HK stocks seen rising with property, resource plays
Reuters UK - HONG KONG, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Hong Kong stocks should climb on Thursday, pacing gains on Wall Street, with property stocks prone to gain sway after minutes from the Federal Reserve’s last rate-setting meeting suggested the bank would keep slicing

Seoul stocks seen up on techs, but inflation drags
Reuters - SEOUL, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Seoul shares are prone to climb on Thursday, led by tech companies such as Samsung Electronics (005930.KS: Quote , Profile , Research ) after the sector rallied on Wall Street buoyed by a strong outlook from Hewlett-Packard

Chinese Internet stocks trade blended, Shanda rises with ‘Atrix’ game
CNBC - NEW YORK - Shares of Chinese World wide web companies traded blended Wednesday, with shares of Shanda International Entertainment Ltd. rising after the company stated it acquired an exclusive license to operate an on the internet game in China. Shanda stated late Tuesday

UPDATE 4-Toronto stocks charge higher on resources rally
Reuters - TORONTO, Feb 20 (Reuters) - The Toronto Stock Exchange’s main index charged higher on Wednesday, shrugging off early losses, as resource shares were boosted by new highs from oil and gold prices. The energy and materials sectors, which combined make

Mexico stocks rally, but peso loses ground
Reuters - MEXICO CITY, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Mexican stocks rose in volatile trade on Wednesday, boosted by heavyweight America Movil, as the peso lost ground on concerns the U.S. Federal Reserve might hold back on aggressive interest rate cuts. The IPC stock

REFILE-GLOBAL MARKETS-US stocks rise after Fed economic forecast
Forbes - NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wall Street stocks rose Wednesday after a U.S. Federal Reserve forecast of lower economic growth prompted hopes for lower interest rates andafter strong profits at Hewlett-Packard Co (nyse: HPQ - news - people ) overcame worries

Web retail stocks mostly rise; Bidz climbs after increase to share
CNBC - NEW YORK - Shares of major World wide web companies traded blended Wednesday, with Bidz.com Inc. rising after the on the internet jewelry auctioneer said it will increase a share buyback plan to $20 million and raise its revolving credit line. Bidz shares rose 66

US STOCKS-Market stays up after Fed minutes; tech helps
Reuters - NEW YORK, Feb 20 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks stayed higher on Wednesday in choppy trading after the release of minutes from the previous Federal Reserve policy-setting meeting. Optimism about unexpectedly strong profits from computer maker Hewlett

US STOCKS-Wall St rallies on tech advance, Fed
Forbes - Hopes that the Federal Reserve will keep cutting interest rates also buoyed sentiment. The Dow Jones industrial average was up 123.66 points, or 1.00 percent, at 12,460.88. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index was up 14.72 points, or 1.09 percent, at 1

U.S. Stocks Pare Advance After Fed Lowers Growth Forecast
Bloomberg - Feb. 20 (Bloomberg) — U.S. stocks pared gains after the Federal Reserve cut forecasts for economic growth and raised unemployment projections. Fed policy makers now expect U.S. gross domestic product to increase by 1.3 percent to 2 percent in 2008

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Filed under: Estates

This home in the village of Indian Hill in Cincinnati, Ohio has me smitten for one reason “the Canterbury room.” This home built in 1933 has a two-story library wing called the Canterbury room which features raised quotations in stone above the fireplace from Chaucer, Dante and Shakespeare and looks like an English great hall. The home is approximately 13,000 square feet and sits on nine acres. There are nine bedrooms total and the home includes all sorts of stained glass, carved stone and wood details that add to the feeling that this is a treasure from another era. At $8.7 million, it’s a high price for the area but this is a truly stunning home right down to the stone carving of the home and its name, Cobble Court, on the wall.

Related: This isn’t the only Cobble Court around, check out Cobble Court in Glen Cove, New York, an estate we featured in October 2006.

