Top Cities Discount Hotel

Automotive sales are in a slump, and no one understands this better than employees of automotive dealerships. And while new car sales may be on the decline, the pressure to boost sales and revenues remains an integral part of the automotive industry.

But selling new and used cars during a consumer drought can be increasingly difficult, especially given the level of competition that exists in the automotive industry. Dealerships compete viciously for customers by offering special pricing deals, low-financing guarantees and other sales tactics, bombarding consumers with radio, television, and print ads in an attempt to beat out their competitors. Not surprisingly, many potential customers have begun to tune out traditional automotive advertisements, turning instead to their friends or mechanics for advice when the time comes to buy a new car.

And therein lies the key to driving new automotive sales: increasing business through the dealership?s fixed operations departments.

It works like this. Consumers who know and trust the mechanics in a dealership?s fixed operations will be more likely to purchase a new vehicle from the sales department of that same dealership. As opposed to competing directly for new sales, smart dealerships should compete indirectly by building business in their fixed ops departments?business that will lead to additional vehicle sales in the future.

And how should you go about building fixed operations revenue? Easy. Institute marketing strategies aimed at new movers by giving them a reason to try your services and encouraging them to return.

Fishing for New Movers

New movers are individuals and families who have recently moved to a new location, most likely after experiencing a lifestyle change (such as a new marriage, divorce, or employment opportunity). New movers typically arrive in their new homes with an open mind, ready to establish new routines and to try out new services offered in their communities. In fact, recent research has found that 62% of new movers buy a new car within the first year after their relocation.

This open-minded mentality, and their relative unfamiliarity with their new surroundings, makes new movers the perfect target for a well-planned strategic marketing plan. So how can your business effectively target these new movers? Easy?through a tailored direct marketing campaign. Here?s how to do it:

Every time an individual or family relocates to your town, make sure they receive a gift certificate in their mailbox offering free services from your business. Not discounted services, not a ?buy-one-get-one free? offer, but a certificate valid for the amount of your business?s most popular service?let?s say a routine oil change. Include a letter with the gift certificate that welcomes the new resident to your community and outlines your dealership, automotive services, and location.

Why give away $20-30 worth of services when you could just as easily have offered a substantial discount on your business?s oil change service? Simple. Customers understand and appreciate the word ?free.? Almost everyone offers discounted services at one time or another, but when was the last time you received a $20 or $30 gift certificate in the mail from your local automotive dealership? Can?t remember? Exactly.

The point is that irresistible offers get the maximum rate of response. Make a powerful impression, and you will draw the customer to your store. After all, new movers are anxious to establish new routines with local businesses. By making an attractive service offer, your business immediately becomes a prime candidate for the person?s future business.

One caveat, however. You must ensure that every time a customer presents a new mover gift certificate, that person is treated with the highest level of courtesy, customer service, and professionalism. If you treat new movers well on their first visit, chances are they will return to your business again and again.

Giving Your Customers another Reason to Return

So there you have it, right? You?ve attracted new movers with your new mover gift certificates, you?ve ?wowed? them when they arrived to redeem them, and now all you have to do is sit back and wait for them to return. Unfortunately there?s a bit more to the task.

Although your new mover offer has certainly gone a long way, it will not guarantee you a steady stream of loyal customers. New movers may like your services, but they may not automatically make your business a part of their everyday routine. Therefore, you must give them a reason to return.

Remember when your new mover arrived to redeem your gift certificate? With any luck, the customer left happy and impressed, probably making a mental note to return to your dealership the next time service was needed. But what if, instead of waiting passively for the person?s return, you could speed up the process with yet another attractive offer? Here?s how.

Before your new mover leaves after redeeming the gift certificate, ask for an email address that will enable you to offer future promotions of the type just rendered. By collecting the emails of your new customers, you are building an electronic database of information allowing you to speak directly to people who already know, use and appreciate your business.

Let?s say you?re having a slow week (maybe even a slow month). Maybe it?s around the holidays and your customers have their minds on other things beside routine auto service. Now think proactively. Instead of waiting for people to come to you, why not draw in those customers who have used your services before, using the same tactics you used when they were new movers?

Remember those email addresses you?ve been collecting? It is time to put them to good use. Decide on a special offer?say, 50% off a tire rotation and alignment service package. Compose a brief email to your customers outlining this discount, and explain that it is only available for the remainder of the week. Hit the ?send? button and then wait.

Your customers will receive that email, remember the positive experience they had last time they stopped by your business, and drop by for the special offer. If they do?and if you impress them with your friendliness and quality service once again?they will have yet another reason to visit you in the future. You?ve turned a slow week into a profitable one, just by going back to customers who have already used and enjoyed your service!

