Trying to Fly like a Bird..

Ok, I ran across a video that I absolutely fell in love with – I laughed until I cried! This video is called “Fat Rant” and I have added it to the post so all of you can see it and all its beauty. Meet you after the video!

Her name is Joy Nash, and she is a blessing to all of us “fat” chicks in cyberspace. She is adorable, positive, and I want to be her new best friend. She is funny, beautiful, and looks awesome in her plus size clothing – who could ask for more.

She makes some very good points though. Love who you are. Be happy that now there are plus size fashion designers making plus size clothing all the way up to “5X”.

Joy, thank you for making it “ok” to be who we are. No one should be scarfing down ho-hos and coke with their sweats stapled to the sofa, as she says, but you should stop yo-yo dieting, find a store where you are accepted for you, and enjoy the life you do have.

Quit worrying about whether you look fat in those jeans… quit worrying about whether that top is too tight. Where the clothes you want, love you for you.

Everyone has something they wish they could change about their appearance. This is not only the curse of the full figured woman. Just love who you are, and be what makes you happy.

Anyone else have a favorite “fat rant”?

Because women are as a whole more loyal and willing to pay for good service and quality, they make ideal customers for small businesses who often surpass their corporate competitors in these areas.

As consumers, women buy or influence at least 80 percent of all household spending. That includes 51 percent of consumer electronics and 75 percent of all over-the-counter drugs.

In the corporate arena, they are increasingly more visible as purchasing managers, an area long dominated by men. In fact, the number of female registrants at national purchasing shows has doubled over the past five years and is expected to double again by 2005.

A Huge Market

In the small business-to-small business venue, women also make up an important market segment. Estimates put the number of female owned business at 9.1 million generating $3.6 trillion in sales annually and employing 27.5 million people – more than all Fortune 500 companies combined—in America.

“Women represent a huge untapped market for most business owners, big and small,” explains Barbara G. Stanbridge, President of National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO). She argues that women, in particular, can make great customers for small businesses because they are very loyal and apt to let their friends know when they have found something worthwhile.

Hence the reason many experts think satisfied women customers can grow your small business and expand profits.

Many professional women believe small businesses need not focus on the differences in marketing to their gender. Others disagree, but all concur that marketing to women requires some specific tweaking of the message and delivery parameters to be truly successful.

When marketing to women there are some dos and don’ts that demand careful thought and consideration. As with most marketing, it always helps if you take the time to stop, think, research and then act.

Anticipate Her Needs

Women have many different responsibilities and time is usually a woman’s most precious commodity. Knowing this, consider how you can orient your business towards that need. Ask yourself, how can my product or service be more available to her and anticipate her needs in relationship to your offering.

An example is the small bookstore at the commuter train station used by Leslie Grossman, of MA, Inc., in New York. Grossman has over 20 years of experience in marketing and is the President of CMA, which specializes in helping businesses market to women.

“Every work day I go by the same bookstore as I am coming and going from work,” Grossman continues, “but they are never open at those times. So where do you think I end up buying my books? Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble because they are open when I need them to be. I would prefer to buy from the small bookseller, but if they are not open when it is convenient for me, it is hard for me to give them my business.”

Grossman echoes the sentiment of many female consumers. They would rather do business with a smaller, independent firm studies by the National Foundation of Women Business Owners indicate. Unfortunately, many smaller businesses miss out on women as potential customers, because they do not make themselves or their products convenient for women. The reason for this ranges from location to operating hours to poor service.

The Importance of Service Orientation

The next do is to make sure your business is service oriented. In research conducted by New York University, “responsive service” was the top criteria for women business travelers in selecting a hotel.

Even today, many women business travelers feel ignored or at best tolerated in hotels, restaurants and other public places. Because they still see this happening, nine out of 10 women indicated responsive service was the most important factor in their choice of lodgings.

In comparison, 65 percent of men ranked location as the most important factor followed by responsive service.