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Filed under: Estates

This home in the village of Indian Hill in Cincinnati, Ohio has me smitten for one reason “the Canterbury room.” This home built in 1933 has a two-story library wing called the Canterbury room which features raised quotations in stone above the fireplace from Chaucer, Dante and Shakespeare and looks like an English great hall. The home is approximately 13,000 square feet and sits on nine acres. There are nine bedrooms total and the home includes all sorts of stained glass, carved stone and wood details that add to the feeling that this is a treasure from another era. At $8.7 million, it’s a high price for the area but this is a truly stunning home right down to the stone carving of the home and its name, Cobble Court, on the wall.

Related: This isn’t the only Cobble Court around, check out Cobble Court in Glen Cove, New York, an estate we featured in October 2006.

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Filed under: Estates

Donald Trump’s billion-dollar Scottish golf course might be on hold, so he has turned his rapacious attentions to Ireland and the remains of the Mountpather House. The 170-acre estate once boasted one of the finest country houses in Ireland but now the 18th century country house has fallen into disrepair. The elegant facade remains but the home’s roof was removed over 30 years ago so the owners could avoid paying tax rates on the property. The fireplaces and interior fittings have either been removed or have collapsed leaving a crumbling shell of a home.

Mountpather House is just one of several properties that Donald Trump’s representatives have looked at while scoping out the right spot for Trump’s Irish golf course development. The estate is located in an area with other esteemed golf courses and is located around 40 minutes drive away from Belfast and two hours from Dublin. The property is listed at

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Filed under: Cisco Systems (CSCO), Dell (DELL), Starbucks (SBUX), Intel (INTC), International Business Machines (IBM), salesforce.com inc (CRM), Small business

One of my favorite books is Patricia Seybold’s Outside Innovation. Her main point is that much of a company’s innovation will come outside its walls — such as from employees, partners, investors, and so on.

For example, the hip on the internet clothing retailer, Karmaloop, gets about 40% of its brand ideas from its customers. Of course, the biggies — like International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM), Cisco Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO), salesforce.com, inc. (NYSE: CRM), Intel Corporation (Nasdaq: INTC) and Dell, Inc. (Nasdaq: DELL) — also operate idea sites.

In the case of Cisco, the company has established the I-Prize competition so as to find the next billion-dollar idea. The company says it may invest up to $10 million into the winning idea.

So what can your company do to benefit from other people’s ideas? Let’s take a look:

Use Web 2.0: Let’s face it, people like to interact in the online world, such as with ratings, comments, reviews, and tagging. This makes things fun but also helps to create superior content and community.

Rewards: So what if few people don’t participate? Well, you can find ways to provide incentives. That is, you might think of having weekly or monthly prizes for the best ideas. Prizes don’t have to be extravagant. A easy Starbucks Corporation (Nasdaq: SBUX) gift card can be a nice gesture.

Be Prepared: At the same time, what if you get a flood of ideas?

“To make things work,” said Matthew Greeley, the founder and CEO of BrightIdea.com, “you better be prepared to respond, otherwise you’ll lose the essential trust.”

What platform? There are a variety of systems you can use to operates your idea site. Perhaps the easiest approach is to have a forum discussion page. However, you’ll not get the Web 2.0 features.

But, there are web-based systems that are especially designed for harnessing and managing ideas, such as BrightIdea.com. And yes, the company offers a small business version of its Webstorm product.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.

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Filed under: Small business

I recently talked to an MBA student who wanted to begin his own business. But his goals involved more than making money - that’s, he wanted to do something “good for the world.”

From what I have the ability to tell, this “social entrepreneurialism” is gaining traction.

And, yes, we are seeing this reflected on the Web. Look at The Point, which operates a group action network. So, if you want to organize fund-raising, a boycott, rallies or anything else, you can leverage the platform.

What’s more, The Point just raised $4.8 million from New Enterprise Associates (NEA).

True, the social networking space looks fairly saturated. Yet, I think The Point is a natural for creating strong communities.

The Point’s founder and CEO, Andrew Mason, also wrote about the funding in his blog - saying “Hey, we raised a bunch of money!”

