Your Proposal Didn't Win? Make Sure You Get Something From Losing

No matter how successful you are, eventually you will lose potential contracts. This is not always a bad thing - losing contracts can present you with opportunities to get closer to the client and get valuable feedback. It allows you to analyze what you did wrong, what was done right, and how you can improve your products, services…and proposals.

If you do lose a contract you should always ask for feedback and find out why you lost. Client's are often happy to provide feedback to "soften the blow" of losing a contract. This is especially true if there was an elaborate qualification period or your proposal required an extensive amount of preparation and research.

Quite often, the deciding factor may be price and you may lose out on contracts where you proposed a superior product or service. Everyone who has lost a contract has been told that it was lost because they were too expensive…but how often have you been told you won because you were cheap?

Even if price is the primary reason, it's good to know. It may mean that you misinterpreted the tender requirements and proposed something above the specification. Alternatively you may need to re-evaluate your pricing, or even serve to shift your focus to higher end clients who pay a premium for the products and services you offer.

It may be they liked another company's track record better, they may have previous dealing with the chosen supplier, or sometimes you may not have fully addressed their concerns in your proposal. Whatever the reason, there is always something that can be learned.

Try and get a face to face meeting. This will enable you to get the most honest and detailed feedback possible – clients will often be prepared to say things off the record that they won't commit to paper. You can also use the lost opportunity as a chance to get to know the client better, build rapport and start to position yourself for future contracts. Any opportunity to develop a relationship with a perspective client serves to better your business base so always take advantage of these opportunities whenever you can.

Remember to also ask for feedback when you win. Ask the client why you were chosen, exactly how you stood out from the rest of the field and how your proposal could have been better – check if there were any parts of your proposal that caused doubt or uncertainty with the client.

All of these options offer you a chance to improve your products and services, eventually resulting in more clients and better business. In such a competitive marketplace you need to grasp any potential advantage you can find. Finding out exactly why you lost makes a huge difference the next time around. Be willing to look at your faults and be prepared to change – it's about what the client wants, not what you have to offer.

Source : http://www.readbud.com

A Guide To Buying A Digital Camera Equipment

How to Buy Digital Camera Equipment

There are so many digital cameras that it can be confusing trying to buy digital camera equipment. Here are some tips to help you decide which the best choice is for you and buy digital camera equipment that you will get the best results with:

• The first step before you buy digital camera equipment is to set a basic budget on how much money you want to spend. You do need to be realistic about the fact you won't be able to get the best of every feature, as you may have to make tradeoffs when you actually buy digital camera equipment.

• Your experience level has to have a big influence in your decision to buy digital camera equipment. There is no point in buying too much buy digital camera equipment than you can actually use. For a novice you should buy digital camera equipment that is point and shoot so that you don't have to worry about manually changing any settings. Digital zoom is not as important a part in the process of choosing to buy digital camera equipment as you may first think. Basically it just means that the camera crops the picture and gives you the center piece of it. You do not need to buy digital camera equipment that does this as you can do it better yourself after you take the picture. You can usually move closer to the subject anyway and to buy digital camera equipment that includes an optical zoom can add a lot of unnecessary cost and weight to the camera. Of course, expert photographers will want to buy digital camera equipment that gives them more manual control over the exposure process.

• Next you need to consider what you will use your camera to capture before you set out to buy digital camera equipment. A fast shutter speed is necessary for moving subjects. You can also buy digital camera equipment that has special features to enable you to take multiple pictures in quick succession for high-action pictures.

• There are a number of helpful websites that give reviews on photographic products to help you decide on the best camera for your needs before you buy digital camera equipment. Of course, you can also ask friends and family about their digital camera choices. Price comparison websites are also essential to help you to buy digital camera equipment at the best possible prices. Remember that when you buy digital camera equipment there are often a list of extras that you may want to purchase, including batteries and memory cards.

Don't be tempted to go for a trendy-looking, colorful camera if you really want to buy a less cool looking one that does more of what you want. Make sure that you have got as many of the features that you wanted to have in the first place and haven't compromised too much on them for the sake of a few extra dollars. It is important to ensure that you buy digital camera equipment that you are happy with and enables you to take the photographs that you want.

Source : http://readbud.com

Start Your Own Sheet Music Collection

Starting a sheet music collection is easy, once you've decided what you want to collect. Sheet music is inexpensive and relatively easy to find. You can find music at yard sales, antique shows and on the internet. Only music that is very scarce or rare is expensive. Most pieces can be found at a price between three and twenty five dollars. Extremely rare sheet music can carry a price of up to a thousand dollars, but few pieces fall into this category. You will find music in any color graphic or subject matter you are looking for.

People collect sheet music in many ways. Sometimes sheet music is collected by the genre or songs. You could put together a history of music in America with a sheet music collection. You could do this with the entire history of our country or concentrate on one time period or decade. The possibilities are endless - be creative when building your collection! Songs have been written about most important events in our history, including wars, plane crashes and natural disasters. Themes such as love or the evolution of images of women in music are popular themes for sheet music collections. Other collectors focus on one composer or cover artist.