Women report that many companies give lip service to customer satisfaction. Indeed, “service” has become such a common mantra that the word has become a cliché. Many experts believe the key to customer service involves providing something that’s unexpected, preferably with a smile.

Others suggest focusing on paying attention to the individual, particularly if she is a woman. Attention, by the way, that includes respect and recognition of her self worth.

A business that really wants to serve their female customers should remember common courtesy can go a long way. Behind every sale, there is a real person who decided to buy your product over the competitors’. When you personally thank that person for choosing your company, you turn a customer into an evangelist. This is also more likely to occur from a woman customer than a male user.

Maintain a “Smart” Database

Another solution is to maintain a customer database, keeping track of their likes and dislikes. That way you can let them know if there is anything that would be of interest to them like sales, new products, special events, etc. However, when you do this, remember to make certain you get the gender correct. Nothing upsets a customer more than to be called a “Ms” or “Mr.” when the opposite is the case.

Sometimes, going the extra-mile means listening to women. Ask your female customers what they want. Some sample questions.

Do they want you to keep longer hours?
Do they want technical support available on weekends?
Do they want you to broaden your product line or services to they can get everything in one place?

When you communicate with her on a one-on-one basis you go a long ways toward building a relationship and earning her loyalty.

Sadly, many companies focus their service on two events: before the sale or when problems come up. Many businesses miss all sorts of opportunities to serve their customers during daily operations.

Nordstrom has a well-known customer service program that is simply part of its day-to-day operations. Salespeople are encouraged to call customers and let them know about special events or items of interest. Each salesperson in the company has a business card he or she can give to any customer, to encourage direct communications. During the first days of a large sale they open several hours earlier. Also, no matter how small the item, they will happily contact other stores for availability and have the item directly mailed to you. Now that’s service!

The last do is very straight-forward: get involved in your community. Women like to be involved in the world around them and like to do business with people who are involved as well. Getting involved with organizations, such as National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO), or other local professional organizations, can be a great way to meet women business owners.

This leads, however, to the first don’t in marketing to women. “Whatever you do, please don’t just write a check!” admonishes Grossman. “One corporation was a very large sponsor of NAWBO and were offering something special to NAWBO members. So they put together a marketing packet and set it out. The packet had a long cover letter, which mentioned at the end that there was a special offer for members. They used the same marketing materials they use all the time and they did not target them to a female audience. The whole campaign was essentially a wash because they didn’t want to take the time to do it right.”

Lessons to learn from this Fortune 500: Take your time to make your partnership with the organization work for you, get to know their real needs and make sure you craft the piece specifically to address what is important to them. Remember that B2B is not the same as B2Women in all areas. Women are more apt to want to be educated about the offered product or service and are inclined to be patient when buying.

There are four things a woman purchaser is more apt to require during the sales process than her male counterpart:

More detailed information.
Specific pricing quotes, including tax and service contracts.
References (A woman is twice as likely as a man to check references.)
Return policies and guarantees.

Women Take More Chances

By the same token, a woman more often than a man will take a chance on a new product or service if it involves reduction in time or money with a specific payback period.

A recent survey by a large software company revealed that women by a 2-1 margin were more included to read the offering material in a new product than men. Their special marketing hotline had three women callers for every male respondent asking questions about this new product.

The potential business that women represent for anyis impressive. It is not every market that represents $3.6 trillion sales. Taking the time to carefully market to women is the first step to getting in on this enormous market.

Remember also that they are a niche market and should be sold to like any other sector, with care and understanding and respect.

MARKETING TO WOMEN

What could your company do with a customer base made up of 85 percent of all United States families? Probably increase your profit and expand your business, and then increase your profit some more. This is exactly what you could do if you focused your marketing strategies to target women. Statistically, women are the primary purchasing agent in 85 percent of U.S. households, holding in their hands more than two trillion dollars.

The National Foundation for Women Business Owners (NFWBO) agrees. NFWBO is dedicated to showing the world that women are a force to be reckoned with. According to the NFWBO, when purchasing such items as television and cable services, clothing, insurance policies and Internet service providers, business women are the primary decision-makers in their households fully two-thirds or more of the time.

