Anonymity Credit Card Style

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Identity theft is a big issue. If you talk to anyone who has been a victim of that particular crime you can get a feel for how incredibly disruptive it can be to your life.

What if a credit card company came along and changed things up to help protect consumers? What are some of the things they would have to do to keep their cardholder’s identity safe?

For starters they would have to remove information like card holder names and account number from the card, right?

Sound crazy, doesn’t it?

Well there is a new credit card company that is doing that very thing.

Revolution Card is a new credit card that leaves the account number and card holder name off of the card.

I think they may very well be on to something. Sounds a little like the PayPal of credit cards.

For those of you unfamiliar with PayPal, it is a system that makes money transactions via email. The person you send or get money from only sees your email address. Your financial information is theoretically much more protected because you can change the email address associated with your account.

In the same way the Revolution Card uses a pin number for each transaction. And they even allow you to create temporary pin numbers. That can be a useful feature for one time purchases, dealing with unfamiliar merchants, and when working online.

I suspect we will be seeing much more of Revolution Card in the future.

Thanks to Valeria Maltoni who shared about this in Fast Company.

Tags: Business, Finance, Credit, Fast Company, Identity Theft, Revolution Card, SuccessCREEations, Valeri Maltoni

Clarify Your Win and Be More Effective

Effectiveness is often a good measure of success. When we are effective we are producing the results we striving to achieve.

Trouble comes when the results we see are different from what we expected. What then? How do we become more effective?

One sure way to be more effective is to Clarify Your Win.

We All Want to Win

Everyone likes to win. People love the excitement when their team is getting ahead. It’s the reason sports are a multi-billion dollar industry around the globe. We are hard wired to crave winning and being associated with winners.

This is also why a team that’s in the middle of a big loosing streak has trouble filling a stadium. No one wants to associate with “losers”.

With sports it’s easy to see who the winner is. One quick look at the scoreboard, or maybe the clock is all it takes. Winning in most sports can be reduced to numbers and guys often memorize an amazing amount of data from their favorite sports teams all with the the goal of figuring out who’s got the best chances to win.

Or sometimes they use their stats to explain why this team won and that team lost. Read more

Tags: Business, Principles, Success, SuccessCREEations, Win

Things are Happening at SuccessCREEations

This has been an exciting week for us here and it’s only Wednesday!

Yesterday we signed the incorporation papers so we are now officially SuccessCREEations, Inc.

We are working on an official logo to replace the lighthouse badges that I’ve been using on the site in places like the Business Blogging 101 series. The new favicon will give you a little hint of the direction we are going with this.

Then, once that’s finished we’ll be working on a complete overhaul to the site here.

With all that going on we are still serving our clients by building out sites and such.

One of my favorite current projects is the Savannah Dachshund Club site. Each year they host the Annual Savannah Wiener Dawg Races. It’s always a hoot and we’re proud to be one of this year’s event sponsors.

Oh, and if you just can’t help your curiosity, head on over there to see an early version of our new logo in the sponsors section!

Tags: Business, SuccessCREEations

Gorgeous Wins an Award

The past few weeks have been crazy for us here in the Cree household. Lots of great things going on.

One in particular I wanted to highlight for you is that Gorgeous was recognized last week for her outstanding achievement as an Entrepreneur. The local Savannah organization, A Working Woman in Need (AWWIN), hosts an award gala every year to honor the top working women in the city.

Gorgeous was nominated and selected to receive the honor for their Entrepreneur category.

That meant that I had to go find a tux to rent. Haven’t done that since we were married years ago.

Our local paper even had a little write up about the awardees the next morning.

Add to that the press release that went out and you begin to see why I keep telling folks that I married up!

Press Release:

NEWS RELEASE September 14, 2007 For Immediate Release: Sept. 14, 2007 Contact: Lisa Cree, 912-927-2838

Business Leader Wins “Top 10 Working Women of Savannah” Lisa Cree of eWomenNetwork awarded prestigious women’s award (Savannah , GA) Lisa Cree, Executive Managing Director of eWomenNetwork of Savannah was awarded one of Savannah’s “Top 10 Working Women of the Year for 2007″ by the local non-profit charity: A Working Women in Need, Inc. (AWWIN, Inc.). Lisa was awarded for the Entrepreneur category. The AWWIN, Inc. Awards Gala was held last night at the Hyatt Regency in downtown Savannah. “I am humbled to be chosen for this award. The business women of the Savannah Chapter of eWomenNetwork are the real success and this award is their award” stated Ms. Cree. To meet the growing need for the promotion of women in business in Savannah, Ms. Cree’s entrepreneurial venture culminated with the launch of eWomenNetwork of Savannah , the local chapter of the 17,000 member international membership-based organization connecting female business owners and professionals throughout North America . The Savannah chapter has grown to 70+ women business leaders in one year. eWomenNetwork is Savannah ’s most successful organization providing marketing opportunities for local women business leaders. eWomenNetwork is a community of women-owned business leaders who support and network with other dynamic women. This organization helps women access needed resources and creates business relationships that move from interActions to transActions. Local Accelerated Networking events are held monthly, along with other events including Strategic Business Introductions. Event information can be found at www.ewomennetwork.com or by calling 912-927-2838. The Local Chapter also raises funds for 2 programs: A) The eWomenNetwork Foundation’s Grant Award program, which will bring money back to a local non-profit that assists women and children in Savannah, and B) The Emerging Business Leader program, which honors and mentors a young emerging leader in the community. The Chapter recently sent Lisa Scarbrough, President and Founder of Coastal Pet Rescue, Inc. as an Emerging Leader Finalist to the International eWomenNetwork Conference this past June. eWomenNetwork of Savannah events host their monthly Accelerated Networking Events on the third Tuesday evening of each month from 5:00 - 7:30 PM at the Hilton Garden Inn Midtown Savannah located on Abercorn near Derenne. For more information, complete press kit, or to schedule an interview / speaking engagement with Ms. Lisa Cree, please contact Ms. Cree at 912-927-2838, fax 912-927-7143, email: lisacree@ewomennetwork.com or visit online at www.ewomennetwork.com.