He also has a picture of the original business plan, which was put on the back of a napkin.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.

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Filed under: Products and services, Consumer experience, Competitive strategy, FedEx Corp (FDX), United Parcel’B’ (UPS), UAL Corp (UAUA), Small business

With airline traffic steadily increasing, more and more of us are faced with the same question; How in the world am I going to fit all these things in our luggage? Maybe it is time to begin thinking outside of the box, and instead of packing all our things, maybe we should just start to take into account sending our belongs ahead of time and stop worrying about packing all of our things?

As I read Joe Brancatelli’s (portfolio.com) article discussing airline baggage, I couldn’t help think back to December when my girlfriend had her bags lost for over a week on a trip from Europe back to the says for Christmas. Inside this luggage we had all her clothes, as well as all of my family’s Christmas presents. Since she was flying into the states on Christmas Eve, and the airline lost her bags for a week, we’d no presents to give out on Christmas, and by the time they showed up, on New Years Eve, the Christmas magic was pretty much lost.

As we examined last week, airline delays last year were near an all time high, but as I mentioned in my article, the one thing that bothers me more than being late, is arriving without my luggage. While lost baggage rates stayed pretty steady last year, with 9 out of 1,000 passengers filing lost baggage claims, there are other reasons why we may should consider shipping instead of packing in the future.

For one, you’ve to worry about paying fees for having luggage in excess of airline guidelines. Returning to Europe after Christmas I felt the pain of that rule. I won’t mention the airline name, but let’s just state that they had a 50 pound per bag rule, which I think is probably pretty uniform these days with major airlines. We’d 4 bags total, with two bags being over the limit. The result? $125 fee! I was definitely kicking myself for loading up on English books while I was home (which I still have yet to open)!

The point? For $125 I probably could have just shipped the extra baggage and had a much greater possibility of the articles actually making to my place on time. Not only will shipping your baggage ahead of time possibly save you money, it also has the added beauty of freeing you from having to lug all those heavy bags around with you as you travel.

On some airlines not only do you face the chance of extra fees for overweight bags, but you also have to deal with fees for taking more than two check-in bags. If you travel airlines that permit more than two check-ins, think about yourself lucky. Soon, passengers that are allowed two check-in bags might be part of the lucky crowd. Last week, United Airlines, UAL Corp (NASDAQ: UAUA) went so far as to lower the number of bags you are allowed to check from two down to one. Now, if you want to check a second bag, be ready to add $25 onto the cost of your flight. I have to say, United is definitely in my “no fly” zone from now on.

OK, so enough about the reasons why we should considering shipping our luggage, what are our options?

There are the usual names, FedEx Corp. (NYSE: FDX) and United Parcel Service (NYSE: UPS), which offer affordable pricing and a solid reputation for their services. But if you want something a tiny more personal, Mr. Brancatelli also points out that there are lots of new companies that specialize just in shipping luggage. These include Luggage Forward, Sports Express, Luggage Concierge, and The Luggage Club.

While FedEx and UPS typically come with a smaller price tag, some traveler like to use the luggage specialists because they feel they have a more personal connection with someone from the company when they need assistance. Brancatelli cites the case of airline traveler Andy Abramson, who is a fan of Luggage Forward, and states that they make it very easy for him in the event of last minute itinerary changes.

I, personally, have never shipped my luggage. I have lost luggage several times, and definitely fell victim to fees for over packing my luggage, which I’ve usually just taken in stride, and promised myself that I would be more careful the next time i packed up my things. But, for sure, the next time I get ready to take a trip I know I will definitely be looking into all my options.

What about you, our readers? Are you a frequent flier? Have you had bad experiences with your luggage in the past, and will you start to consider shipping in lieu of lugging your bags on your upcoming flights?

~ Here is another good article on traveling by Mr. Brancatelli, “What I Learned on the Road This Year” ~

Michael Fowlkes has worked as a stock trader for seven years and spent the last four years working as an analyst for the on the web investment advisory service Investor’s Observer.

