking with the groundswell through marketing and PR campaigns, and energizing your best customers to recruit their peers

Timely and insightful, this book is required reading for executives seeking to protect and strengthen their company s public image.

“Groundswell is jammed with big ideas, useful stories, and quotable stats. This is the new industrial revolution. Are you on board?”

-Seth Godin, author, Meatball Sundae

“This book will rock your world, if social technology hasn’t rocked it already. It’s a tsunami of unstoppable force. Amazon, Procter & Gamble, Facebook, Google, and Dell are profiting from the crest of the wave. Are you? Li and Bernoff are the apostles of the tsunami. This book will be your bible.”

-Scott Cook, Founder and Chairman of the Executive Committee, Intuit

Groundswell provides practical advice on how to stay nimble and flexible in an ever-morphing digital world. Enabling your company to respond to change quickly especially when talking to and supporting your consumers is essential for business success.

-Cathie Black, President, Hearst Magazines

“The first phase of the Internet was about getting everyone connected. In this next phase, which changes the way we work, live, play, and learn, we re starting to realize the value of those connections as well as the new communications and experiences those interactions lead to the human network. Groundswell effectively documents this shift and underscores the opportunities available to all from this major market transition.”

-John T. Chambers, Chairman and CEO, Cisco

“Heed the Groundswell! It’s critical reading and helped us master the new dynamics of social media.”

-Christina Norman, President, MTV

“Groundswell is a comprehensive look at the tidal wave of change engulfing marketers. Nobody should attempt to engage the newly empowered and emboldened consumer without first hearing what Li and Bernoff have to say on the subject.”

-Clark Kokich, CEO, Avenue A | Razorfish

“Social technologies and the groundswell impact every business and organization worldwide. Li and Bernoff have written an insightful book that takes a refreshing research-driven approach to helping businesses transform themselves and successfully navigate this new dynamic landscape.”

-Steve Rubel, Senior Vice President, Edelman Digital, and columnist for Advertising Age

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How to Develop an Investment Strategy

As the expression goes, those who fail to plan, plan to fail. This rings especially true when it comes to planning an investment strategy. Someone who jumps into the stock market without a clear plan will stand to be unsuccessful and lose a lot of money. There are a few things that everyone should keep in mind when planning their investments in order to be successful.

Before getting started with investing, it is important for someone to clearly define their investment goals. They should consider if they just want to make some extra money or if they want to eventually quit their day job and invest full time. It is also important for someone to decide how much they want to make and, more importantly, how much they can afford to lose. If this is too complicated for someone to determine on their own, they should consult with an investment advisor.

The other thing that someone should do before they even get started with serious investments is get themselves out of debt. This means that they should pay off everything from their credit cards to their mortgage and student loans. If they add up how much they spend each year in interest, they will see how much money they could be investing if they did not have any debts.

When someone finally gets started with their investments, they should not run before they have learned how to walk. It is best to start out with low risk and low maintenance investments that remain steady, such as selling options. Risks should be saved for after someone has built up the capital to invest further and has the time to focus on more high maintenance investments.

It is also very wise for an investor to make sure that their portfolio is diverse. This means investing in stocks, bonds, CD’s and mutual funds. It also means that they should invest in a variety of different industries. The philosophy behind this is basically that nobody should put all of their eggs in one basket in case one of their investments fails for some reason. It is always smart to have a safety net in the event of the worst case scenario.

A good investment strategy can make the difference between success and failure when it comes to investing. Before investing, it is important for new investors to get out of debt and think carefully about how much money they can afford to use for their portfolio. Having clear investment goals and planning for them is the best way to have financial success with investing.

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Offshore Investing

One way to diversify your investment portfolio and potentially see bigger returns on your investments is to invest offshore. When choosing to invest offshore you are gaining access to untapped and potentially lucrative markets in countries that many investors would not even consider investing in.

There are a number of directions to go when considering investing offshore. However one of the most popular methods for investing offshore is through incorporating a company in an offshore jurisdiction. Incorporating an offshore company has two primary advantages; it can provide security for your assets and can help to minimize the taxation on your assets.

Incorporating an offshore company in the right jurisdiction can effectively protect both your investments and assets. By placing your resources in a legal entity such as an offshore company you benefit from the inherent protection of both domestic and international laws. Another option for safeguarding your assets through offshore investment is to establish a trust or foundation.

