Today I came across a nice unique site – Creative.gd. Creative.gd (Creative Graphic Design) is an innovative site that offers the designing community at chance to interact with a whole range of different clients, all with a variety of design needs from a simple business logo right through to a complete website design. Creative.gd allows businesses or individuals to post their design requirements on the site in the form of a competition, which can then be accessed by the global designing community. These design contests are open to any level of designer, from a student right through to a world class art director, and are an excellent way for designers to broaden their freelance portfolios and enhance their careers.

Creative.gd was founded in 2008 by a professional freelance creative, who recognised the need for a forum where designers and clients of all levels and budgets could meet and work together, allowing designers beginning their careers the chance to get experience meeting client requirements and deadlines, and also allowing professional freelancers the chance to work on new and more varied projects away from the rigorous and competitive demands of big business design.

It is easy to launch a design contest with Creative.gd, just start by drafting a design brief, listing your requirements and how much you are willing to pay the winning designer for their work. This is the prize offered for the whole competition and could be anything from $250 – $1000, or more depending on your individual requirements. It is completely free to post the contest on the website, so just simply prepay the prize money (held securely in the Creative.gd escrow account) and then post your contest online. Designers from around the world will then submit their concepts to you, and as the client you can rate the designs and provide feedback through the ‘Discuss this Project’ feature in your control panel. At the end of the project (usually between 7-14 days), you then select a winner and the designer will send you the finished, original work and Creative.gd will complete the transaction by forwarding the prize money to the winner.

If you are a designer interested in entering one of the Creative.gd competitions, then you can visit the website  to see all of the latest contests on offer. For example currently Creative.gd are offering an excellent little project to design a new slogan for the Creative.gd website itself, which has a prize pot of $300 and is open until the 3 September 09. It is also a good idea to read through the Creative.gd blog pages, which offer additional prizes and also provide news on any upcoming features and enhancements to the services, and also any bugs that may be affecting the site.:cool:

Often in our day-to-day lives, we encounter situations where we feel completely ripped off by the other party. Sometimes it costs us a fortune and at other times it is a matter of absolute humiliation. It‘s exactly here when CanYouTrustThem.com comes into the picture. Being a brand new public opinion site, it has taken the world by storm with its outstanding performance. CanYouTrustThem makes use the enormous power of the World Wide Web, national media and social networking sites to expose the business entities or owners with malicious intentions. What’s making this site scale heights of success in the recent times is its simplicity of features and user-friendly interface. At any point of time, you can lodge your business complaints without any kind of hassle. What more to expect when it comes absolutely free of cost. Coming to speak of the technological advancement exploited completely by the site, CanYouTrustThem.com exploits clever search engine technology to make sure that any business complaint lodged about any enterprise remains absolutely transparent to the potential customers. When potential customers’ searches for information on any particular company they will come across CanYouTrustThem, which will top the search engine listing; in some cases it may appear prior to the company’s website. The customers’ testimonials are sure to watch out for. Some of them got their claims settled soon after they lodged in their business complaints on this site, yet others were enlightened with valuable information before striking a deal with a company, which otherwise had a notorious reputation. So what are you waiting for? Register as a member right away and express your grievances against the company with which you have had a bitter experience, so that the whole world can come to know beforehand if they are hiring/buying their products or services and save themselves.

There are various terms used in publicity industry, and these cover a number of aspects that are essential to a successful business:

• Advertising – this is when a product or service is brought to the attention of new and existing customers through a number of methods including direct mailing, television, posters, website banners and email messages.
• Marketing – this focuses on a product or service (either new or existing) and creates a plan to ensure the customer’s needs are being met and the product/service is good value (the right price). It involves a wide range of methods such as research and focus group testing and analysis of competitors, and also includes ongoing advertising and promotional campaigns.
• Public Relations – this focuses on the company image as a whole (products, services, customer relations, company vision etc), to ensure that it has a strong, positive presence in the public arena. Public relations ensure that the company is visible and recognizable, and that people understand who they are and what they sell. This is usually carried out by maintaining a strong presence in the media (publicity) through newspapers, magazines, television and the Internet.
• Promotion – this is similar to all of the above, in that it is designed to attract consumer attention to a specific product or service, and is an ongoing campaign that involves combination of advertising, marketing and public relations.

Public relations, advertising, marketing and promotion are all essential to success for many companies, as there are very few trade ‘niches’ left in the current market and the majority of businesses face stiff opposition from competitors, and must also deal with any global market downturns. In order to sell your product or service to as many customers as possible, you have to reach out to as many people as possible, and persuade them through your strong, attractive company and brand image that they want to purchase from you, rather than from your competitors.

