Profit The Books

If you have ever begun the task of writing a book you know how difficult it is to cover a subject without losing the reader in a mountain range of details. This is so much truer when the subject is intended to be a comprehensive guide to a complex process such as nurturing a business.

Burns and McCullough tackle this challenge by a combination of concise writing and clever formatting. With quick summaries, pointers to print and online resources, as well as forms, lists and service directories, this book is designed to be a constant companion.

Although the book reads like a workbook, it contains the depth of information only found in a desk reference. If you have that entrepreneurial spirit you will read it hungrily like a novel. Yet, even as you attend to the daily tasks involved in your business you will keep Business Savvy near your workspace for quick reference.

One trick used here to bring this sea of advice into real settings is a case study or success story of a fairly average retail business started by two sisters. The challenges and solutions are added piece by piece throughout the book as they coordinate with the current chapter. In many books case studies are chosen to demonstrate a single rule. Here we see how application of good business practices works as a whole while we follow the same two sisters in their adventure.

New entrepreneurs will find this book of priceless value, while seasoned entrepreneurs will devote a special spot on their desks to keep it ready for reference.

I have read this book and found it to be one of the best books for small business want-to-be's and owners that I have seen. For the past 19 years I have worked as a small business and self-employment training consultant and have read and examined lots of small business books. This one, unlike many of them, is truly written for the small business person. The four sections of the book -- Choose your Business, Establish your Business, Build your Business Operation, and Make your Business Profitable -- can help you regardless of where you are in the development of your business. The forms and worksheets throughout the book and in the appendix are worth the price of the book alone. Pay particular attention to the wide side margins throughout the book where you'll find great additional information including tips, insights, red flags, and resources (hard copy and internet references, as well as software). Marilyn Burns and Cathy Bolton McCullough know what they are talking about. They have a wealth of small business experience and can become your personal consultants as their ideas lead you to success and greater profits in your own small business. Need I say more? I recommend this book highly!

The content of the book was a great resource for me in developing advanced strategies as a Business Systems Analysis. It provides clear cut details that can be applied effectively and economically.

Time and cost are important factors in each project in order to get beyond the feasibility report, and the outlined process helps in creating this most important document.

If you use the SDLC and TQM methodology in your business practice, then this manual is a priceless asset.

"Business Systems Engineering" is an excellent resource for anyone interested in creating a world class organization. The tools of business systems engineering allows you to transform a company into a learning organization capable of strategic change and excellence. The emphasis on "adult learning theory" and its role in reengineering the work process is particularly refreshing. Because strategic change and leadership begins with learning, the emphasis on the work performed by cross-functional teams of employees is essential to creating a learning organization that can successfully respond to challenges in the marketplace. Case studies emphasize organizational learning and looking outside the box, and demonstrate the use of benchmarking to identify the best business practices and applying them to creating a competetive advantage. Watson's holistic view of business systems as open systems that are capable of improvement, easily promotes the integration of TQM principles and the use of information technology. The result of this synthesis is the business system engineering model. The model allows you to transform your organization without sacrificing your focus on quality or the customer, and is adaptable to any business. It also helps you to realize the value of employee training to support change initiatives for profit. If a change in your organization's culture is the prescription, then Business Systems Engineering is the treatment.

I still remember the impact Steve Briese'a ideas had on me when I first encountered them a dozen years ago. There are three groups of futures traders - hedgers (the true insiders!), big speculators (supposed to be smart but not always...), and the rest - small specs. The US government publishes reports about their relative positions. When you see a situation where the bulk of hedgers is squaring off against the bulk of small specs, you have the makings of an explosive move. In whose favor? Who do you think is likely to win - the insiders or the small fry?

This analysis is further complicated by the fact that hedgers tend to be on the short side of the market (you may want to look up my latest book Sell & Sell Short). Briese discovers their true bias by comparing their current position to the historical norm. A beginner may look at the numbers, see that hedgers are 70% bearish and decide that the insiders expect a decline. In fact, if their bearish norm in this market is 90%, then 70% is wildly bullish!