Just take a look at the stats*:

Women are the primary consumer decision maker in 85% of all households.
Women are expected to acquire 94% of the growth in U.S. private wealth between now and 2010.
Women make 69% of all household health decision.
Women purchase 74% of all NBA and NFL apparel, and are contributing to a 10.3% increase in soccer equipment sales.
Women make 75% of the decisions about new homes.
Women make 81% of the decisions about groceries.
Women will make up 60% of the online population by 2005.
Women will account for 62% of all workers by 2005.

Some of the following information shows that companies also need to know how to market to women.

80% of women employees and 74% of women business owners combine different shopping tasks into one trip.

One-third of women say that the effect of a product on the environment is a major influence in purchasing decisions, and one in fiveagree that the social responsibility of a company is a major influence.

Women reflect that advertising is the primary source of information on products, while coupons do not influence purchase decisions.

So if you would like a large piece of the pie U.S. women might be willing to hand over, think about marketing to women. It could change your Profit margins forever.

A funny thing happened to me on the way to making a living, I went from being someone who had never dieted in her life and hated diets to someone who had never dieted in her life, hated diets and found herself a bit of an expert in diets and dieting. Funny how being good at your job can lead you into fields you never thought you’d explore.

If you were asking me for advice about dieting and weight loss, I’d point you to Kristy’s Good Health-a-thon post and suggest you create very small, attainable and measurable goals that are related to healthy eating, healthy exercising and healthy body image and I’d tell you to throw away your scale. But, I know a lot of you feel like you need a real live diet plan to follow so I’m going to help you out with a bit of an overview on some of the biggies.

The most important thing I can tell you about choosing a diet plan is that you need to find one that you’ll actually be able to follow. Almost all of them work, (if you don’t have a chronic health condition ortake medications that cause weight loss to be more difficult), but… you have to follow the plan. You can’t just say you’re following the plan. You can’t just pay the membership fees. You can’t just buy the special food.

Kalyn is a huge fan of the South Beach Diet and it’s worked for her. Why has it worked for her, and not my friend “Click Michelle”? Because Kalyn has followed the plan and “Click Michelle” has not.

Alanna has been doing Weight Watchers for ages and it works for her but Weight Watchers didn’t work for my neighbor in NJ. Why is that? It’s because Alanna follows the plan and my neighbor in NJ did not.

So which diet is right for you? Which one can you follow, long term?

So you lay the cards out, you talk about what they mean, you tell all you can see and then some and then the sitter says, “Um…I’m not sure who you just read for, but it wasn’t me.”

Oops! Your face flushes and you sit there a bit stunned for a moment before stammering, “Are you sure? I mean, nothing fits? Nothing at all?”

Nope. So what do you do when you’re just plain wrong?

May I present to you this fallible human suit. News flash: you will get it wrong. It happens to us all. Some will say, well the cards are NEVER wrong, only the reader can be wrong. The reader interpreted them poorly. Maybe. Or maybe the wrong cards came up. I’ve had it happen. I threw a spread meant for someone else but the cards distinctly and clearly told the tale of my life angst at the time. As I’m reading I’m marveling that this other person was going through exactly the same things I was, look at that! And when she couldn’t relate to Thing ONE in the reading, I realized those were MY cards, not hers. Were the cards right or wrong? Well, damn, I was trying to give her a reading, not me, so the cards were wrong for her.

There’s this Dan guy on Aeclectic Tarot Forum that always says, “It’s not about you, it’s about the sitter.” True enough. It is about the sitter and when the sitter looks blankly at you and says the reading sucked, suddenly its really really hard for it not to be about you. You’re the one that read the cards, after all. The ego really gets a bruising then and it can be difficult to regain your composure after such a flop.

