Monthly Archives: August 2013

Is Offshore Outsourcing Right For You?

August 31, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Outsourcing Articles | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

We have all heard horror stories about outsourcing
All of us have heard the stories about people in America who had a nightmare of an experience outsourcing to India, Pakistan, or China. The work didn’t get done on time, or the company went out of business. There have been many horror stories with offshoring. However, there are also many disadvantages to outsourcing your work to companies in the United States or in-housing your work as well. American companies often lie and cheat, overcharge, and are often far behind schedule with deadlines.

Why outsource overseas?
It is really about finding the right company for you — overall. If you find someone in America who gets the job done correctly for a fair price, and treats you well, then great. India and the Philippines have hundreds of outsourcing companies that are hungry for work. They can get work done in fewer weeks than their local counterparts, and for a much lower price as well.

An infinite labor pool
Part of the reason offshore companies can get so much work done so fast is that the labor pool in those countries has more “availability” than here. In America, in programming, there is no available labor unless you want very inexperienced people. In India, programmers grow on trees and the pool of programmers is growing daily.

The downside of outsourcing to India
Companies in India tend to be very unpolished with communication. Even if the boss communicates well, his workers are not likely to be verbally adept. Sloppy work is another problem you have to look out for. But, you can get similar problems right here in the United States — you can get people who don’t check their work and REFUSE to communicate. Sure, refusal to communicate is different from people who garble their communication attempts, but the bottom line is the same.

So, how do you proceed?
Regardless what country you hire your outsourced company in, screen them. Don’t just hire a company because you like them. Email them a few questions from time to time to see how they respond and if they respond. Talk to various staff members on the phone at various times. Spread your screening out. Give a 3-hour test project to see how fast and how well they get work done. Many won’t even start. If they get through the first test project, give them a small “real” project, perhaps 7-15 hours. If they get through the 2nd project too, then you can continue giving them larger and larger assignments until you decide it is safe to have them work for you regularly.

Start calling companies today
Use 123outsource.net and find outsourcing companies in any category from call center, to software to data entry. Have fun!

You might also like:

Hire staff with a flexible schedule
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/08/28/hire-staff-with-a-flexible-schedule/

Paying more gets you better service, right? WRONG!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/08/19/paying-more-gets-you-better-service-right-wrong/

What is the correct order of steps to screen an outsourced company?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/08/16/what-is-the-correct-order-of-steps-to-screen-an-outsourced-company/

Companies who talk well at interviews don’t always deliver
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/08/10/companies-who-talk-well-at-interviews-dont-always-deliver/

What time of the day do you think better?

August 26, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Of Interest, Semi-Popular | Tagged , | Leave a comment

What is time?
Time is an intangible non-object that is very critical to our daily lives. Astrology dictates whether a particular day will be good for you or not, and whether the world will have a good day or not as well. Did you know that there are 12 periods of the day according to acupuncture theory? The human body is “focusing” more on particular parts of the body at different times.

The bewitching hours of the night!
11pm to 3am is the time of the night when the body emphasizes activity of the gallbladder and then the liver. If you have problems with your gallbladder, it is good to be asleep before 11pm, so that your body can optimally perform healing activities for the gallbladder. 5am to 7am is when the large intestine is more active. Sometimes, when I experience pain due to a dry colon, it happens typically around that time, although my body will react between 4:30am and 8am. I guess my body is not punctual!

But, what about your work life?
Is there a time of the day when you are more productive, or do better at certain tasks?Do you do phone calls better in the morning? Are you better at accounting at 2pm. Did you ever put any thought into this? You can make a chart and take notes as to how well you do particular tasks at different times of the day.

Business decisions
If you engage in deep thought for business decisions, from 11pm to 3am is perfect. The atmosphere is still, and you can think on a very subtle level. You can meditate on business decisions at that time. I do this regularly.

A formal study
A study was done on Junior High Students by Finley Edwards of Colby College. Students did 3% better at math and reading when they started the day an hour later.

Interesting! What do you think? (But, don’t think about this now, because now is not a good time to think.)