Briese's book covers everything you need to know about COT )Commitments of Traders Reports) - including technical patterns, currencies, metals, oil, and much more. If you trade futures, you sure need this book!

I like Briese's breezy writing style (pardon the pun!) but dislike the arrogant title of the book. I know of only one Bible, and Briese is definitely not its author. This minor quibble aside, I highly recommend his book to every serious futures trader.

I am pleased to be the first reviewer of this book. Actually this is my very first Amazon review, but what a book to start with! Mr. Briese has done an excellent job of summing up his vast experience with the Commitments of Traders data and presenting it clearly, without compromises.
I am a private futures trader and the real breakthrough in my results coincides with my realization of the importance of COT analysis. The proper application of COT signals is an edge over the market - many studies show this (including my dissertation work that was awarded by the Budapest Stock Exchange).
But I have to warn everybody (like Mr. Briese does several times in his book) who thinks that this is the holy grail of trading. Many times the trader is faced with situations that are far from straightforward, so proper interpretation of COT data demands experience. The experience this book contains is of a man who analyzed these data from the beginnings and have personally lived through and traded the bull and bear markets of the past 35 years.
Like your library (independent of your religion) contains a copy of the Holy Bible, the trading books shelf (independent of your trading style) cannot be complete without the Commitments of Traders Bible.

As the owner of a small physical therapy practice, I learned many valuable lessons from Mr. Silveman's text. His book distills the complex issues of compliance and makes them accessible to the novice as well as the experienced professional. After reading this book, I am looking more closely at my own business. I can see how to adopt more effective practices and decrease my risk exposure.

This is a well written, tightly organized, reader friendly text on compliance. It will be useful to professionals and lay persons who want to initiate, participate in, evaluate, or simply understand compliance. The reader will find invaluable information whether she or he works for a corporation, sits on a non-profit board, or operates a small business. I agree with Mr. Silverman's stress on ethics. I highly recommend Compliance Management.

Richard Band's books on contrary investing are a must for anyone who understands that trading agasint the crowd is what leads to winning trades. I highly recommend this book! Mitchell Holland, Author "The Master Trader" http://www.trillions.com/

This book offers great investing advice as well as a historic recap of past events. I never realized I was a contrarian myself until I read this book.

Reading it in 1999 I can only wish I had read it in 1990 as it predicted many of the decade's economic events: low inflation and budget surpluses.

Even though it predicts the Dow at 4000-5000 by New Years's Eve 2000, who would have thought the Dow would be at 11,000+?

The investing tips this book provides are timeless and once you start reading this book you can not stop. I wish this author would write a book about the next millennium, I'd be the first one to buy it.

The beauty of the "Customer Learning Curve" is its pulling together the multiple pieces of the overall business growth puzzle necessary for systematically achieving market success. A very well done book!

- Kevin McClair, Financial Services Industry Veteran and Wharton MBA

Finally, a real-world model for evaluating the effectiveness/impact of every aspect of your marketing program. This very readable book demonstrates, with numerous proven examples, a marketing tool that finally enables marketers and everyone focused on profit to answer the age old question, 'Which part of my marketing programs are truly effective?'

By page 24, chapter 1, I learned to use a simple (math-a-phobics will love this book!) mathematical tool to evaluate every step of the marketing process, from building awareness to supporting the distribution channel, motivating the purchase, and creating post purchase satisfaction that will lead to re-purchase. The examples guided me through an evaluation of the most impactful ways to spend marketing dollars, and the whole process is done in a way that can easily be explained to upper management.

The "Customer Learning Curve" is a fantastic tool!