We all want to read really well. We want to be accurate. We want to give the sitter what they came for. And if we admit it to ourselves, we want them to go, “Wow…how’d she do that?” Tarot reading is both easy and hard. It does take a lot of study and time and effort to get to know the cards really well. There is plenty of skill involved. But a tarot reading straight out of the box with the Little White Book that came with the deck can be just as chillingly accurate as one done by someone with thirty or forty tarot reading years under their belt. So there’s one chip off the old ego. Your tarot experience does not matter.

Your reading ability does not matter. You read the cards, you were wrong, or the cards were wrong or something. And what does it matter which? The reading pooped. Oh freaking well. You just shrug it off, let it go, and move on. That’s hard but it’s really the only thing you can do. Sure, you can learn from it…I did. I still do. I’m certainly not past having those kinds of readings. I don’t make excuses, I don’t try to make what I said fit the situation or backpedal in any way. I simply say, well…I screwed up. Besides, one stinky reading in the many, many other good readings I’ve done shouldn’t be the one that makes me throw the cards down and walk away.

Sitters come to readers for insight, advice, a psychic tickle for their nickel or some other reason. Ultimately, the responsibility for what they do with the reading is up to them. They received it, they own it. They can toss it, disown it, or follow every last word to the end. It’s up to them. If they get angry because something you said you saw in the cards ended up being different than what ultimately happens, that’s their prerogative, but I think that’s a consumer mentality. It’s like they bought a toaster that ended up fritzing out in a week’s time and feel like they got gypped…literally. (I so amuse myself…gypped comes from gypsy doncha know?) But tarot reading is on a different level altogether. It’s not a product, it’s an experience. It’s not a guarantee, it’s an opportunity. It’s just not measurable or concrete the way a purchased thing is.
So you’re providing a service? You gave it. They don’t like it? They won’t come back. Oh well, them’s the breaks. Don’t sweat it. Do I sound callous? I mean, people come to tarot readers looking for advice, guidance, a peek into themselves and their lives. If we steer them in the wrong direction, it’s hard not to feel bad. Well, I didn’t say don’t feel bad. Anytime someone’s advice goes wrong, it’s natural to feel a bit responsible. There’s not a service professional in the world who doesn’t sometimes get it wrong. There’s not a lawyer, a financial advisor, therapist, doctor, student advisor, or anyone else who gets paid to give advice that hasn’t dropped a bomb once or twice. Framed certificates on your wall don’t guard against being fallible. And when you’re dealing with something as hard to nail down as intuitive flashes, grasping into the ether for something solid to show someone, it’s all the more difficult to hit it every single time. So take it easy on yourself and just let it go.

When you let it go you free your mind up for the next reading. When you let it go, you also let your ego go, and your ego really has nothing to do with reading tarot, so good riddance. When you let it go you embrace your own humanity and gain more compassion for the other humans in this world and that can only make you a better tarot reader. Honesty is your best tool. It’s much better to say, “Well, I guess that reading really sucked, I’m sorry. Would you like a rain check for another?” Besides, I’ve found that I just read better for some people than others. If you’ve ever gone to a reader that your friend raved about and found the reading less than flat for you, it’s not that the reader sucks, but the connection — whatever that is — just didn’t, well, connect. Who’s fault is that? No one’s, of course, so don’t waste your time taking responsibility for it.

I will admit, when I gave that first really, really bad reading it shook my confidence for a while, and that, too, only means I’m human, and in need of grace, as are we all. So whether you’re on the giving or receiving end of a crappy reading, remember that. So you may not return with your coin purse to a reader with whom you did not connect, and no one expects you will, but unless there was some seriously fraudulent smack going on, don’t hold it against them. If you’ve read tarot yourself at all, you know how it is. Some readings just suck.

Let it go.