Ragtime music from the early twentieth century is popular with collectors of vintage sheet music. This music is considered the foundation of modern jazz music. A ragtime music collection looks great displayed in a room decorated in the Early American style. And the cover art on rag time sheet music looks great displayed in picture frames on a wall or sofa table.

Music written by famous composers is popular among sheet music collectors. This music is readily available in all music genres. Other collectors focus on rare or vintage sheet music. The value of these documents depends largely on the condition of the sheets. Pieces in mint condition will be more expensive. Most sheet music isn't found in perfect condition. The spine of the sheet was usually broken to make the score stand up in the music stand. Spills, tears and names written on the covers are common because sheet music was often used at parties.

Sheet music displayed in a family room or bar area makes a great focal point. Even people who don't collect sheet music use it in a display of other collectibles. Collectors of beer, whisky, golf, military, cigars or trains can find sheet music to accent their collection. A few pieces of sheet music with great cover art enhance a display of other collectibles. Collectors of memorabilia from movies or Broadway productions often look for sheet music written for the production.

Any sheet music that isn't displayed should be stored properly to preserve the condition. Store each set of sheet music in a plastic baggie like those used for comic book collections. Place those bags in a large plastic storage container to protect them from being ripped or crumpled. Store your containers in a dry place away from sunlight or moisture, which can damage the music.

Source : http://readbud.com

You Need Your Own Reasons for Organizing Your Home

First off, you need to know organizing your home is different for you than it is for someone else.

Some folks don't have a lot of clutter and junk but need to know how to maintain organization and have a place for their stuff.

On the other hand, some homeowners have piles upon piles...a big mess, and still think it's just a matter of needing storage.

When, in fact, storage is the last thing you need. The first step is getting rid of clutter, rather than adding more storage just to keep more stuff.

The thing is, once you start organizing your home, you'll see how great and real the benefits are:

-It's reducing stress by having order and discipline.

-It's having more space by keeping clutter out for good.

-It's simplifying the way you live at home by creating useful systems that work for you personally.

-It's a way of being on time, and not feeling the strain of running against the clock.

Quite simply, when you finally start to make the simple changes of organization, it all adds up to give you more room to breath so you can enjoy your family and friends more.

Being organized isn't a matter of being rich or poor, young or old. We were never taught organization in school and, in fact, were taught to multi-task and go in too many directions at once.

This was how they told us to live.

Personally, I have always gone against the grain and never worried about keeping things we don't need. My wife Megan and I make sure if something is not being put to use or it's out-of-date... it's getting sold or thrown out.

We also utilize smart, affordable storage to keep only useful items and starting teaching our kids the value of being organized at a very young age. It makes it easier on them and on us to stay disciplined about organization.

The funny thing is I don't think I was raised to be organized. Nobody knew much about "organization" back then, although I was always a little "neat" as a kid.

But somewhere along the way I figured out it made the most sense. I like to be on time and being organized makes that possible. I don't like wasting time looking for things, like tools or ingredients for cooking or paperwork or bills.

Being organized makes it all a lot easier.

It's not going to make you ri*ch, but it will certainly save you money by avoiding duplicate purchases and late bills.

It's not going to make you any younger, but it will certainly give you more time to do things you might think you don't have time to do.

Being organized isn't going to give you a bigger house, but it will clear clutter and open up some space so you'll feel like you have a bigger house because there will be less congestion and "stuff" all over the place.

There may seem like there is a lot to getting organized and over the next few days I'm going to share with you even more tips and tricks to getting and staying organized.

Source : http://readbud.com

What is PP in Digital Photography?

Of course, we would like to say, that this is PP Group – a leading team in the photography branch, because this is our name! Because we are PP Group. But PP in the Digital Photography means something else.

Our research shows, that most of the people use this abbreviation - PP in digital photography conversations to say the word "Photoshop" shortly. It comes out from the first and the last letters in the word - P. Normally the Photoshop software is in use from the Professional Photography, because it offers a lot of abilities for picture optimization and getting higher images quality.

Another use for PP with the photography stuff is when people are trying to say "Post-Processing" shortly. In this case people are talking about the Post-Processing in Digital Photography or for short: "PP in Digital Photography".

You can see the PP abbreviation, when it says "Photographic process". It means the processing, developing photographs. As we understand there is even a book, called this way – "Photographic Processes", which describes the PP – color-negative / color-reversal processing, shooting and developing photographs. Color and B&W (Black and White) film and print processing, as well.

And talking about print processing we remembered that there is another PP meaning, which is used in digital photography conversations. That's right! This is the Photo Printer's stuff or the Photo Paper's stuff. There are even some printers' models that are called "(something) PP". One of them is a Canon's model. Or photo paper, called "high gloss photo paper PP 101D" or something similar.

May be you will hate us, but we feel the need to share with you, that there is another PP abbreviation and it's for Pocket Pouch. Believe us – we think that this is not normal too, but it is a fact. The pocket pouches for your digital cameras can be offered in some sites or pamphlets like PP for digital cameras.

Believing or not, but you may see PP like "pages" meaning in Photography as well. There are lots of lessons, courses, lectures and articles that are written on different places – mostly in the internet and they are quotations from some photography books. When it is attended by numbers it is too possible PP to be a page number. Mostly it looks like this way: pp 136-278, and means, as you know – pages 136 to 278.

