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For a small business to grow into a big business, it needs a loan unless it has exceptional sales and profit margins. A small business owner has a number of places they can go with a loan request. Banks seem to be one of their options in most cases. What these owners may not realize is that banks have recently developed a reputation for turning down small business loans. It seems that banks are more interested in financing large enterprises because of their advantages. A bank can come up with a variety of reasons to deny approval for a small business loan. Some of the common reasons are as follows:

Reasons Banks Reject Your Small Business Loan

Credit history

One of the barriers between you and a business loan is your credit history. When you go to a bank, they look at your personal and business credit reports. Some people are under the impression that their personal credit doesn’t factor into their business loans. But this is not always the case. Most banks consider both types of loans. One aspect of credit that is of great importance to banks is credit history. The length of your credit history can negatively or positively affect your credit approval.

The more information banks have to assess the creditworthiness of your business, the easier it is for them to forward you the loan. However, if your business is new and your credit history is short, banks will not be willing to grant you the desired loan.

Risky business

You should be aware of the term high risk business. In fact, lending institutions have created an entire industry for high-risk businesses to help them with loans, credit card payments, etc. A bank can look at many factors to rate your business as high risk. Perhaps you belong to an industry that is inherently high-risk. Examples of such businesses are companies selling marijuana-based products, online gambling and casino platforms, blockchain-based dating services, etc. It is imperative that you understand that the activities of your business can also make it a high-risk business.

For example, your business may not be a high-risk business per se, but you may have received too many chargebacks for orders sent to you by your customers. In such a case, the bank will see you as a risky investment and may end up rejecting your loan application.

Cash flow

As stated earlier, your credit history matters a lot when the bank has to approve your loan request. Although a short credit history increases your chances of rejection, a long credit history is not always a lifesaver. Any financial incidents in your credit history that are not in favor of your business can force the bank to reject your application. One of the most important considerations is the cash flow of your business. When you have cash flow problems, you are at risk of getting a “no” from the bank on your loan.

Your cash flow is a measure for the bank to know how easily you repay the loan. If you have limited cash flow, how will you manage repayments? However, cash flow is one of the controllable factors for you. Find ways to increase your income and decrease your expenses. Once you have the correct balance, you can approach the bank for a loan.

The debt

A mistake small business owners often make is trying too many loan places. They will avoid going to the bank in the first place, but in the meantime they will get loans from several other sources. Once you have received your business financing from other sources, it makes sense to pay it back on time. Turning to the bank when you already have a large debt to pay is not at all advisable. Keep in mind that the debt you or your business owes also affects your credit score. In short, the bank doesn’t even have to investigate to understand your debt. A review of your credit report can tell the story.

The preparation

Sometimes your business is doing well and your credit score is in good shape too. What is missing, however, is a solid business plan and proper preparation for loan approval. If you haven’t figured it out yet, banks require you to submit a lot of documents with your loan application. Here are just some of the documents you will need to present to the bank to get your loan approved.

• Income tax returns

• Existing loan documents

• Personal financial documents

• Belongings and property

• Business Lease Documents

• Business financial statements

You should be extremely careful when presenting these documents to the bank. Any discrepancy may result in loan rejection.

Concentration of customers

This may come as a surprise to some, but many banks take this aspect of your business seriously. You should not forget that loans are investments of the banks. Businesses turning to banks are their means of multiplying their money in the form of interest. If the bank feels that your business has no potential for expansion, it may reject your loan request. Consider a mom and dad store in a small town with a small population. If it serves only the people of that town and has no potential for further growth, rejection is inevitable.

In this particular case, even if the business has significant profit margins, it relies on its regular customers for that. The bank may see it as a repayable loan, but not as an investment opportunity.

Conclusion

The good news is that you have many financing options as a small business owner. Today, banks are just one of the many options for you to finance your bank. You don’t have to apply for loans when you have crowdfunding platforms actively helping small businesses with their funding needs. If you are looking for a business loan from a bank, that’s fine. However, if the bank does not approve your request, this should not worry you much.

The corporate environment is characterized by a number of variables: competition, dynamism, turbulence, complexity and change. All organizations must develop ability to continuously and consciously transform themselves and their contexts. Such contexts include restructuring for optimum effectiveness, reengineering key processes and streamlining functions that are able to provide a source of competitive advantage. The aim is to adapt, regenerate and most important, survive. (McLean, 2006).

