Archive for April, 2009

Attend the Splendor and Spice’s “Entertaining in Style” series by Sona Khanna at the City of Mississauga Auditorium at City Centre Dr. on May 6th from 7.30 pm to 9.30 pm.

Fee is $ 20.31.

Register through the Mississauga Recreation and Parks. The registration is available on line as well as on phone. Please call 905-615-4100 to register. Name of the program is “Entertaining in Style.”

Learn the “how to” of the social, business and festive entertaining at home. You will learn the basic rules, etiquettes and techniques of planning, organising and executing an event in style. Take the stress of entertaining out of your life and discover all the fun and influential ways to impressing others and creating long lasting impressions being a perfect host.

Website: www.SplendorandSpice.com

(905) 827-7181
(905) 827-2152 (Fax)
(416) 802-8404 (Cell)

We have adjusted the membership guidelines in response to the recent developments in the group. We have realized that the bigger the group gets, the more formal guidelines we need.

The new guidelines will be posted on the webpage and they apply to all pending membership applications and for existing members as of today, May 1, 2009.

The most pertinent changes are listed below

Missed meetings: if 4 meetings in a row are missed, the membership will be on probation, and if 5 consecutive meetings are missed, the member is removed from membership list and web page and the category is re-opened.

New members: you will become a regular member when

1. your application has been approved by the executive committee
   and
2. you have attended three (3) consecutive networking meetings

All applications are treated on a first come first served basis.

Members are encouraged to contribute to the group. The group is run by an executive committee, 5 people are elected each January at the regular meeting.

It means that you can get a 5 year fixed rate Mortgage for as little as 3.69% Quick Close Special (the lowest in Canadian history) and a variable rate at 2.85% (Prime plus 0.60).

Another important point, never before made, is that the Bank of Canada is going to hold the overnight lending rate steady until June 2010.  

So if you currently have a variable rate, now is not the time to lock in if the Bank holds true to its promise.

Many people who are in fixed rates are looking at refinancing their mortgages into lower rates.  The penalty to break an existing mortgage is the greater of three months interest or what is called the interest rate differential. The interest rate differential is the lost interest between your current rate and market rates.  Whether this is worth your while can only be decided on a case-by-case basis.

I listened to Benjamin Tal, chief economist of CIBC and his comments regarding the variable rate mortgages where as follows:

“You might do better the first two years [of a five-year mortgage] but not the remaining three. I’m convinced long-term interest rates will rise. I can see [long-term] rising 200 basis points. These are emergency rates and at some point this emergency will end,” says the economist.

The banks and the mortgage insurers are becoming more stringent on their lending criteria; minimum credit score requirements have increased, if you are self-employed they are wanting more documentation and appraisals are getting harder too – they look at the appraised value as opposed to the purchase price.  If your credit is less than perfect, this can also be challenging, that is why we are finding more and more people seeking out the expertise of an accredited mortgage professional.

Written by:  Charmaine Idzerda, (AMP) Mortgage Broker   FSCO# M080000747
Verico Designer Mortgages Inc.  www.DesignerMortgages.ca    FSCO# 10194
Tel: 905.336.5997, Tollfree 1.866.824. 8057

 

Did you know that:

• There are 31 billion searches on Google every month?
• China will soon become the number one English-speaking country in the world?
• India has more honour kids than America has kids?

See this 5-minute video for a quick reality check of the world we live in.

Boris Mahovac R.G.D.

Sign up for my next Contacts2Clients Business Seminar

Let's connect:

During Canada’s “Housing Boom”, that occurred roughly from 2002 to 2008, unsound price increases drove up levels of building. Affordability of these prices have diminished significantly leaving a large disconnect between house prices and income. This situation was in great need of a correction. Our view is that house prices exceeded the value of housing that was justified by fundamentals by approximately 9% nationwide. This overpricing forced a level of residential construction that exceeded its fundamental-justified level by approximately 12%, an excess that was exaggerated in the past three years. The current unwinding of house prices reflects both a cyclical downturn and a return of house prices to fundamentally justified levels.

We consider “overbuilding” of two forms: “demand driven” where home buyers buy up too many houses and that this demand cannot be sustained; and “supply-driven” where builders accumulate excessive inventories. Although there is evidence of both types, we contend that Canada’s “overbuilding” was mainly of the first type, where home buyers pushed homebuilding to an unsustainable pitch that is now being rapidly reined in. While most markets won’t face U.S.-style overhangs, the construction of too many new homes over the boom means a deepened slump.

While Ontario homebuilding will reel from a cyclical downturn, the degree of structural weakness appears limited – with the important exception of the Toronto condo market. Both in Toronto and Vancouver, historically high levels of apartment-style units presently under construction mean that record numbers of condos will reach completion during 2009. If absorption rates fall, as cyclical factors would indicate, condo inventories could spike severely.

However, Canada will not experience a U.S.-style housing crash, owing to less overbuilding and more conservative lending institutions.

Source:www.td.com/economics

Are you a sales professional or business owner, who wants to maximize your business development and triple the prospects in your sales funnel?

Every business I have ever worked with wanted to generate more prospect leads for their sales pipeline. My clients tell me this all the time. The disconnect occurs when I investigate the process used to process new prospect leads gathered at trade shows, networking events etc.

As a Sales Support Specialist, many times I find marketing is generating so many prospect leads that sales is cherry picking and choosing to follow up only the hot leads. Hot is defined by sales as leads they believe will close within the near future and contribute to this month’s target. Sales does this because they have monthly and quarterly targets to hit. Does this practice sound like what is going on at your business?

The question I asked is “What happened to the remaining cold and warm prospect leads?” Usually I find they are stacked on a desk or lost in a folder somewhere. No one is following up and talking to them. You have to wonder about lost potential.

When sales prioritizes the hot leads they are harvesting only the low hanging fruit to reach short term goals for this month’s or next quarter’s sales target. Continuing this practice plays only your A team and does not develop your farm team. How much money are you leaving on the table for the competition who offers a similar product or service and is communicating with every prospect?

To develop hot prospects for tomorrow when today’s hot prospects are gone, you need to implement a follow up strategy today. That way, you can leverage the numbers, triple the prospects in your funnel and maximize the potential business development brings to your doorstep. A follow up strategy puts in place a system to not only organize, build and manage a prospect database but also communicate and educate to build future sales. Implementing a long term follow up strategy gets those cold and warm prospects, currently lost to follow up, into the sales funnel and a chance to bake from cold through warm to hot. Hot and ready for you to close that deal tomorrow.

The result? Minimization of the feast and famine cycle you may have been experiencing in your business. By adding cold and warm prospects to your sales funnel you triple your prospects. Following up with EVERY prospect allows you to mine incremental growth and revenue that can be added on top of your current business.

Here are 5 simple things you can do today to start building your follow up strategy and a system to leverage your time and information.

• Put every business card you currently have into a database.
• Start marketing and educating about what you offer and how your solution can help solve problems.
• Insert hyperlinks directing prospects back to your website where they can find more information.
• Commit to communicating on a regular basis and ask for feedback.
• Utilize drip marketing to communicate over time.

Once you get going you can optimize your time and money by expanding your system and utilizing automation and email marketing to reach even more prospect leads.

Let’s review how your prospects are processed with a sales funnel optimization consultation. Discover the hidden road blocks that are preventing you from cashing in on the opportunities already on your doorstep.

Contact me at Cheryl [at] Executive Sales Support.com.