Tweets:
(1) Time is an intangible non-object, but what time of the day do you think better?
(2) According to 82% of spiritual gurus, time does not exist. But, what time of the day do you think better?
(3) Students did 3% better at math & reading when they started the day an hour later.

You might also like:

What if classically trained musicians ran IT companies in India?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/01/01/what-if-classically-trained-musicians-ran-it-companies-in-india/

500,000 Filipino call center workers are on American time!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/03/29/half-a-million-filipino-call-center-workers-are-on-american-time/

Why a CEO is worth 6000 times more than the average worker
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/03/06/why-a-great-ceo-is-worth-6000-times-more-than-the-average-worker/

How to get outsourcing work without lifting a finger

August 25, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Humor, Semi-Popular | Tagged | Leave a comment

“Myron, are you up yet????” yells a woman’s voice.

“Sure, sis. Yeah, I’m getting dressed.” An obvious lie…but why not? Whose company is it anyway?

You live outside the U.S., in the Philippines, let’s say–but want to entice U.S. companies into using your BPO services. You’ve chosen a snappy company name and a logo, have a mobile phone, and absolutely no work. You have a trusted group of friends who are now your employees…but again, you have no work, so you really can’t test out how this new relationship will go. In the meantime, you come downstairs and lie on the sofa after you are dressed, and maybe you watch the news or a few cartoons.

“Myron, what are you going to do with yourself today? Are you going to get listed on 123outsource.net? Are you going to call your prospective client list? Are you going to search the internet for more clients? Are you going to call a few people you know who might need you to do some accounting or office work? Are you going to at least visit other BPO companies and pretend to want to hire them so you can snoop around?”

So you lie back on the sofa and watch a few shows. Your sister goes to work and you lie there. Soon she comes back for lunch and sees you lying there…

“MYRON!!! Here’s the trash. At least take the trash out. And go buy the paint for the guest room so you can make it into an office. Here’s 2000 pesos. Don’t come back with that same lazy, depressed attitude. You’ve got to DO something!!! So take out the garbage and get the paint. Then you can…” and she goes on and on and on.

Sure, without lifting a finger, you’ll get work, but not the kind of work that a positive attitude, energy, and diligence will bring. Anyway, what your sister is giving you are chores, not work.

Not BPO work.

Notice I didn’t call this blog “How to get hired by a serious U.S. company without lifting a finger.”

THAT takes work. (:

Tweets:
(1) You have a snappy company name & logo, but no work. What do you do? #outsourcing
(2) Sure, without lifting a finger you’ll et work, but not the kind of work you get with a positive attitude!

You might also like:

An American teaches Indian companies to be more American
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/09/23/an-american-teaches-indian-cos-to-be-more-american/

If you hire happy people to interact with your staff!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/05/29/if-you-hire-happy-people-to-interact-with-your-staff/

Integrity is more important than skills or even prices

August 23, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Hiring & Firing, Semi-Popular | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

How do you assess a person’s character? Should you? Should you jump to conclusions? Should you trust your gut? Or should we be good Christians and “Judge Not” like the Bible says? In business, the minute you stop judging, you get eaten alive. You have no choice but to determine where danger lurks and avoid it like a disease!

Imagine a world where you have a million dollars, but the people around you lack integrity. They lie, cheat, deceive, and steal. They are late on deadlines and they couldn’t care less about their clients. How long would your million last without integrity? I feel that the majority of outsourcers lack integrity, and you can get taken for a ride very easily. Without a society with integrity, you will lose your money easily. My personal story is that I was very lucky to find many outsourcers who had excellent integrity, and it has only been recently in the last two years when I have been confronted with so many crooked people involved in outsourcing. Maybe God wants me to learn how to deal with them.

On the other hand, in a world where you start out with little or no money, but are surrounded by honest and decent folks, you will make money, and not get cheated out of it if you do worthwhile work for a living. You would be given a fair handshake every step of the way! You might only make moderate income, or you might make millions. With integrity, the money comes!