AWWIN, Inc. “Top 10 Working Women in Savannah” awardees Lisa Cree (left), Executive Managing Director, eWomenNetwork, (Entrepreneur category) and Lisa Scarbrough (right), President/Founder, Coastal Pet Rescue, Inc. (Non-Profit category).

That’s my girl!

Tags: Business, AWWIN, Lisa Cree, Savannah, SuccessCREEations, Top 10 Working Women

Self Improvement Question: Skill Development

How much time do you invest in developing your skills to become more successful in your business?

Tags: Business, Misc, Skill Development, SuccessCREEations

Charging Outrageous Prices Because We Can

I spent a good part of the day today inspecting cars that were being loaded into shipping containers for export. The industry term for loading a container is “stuffing”. Taking cargo out is “stripping”.

So they were stuffing cars in containers for export. And I was there. Doing my thing.

Anyway. The coolest car of the day, I thought, was this brand new Mustang GT Cobra.

It was nearly enough to make me start drooling right there on the concrete. I’m not a big fan of the racing stripes. But I was digging pretty much everything about it.

Well except for the price on the sticker in the window, that is. Take a look at what I saw.

“Market Adjustment” $20,000

So the dealer charged some rich someone overseas an extra $20,000 just because it could. How’s that for capitalism at work! That’s adding like 46% to the cost of the car.

Takes a $43K car and magically transforms it into a $63K car. Because they could.

A Question

So here’s my question to you. If you found your market was willing to pay an extra 40 or 50% for whatever it is you do, would you charge it?

Is that a reasonable thing to do?

Or is that unethical? Gouging?

What do you say?

Tags: Business, Misc, Free Markets, Mustang GT Cobra, Prices, SuccessCREEations

Networking to Promote Your Blog

One of the facets of blogging that doesn’t get as much attention as it deserves is the networking aspect. Networking is a huge part of promoting your blog.

Successful bloggers read other blogs they are interested in, especially those in their same niche, and actively comment adding value to those blogs.

Many are also active on various other social media type web sites that are relationship oriented and make new connections there as a result. Two of my personal favorites are Facebook and Twitter.

Often conversations that started in a comment box, or on one of the other sites spill over into emails with different folks.

Or maybe it might even lead to a phone conversation like it did the other night when Chris Brogan Twittered his cell phone number and asked who wanted to give him a shout. I called his number and chatted with Chris for a few minutes.

And now I have a friend and professional contact in the Boston area that I doubt I’d have met without blogging.

Promoting your blog takes time, sure. But that time will equate to new contacts that your business could never make via traditional marketing approaches.

Is it worth it? I sure think so.

Tags: Business, Misc, Chris Brogan, Facebook, Networking, SuccessCREEations, Twitter

Does Your Fancy Web Site Suck?

Does Your Fancy Web Site Suck?

Odds are it does.

Tim Wall posted a great article over at Church Marketing Sucks yesterday. Why Your Fancy Web Site Sucks is aimed at churches, but replace the word “church” with “business” and he could be talking to you.

Your web site really sucks when you try to be fancy. Yes, I’m talking to you, Mr. Front-Page-Guy with your blinking animations and scrolling text. But I’m also talking to you, Mr. High-End-Web-Guy with all that stunningly beautiful functionality few people care about or use.

Go read the whole thing. It’s great stuff!

Majoring in the Minors

The trouble with most fancy web sites is they major in the minors. Snazzy functionality and animated flash graphics are meant to enhance the experience of the web site.

All too often they become the website.

It is easy to become enamored with all the cool things our site can do and loose site of the reason we have the web site in the first place. We get all wrapped up in the how and neglect the what. Read more

Tags: Business, Misc, Church Marketing Sucks, SuccessCREEations, Tim Wall, Web sites

Would You Fire Your Problem Customers? Sprint Just Did!

We’ve all experienced a challenging customer. You know the kind - no matter what you do you just can’t seem to please them.

What do you do with those difficult folks? How do you handle it?

Well if you are Sprint-Nextel you cut those chronically dissatisfied people loose.

Check out this headline:

Sprint Cuts 1000+ Customers For Excessive Complaining

From the article:

A Sprint representative said the average customer calls customer service less than once a month, but the 1,200 clients getting the boot call 40-50 times as often.

Sprint said whatever the complaint, it has worked to resolve it but due to the volume of calls it’s obvious customers involved are not happy.

In a statement, the company said: “Rather than continue to operate in a situation that was unsatisfactory for Sprint and our subscribers, we chose to terminate our relationship with those customers to allow them to pursue other options.”

What do you think?

Is Sprint right to pass their difficult clients on to another provider? Or is there a better alternative?

Tags: Business, Misc, Customer Service, Sprint, SuccessCREEations

SEO Charlatans

SEO

There are some folks out there who really know to make web sites what we call search engine friendly.

These experts in Search Engine Optimization (what the web world calls SEO) can analyze a web site, make some basic changes in the structure and wording, and see that site get much more prominent rankings in the search engines for particular keywords.

The truly good SEO experts are usually very expensive.

Their game is one of constant learning and change. It has to be because the search engines, especially Search King Google, periodically change the rules on how they rank sites.

And they are very secretive about what they do.

By “they” I mean both the search engines and the SEO folks. In both cases their knowledge is their professional edge so it is very much in their best interest to hold what they know close to the chest.
Read more

Tags: Business, Misc, Business Blogging, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, SuccessCREEations

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