That?s smart business. Even more, it?s a strong step towards expanding your customer base, forging positive relationships with customers, and ultimately turning positive customer relationships into new car sales.

JAY SIFF is a principal of Moving Targets (http://www.movingtargets.com), a Perkasie, Pennsylvania-based provider of new resident direct marketing programs for small business. Jay can be reached at 800-926-2451 or jay@movingtargets.com.

You may not think of Las Vegas as an area known for its gardens but you?d be wrong. There are more gardens in and around Las Vegas than you?d think possible given the desert environment, the heat and the crowds of tourists that never stop coming. There are gardens inside in some of the most unlikely places and there are outside gardens that will make you forget you?re in the desert.

Try The Garden of Love for an interior chapel filled with live plants, waterfalls and even some birds for that natural feel. Try a desert garden of natural rock outcroppings in Red Rock Canyon a mere thirty minute ride from the Las Vegas Strip by limousine. You won?t believe the natural wonder as you take your wedding vows in one of the most beautiful natural desert gardens in the world. Or drive a little further into the Valley of Fire for a setting used by hundreds of western movies over the years.

For interior, jungle-like gardens, check out the wedding facilities at the Mirage, the Bellagio or the Monte Carlo hotels on the strip. You?ll forget where you are as the trees, plants and vines of the jungle, transported thousands of miles to Las Vegas hotels, whisks both bride and groom away to a dream world unlike any other on the planet. Whatever your garden desires, inside or outside, natural or created, desert or jungle, it can be found at many locations in and around Las Vegas.

Las Vegas Weddings Info provides detailed information on Las Vegas wedding chapels, packages and receptions, as well as garden, helicopter, casino, hotel, Elvis and other Las Vegas theme weddings. Las Vegas Weddings Info is the sister site of Maui Weddings Web.

Goldfish are known to be the most common and popular choice for pets. But why do people bring home Goldfish? They can?t run or let out a squeak leave alone express themselves and they definitely can?t play catch. All they will do is just swim and swim and swim and yet they manage to make that connection with us and we love them for it. If you ask a Goldfish lover what makes them great, the answer would be: they are great because they just are!

Are Goldfish really gold?

One of the probable reasons why people are attracted to Goldfish could be because of their golden hues. It gives them that exotic and different look. However, they aren?t really golden ? more a combination (or absence) of the two or three types of pigment cells black, yellow and red ? that give the Goldfish a variety of color effects. Goldfish can be golden, red, white, bronze and even blue and black. In fact, when Goldfish are born they are neither gold nor orange. They are a very tan or olive kind of shade and sometimes they can be pretty dark. It?s only when they grow that they begin to change their color.

Essentially a wild species, Goldfish probably acquired their color over the ages and thanks to genetic mutations and selective breeding we have Goldfish that can range from silver to gold, red to orange, with a single tail or a fantail and some with pop eyes and without dorsal fins! The color of goldfish depends on the environment it is bred in as well as the light it is exposed to. Goldfish is one species that has been bred, crossbred and changed quite a bit and this has been going on since more than hundreds of years. But when did it all begin? The Birth of the Goldfish

It all began in Ancient China when the goldfish as we know it today was bred from the gibel carp which is found in slow moving waters in South China. The first evidence we have is in the year 265-415 when the Chun dynasty recorded the gold hue of this fish. From then on documents show that the goldfish were raised in ponds within Buddhist monasteries and mostly in the houses of royalty and other aristocrats.

It was during the reign on the Ming Dynasty that records show the Goldfish being raised in bowls as indoor pet. This in fact helped the Goldfish to evolve double tail and anal fins, red and white coloration and even dispense with their dorsal fins. Goldfish became linked to prosperity, fortune and good luck and even inspired art in China which was reflected in the goldfish motifs used in silks, ceramics and jade carvings.

Soon they began to become more commonly available and made their first trip out of their homeland to Japan in 1603. In 1611- 1691 goldfish were exported to Europe. It was in 1874 that Goldfish made an entry into United States of America. The 19th Century saw

the demand for aquariums and goldfish grow. The world's first public aquarium opened in London in 1853.

Today?s modern Goldfish has its very own definition: ?A small reddish golden Chinese carp kept for ornament? (Oxford Dictionary, American Edition, Oxford University Press). Its official biological name is Carassius auratus and but it?s commonly known as the golden carp or simply the goldfish.

