The Diamond-tini

The "diamond-tini", an adult beverage with a hint of lime and chilled Belvedere vodka over a 1.06-carat stone, is topping the Ritz-Carlton beverage menu at a cool 1.8 million yen, or about $15,000. MSNBC

Here's one of those products the defies logic. Always great to see something that makes the regular guy look extremely poor. The drink comes with a serenade of "Diamonds are Forever", and a ring mounting by a local jeweler. So at least they get to keep the diamond. I was actually surprised they could. Figured they would just throw the diamond away afterwards along with the $100 bills they flush down the toilet after a a sitting. Funny thing is that these are probably people that steal the towels and the catholic bibles from their hotel rooms too. It's funny how some rich people act. Spend $125K on a car they will drive once, but they are usually pretty frugal with other stuff.

1-800-NO-DRUGS: Drug Rehab Referral Service

When someone you care about has an addiction it is always difficult to understand it if you are not familiar with the behavior. Knowing which drug rehab methods to look for, and which one is right for that particular person isn't readily available for most. Where can you get the information and get them on the right track?

1800nodrugs.com is a drug rehabilitation referral service that provides recommendations specific to your situation to get those you care about, or even yourself into the rehab program that will work best for you and your loved ones. The best part is that this is completely free. If you need some direction to get yourself, or someone you care about some help, you may as well visit their site, or call them toll free to get the information you need.

Wal-Mart eyes '08 launch for India stores

The evil Walmart has expanded again. This time rolling into the Middle-Eastern country of India. Celebrate the occasion by purchasing some cheap pens from Pensrus.com.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, plans to launch joint-venture wholesale stores in India by the middle of 2008 and expand to 75 cities in five to seven years, Indian media reported Thursday.

Wal-Mart (Charts, Fortune 500) expects to sign an equal joint venture with India's Bharti group for a cash-and-carry venture in a few weeks, the Mint daily quoted Wal-Mart's president for emerging markets, Rahul Jain, as saying in New Delhi.

The Indian group, which controls India's top mobile service firm Bharti Airtel Ltd., has a wholly owned front-end retailing venture, Bharti Retail Ltd., and plans to spend $2.5 billion by 2015 to set up hypermarkets, supermarkets and other stores across India.

The Business Standard quoted Jain as saying the wholesale joint venture would cut prices of agricultural products 10 to 15 percent, electronic goods 5 to 7 percent, and television sets and refrigerators up to 25 percent.

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CRM Software

Focus more on making sales, and less on learning software.

This is the claim if AIMPromote and their customor relationship management, or crm software. Offering a 14-Day free trial on their software they have developed an easy to use, and low cost implementation for the software.

There are no set up fees and the system can be integrated with your website quickly free of charge. Monitor the ROI of your campaigns, and easily determine where the best sales conversions are coming from.

With a CRM firm you have to assume that their customer service would be top notch. You would be correct in your assumption. Either by contacting them directly, or just asking for information on the support forums there will be someone to give you the help you need to get rolling ASAP.

Dressing for Success

What exactly is considered dressing for success these days? For many it still is the old suit and tie for the man and suits for women. Isn't it great how we don't have to worry about any of that when we make our living sitting at a computer in a comfy chair at home? I remember the days of waking up in the morning and looking through my tie collection to come up with that great combo of the day. What a pain.

Now I guess my only concern is comfort at home while I work. Picking out some Powell furniture and living in comfort is the way to go when trying to give your home the look of success.

Get Noticed on a Bid Link Web Directory

Building a name for yourself online, or just getting your site noticed by search engine is a lot of work. Not only do you need to work on your content, but you also need to think about how the machines read your stuff, promote your site in various places, and spend money on getting links. Web directories are a great source as long as they put you in the correct category and you ahve a fighting chance to be on one of the first couple of pages. Most just throw you in as you register, alphabetical order, or even based on your Google Page Rank. Odds are that you will end up on page 158 and no one will ever see your site. I can guarantee that you never get more than a handful of hits this way.

A better solution is to look at using a bid link directory. These directories will provide you with the opportunity to bid your way to the top and get yourself some publicity. You have control over where you show up, and sites like this one will even hlep your page rank significantly if you get onto the front page, thus benefitting from their high PR7 ranking.

The Right Way to Get Media Attention

While looking around to find some sites that help with creating and designing custom pens to do a bit of advertising for me I came a crossed an article on the same level. It talks about being an unknown with a great idea and what you can do to become a household name, celebrity because of the idea, or at least known in the arena you are involved in.

Most entrepreneurs I know think that when they achieve success, fame will follow. And now that I have made the transition from business to academia, I can also say that my academic friends think that big discoveries automatically lead to big press.

They're dreaming. Ralph Waldo Emerson was wrong when he said, "Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door." The reality is that even if you did, no one would find you. To be known, you have to have a great story and tell it to the right people.

I've co-founded two successful software companies. In the first, we grew into a $100 million revenue machine in five years and pulled off a successful initial public offering. But it seemed as if no one had ever heard of us. Out of frustration, we used to joke that we should change our motto to "We've never heard of you either."

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