WELCOME...to our new Motivating Moments newsletter. I hope you enjoy the thoughts and ideas included.

My personal goal is to keep you informed of critical and not so critical news. This newsletter is filled with good ideas for increasing your sales opportunities.

I hope you will take the time to share any future topics you have an interest in.

Joe Stiles

February is the month of love (Valentine's Day) in which we tell the ones we are close to how we feel about them.

While we are sharing our warmest thoughts to others, how about sharing those thoughts with ourselves! Do we like ourselves, our attitudes, our career path, etc?

What do we tell others about our career choices? Do we really enjoy our career choice? What happens if we do not really enjoy what we do for a living?

Before making a dramatic career change, perhaps we should devote some quiet, prayerful deliberation towards other choices. A second and viable option is to find a mentor. This should be a person with a varied experience background that will address some penetrating evaluations and ask hard questions of our interest. Picking a mentor is very much like the research needed in a job change. In a position, company or industry, use your networking skills to find the idea mentor, who can share his/her experience and guide you.

For those who receive a set salary for their services, what if...you had to "earn" your salary in the form of tips? The tips I am referring to are the same tips we share with tne waiter/waitress for good service at our favorite restaurant. What would you do to earn your tips (aka salary) if your service to others required it?

Join the Business Over Breakfast meeting of the Houston West Chamber of Commerce at 7:15 AM in the Memorial Hermann Memorial City Hospital at 921 Gessner (be sure to enter from the Frostwood entrance)

BUSINESS OVER BREAKFAST 2007 CALENDAR

FEBRUARY 21st

Dress for Success - Atire to Inspire

Tariq Jilanic, Joseph A. Bank, Clothier (The way we dress determines the way we are perceived)

MARCH 21st

Stand Up to Stand Out - the image of our communication

Linda Stiles, Stiles & Associates (The tongue is our strongest muscle – how we use it determines our impact)

APRIL 18th

Networking Workshop - hands-on practice, practice, practice (Putting everything together to help us grow)

RSVP to www.hwcoc.org

If you are looking for a great networking opportunity, how about your local chamber of commerce. It is a great place to give something back to your community and to others with their business. For more information, go to www.hwcoc.org

The biggest group of home buyers, by far, is still married couples, accounting for 61 percent of all homes bought, according to the National Association of Realtors. But single women now purchase 22 % of all homes. Single men accounted for only 9 percent of purchases

According to Pat Vredevoogd Combs, the president of the National Association of Realtors, that shows real change. "Thirty-five years ago, when I started out as a realtor, a single woman couldn't even get a mortgage," she says. (source: www.cnnmoney.com)

Part of the reason why women have become so big a buying bloc is that more women are single than ever before. The New York Times recently concluded, after an analysis of Census Bureau data, that 51 percent of all American adult women now live without a spouse.

For those marketing saavy professionals, where are your marketing and sales efforts directed?

In my personal marketing efforts, I serve others by being a resource for real estate related questions and support. Whether to home owners or home buyers, I want to be known as a supportive resource. I offer support to home owners who need help in protesting their property taxes. To the home buyer, I offer referrals to real estate agents, inspectors, plumbers, etc.

How are you serving others?

All small to medium size business owners are charged with making every dollar count, especially when it comes to marketing. With this in mind, how does one go about getting a website created that will actually drive business as opposed to just taking up space online?

There are of course the common ‘golden rules’ of website design, such as being able to capture the visitor’s attention in three seconds or less, providing clear and easy navigation throughout the site, offering easy to find contact information, optimizing the site for high search engines rankings and making sure the user experience (not the latest trick learned by your website developer) guides every decision made.

Beyond, all the basics, however, your website must work hand in hand with the rest of your business. Direct mail campaigns should reference unique URLs where readers and prospects can go for captivating calls to action. By tracking the number of visits to these URLS not linked from the home page you can gain important feedback on the success of your direct mail campaigns and which messages and/or calls to action generate the most interest. Visitors should be able to download PDFs versions of corporate brochures. Prospects should be able to take surveys and polls or sign up to become a client, and existing clients should be able to offer customer service feedback or even refer a new prospect. Interaction is the key for a website that will truly drive business.

By Catherine Stafford Ideas in Motion

Are you looking for new new business development opportunities? Be sure to ask me about the Lunch & Learn Program and how it benefit you, directly.

• Soaring with the Eagles vs. Pecking with the Chickens
• Referring a Referral - where to find the "best" referral sources
• Your 30 Seconds of Fame - Mastering Your Elevator Speech

JOE STILES has over 20 years mortgage experience and lives in West Houston with his wife, Linda, a dynamic professional speaker and communications trainer (www.lindastiles.com). Joe earned a BBA degree in Marketing from the University of Houston/Downtown, where he was awarded membership in the Phi Kappa Phi and Beta Gamma Sigma honor societies. Joe is also a graduate of the School of Mortgage Banking at Northwestern University. Joe remains active in the Houston community through Second Baptist Church and numerous civic organizations.

Joe frequently speaks at many Houston-area organizations and firms on Credit Scores, stolen IDs - Prevention & Cure and several other funny and motivating topics.

Network Funding is a Houston, TX based mortgage banking firm that has 160 branches in 32 states.

DO YOU HAVE A REAL ESTATE RELATED QUESTION? LET ME HEAR FROM YOU VIA MY WEBSITE BLOG