Keep an eye on the B-pound

Possible British Pound Trade?

I'm kind of curious about a formation on the British Pound Charts. The formation is taking place on the monthly trading charts. Early last fall, my dad made a great trade to the downside. It was a big drop!

Since then, the pound chopped down low... kind of consolidated, and then, this May, jumped back up a bit. What I am curious about is if this is a 50% retracement or maybe an up tick, to turn around and go for a double bottom. Good money both ways, the problem is first, deciding if my two predictions are accurate. Then, deciding what the market will do.

The best options are probably just watch the hourly chart, the daily chart, and the weekly chart for direction. I will have to call my broker in the morning to see if he has any other details or input I should know about. Until, I'll keep scanning the charts and markets for more trades.

Be the best

Dedication

Dedication is the topic of today's post. I'm am not talking about the kind of dedication a person devotes to their favorite sports team. This isn't about buying a jersey, hanging posters up on the wall, and maybe getting rare tickets to the next big game. No, this is the kind dedication (or possibly even obsession) for the details. The boring, mundane, gritty details. The type of details that very few want to know. Where does your favorite athlete work out. What is their schedule. What type of shoes do they wear to work out in. How was their last cancer screening, or basic check up. Do they have allergies, etc.

Now that you know the depth of dedication I am talking about, the dedication to being the best, I can move on to my post. The dedication to perfection. I saw this type of dedication today in a report provided to me by my broker. The CME(Chicago Mercantile Exchange) has this type of dedication to trading.

The CME Group held a summit for the 2009 Corn, Soybean, and Wheat markets. In this report experts from all over gave reports and outlooks for trading on the next couple of months. Every single detail that could give a trader an edge was outlined. Past weather patterns, sunspot trends, foreign demand for our commodities, and more! I sat astounded by how meticulously in depth these traders and trading companies get.

The summit included many important guests. Susan Sutherland, who is the Director of Commodities for the CME Group was there. She introduced the guest speakers and outlined the summit. David Hightower the principal of Hartfield Trading Partners. Drew Lerner, Owner, World Weather, Inc.

The bottom line (or lesson to take away) here is to know your craft. It is no secret how volatile and dangerous the commodities markets are. It is because of big, powerful companies and traders who know exactly what they are doing. For this reason a lone, they are extremely successful and make lots of money. In conclusion, this post is to remind all traders out there (myself especially) how important it is to dedicate yourself to what you do. If you want to have success, you must pursue it. Strive for it. Study it.

(Image Credit goes to Trine de Florie)

First profits on new account

Called the broker today. We covered the short side of the corn trade. We locked in just under $500 dollars in profit and now have some time for corn to start trading to the upside. The grain reports on Alaron.com support the trade and point to some promising buying potential on the beans. For now the idea is keep the long option and keep my eye on the futures there.

Read the beginning of my corn spread here.

Some more dusty notes

Continuing with notes I want to document, I found more to add to this blog. I thought I'd dust them off and keep them here. Too many loose papers lying around.

Keep things simple. Those who make things hard, lead a hard life.

In other words, focus on the fundamentals. Don't over complicate things. Do what needs to be done. Build a solid foundation, before you begin the structure.

If you don't have any motivated people in your corporation, that want to build the business and have the vision with you... GO FIND SOME!

It's hard enough building a business, let alone trying to drag people along who aren't motivated. Make sure to recruit people who already have a burning desire to succeed. If they aren't in line, with the needed vision for the good of your budding company, either get rid of them, or push them to the side, and find someone who wants to help steer the ship in the direction it needs to be headed.

Change without change, is not change!

Moving from an employee mind set, to an entrepreneur mind is very hard. Often times, people get lazy and/or make excuses to put vital work off. There is also no one there to hold you accountable, so being lazy or timid is easy. You must change to run your business, and it will not build itself.

Rob Dyrdek - Skate 2 Fantasy Factory

By now, if you read my blog, you know that I am a huge fan of Rob Dyrdek. Why wouldn't I be? Every thing this man touches turns to gold. The man is a walking product! It's like he was born onto the top of a meeting table in a of corporate board room of marketing executives.

I love playing video games, and Rob Dyrdek has a sweet new one out. I came across Rob Dyrdek's new video game, skate 2. It looks super sweet.

Skate 2 - Fantasy Factory Trailer
by ElectronicArts

Ambition

You've got to have ambition



Anything worth doing, is worth doing right. Anything worth starting, is worth finishing. To be successful, in anything, ambition is most certainly key.