For a company to thrive today, strategists must find ways to increase the organization’s ability to read and react to industry and market changes. They must know their goal to boost the company’s strategic flexibility by recognizing disruptions earlier and responding faster.

Strategic flexibility or adaptability can be defined as the organization’s capacity to identify major changes in its external environments, quickly commit resources to new courses of action in response to such changes, and to recognize and act promptly when it is time to halt or reverse existing resource commitments. Being adaptable means leaders must not get stuck in a too-rigid way of looking at the world. The organization must view change as an inevitable and essential part of an organization’s growth, in order to achieve this adaptability.

When there is uncertainty or unpredictability in the environment, managers tend to focus almost all their energy on successfully executing the current strategy. What they also should be doing is preparing for an unknown future. Flexibility stems from the ability to learn; managers tend to overlook the negative and emphasize the positive. They need to understand not only what led to the positive outcomes but also what led to the negative ones. This will optimize their learning experience. According to Ford (2004) four points to foster and maintain adaptability include challenging complacency, giving all employees a voice, encouraging participative work and driving fear out of your group.

The companies chosen for this task vary by industry: a famous automobile manufacturer (Ford) a bank going through a merger (Compass) and a start-up software company (DawningStreams). Ford and Compass have been in business for a long time; it is likely they have changed their strategic plan based on changing forces and trends. DawningStreams is new (established in 2005 and incorporated in 2007). Even though they have not had their first sale and have no staff, the owners have devised several iterations of their strategy.

There is a diversity of stakeholders all that are interested in the activity of business organizations. Emphasis must be placed on their adaptability in strategic analysis and their adaptability in strategic management of business organizations. The organization must have a strategic management model.

Each company might scan the same areas, but for different reasons. Considering technological advances, Ford would prepare itself to lead the market by having various electronic equipment in their vehicles, as well as robotic equipment with which to build them and the supply chain technology to keep all in check. Compass Bank is going through a merge and expanding globally; therefore they will need to keep abreast of communication technology. DawningStreams is a software company; they will need to monitor those companies who would be their competition to ensure their product offers better functionality. All three companies would make sure potential customers would be able to get good information from internet websites and advertisement, which encompasses yet another area of technology the organizations may need/want to scan. In this instance, many members of the organization must be enrolled: upper management and finance, who will determine budgetary factors; the IT department, who will be responsible for the implementation and maintenance of some of the technology; the staff who must be trained to use the technology; a sales force who will sell the technology.

To the outside observer, it may seem unnecessary for any but Ford to scan the (actual) environment when it comes to issues such as emission control, fuel efficiency and hybrid cars. That is true however; Compass Bank and DawningStreams can plan a strategy to be friendlier to the environment (and their pocketbooks) by practicing paper reduction (through the aforementioned technology). Lastly, DawningStreams’ product may be useful as a file sharing service to environmental groups.

With regard to the legal environment, all three must be acutely aware of laws, which affect their respective industry among others. To Ford, legal applies, among other areas, to environmental protection laws and department of transportation safety laws. To Compass Bank, they would abide by the rules of the Federal Reserve (www.federalreserve.gov) and the Federal Insurance and Deposit Corporation (www.fdic.gov). DawningStreams must follow laws as they pertain to the transfer of files, which have intellectual property and also the export of products, which have algorithms. All three companies are global and will need to monitor those laws in other countries, which could effect the strategic planning.

At one company after another–from Sears to IBM to Hewlett-Packard to Searle, strategy is again a major focus in the quest for higher revenues and profits. With help from a new generation of business strategists, companies are pursuing novel ways to hatch new products, expand existing businesses, and create the markets of tomorrow. Some companies are even recreating full-fledged strategic-planning groups. United Parcel Service expects to spin out a new strategy group from its marketing department, where strategic plans are now hatched. Explains Chairman Kent C. Nelson: “Because we’re making bigger bets on investments in technology, we can’t afford to spend a whole lot of money in one direction and then find out five years later it was the wrong direction.”