If you want to know more about goldfish, than why not visit my site and pick up your own Comprehensive Guide to Goldfish! http://www.SecretsOfGoldfish.com (Recommended)

When you have enough money to spare and you have worked hard and feel that a well-earned vacation is in order you immediately scout for the best vacation spot in mind that could help you unwind with great entertainment and sleepless fun.

You decide where to go and like a bolt of lightning, Las Vegas dawns on you as the best playground for adults, with every imaginable luxury available to you. There?s one thing you should remember though, Las Vegas means spending money, and lots of it. So here comes the practicality of finding cheap airline tickets to Las Vegas so you can spend your money in Las Vegas, not on the way there.

Imagine not being able to find cheap airline tickets to Las Vegas, and arriving there with no cash to spend. You could go sightseeing then. Sightseeing though in Las Vegas costs an average of $9.16 per person. If one needs to truly see and enjoy Las Vegas, you need to immerse yourself in its culture: The Culture of Money.

Then again, you might be one of those many hopefuls who don?t really consider finding cheap airline tickets to Las Vegas an option because they could win big in the casinos.

Well, the numbers could work for you, but the statistics don?t necessarily body well. On the average, Gamblers lose at least six billion dollars of gambling money in Las Vegas.

Gambling, after all, is the main source of revenue for the city of Las Vegas.

Finding really cheap airline tickets to Las Vegas should be a contingency plan for you to make sure that you could still be able to find your way back home after a visit. That is, if you don?t sell your tickets for more cash to spend on the casinos. After all, the average gambling budget of visitors is $700 per visit…CONTINUE

Article Taken From: http://Airline-Ticket-Guide.useful-tips.com

Blown art glass is quickly becoming one of the fastest growing hobbies in North America… and it is about time. Glassblowing has been around since 27 BC in Syria, though the first evidence of manmade glass products occurs in Mesopotamia in the late 3rd century BC. But the advancement of actual “blowing” glass using a tube transformed the materials usefulness. The new technique quickly spread throughout the Roman world.

Harvey Littleton, a ceramics professor, and Dominick Labino, a chemist and engineer, are credited with starting the most recent “studio glass movement” in 1962. The two held workshops at the Toledo Museum of Art. This is where the current method of melting glass in a furnace for use in blown glass art was originated. Thus, Littleton and Labino are credited with making molten glass available to artists in private studios.

The actual process of preparing the glass for blowing is very involved though. The glass is melted in furnaces using the sand, limestone, soda, potash and other compounds. The actual transformation of raw materials into glass takes place well above 2000 degrees Fahrenheit.

After the glass has melted, the artist uses a blowpipe to shape the glass. The blowpipe is about five feet long and is used for blowing a parison of molten glass. Molds are used to impress decorative patterns.

There are two types of modern glassblowing but offhand glassblowing is the type most people picture in their mind when they think about this kind of art. The artist gathers a glob of fused glass at the end of a hollow tube called a blowpipe or blowing iron. The molten glass is then fashioned into its final form by various techniques of blowing and shaping with hands, tolls and molds. The second kind of glassblowing is lampworking. Lampworking is the softening of a glass tube by heating it in the flame of a torch. Next, the softened glass is manipulated into its final form by blowing and shaping with hands and tools. Any number of things can be created using either technique sculpted animals, ashtrays, vases, aquarium pieces, beads, paper weights, perfume bottles?the list goes on and on. Moreover, practically every major part of the world at one time or another in its history has been known, in some part, for its glass art. However, Mexican glass art is the most popular.

Mexico is the land of the master craftsman. Known throughout history as being expert potters, weavers and wood carvers, Mexican artists have really made their mark as glassblowers. Beginning in 1542 in Puebla, these artists produced glass items in a variety of shapes with little more than a long pipe and a glob of melted glass. Experienced Mexican glass blowers will even add effects as small bubbles, blobs of color or pebbles to their finished to pieces to make them stand out.

Authentic Mexican glass is easily identified by a ponti, or a place at the bottom of the finished product that indicates it was mouth blown. Another feature of Mexican glass is its individual nature. No two pieces are ever exactly alike in size, shape or design, which simply adds to the unique nature of each piece.

But the most unique detail about this glassblowing is how little it's changed since its inception. For the most part, glassblowers are still producing beautiful works of art the same way they did back in 27 BC?melted glass and a metal tube. This is one instance where my grandpa was wrong. In the case of glassblowing, “They are still making them like they used to.”

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Allen Shaw is a successful author who provides information on blown glass and bottles.

“I am the news director at USA News Network and have been working as freelance writer for 2 years. I've been published in a few magazines, newspapers and websites and my specialty up to this point has been movie and music reviews.”