Forming an offshore company is a legitimate strategy for improving tax efficiency. Depending on the jurisdiction, one can benefit from both lower tax rates and double tax treaties between the offshore jurisdiction and your country of residence. With double tax treaties you avoid duplicate tax on global income. Converse to what many people think, investing your assets offshore is not necessarily tax evasion, but is a simple matter of legally capitalizing on well-established jurisdictions that provide favorable tax rates and laws.

Entrepreneurs who invest offshore should also consider offshore banking. Offshore banking makes the process of incorporating and running an offshore company easier and more efficient. Banking offshore provides greater protection of one’s assets and investments, along with operational efficiency from the improved ability to manage transfer of funds for your international business. Two jurisdictions that are internationally regarded as respected financial hubs, are Singapore and Hong Kong.

Investing offshore may be viewed with suspicion due to the fact offshore companies and bank accounts are sometimes associated with criminal activities, such as money laundering. Many entrepreneurs are rightfully wary of the stereotyped term of ‘tax haven’. Building brand reputation and perceptions of customers and investors is an important aspect of running a successful business. This stigmatization can be shed by carefully choosing the right jurisdiction and correct planning before undertaking offshore incorporation.

Whether you are incorporating a company or opening a bank account, both Singapore and Hong Kong are well-regarded locations for offshore investing. Both countries don’t carry any negative stigma, provide low corporate tax rates and give access to a number of double tax treaties. In addition, Singapore and Hong Kong are supported by well-developed infrastructure, along with governments that provide many incentives for entrepreneurs wishing to set up in these jurisdictions. As a result, both jurisdictions perform well in international business surveys as two of the easiest places in the world to set up and operate a business.

Healy Consultants is a leading corporate services firm that assists entrepreneurs with offshore investing. The firm provides a range of corporate services to assist entrepreneurs with setting up their company, including offshore company formation and corporate bank account opening. More information on company formation can be found by visiting www.healyconsultants.com.

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The Secret to Successful Investing

When it comes down to evaluating how well we do with investing, we are a lot more likely to comment about our investing skills the way we do about our driving skills. In other words, we easily find faults with the way other’s invest our money (like those mutual fund managers who lost 30% or more of our retirement portfolios) than we can find faults with our own investment skills (we can surely do better in a self-directed plan!).

However, there is one way we can take full credit for our investment prowess. Something that takes the heat off of our hired investment team (those darn fund managers) and still put all of the glory in our own court. Better yet, this technique will effectively eliminate the risks associated with those short-term market fluctuations that get us so worked up (or stressed out) in the first place. That secret?

Dollar cost averaging. That’s right, it’s as simple as putting a preset amount of money aside with every paycheck. Whether it is $100 every other week or $1,000 every other week, by investing this way we average down from the ultimate highs and average up from those death-defying lows. In the end, we end up “buying in” at an average price… but the kicker is this: With markets trending upward over the long-term, our average cost will always be below the moving average price of that fund.

Of course, if we are buying into individual securities every other week with just $100, then our costs will outweigh the benefits. But for investors who are taking a more long-term approach, mutual funds (where you can buy fractional ownership in the underlying securities) makes the most sense. It gives you the asset class exposure you need, the professional money management that costs next to nothing (if you save $12,000 per year and pay an expense of 1%, where else can you find someone to manage your retirement for $120 per year?) and the long term performance track records that really could put us to shame.

And since you buy more units when markets are low (you want more units, provided the price is up, up, up when you need the money), you never really worry. Your investment technique makes you look good because over those years of buying more units, your costs have remain low. So low that depending on the next market correction, you may only see a mild reduction (if any at all) while your friends and family will see severe reductions in their portfolios.

Remember that term: Dollar cost averaging. While it is the simplest investment technique out there (you will not even “feel” the money you contribute with every paycheck after a few months), it is also the smartest. And when it comes to investing in these trying times, smart investing is something we can all use more of.

–> Learn more about the Top Dividend Fund as chosen by the Mutual Fund Site.org.

Chris has more than 17 years of financial services experience. In addition to writing reviews for the Mutual Fund Site, he also manages a Debt Blog at HowToRepayDebt.com.

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