Dave Swaddling and Charles Miller have effectively articulated the direction that market research is taking. As a professional market researcher, I have seen the mistakes organizations have made as a consequence of bad market research. There have been too many wrong questions asked for too long a time. In Customer Power, Swaddling and Miller demonstrate that the questions researchers need to ask must focus on how customers make buying decisions, the factors they use to define value, how much value is delivered by each factor and the importance of how each of those factors impacts decision-making. The "Customer Perceived Value" approach described in this book is about researching the outcomes the customer desires by purchasing a product or service. CPV represents an important shift from organizing a company around products to organizing a company around customers. Don't just read the book, engage Dave Swaddling and Charles Miller in a project. It will change the way marketers look at their customers.

Customer Power: How To Grow Sales And Profits In A Customer-Driven Marketplace focuses on informing corporate managers at all levels of authority about "customer perceived value" (CPV), potential hazards in identifying CPV, and management tools for developing and capitalizing on CPV. Managers will learn how to incorporate CPV into their business strategies, its role in market segmentation, product innovation, pricing, channel management, marketing communications, operat-ions management, and more. David Swaddling and Charles Miller successfully collaborate in presenting an informative, practical, effective, and "user friendly" course in CPV oriented management that is very highly recommended reading for anyone involved in corporate policy making, supervision, product development, sales, or customer service.

This is absolutely the best book ever written for the mobile home investor. Not just for the beginner, Deals on Wheels provides the experienced investor with a business model from which he/she can develop real wealth.

Unlike conventional real estate investing, mobile homes are not typically subject to wide market fluctuations. Instead, they continue cranking out CA$H every month. Even with prices crashing in most markets, investing in a single family home is pricey. Contrast this with buying a used mobile home for $1500-3500 full price (though I've paid as little as $500 in recent years). Whether you choose to flip, rent or sell on terms, at those prices even a beginner would have to work really hard to lose money.

The author, Lonnie Scruggs, is THE authoring on mobile home investing, & his reputation is well deserved. I have read all of his books & heard him speak several times. This book should be your first mobile home investment, & if you follow the principles he teaches you will not only make money, but you will have the satisfaction of helping tenants and/or buyers in their quest for decent affordable housing.

Even if you have no intention of every buying a mobile home, I'd still highly recommend this book for the basic financial education you'll receive just by reading it. This is a classic, one to read & re-read. I also recommend the Mobile Home & Parks Forum that Lonnie Scruggs co-hosts with Tony Colella .

The mobile home section of the real estate world is a specialized niche that might be a good area for you to get started in if you are nervous about getting your feet wet in real estate investing.

The really big money is in commercial real estate such as big apartment buildings but if you are nervous about risking your money, mobile homes or trailers as they are often called don't take a lot of cash to get started with.
In this book the author will provide you with tips on how to get a low price if you are buying in order to resell.

He also provides advice on who you might want to sell to so you avoid problems.
Advice on newspaper ads is also in the book.

But probably one of the most important sections is how to become friends with trailer park managers. They have all sorts of inside information that can be beneficial to you.

Only someone who has been in this particular area of real estate can provide the specialized knowledge that is presented in this book.
So if you are looking for a way to get started with little cash this area might be just the ticket for you.

Doc & Raider is one of the best gay comics available to read today! Tackling everything from the honest libido and physicality of a male to male relationship to HIV and Gay marriage, Sean Martin can find a way to make even the most normal daytoday stuff eye opening and remarkable. If you are gay, or have someone close to you that is, you HAVE TO READ THIS BOOK! It's adorable and a must have for any gay coffee table around.

...and Sean Martin's Doc and Raider comics are no exception. I have never anyone with the ability to convey emotion through simply drawn, single panel cartoons with the deftness Mr. Martin displays.

Within a few pages Doc and Raider develop their very unique personalities and by the end of the book they feel like your best friends. You will run a gamut of emotions while discovering these two characters' (pun intended) strengths and frailties. Amid the humor and often hilarious situations are moments of seriousness and even crisis. The ending isn't necessarily happy (it actually had me rather choked up), but you discover that love wins out in the end, even for two gay leathermen.

This is easily on a par with Tim Barela's Leonard and Larry. You won't regret reading this.