In such a world we need a planning model that allows us to anticipate the future and to use this anticipation in conjunction with an analysis of our organization–its culture, mission, strengths and weaknesses–to define strategic issues, to chart our direction by developing strategic vision and plans, to define how we will implement these plans and to specify how we will evaluate how well we are implementing these plans. The fact that the world is changing as we move forward in the future demands that the process be an iterative one.

Ford Motor Company – Socio-cultural

Ford Motor Company embraces the socio-cultural changes taking place to allow the company to move in the right direction with respect to attitudes in the society. Two areas that stand out in terms of socio-cultural attitudes would be that of fuel economy and smaller cars. The growing concern by the public for better fuel economy has influenced the company’s introduction of the Ford Escape Hybrid and Mercury Mariner Hybrid. The organization is committed to the hybrid to improve fuel economy as a global strategy to meet customer demands. The increased demand in society for such environmentalism has assisted in the decision for Ford Motor Company to look forward to adding the hybrid feature to the Ford Fusion and Mercury Milan and continue in such a strategic planning direction.

The customers that use these vehicles get a substantial break on their insurance in many states and a tax credit as well while enjoying the increased mileage of a vehicle that runs on gasoline and capabilities for 100 percent electric power. The environmental scanning by Ford Motor Company has allowed the company to be knowledgeable of the fact that the people in the United States are buying more small cars today than any other type of vehicle segment. The lifestyles changes have been monitored and there is good data that shows that such a trend will continue in this direction and the expected growth in this segment will continue. The company has redesigned the inside and outside of the Ford Focus to set the car apart from the competitors in the small car segment while increasing upgrades and features to experience positive outcomes. The direction that the company is taking is based on a competitive advantage and being a leader in the industry. The vehicle line has both a sedan and a coupe to attract targeted markets including younger buyers at an entry level to build upon brand loyalty and customer retention. Ford Motor Company will continue to use the socio-cultural factors to drive the business and enjoy future success.

Ford Motor Company – Legal –

Ford Motor Company with regard to the Environmental Protection Agency adheres to the legal aspect of environmental scanning. Ford Motor Company accepted an award in March 2007 from the Environmental Protection Agency called the Energy Star 2007 Partner of the Year Award in Energy Management. The company is the first automaker to have ever been awarded the award two years in a row. The award has come to be presented due to the commitment made by the company to increase energy efficiency and to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from all of the facilities in the company.

The organization is committed to the responsible use of resources and energy efficiency. The leadership realizes that the environmental protection laws are of great importance and use the environmental scanning to move in the right direction to obtain future success in the company. In 2006 alone the company has improved the energy efficiency in the United States operations by five percent and saving approximately $25 million with enough energy saved to equal 220,000 homes. The effective energy management protects the environment and reduces the greenhouse emissions. Some of the actions taken by the company include replacing lighting fixtures that use 40 percent less energy and using different low-energy, long-lasting compact fluorescent lamps in the properties to include the plants, corporate offices, distribution centers, and research and development campuses. Due to the environmental scanning that takes place at Ford Motor Company the company will use the information that is collected and continue in this direction. New projects for the company include Fumes-to-Fuel that is a system that converts paint fumes into electricity that is being performed with Detroit Edison along with attempting to consolidate the application of primer, base and clearcoat paint applications into a single application to eliminate the need for separate applications and ovens. In addition to the paint booth emissions Ford Motor Company will continue to rely on alternative energy sources such as landfill gas and wind and solar technologies to power their manufacturing facilities.

Ford Motor Company – Technology –

Another environmental scanning tool that Ford Motor Company monitors and uses would be the technological portion. The company has invested $1 billion in the latest technology for flexible manufacturing. The technology that is involved is in many forms to include wireless technology that is installed on the delivery trucks with supplies to the plant as a monitoring status and improved efficiency to reduce inventory. The flexibility of products in the same plant allows the organization to use the same machinery and process for all areas from body assembly, paint facility, and final assembly. The improved efficiency at the manufacturing facility allows for several vehicle platforms to be built on the same line to produce multiple models and quickly change the vehicle mix, the volume, and options based on customer demand.