This post will mainly focus on prospecting and recruiting scenarios. Most of my business experience has been focused in prospecting and recruiting. Much of my formal and informal trainings are concentrated here in these two areas.

Like I said earlier, ambition is key. Look at it this way, you will always be able to find a million reasons to quit anything that is hard. Human beings are great at justifying things. Coming up with a reason to quit would not be hard at all, but you only need to find one reason to stay. It is a simple game of choices (to stay the course) vs. excuses.

There is something called the Three Foot Rule. The three foot rule is simply a tactic you use to ensure that you are always focused and building your business. Here is how the Three Foot Rule works... anytime someone is within three feet of you, you are talking to them about your service, product, or business. Sounds annoying right? Well, it would be if you used this technique in a tactless manner.

A great way to initiate the Three foot rule is to use F.O.R.M. Which stands for: Family, Occupation, Recreation, and Money. These topics are all great icebreakers when first meeting a person. Eventually, when you build up a tact full and usable ability to master the art of small talk, you can spin any of these topics into your business, product, or service... especially the last one (money).

One great thing about the Three Foot Rule and F.O.R.M is that they lead into conversation. Inevitably, conversation leads to three main things. Which are:

1. What's happening
2. Wishes
3. How rotten things are.

If you are good, you will steer the conversation in the direction of the third. From here, you should be able to present a solution to problems people are having. When using these tactics, remember that you are fishing, not hunting. You don't want to chase anyone, you want to lure them. Be the expert, with solutions to their problems.

Final thoughts:

Remember that you can't say the wrong thing to the right person. Inversely, you can't ever say the right thing, to the wrong person. So when in doubt, blurt it out. When you do, and every time you get a "no," just simply tell yourself that it is success slapping you in the face, trying to get you to quit.

12 Steps to perfect a meeting

In the business meeting

In continuing through my notes, I came across 12 useful steps to either conducting or attending business meetings. These steps hold relevant still. Read through the business notes and incorporate the things that you find useful into your meetings!

12 steps:

1. Dress Professionally. This may seem very straight forward. The old adage is very true, "Dress For Success." Don't let the old business-causal is ok at times, but if you are serious about getting new prospects or clients, you want to dress professional.
2. Leave the negatives in the car or at home. People are drawn to positive and professional people. Negativeness is very contagious. You don't want anything negative spilling over into what you are presenting or pitching.
3. No Children. Junior may be adorable and cute... but keep things professional. Kids get board at meetings and this can lead to very serious distractions when you are pitching vital sales. Do yourself and your business a favor, get a sitter.
4. Arrive Early (Premeeting). Aside from the early bird getting the worm, arriving early shows you mean business. This also gives you valuable time to correct any unforeseen mistakes or problems. It also gives you time to have a pre-meeting with your prospect or client. Warm them up, get them talking and relaxed.
5. Seat your guest up front. This pertains more to seminar style meetings, or meetings for large groups. The front keeps people more engaged in what is happening and in what is being said. This also can be flipped and used as a tactic to make them feel more important (or that you are an important figure). Make sure to introduce them to any key people or speakers in the pre-meeting... letting the key person (or speaker) know that you and your guest will be upfront (make sure that your guest hears you telling the speaker you'll be up front), this will reinforce that they are with someone important.
6. Introduce your guest to others. This will put them at ease. It will also create a feeling of belonging or being included in this group. This will in turn put them into a mind set of owning the ideas or company, by feeling that they have common goals with the group.
7. Participate. Clap for the speaker, nod, laugh, raise hands. Smile and get excited.
8. Don't leave the room. It discounts what is happening. Why should this meeting be important to your client or prospect, if you don't take it seriously? Give the speaker the respect they deserve and don't walk out.
9. No Talking. This is another thing that discounts what is happening. You need to emphasize that what is being said is important. Don't let idle side talk distract you or distract your guest.
10. Do not interrupt the speaker. Aside from just being rude... this kind of goes with the previous step. Your speaker has important information. You need to listen to it.
11. Testimonials. Testimonials help build belief. Whether it's in your business, your speaker, or your product. Endorse! Validate!
12. Have literature packets or necessary info. Arm your guest, clients, or prospect with info. Give them something to hold on to, follow along with, and get engaged. Involving the sense of touch helps to actually cement things they hear and learn. Studies show that the more senses that are involved in learning something new, the more is retained by the memory. (Sight, sound, and touch!)
    

