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Business News & Trends

Mountain Views News Saturday, November 23, 2013

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BUSINESS NEWS & TRENDS

Mountain Views News Saturday, November 23, 2013

LISTINGS LINGO

As if the language of real estate weren't confusing enough, the wave of bad lending practices and loan
defaults of recent years have added more terms that have subtle but important shades of difference.
When you prepare to speak with an agent about buying or selling, make sure you understand the
lingo.

First, realize that the word "foreclosure" does not describe a property, but the legal process by which
a homeowner loses their interest and the bank or lender assumes ownership. It's a legal term, not a
property description.

If you're buying, you go to tour "foreclosures," per se. You're probably going to look at "Real Estate
Owned" listings, or REOs. These are properties that the lender has taken back after the foreclosure
process is complete. You may see these advertised as "bank owned."

Then there's another type of listing described as a "short sale." This may qualify as a "distressed" property,
but it is not yet in the hands of the bank or lender. The homeowners and the lender have reached
an agreement to sell the property for less than the owners owe on their mortgage.

The short sale is an attempt at compromise between the two parties, keeping the sellers out of foreclosure
and credit history ruin, and keeping the lender out of the costly process of foreclosure and
expensive business of property management.

FORM FOLLOWING FUNCTION
ON-LINE

The idea of form following function is that the shape or design of an object
should be primarily based upon its intended function or purpose. It’s an on-going debate among the
super creative and the practical.

In the world of on-line marketing, the tools direct the design. This can be challenging for artists-at-
heart.

For example, there is only one way you can lay out a Facebook page - a long cover image on top, a
perfect square profile image in the lower left and four app buttons in the lower right. You can get
creative with the images and colors you choose, but you can’t manipulate the foundation, shape and
placement. If you get too caught up in trying to manipulate your Facebook page, you’ll miss the whole
purpose of the tool – to get your messages in the newsfeed and engage with your audience!

It’s very important to look good and have brand consistency but at the end of the day, the tool needs to
do the job it was designed to do. I’ve seen people spend hours designing the “perfect looking” email
campaign but they never get around to pushing that send button.

The successful entrepreneurs online don’t let perfection get in the way of their progress. They don’t let
the tools frustrate, they use them for their intended purpose and find a way to fit their brand identity
into them.

Perhaps its as simple as making sure you have two versions of your logo to fit different tools: one that
fits in a perfect square (stacked) and one that is wide-format for top banner tools.

Take a look at all of your online areas and ask yourself, “What is the purpose of each?” If they look
good and they are doing what they need to do – you’re 10 steps ahead of the game!

About MJ: MJ and her brother David own HUTdogs, a creative services business that specializes in
Internet Marketing strategies and Social Media. They offer social media management services and
help their clients build a strong on-line presence. “Like” them on Facebook for trending news in
social media, internet marketing and other helpful tips, www.facebook.com/hutdogs.

BUSINESS TODAY

The latest on Business News, Trends and Techniques

By La Quetta M. Shamblee, MBA

IS SUCCESS IN YOUR DECK?

Some people have faced hardships that have cause them to think they may have been dealt the wrong
deck of cards during this round of life. Everyone faces challenges along this journey called life as
certain cards are dealt, unexpectedly creating situations where it seems that they are holding the
cards that don’t provide them with a chance of winning. Those who make the decision to become
entrepreneurs understand that, in spite of the cards dealt by life, there is always the option to keep
shuffling the deck and exchanging cards to create a winning hand.

Each of us can decide whether the deck we’re holding suits us, or we can create a brand new deck to
begin the journey in the direction of success in business and in life.

Decide on what you want. It is important to write your goals, along with a plan of how you foresee
achieving them. This plan will serve as a roadmap, and outline, with the understanding that you will
need to make adjustments as you incur unforeseen roadblocks and detours. However, by having a
well-laid plan, you’ll always know whether you’re moving toward your ultimate goals as you navigate
the challenges to get back on track.

Execute your plan with fervor. Embark on the execution of your plan as if your life depends on it.
“Anything worth having, is worth fighting for” and if your dreams and aspirations are important, you
will do whatever necessary to hit the milestones noted in your written plan. No one attains success on
an island, so it will entail collaborating with others along the way in some manner, whether through
partnerships, alliances, or simply an exchange of encouragement or support.

Consistency will provide you with momentum when the going gets tough. Maintaining diligence in
the face of challenges that may make you want to quit will create a level of internal discipline that is
shared only by an elite family of achievers across many industries and disciplines. By doing what you
know that you should do, in the timeline that you know you should be working on it will propel you
from average to extraordinary in terms of your progress and achievements that you desire.

Keep moving forward, with the knowledge that “every journey begins with a single step.” If you will
simply continue to put one foot in front of the other by focusing on the key things in your plan, you’ll
find some parts of the journey to feel effortless at times. These moments don’t come often, but when
they do, you will find yourself propelled farther along that you’d anticipated.

Look through your deck. Don’t like it? Shuffle it and dare to make a decision in the direction of your
heart’s desire and you’ll be amazed at what you will accomplish. By taking time to put your decision
in writing along with a gameplan, you will lay the groundwork to get started with the execution of
your plan, and with a commitment to being consistent with your efforts you’re develop the muscle to
keep moving in the midst of what may seem to be insurmountable challenges.

“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one single step.” – Lao Tzu

WHAT’S A CLOUD?

Modern computing in the age of the Internet is quite a remarkable thing. As one sits hunched
over a laptop watching a YouTube video or using a search engine, one is actually plugging into the
collective power of thousands of computers that make available all this information from server
rooms distributed around the world. It’s practically having a massive supercomputer at your beck
and call thanks to a little thing called the Internet.

This phenomenon is what we typically refer to as “Cloud Computing”. We now read the news,
listen to music, shop, watch TV shows and store our files on the web. Some of us live in cities
in which nearly every museum, bank, and government office has a website. The end result of all
this technology being we spend less time in lines or on the phone, as these websites allow us to
do things like pay bills and make reservations. The completion of many of our daily tasks online
enables us to live more fully in the real world.

Cloud computing offers other benefits as well. Not too long ago, many worried about losing
important documents, photos and files if something bad happened to the computer it lived on,
like a virus or a hardware malfunction. Today our data has migrated beyond the boundaries of
our personal computers. Instead, we move our data online into “the cloud”. If you upload your
photos, store critical files online and use a web-based email service like Gmail or Facebook, a city
bus could over your laptop and all your data would still safely reside on the web, accessible from
any Internet-connected computer, anywhere in the world.

What cloud computing is not is storing data on your local hard drive. When you store data on
or run programs from you hard drive, that’s called local storage and computing. Everything you
need is physically close to you, which means accessing your data is fast and easy – and local.
Working off your hard drive is how the computer industry functioned for decades and some
argue it’s still superior to cloud computing due to the greater amount of local control over the
data. The cloud is also not about having a personal dedicated server local to you . Storing data on
a home or office network does not count as utilizing the cloud.

For it to be considered “cloud computing,” you need to access your data or your programs over
the Internet or at least have that data synchronized with other information over the Net. In a big
business, you may know all there is to know about what’s on the other side of the connection; as an
individual user, you may never have any idea what kind of massive data-processing is happening
on the other end. The end result is the same: with an online connection, cloud computing can be
done anywhere, anytime.

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