When working with outsourcers, you might not see their flaws right away. Part of your skill as someone who hires companies is to quickly recognize the character of the owner, manager, and workers in an outsourcing company. You can see certain traits right away if you are looking. You can ask questions that reveal a person’s character or thinking style too. Avoid questions where they tell you what they think you want to hear and ask probing questions which bring out their personality.

If a company gets by your initial scrutinization, you might see character flaws later on, i.e. Recklessness, carelessness, disrespect to others, substance abuse, keeping bad company, etc. You need multiple backup plans when hiring companies just in case your first pick doesn’t work out well. If your hired company exhibits character flaws, you can expect trouble to manifest itself later on, and you will suffer as a result. Keep a keen eye and watch out.

An outsourcing company that is not reputable can start out nice, but later on cheat you in so many ways you never thought of. There are so many ways to cheat in outsourcing services and it is so hard to protect yourself. The only real protection is good karma and choosing people with integrity. Integrity means you don’t cheat, you don’t lie, you deliver when you said you would, and you are generally decent. Don’t compromise on these.

Pick people with good character even if they are not the smartest! In the long run you will be better off!

Tweets:
(1) How do you assess a person’s character? Should you? In business you get eaten the minute you stop judging!
(2) The Bible says, “Judge Not,” but if you don’t judge in business, you can lose everything overnight!
(3) If you lived in a world where people were honest, you might do okay w/very little money.
(4) An outsourcing co that is not reputable can start out nice & then cheat you!

You might also like:

What type of salesperson to avoid in outsourcing
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/12/14/what-type-of-salesperson-to-avoid-in-outsourcing/

You are a helpless victim if you hire the wrong company
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/07/04/you-are-a-helpless-victem-if-you-hire-the-wrong-company/

Mistrust and Phone Interaction
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2012/05/26/mistrust-and-phone-interaction/

Motivating workers with bonuses or shortages, which is better?

August 22, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Motivation, Semi-Popular | Tagged | Leave a comment

If you are an employer, you need to know more than just how business functions. You need to understand psychology. Many people are what you might call psychologically demented. They do not respond to reason. However, they do respond to particular stimuli. As a company boss, you need to understand that what a textbook says about motivating workers might be true in general, you need to understand the particular psychological makeup of EACH of your workers and subcontractors if you want to have an optimal working relationship. So, how do you go about this?

The shortage type
Some people are motivated by money. Others are motivated by laziness. A few like flexible work schedules, while many like a good quality of life. What I learned from reading and also from real life is that there is a set of people who are motivated by shortages. There is a particular mindset of some individuals where they are never satisfied. If you give them more, they respect you less — or at least not more. If you give them enough, they take it for granted. You can not motivate these types of people to do more unless they are afraid that they will not have enough. This type of people don’t save money, because they don’t plan for tomorrow. They only want enough to get by.

There was a car manufacturer that moved its operations to Mexico. They paid top dollar to have good workers. As soon as the workers had enough money in their pocket, they stopped coming to work. Yes — it was very short sighted to stop work like that. It is hard to get a good job at a good company. But, many people, particularly in the third world countries, do not think about tomorrow. The only way you get them to work is if they are hungry. Unfortunately, the strategy with this demented type is to keep them a little bit hungry. Not too hungry. Just hungry enough so that they don’t skip work.

Identifying the shortage type
To identify someone who is motivated by shortages is not hard. Offer them a bonus for good performance. See if they respond well. If they slack off after you give them a bonus. Try talking to them — try reasoning. If they still don’t respond. Try one last bonus after a few months if they did something to merit it. If there is still no good response, then you have identified that your employee is definately not the bonus type — the type who is motivated by bonuses (or who gets bonuses as the two go hand in hand). Step two, is to reduce the job responsibilities and payment for this individual to just below their comfort level. Knowing their comfort level might require some study and guesswork. Giving them 5% below what they think they should be making might be a good place to start. It is not low enough to panic, but low enough to get off their rear and start performing!

If they don’t respond to bonuses, maybe they respond to shortages. Use shortages as a way to motivate workers who don’t respond to bonuses and see what the results are. In some cases, your workers might not respond to any stimuli in which case you might have to phase them out! Good luck!