The technological changes that are being embraced by Ford Motor Company through environmental scanning enables the company to experience huge cost savings through new product launches and 50 percent reductions in cycle changeovers along with waste reduction. Robots are among the technological changes that are being experienced within the organization to include the 400 from the project that are used to weld and assemble the metal body of the vehicle for stamping and assembly. Artificial intelligence in the form of advanced visions systems and laser tracking systems are used to ensure quality through accuracy and dimension abilities. A multi-million dollar training facility is used to ensure that the workforce has the knowledge, skills, and ability to reap the benefits from the new technology that is being used by the company. The training that is administered includes the new servo-electric weld gun system that identifies the perfect center for welding that has replaced the older and loud air-powered system that used a less sophisticated spring system. The environmental scanning of technology that is performed by Ford Motor Company has allowed the company to have positive outcomes in efficiency while remaining a competitive company in the industry through cost savings and continuous improvement.

Compass Bank- Political –

On February 16, 2007, Compass Bancshares, Inc., the parent company of Compass Bank, announced the signing of a definitive agreement under which Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria, S.A. (NYSE: BBV Madrid: BBVA) (“BBVA”) will acquire Compass for a combination of cash and stock. Compass will become a wholly owned U.S. subsidiary of BBVA and will continue to operate under the Compass name. The transaction is expected to close during the second half of 2007, pending customary closing conditions, including necessary bank regulatory approvals in the U.S. and Spain and the approval of the stockholders of both Compass and BBVA.

BBVA, which operates in 35 countries, is based in Spain and has substantial banking interests in the Americas. The transaction will facilitate BBVA’s continued growth in Texas and will create the largest regional bank across the Sunbelt. Upon completion of the transaction, Compass will rank among the top 25 banks in the United States with approximately $47 billion in total assets, $32 billion in total loans and $33 billion in total deposits. In addition, the combined company will rank fourth in deposit market share in Texas with $19.6 billion in total deposits and 326 full-service banking offices.

Compass is a $34 billion Southwestern financial holding company that operates 415 full-service banking centers in Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, New Mexico and Texas. Compass provides a broad array of products and services through three primary lines of business – Corporate Banking, Retail Banking and Wealth Management. Compass is among the top 30 U.S. bank holding companies by asset size and ranks among the top earners of its size based on return on equity.

Under the terms of the definitive agreement, which has been approved by the board of directors of Compass and the relevant bodies of BBVA, Compass will become a wholly owned subsidiary of BBVA. After closing, BBVA intends to merge its U.S. based banking affiliates – including the former operations of Texas Regional Bancshares, State National Bancshares and Laredo National Bancshares – with Compass.

The aggregate consideration is composed of a fixed number of approximately 196 million shares of BBVA common stock and approximately $4.6 billion in cash. The merger is subject to customary closing conditions, including necessary bank regulatory approvals in the U.S. and Spain and the approval of the stockholders of both Compass and BBVA. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2007.

The merger between both companies will be determined by the political factors ranging from implications of laws and regulations to the state of world politics including the consideration of wars which may be going on in different parts of the world. New laws, regulations, tax programs and public policy create forces and trends, which may provide challenges and barriers or opportunities for any company or organization.

Compass Bank – Technology –

Ford is in the process of implementing a laser marking system on its production line to ensure the highest standard on each transmission assembled. The system will be checking for quality on different points on the assembly line. Ford is teaming up with a company called MECCO to implement this process and a trial run of the new system will last for 3 months. MECCO is a leader in its industry when it comes to laser technology. The decision to implement this new laser marking system came because it is more cost- effective and safer than previous ways of marking checkpoints for quality.

Although this process at Ford has not officially been implemented yet, Compass Bank can learn a few different things. It may be a good idea for Compass Bank to do a short trial of online cell phone banking to see how popular it becomes and if it worth all the time and effort, being spent to get it launched. Compass Bank should also consider investing into a company who is the best at what they do, is in the same time zone, and can meet their demands in a timely manner, not simply because they may be cheaper. Finally, Compass Bank can learn that they need to consider what will be most cost-effective and in the best interest of the company over time. Organizing a time line and a list of costs and potential risks would also be beneficial to Compass Bank so they know what to expect and when with the implementation of online cell phone banking.