Because publicity, advertising, marketing and promotion is so important, you may want to think about seeking some professional help from a public relations (PR) agency, who can give you expert advice and also run your publicity campaigns for you. Taylor Herring is one of the UK ’s top PR agencies and has won a number of awards in their field including the CIPR Excellence trophy for ‘Best Consumer Campaign’.

Taylor Herring offer expert and professional advice in a number of areas including media relations, brand image, online PR, celebrity endorsements and promotional events, and have covered a number of high profile campaigns in the large few years for clients including Honda, Guinness World Book of Records, Disney (High School Musical film) and the BBC (Doctor Who). Taylor Herring also specialise in personal PR, and have several high profile celebrities such as Robbie Williams and Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber on their books. To find out more about the services offered by this top PR Agency you can visit their website  or telephone 0208 206 5151.

There are many reasons why businesses can need a financial boost. It may be that you have just started up and need to purchase expensive equipment or work vehicles, or you may be an established business that wants to move to newer, better premises and taker on more staff to expand your profit growth. Whatever the reasons a business loan can inject vital capital into your company, and it is important you choose the right loan at the right interest rates to suit your business budget.

The first step to applying for a business loan is to work out exactly how much you are going to need. Banks and lenders will want you to justify every penny that you are asking for, so make sure you draw up a complete finance plan, and also project your future earnings during and after the changes you are planning have taken place.

Lenders will be more willing to accept your application if you can show you will have adequate money coming into your business in the future, and also if you are willing to put some cash into the project yourself (which demonstrates your commitment). Owners who do not have any money to put in, can find it difficult to get finance and banks may ask you for some kind of security such as your house.

Banks decide on finance on a case by case basis, so it is vital that you present your business finance plan clearly and professionally, as you can sometimes literally ‘blow it’ by being unorganized or unrealistic. Many banks do provide useful business plan guides, which can help you to write and prepare your finance applications.

The next step is to review the loan products on offer from the various lenders, and see if they can accommodate your needs. Many applications fail because people have asked to borrow outside of the lenders minimum and maximum loan parameters, so don’t waste your time and theirs and check first before you apply.

Don’t be put off if your first application is turned down, Review your small business financing options and see if you can make any changes, then try again with another suitable lender.

There are hundreds if different opportunities these days to work at home, and many of these can be carried out quickly and easily over the Internet, so all you need to set up is a computer and broadband or dial up access. Internet jobs are varied, and it is important that you research each opportunity carefully, as there are plenty of scams out there that could end up actually costing you money, without any profit at all.

Watch out for opportunities that seem to good to be true, as like any home business Internet based jobs require a bit of time and effort before you starting making good money, so any opportunity that promises instant rewards for little work is usually a scam, especially if you need to pay a sum of money to set it all up.

Here are some of the legitimate working from home opportunities currently available on the Internet:

Data Inputting – several companies offer opportunities for data inputting, which can be done quickly and easily from your computer at home. How much you earn will depend on how much data you can input per week, and this is a good opportunity for those who are new to Internet working and using computers.
Survey Completion – this is a very popular Internet job, as surveys are quick and easy to fill out, but you may find it difficult to find enough survey work to make any money. However this is a good ‘fill in’ job that you can have running in the background and fit in around other work to supplement your income. Companies like Lightspeed Panel (www.lightspeedpanel.com) pay around £1.50 per survey (depending on the length) and long running surveys completed over a few weeks can pay up to £16 each.
Form Completion – several companies offer jobs working from home filling in forms, which pays well at around £4-6 per form. This is easy work, but similar the survey jobs as you may find it difficult to get enough forms to make good money, so again this is another ‘fill in’ job.
Blogging – setting up your own blog requires a bit of time and effort, but if you have a successful blog with a high volume of site traffic then you can potentially make a lot of money by advertising products on your website through affiliate programs.
Internet Research – there are some job opportunities that require you to have a good knowledge of the Internet, and be able to search through it quickly and efficiently for required information. These jobs can pay good money, but you will need to be fast and accurate, and have a good understanding of spelling and grammar.

Dropship wholesale business – this is also one of the popular work-at-home opportunity among many internet marketers. It works like this – buyer buys a product from your site or ebay listing, you place same order on drop shipper’s site at wholesale price – drop shipper sends the product to the actual buyer. Thus you sell a product at retail price and thus generat a handsome commission without the hassle of shipping it.

There are so many Internet based opportunities out there it can be difficult to work out which jobs are legitimate, and which ones will make you enough money to make your input worthwhile. Work at Home 99 is a helpful website that guides you through the process of working from home, and also has an excellent work at home directory that lists all of the best Internet jobs currently available. Work at Home 99 also has some valuable advice on home computer security, so that you can keep your computer and personal information safe whilst working on the Internet.