Tweets:
(1) If they don’t respond to bonuses, maybe they respond to shortages. #motivating workers
(2) Use shortages as a way to motivate workers who don’t respond to bonuses & see what the results are.
(3) If you are an employer, you need to understand business & psychology. R ur workers motivated by bonuses?

You might also like:

Positively reinforcing good worker behavior & negatively reinforcing bad
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/03/31/positively-reinforcing-good-worker-behavior-and-negatively-reinforcing-bad/

What is your management style?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2012/02/02/what-is-your-management-style/

Are bonuses really the best incentive?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/01/17/are-bonuses-really-the-best-incentive/

How do big companies get big? It is not an accident!

August 20, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Success | Tagged | Leave a comment

As a child, I used to wonder why certain companies were big and why others remained small. My father always used to tell me that the small companies were not doing that badly — at least they were still in business. When my business broke even, my father said, “At least you are not losing money.” Many companies lose big, and I have indeed been very fortunate in business.

As a child, I always used to hypothesize about why certain things were the way they were in the world. But, at that age, I had no real world experience. As an adult, I see people’s behavior, and the results such behavior reaps. The behavior of big companies is very different from that of little companies. Big companies are not always that wonderful, but at least they have the mechanism to become big and stay that way.

After dealing with little programming outfits for years and years, I realize that they seem to slack off when assigned work. They put you in a situation where you are desperate to get your work done. You wonder if you should try to bail yourself out of trouble by bribing them or run like hell. Companies that are so neglegent and unethical are common — but, what type of customer retention rates do they have? If you were a client, would you remain a helpless victim with these sadistic and negligent clowns? I think not!

Some companies have one programmer while others have one hundred. What is the difference about the ones with one hundred (unless they are lying about having 100 which is possible)? The ones with lots of programmers know how to KEEP clients as well as ATTRACT new ones. Small companies attract new clients, and then lose them through their stupidity and negligence, not to mention laziness. Smaller companies have much less skill in scrutinizing prospective employees, for one. Smaller companies also don’t have the refined management techniques or personnel that a larger company might have. The third huge difference between large companies and their mini-equivalents is that they normally have professional project managers who oversee and double check everything, which drastically reduces the error rate.

So, if you systematically throw your clients in the trash — you will never become a big company. You might succeed at making others feel helpless and get an ego trip. But God will never let you get too far ahead if you are like this.

Paying more gets you better service, right? WRONG!

August 19, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Of Interest | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

My buddy always says that you get what you pay for. This is simply not true. In my experience, if you hire the cheapest service providers in any realm, you will be very disappointed in one way or the other. They could even do damage. If they do passable work, they might have terrible personalities or be unreliable. If they are nice, then their work might be horrible. How do you get the best of all worlds? Sometimes it is not possible, but you can optimize.

High-priced service providers are not always good, but at least the possibility of them being good is much higher than with their low-priced alternatives. I have learned that expensive providers in any field are rarely perfect, but if real people are really paying them their really high rates, then that speaks for itself. Some people who are worth $50 per hour might quote a rate of $100. They might just be cheating you. Be cautious with ANY service provider no matter where they are, no matter how much you like them, and no matter what they charge. There are pitfalls with any type of providers. If you want a top notch provider, searching higher priced providers first will yield you a higher rate of return finding the best providers in town — but you still have to weed out a lot of people — perhaps up to 80%.

What about mid-priced providers? Recently, I have had excellent luck with mid-priced providers. The communication wasn’t as seamless as with their higher priced counterparts, but adequate. And the type of service I got was top notch. I used to get massage from someone who charged the higher price in town. She was excellent and had a lifetime of experience (a long life of 78 years too I might add). Then, I found another provider at half the price who was equally good. The communication skills were not as good, and the others at the same location were not as good — but, I only need one provider, and she is generally available.

I also found a great software house that has a top notch boss. He charges more for outsourced programming than most other companies. He is in the $45 range with a team in India. Most companies in India charge $20 with a few charging $25 or more. There are a handful in the $40 range and a few companies with their heads at fancy companies in the U.S. who charge up to $90. So, $45 is in the mid-range for India. But, his quality of work was flawless. Other companies in his price range left me high and dry, but he delivered timely and accurate results. I didn’t find him by guessing, or by accident, but by scouring the market to find good people.