90th Birthday Party!
Birthday celebrations can be meaningful and memorable. Having a successful party for a senior citizen can be challenging. Here a few tips which may help you to organize a marvelous party which I am sure your elders will love it.
1.    Include the senior in the planning. They may be more comfortable with a small family gathering than with a large event where dozens or hundreds of people arrive.
2.    Include memorabilia from past eras and events. Videos can be created from old photos to make a moving collage. Have younger members of the family recite the birthday person’s achievements and adventures, perhaps as pictures are appearing on screen; this will bring on a smile to everyone and will touch the birthday person knowing that the younger people cared enough to understand about the past.
3.    Include a Memory Book — ask everyone to write down something about the birthday person. Sample questions can include:
Embarrassing moment with (Name of the birthday person) was _________.
What I remember most about (Name of the birthday person) is ______________.
A wonderful thing (Name of the birthday person) did for me             is___________________________.
The funniest moment.
Something the birthday celebrant did to change my life.
4.    Get all the family members on board for the event. They should all have a part to play in such an amazing event. Many will have stories to recall and might even have special photos, objects or memorabilia to contribute.
5.    Ask around for good ideas (and bad ideas to avoid). Many of the relatives will probably be aware of the things the birthday person loves and dislikes the most. Collect a list together and choose the best ideas and pay heed to any warnings given about what not to include.
6.    Remember that an elderly person will probably not want to party all night. Give the person space and be conscious of signs of tiredness. While many 90 year olds can hold their own to the rest, it isn’t fair to make them do more than they are willing to do. It doesn’t mean the celebrations have to cease if they head off early; the party can still continue in their honor. But just be sure that all the ceremonial aspects of the party are carried out early on in the event, so that the birthday person is fully involved.
7.    Invitations need to be sent out well in advance, especially for people who need to travel to attend the event. Reserve a block of hotel rooms for out of town guests. If you have guests coming from out of town, ask them if they’d like a room reserved. Most will probably do it themselves but you may like to help them with suggestions of where to stay. Such suggestions could be printed on a sheet and slipped into the invitation.

Today’s women’s clothing is a line of ultimate representation of a woman’s body confidence that will make her all the more stylish and glamorous. Find about the lessons of women’s clothing and the cardinal rules of dressing up in relation to your body shape as you read on. I hope the tips below helps you all to dress well and feel good at any size!

· The Summer style-The hot sun is on! Pull on your khakis and t shirts. Plain tees are too boring to beat the heat. Get load and do it thru colors. Summer is all about kooky pattern mixes, wild and exotic colors. Try on some batiks or embroidered fabric tops, uniquely patterned skirts or clothes that are rich in colored pretty ruffles. If you want to stick with your jeans, pair it up with off-the-shoulder tunic as a cover up.

· Simple but elegant style-Dressing up sexy does not always mean micro mini skirts and super tight tube tops. Try on some classic look. Make it loose, not tight. Full-skirted. Flatter the looseness of a longer, full-skirted dress that will go with your height and don’t be afraid to stand out. Skinny and tall women will look good on belted dresses with stiff pleats that are so forties look.

· Cheer up style-Who says only the kids can dress sweet and funky? Deduct 8 to 10 years your real age with colorful, swooshy dress that will make you feel dancing. It’s okay to dress sweet and funky as long as you know where to wear it and the right accessories to go with it and also that suits you.

· Shape up!-Covering up isn’t flattering. And broad expanses of fabric emphasize body shape and size. Bare backs, knee-length or shorter skirt, v-neck tops and three-quarter sleeve t-shirts will help you show off some shape. The most flattering with women’s clothes are straight leg or boot cut jeans that will sit on your hips, your waist or just below your hip bone. And remember, that full, round shapes on top and bottom will make you look a bit more round.

· Ravishing Red!-In every woman’s clothing style, Red is a classic color that has never bored anyone. It embodies power, bold confidence and certified trickery for figure-flattering because of its deeper-hued incarnation. Also, it has an amazing power to absorb light and conceal darkness. It really needs guts and confidence to go along with red costumes as it suits very few of them.

· Wear Black- It is the safest color to be in. Take note of this, black will never fade in the language of fashion, especially in with women’s clothing.

· Look great in a shift-Shift dresses has a slimming effect because they are constructed with darts at the bust line and seams that enhances curve and waist-shape. Most shift dresses are either knee length or shorter. But both lengths give the same universal slimming effect.