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Filed under: Google (GOOG), Apple Inc (AAPL), Next big thing, Small business

While the mobile space is huge, it’s still not easy to penetrate. Yet, with only $2 million in angel funding over the past couple years, Ringleader has done quite well. The company has put together a sophisticated on the web advertising network, which helps with mobile ads (as well as those on the desktop). Some of its customers include Best Western, Absolut and Blu-Ray.

Well, now Ringleader has some more juice. That is, the company has raised $6 million from W2 Group, which is a global marketing services company.

“Growth is ramping in mobile ads,” said Bob Walczak, the CEO of Ringleader, in an interview with me. He points out that in 2005, the typical ad purchase was a paltry $5,000 to $10,000 per campaign. But, as of last year, it increased to $50,000 to $100,000. “Going into 2008,” said Walczak, “we are seeing proposals for seven figures.”

There are some large drivers, such as Google (NASDAQ: GOOG)’s Android platform and Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL)’s iPhone. But perhaps the biggest key is that mobile ads tend to get results. “We are seeing click-through rates of 2% to 3%,” said Walczak. “This compares to a traditional web ad that gets 0.1%.”

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar On the internet Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.

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Filed under: Next massive thing, Small business

In the marketing world, the concept of “1-to-1 marketing” gets lots of buzz. After all, with the World wide web, it should be simple to personalize marketing messages, right?

Not necessarily. If anything, it’s proven to be quite difficult.

Well, that’s something that Genius.com is trying to solve. In fact, the company recently snagged $19 million in venture funding. The lead investor was Accel Partners, with additional funding coming from existing investors Mohr Davidow Ventures, Emergence Capital and Walden International.

With Genius.com, you can put together compelling emails for sales prospects. From there, the system tracks the leads and what are they looking at on your website?

Something else that’s important: it’s easy to use. “There is no need for IT,” stated David Thompson, the CEO and co-founder of Genius.com, in an interview with me. “It only takes two minutes to setup. We wanted to delight our actual users.”

The upshot: Genius.com’s customers often come from word-of-mouth. Of course, that’s perhaps the best 1-to-1 marketing system you can have.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar On the internet Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.

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Filed under: Google (GOOG), Apple Inc (AAPL), Monster Worldwide (MNST), Small business

Back in 2000, a variety of dot-coms - like Pets.com, LastMinuteTravel.com, Monster.com (Nasdaq: MNST) and so on - spent gobs of money on Super Bowl commercials. Of course, it marked the height of the bubble. Since then, upstart companies have been mostly afraid of producing commercials.

Hey, take a look at this classic ad from Pets.com (now defunct), during the 2000 Super Bowl:

But don’t be afraid. While I’m not suggesting that you shell out $2.7 million for a Super Bowl ad, I still think things are different. After all, it’s fairly cost-effective to advertise on local cable channels. What’s more, on the web video is also surging.

So how can you crank out a top-quality 30-second spot?

Let’s take a look:

Production: Technology is making it incredibly cheap to create commercials. “All you need is an Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) Mac laptop and the iMovie software that comes with the personal,” said Rob Frankel, who is the author of The Revenge of Brand X and has his own marketing firm. “And just about any MiniDV camera can produce broadcast-quality video.”

That’s all he needed to create this spot:

To spice things up, you can use stock footage and music clips (which might even be free). “A simple Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) search will find a lot of stock content,” said Frankel.

Crafting the right message: It’s temping to be too adorable or cutting-edge when putting together a 30-second spot. Unfortunately, the result is that your audience ignores things - or is just confused. Some tips:

• Focus on one idea (that’s easy to understand). Clutter is your enemy.
• Avoid special effects and location shoots.
• Don’t star in your own commercials.

“Notice that some of the best commercials these days offer one central image or theme with even stark or simplified backgrounds,” Rachel Weingarten, who is the president of GTK Marketing Group. “It might be wiser to spend more on the concept and come up with a very clever and catchy phrase or theme or even sweepstakes or promo that can drive people to your website, retail location or some other call to action.”

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.

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