So, when you do your market research for service providers for data entry, software, call center services, KPO, etc., remember this thought: If you want to save money, be careful of these cheap companies. They can destroy you. If you want to pay too much and have the illusion that it will get you quality — think again. I strongly recommend to all parties to start your search with medium priced providers and then compare their price : value ratio to whomever else you are thinking about!

How to get more clients for your Call Center — Craigslist!

August 18, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

I study the analytics on my blog and roughly 10% of my readers are Americans, 80% are Indian, and the rest are from all over the rest of the world. If you are American, you will know what Craigslist is. But, if you are Indian, you need to learn how to advertise your offshore call center services on Craigslist — today! It is a site where you can post job openings, houses for rent, used lawnmowers for sale, etc. You can join discussion groups, find a date, and much more too. Craigslist is famous. It was started by a regular guy, and it just grew out of control.

Craigslist makes it free to post an advertisement. The trick is that you need to keep posting it or it will move down in the search results and get lost in the shuffle. They allow you to repost every 60 days. You post ads based on geographical locations. You could choose several metros in the United States. You could advertise your call center services in many metros in the United States. I can not guarantee what type of results you will get, but it is one of the things that you should try. Marketing always includes a mix of different techniques. After you use these techniques, you try to measure which venue got you more leads and how much it cost in time or money.

We put an ad in Craigslist for bloggers. We got 18 inquiries in two days. Not the best quality people, but at least they responded.

The point to remember is that new Indian companies tend to behave like beggars. “PLEASE give us call center work.” Don’t behave this way. You are there to help others without being desperate or pushy. Successful Indians are cool and know what to do. Unsuccessful Indians are the worst pain in the rear and NOBODY in American will want to deal with a headache. Be calm, cool, helpful, and let your readers know that you can accommodate their needs the way they want it. The minute you try to act impersonal or rigid like a big company, you will lose small customers.

Indians typically like to impress others by pretending to work at a big company when they work out of their bedroom. Nobody in America likes a fake. Keep it real, and be really helpful without being pushy. You are there to help them, not to push your unwanted service down their unwilling throat. If you are sincere and able to help others, you will get clients.

Small clients are good if you are a small company. They are easier to get, and easier to keep if you do good work. Big clients will dump you in a second if you don’t measure up, and trust me — they have refined analytics about what it means to measure up. They will not tolerate a single slip-up.

Keep your advertisement simple, yet informative. Helpful, yet competent. Be there when your email rings, or when you receive a phone call in your inbox (or the other way around). Be friendly and non-aggressive to prospects. Let them get to know your staff. Don’t make them sign a contract right away until they have gotten a test run of your service. Give first.

What people worldwide don’t understand is that it is God who pays us. If you are delivering value to the universe, God will make sure you get paid. Contracts are just formalities. Relationships are what guarantees that you make money.

Keep it real and try Craigslist today!

Visit our search results for Blog Set Up Programming

What is the correct order of steps to screen an outsourced company?

August 16, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Hiring & Firing, Semi-Popular | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Many of us hire BPO companies to do outsourcing work for us. Some of us who are less experienced just talk to them over the phone, say, “They sound good”, and hire them. Once we have had bad luck a few times, we start scrutinizing a lot more. But, what is the best order of steps to scrutinize a company?

If you spend hours interviewing people, and then find out that they don’t cooperate when given a real task, you just wasted a lot of time. Sure, it is fun to interview people, but that is a huge chunk out of your day, and can go down the drain easily.

Part of scrutinizing companies has to do with finding out how cooperative they are. People these days tend not to be so cooperative no matter what you pay them. An email is a fast way to contact many companies quickly. You can keep a log of how fast people responded to your email. You can ask them all types of questions and see how thorough or realistic their answers are.