From the vault...

Business Notes and scraps of paper



I found some old papers tonight. Over seven years old to be exact! They are notes from both Market America seminars and Quixtar Seminars.

There is some great advice that was lying dormant in these notes, but the paper needs to go. I thought I'd post them on here. Hopefully, you will read something here that helps you in some way!

• 3% of the American people write goals. (What does this say about why most are not rich?)


• Schools teach people become hard working and highly qualified employees.


• "Life by an inch is a sinch, life by the yard is hard."


• The difference between success and failure is simple. The individual who succeeds simply does what the failure did not do.


• Set a goal to walk away from your job and work for yourself.


• Don't let people get in your way.


• Visionaries are the ones who end up making their dreams mesh with their lives.

Goals:

If you get into a car, you need a destination... other wise you are just driving around. Wandering aimlessly. While that's fine if you're out for a joy ride, it doesn't work so well when you are starting a business or striving for success of any kind.

How do you set a goal? Well, a goal without a number... really isn't a goal at all. It's a slogan. You need a time line of when things will be accomplished. Here's how you can break it down into short term goal dates:

Monthly: Yearly goal divided by 12.
Weekly: Take you monthly goal, and divide by 4
Daily: The weekly goal, divided by 7.

If you want your business to generate $120,000 a year... then you must be bringing in $10,000 a month. In order to make $10,000 a month, you must be bringing in $2,500 a week. In order to do that you must be making $357.14 a day. Once you can find out these type of specifics, it makes it much easier to see where you are and what needs to be adjusted.

Well, that was page one of seven. I hope that something here has sparked an idea or helped solve a problem. Best wishes with all endeavours and I'll be posting more to come!

Bullish Corn Spread

My broker called me with an idea on corn. I took a look at the charts, and he explained his idea to me. After a little while, I decided it looked like a good trade.


Moving forward we took a bullish spread. Shorting the July contract and long a September. The spread was filled at 17'0 (and not 19'0 like we had thought, due to a pit order we couldn't confirm).


It looks like corn had a big drop today, but recovered and closed just a bit below the open... which is fine. I'm looking for a bit of a drop in the short term (or sideways action to give me some time decay). We'll keep watching corn and hopefully report a gain on this trade in the future.

Ah ha! (Now I can't sleep)

The Ah-ha moment

Tonight was one of those nights where I just felt drained. I was up very late last night, and up extremely early today with the broker on the phone. By the time I got home this evening, the girlfriend and I were on the couch and basically both passed out. It was one of those times, when you wake up an hour and a half later and call it a night. Turn off the TV and head to bed.





This is when I'm supposed to remain tired and fall asleep, right? Of course not. The silence throughout our place was deafening. My mind started to wander. Through my cognitive rambling, I started to think about bills, business, money, and the like.





I started to think about business ideas my business partner and I had approached, and bounced off each other. I thought about all the ideas that have worked for us in the past, and those failures we had had as well. I thought about the ones that seemed fail-proof, that were in all actuality full of holes. I also thought about the ideas that were good, but got lost somewhere along the way. What went wrong? What could we do to improve them? Which ones had the most profit potential? What would make those profitable ones appealing to the masses?





As I silently quizzed myself, there in bed, it started to piece itself together like some sort of fuzzy puzzle in my head. I would have to create some kind of hybrid that couples the advantages of all the good ideas from the past, has very few holes (and those it does have could either be fixed easily, or out-sourced to those more intelligent than myself), and most importantly has mass appeal (this is where the income generation would stem from).



It would have to be an idea that, once released, and pushed a little, could take on its own life (think of pushing a resting rock over the crest of a hill). Something that would create a ripple effect across the net, and perpetuate itself.

Once it started to spread, it would need to be able to automate itself, and handle the masses accessing it. To spread, what would it be that made it appealing? It would need to be something both beneficial and interesting enough to generate a lot of users.


I think I have it figured out. I took several things that already exist, that seem all very different, but in reality are very much the same and actually compliment each other very nicely in both their functionality and has mass need. People already use all things, why not blend them, and make it much easier and convenient? I think it would be, well, frankly, stupid of me to say what it is at this point...


I assure my readers that when the time comes, you be the first to know. You'll find it at http://www.biz-tone.blogspot/ first. You will also be encouraged to be the first to participate, explore, and utilize the aspects of the site!


(Photo Credit for the beautiful light bulb image goes to Roma Flowers)