Well, it is not so difficult to understand what is PP in the Digital Photography now, when you know the rest of the text. You can assess which meaning will be helpful for you and to understand the main text idea.

Source : http://readbud.com

Crochet Tips You Need To Know

Anyone who is beginning to learn how to crochet, or even those who have been crocheting for a number of years, can benefit from some crocheting tips every now and then. There are some common crocheting queries that require tips which everyone needs at some point. For example, how to add beads can be a mystery unless you get a few tips from someone who is knowledgeable about crocheting. There can be a number of different ways of achieving your goals, so crocheting tips can differ. There can be several ways to add beads to crochet work and include threading the beads onto the yarn itself so that they can be pulled up whenever they are needed. Another way is to slip the bead onto the crochet hook when it is needed. Crocheting tips like these need to be tried out and then you can decide which one is best.

Crocheting Tips for Complete Beginners

Complete beginners can need very basic crocheting tips to get them started, such as how to start a row, how to finish off and how to add another ball of yarn. The importance of keeping equipment clean and tidy is a valuable crocheting tip for beginners because if they are dealing with skeins of yarn that is not rolled into a ball, it can easily tangle and snap. It is well worth the time it takes to wrap the yarn into a ball and this is one thing that beginnings often try to skip.

Another important crocheting tip that beginners should note is that when a row has been completed, the work needs to be turned. Constantly turning the same way will lead to the yarn becoming twisted. To prevent this, the work must be turned the opposite way after each line, for example turning clockwise with the first row, anti clockwise with the second and so on. To make the ends of the yarn neat and tidy, it can be a good idea to weave the ends of the yarn into the work using an embroidery needle. It can make the ends almost invisible to the eye. Likewise, when adding a new yarn to work, it can be better to sew in the ends; it may give a few thicker areas to the work but it will be barely noticeable. There are many more crocheting tips to be had, but a beginner can learn wisely and quickly from experience and their own mistakes.

Source : http://readbud.com

You Don't Know How Write To A Song ... You're Not A Musician!

This is something I briefly touched on in a previous newsletter - ...over and over I get asked "will I write better songs if I'm a musician"?

What's the answer?

Yes AND no.

Confused?

Let me explain. For the sake of simplicity, here I'll talk about the 'music' aspect of songwriting.

First up, I'll tell you that I'm a musician, songwriter and a vocal coach. And I have worked with both songwriters who play instruments and songwriters who don't. Which group are a better bunch to work with?

It goes like this. Those who play an instrument (to a certain degree) are more prone to understand timing, tempo and perhaps some syncopation. Sometimes, musicians will also understand the creation of melody a little more than non-musicians. They'll understand the structure of harmony and some music theory that goes along with it.

Because of the various 'pieces' or 'songs' they have played with their instruments, these musical and rhythmic elements are more or less naturally embedded in their brain - in practice and in theory.

Of course, this is GOOD thing. It's an advantage. Now yes - there are non-musicians who are gifted with these elements also, but I'm just talking in general terms here. For the most of it, more musicians will have these elements than non-musicians.

Now here's the twist. It's because of this very same reason that many musicians find it hard to write great songs. How? Well, because there are musicians that are pre-programmed into believing that perhaps a melody should flow a certain way, or maybe a chord sequence shouldn't fall in that pattern, etc, BECAUSE they get caught up in the theory that indirectly tells them "this isn't right".

You see, songwriters who don't know anything about music theory or playing an instrument will write freely. Meaning they won't think about whether something is 'musically right' or not. Of course, you can't write a song of pure non-musicality and expect to get a welcoming reception. You'd be mad to.

But it's nice when you don't think too much about something 'sitting right' musically in the song. Why care? It's a song. If the second verse has 10 bars and the first verse has 8 - so what? No big deal.

On the flip side, there are non-musical songwriters who just need that little push to learn some very basic chords on a piano or guitar....just to give them that edge and sometimes to even super-charge their creativity. So....

....here's my conclusion. If you play an instrument and you wish to be a songwriter, then don't think too much about what's musically correct. Let the chords and melody take you away. Don't think about it too much. Yes, stick within the rules of music, but don't get caught up in it.

If you are a non-musician and you write songs, then a great idea would be to learn some very basic chords on the keyboard. This isn't completely mandatory, but it will definitely give your songwriting a boast. Just the basic chords will do. You'll be amazed the kind of music you can make with learning the basic stuff.

And why did I say the keyboard and not the guitar? Well, I believe the keyboard to be fundamentally easier to learn than the guitar, as you can blatantly see the notes for the intervals you are playing face-front.

But please, don't let me deter you from learning the guitar if that's in you to do so. It's a wonderful, natural songwriting accompanying instrument.

If and when you do decide to learn an instrument, I wouldn't get too caught up in the theory, unless it's your desire to really learn about it....

......and if you wish to do so, then try to draw a firm line between your musical ego and your songwriting craft. This is the key here. As much as they may fight against each other, they *can* work together, if you consciously try to find a balance.

Source : http://readbud.com