Requesting a bid for a project is a wonderful way to get to know companies. You can see right away if they have slow or inefficient workers. I would do basic email Q&A, and a bid request before you spend too much time talking — if you want to save time. Once you get a bid on a sample project, maybe give them a mini-project to see how they do. You would be surprised at how companies handle mini-projects. A few will leave you high and dry, others will deliver horrible work, while a few will do a great job. This is your opportunity to weed out the troublemakers and identify amazing service providers. There are “A” quality people out there, you just have to find them.

After a company has done a good job on a test project, then talk to everyone at that company who is pertinent. However, I recommend spending as little time talking to salespeople as possible. They are not going to be working with you after the fact, so don’t cloud your mind with the impression of how much or little you like them!

Tweets:
(1) Do you talk to the company over the phone and say, “They sound good” or do you test them?
(2) You can spend hours interviewing people & learn that they don’t cooperate w/real tasks!
(3) Requesting a bid for a project is a wonderful way to get to know companies.
(4) Interviewing new companies? Get to know the technical manager, not the salesperson!

You might also like:

The 2% rule; only 2% of companies are worth hiring
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/10/21/the-2-rule-only-2-of-companies-are-worth-hiring/

The 2nd interview: why is it so important?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/09/02/the-2nd-interview-why-is-it-so-important/

Types of tweets that win the game!

August 15, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Marketing, Semi-Popular, Social Media | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Many people like Twitter, but being popular on twitter is hard, even for the talented. So, here are a few “twips”.

(1) Don’t write downers on Twitter. Keep it upbeat and happy. Even an informative tweet that has tone in it can repel followers quickly.

(2) If you are going to Tweet about something unpleasant, make it a shocker. People like to be shocked and will be likely to retweet, especially if someone died, was jailed, injured or was maimed.

(3) Many people like it if you tweet about what is illegal or who got in trouble for doing something dangerous or illegal

(4) Then, there is the G-Major tweet. A simplistic tweet stating some very basic information about some subject matter.
i.e. Acupuncture originated in China and is 3000 years old — is an example of a simple yet informative tweet. These tweets generally get some positive attention, especially if they are general enough for a regular person to understand!

(5) Tweets about how to succeed or make more money are often very well accepted.

(6) Tweets that are funny or have an interesting point of view on an issue can get retweeted easily!

(7) Keep it varied, and don’t write the same thing over and over again.

(8) Mixing in some current events, general media info, responses to posts on Facebook or other social media platforms that were interesting, and general industry news is a beneficial mix. The exact mixture needs to be experimented with and decided upon by you.

(9) Interactions are better than tweets. Yes, it is a documented fact, at least with my accounts. Writing really interesting responses on OTHER people’s Twitter accounts can get you noticed fast. If your account only has 100 followers, you can still go to someone’s account with a MILLION followers and write a beautiful rebuttal to someone’s point. Typically what happens is that you will get retweeted systematically, but NOT usually by the account where you posted the remark (if it is a big account). Typically, others that frequent that account to read responses will retweet you, and this will get you fantastic exposure overnight! However, if the account you responded to is in the same industry as you are, then you have a high chance of being retweeted by them. It is interesting to see how the game manifolds itself. Twitter is fun, and if you play your tweets right, you can become a hit sooner than you “thwink”.

Notes
My audience for one of my accounts loves accounts of fraud, crime, punishment, industry news, how to make money fast, etc. But, they don’t like international themes, overseas news, witty points, or philosophical observations. I need to be aware of my crowd to please them. Are you aware of your crowd? Pay attention to what you Tweet and how your audience responds or grows when you tweet stuff they like!

Visit our BPO outsourcing page!

Find Social Media companies on 123outsource.net

Tweets:
(1) Don’t write downers on Twitter. It is better to look at the tweet as half full, than half empty.
(2) Even an informative tweet that has tone in it can repel followers quickly.
(3) If you are going to Tweet about something unpleasant, make it a shocker.
(4) Shock, but don’t depress: tweet if someone died, was jailed, injured or was maimed.
(5) When you tweet, make it provocative. Provocation provokes a retweet!

(6) It is hard to ignore a tweet that has an element of shock to it.
(7) Don’t tweet that your lunch made you queasy, tweet that you were food poisoned by the waiter!
(8) Many people like tweets about what is illegal or dangerous!
(9) Many people like tweets about illegal activities that blew up in someone’s face!
(10) Girls are as attracted to dangerous guys as people are to tweets about danger or illegal activity!

(11) A tweet with very basic information or simple facts will be very appreciated by your followers!
(12) If you want your Twitter to be successful — tweet about #success (or #failure). People like this!
(13) Successful tweets are likely to be short, and have at least 2 #hashtags, plus a link. #success
(14) For a successful tweet, tweet about #success (or #failure.) People like succeeding (& watching others fail.)
(15) Tweets that are funny or have an interesting point of view on an issue can get retweeted easily!
(16) Mixing in some current events & quotes from ur FB followers w/ur industry specific tweets gets traffic!

(17) Tweets get lost in the shuffle, but interactions show up in people’s “connect” inbox & if u click “expand”
(18) If u have a small twitter account, you can still get seen by RESPONDING to tweets from bigger accounts!
(19) Are you aware of your crowd? Pay attention to how they respond or grow when you tweet stuff they like!

You might also like:

Active verses dormant followers on Twitter
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Twitter and the American dream. The chance to make it big is possible
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Motivating workers with competition

August 14, 2013 by 123outsource
Categories: Motivation, Semi-Popular | Tagged , | Leave a comment

There are various techniques for motivating workers with competition. Many workers don’t like competition, because that will show them up if they are underperforming. Other workers who are more confident and capable welcome competition since they know they can beat out any competition. What I have learned is that people always perform better under two circumstances: (1) When they are being watched (or think they are) and (2) When they are competing against someone else.

Competition is a more than just a business concept; it is very emotionally involving as well. People’s pride and dignity are involved when they are being compared to someone else. Can you imagine how a seasoned worker will feel when competing against someone new? What if the new person is more motivated and outperforms them? Imagine the shame that the more experienced worker would feel!

Personally, I like to compare people as well as companies. I like to see who is good at what and how they are overall. There are many components to a particular individuals skill sets. They might be good at work, but be slow. Or, perhaps they are great at communication, but make lots of mistakes. What if they are fast, but sloppy. It is hard to find people who are perfect, so we have to compare apples and oranges, since no two workers have the same attributes.

If you can track the weekly sales of a salesperson — it is easy to compare them to another salesperson. One made $4000 sales in that week, while the other made $3000. Or, perhaps one made more “hard sells”, while the other made more “easy sells”. Some sales are hard to compare. In manufacturing people might make widgets, and one worker might make double the widgets that the fellow next to him might make. It is sometimes really hard to track the performance of one worker against another worker, especially if they are doing different tasks.

The main thing to remember is — even if two individuals are doing different, but related tasks, the fact that they are being compared puts a sort of psychological pressure on them that can lead to better performance. I just put my main saleslady against a newer salesperson and in competition with myself as well. At first I was afraid that there wouldn’t be enough sales to go around. To my very happy surprise, I learned that both ladies were getting plenty of sales, and I made a generous helping of sales myself in record breaking time. As a matter of fact, the next happy surprise was that my main saleslady became BETTER at selling courses after I told her there was competition and that she was being compared. She went from selling a few courses per month to selling a few courses per week. Such a huge improvement. This salesperson complained bitterly about how it was not fair to compare her to someone else, and how loyal she was to the company, etc. Talk is cheap. But, her new and improved performance is proof that competition motivates workers!

Tweets:
(1) Workers perform better when they are being watched (or think they are)
(2) Workers often perform better when they’re competing against someone else.
(3) Competition is a more than just a business concept; it is very emotionally involving as well
(4) People’s pride and dignity are involved when they are being compared to someone else
(5) Can you imagine how a seasoned worker will feel when competing against someone new?

(6) Imagine if a new worker outperforms a seasoned worker… imagine the resentment!
(7) A seasoned worker will be put in their place when a new worker outperforms them.
(8) Being measured against others puts a sort of psychological pressure on you to perform better.
(9) Salespeople might bitterly complain about the unfairness in being compared to others.

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