When completing the global scan one looks for emerging new technologies which may impact any business in any industry. At one time the emergence of the Internet was a technology that was becoming an emerging trend across all industries. Today very new technologies are used to develop information systems at a fraction of the cost and time of processes that were used five years ago. Wireless is a telecommunications technology that may have moved from a trend to a force in revolutionizing the way information is stored, accessed and used across all industries around the world. Some, if leveraged by a company within an industry before competitors use it, may even provide a competitive advantage.

Compass Bank – Competition –

Although mergers may be costly and rather difficult, the value it creates in the end is the desired outcome companies seek. The eagerness to merge is based on several beliefs, those beliefs are, that the performance gains are greater, expenses are reduced, market power is increased, and shareholder’s wealth is also greater than before. The value of a merger is enhanced when the overall benefit is more valuable than the aggregate of two separate pre-merger companies.

In the end, both John and Bernard should consider this before finalizing a decision. When Zion’s purchased Stockmans, there overall value increased by 43 branches. These branches will help performance and brings much more power to the financial market. In the Journal of Money article, Pilloff states “Companies are more willing to acquire others to avoid being acquired themselves.” Keeping this in mind, companies must figure out a cross border strategy.

As part of the broad environmental scan, it is important to identify the internal capabilities of the organization. There are various models for defining capabilities. Most focus on the broad set of intangible assets such as brand, human capital, organizational capital and even relationship capital. Others include the more concrete assets such as available capital, the organization structure, current technologies and information technology infrastructure. In addition to doing a broad environmental trend, Compass Bank needs to do a more detailed capability assessment using any of the models available.

DawningStreams – Competitors –

Business activities are becoming more and more complex to manage, because of distance, time zones, number of parties involved in projects, number of tasks to achieve, multiple prioritizations, lack of general synchronization, insufficient secure and confidential communication channels and growing complexity of IT infrastructures. The use of task list managers has become very common. It is becoming more difficult to keep teams synchronized, to follow and to implement new business processes and to exchange sensitive information confidentially. The DawningStreams software application is aiming at increasing the practicality of daily executive activities. The types of business, which will most probably be interested in our product, are construction (size of network), consulting (need for synchronization), pharmaceutical research (secure exchange of information) and the software industry (complexity of manufacturing).

Many companies have already developed software applications that enable secured communications and file sharing. However, most, if not all, are relying on Microsoft technologies, which prevent them from expanding to Mac or Unix users. DawningStreams is developed in Java, which can be used on any platform, including Mac and Unix. Microsoft has acquired the Groove Company and has released a new version of the product, which can perform many of the functionalities of DawningStreams, but not generic activities (http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/groove/default.aspx). This is our closest competitor by far. More recently, we found, merely by accident, a company called Shinkuro (www.shinkuro.com), which offers the file sharing aspects of DawningStreams but lacks other capacities.

Although DawningStreams will face competition from many existing players, the fact that it will combine a super-set of functionalities in one application, for a very reasonable price, will give it some leading edge over other competitors. If the US patent is granted, the position of DawningStreams will become a niche. Even if the patent were not granted, it would take a profound architectural redesign of Groove (or other competitors) to include generic activities and match the offer of DawningStreams. As a strategy we will monitor the activities of those companies’ websites and understand what they offer in terms of similar functionality and try to ensure we match or best those functionalities to the best of our ability and resources

DawningStreams – Political –

Maintaining the secrecy of information is the fundamental function of encryption items. Persons abroad may use such items to harm US law enforcement efforts, as well as US foreign policy and national security interests. The US Government has a critical interest in ensuring that persons opposed to the United States are not able to conceal hostile or criminal activities, and that the legitimate needs for protecting important and sensitive information of the public and private sectors are met. Since 2000, US encryption export policy has been directed by three fundamental practices: technical review of encryption products prior to sale, streamlined post-export reporting, and license reviews of proposed transactions involving strong encryption to certain foreign government end-users and countries of concern. US encryption policy also seeks to ensure that American companies are not disadvantaged by the European Union’s “license-free zone.” (Bureau of Industry and Security, 2007).

DawningStreams will contain cryptographic functions. Any reliable and efficient cryptographic system requires a central authority to avoid identity theft. Cryptography is a key functionality of DawningStreams. All specialists insist on designing systems using well-studied algorithms and fully tested protocols; novelty is considered a source of risk. The cryptographic layer of DawningStreams will rely on a dual public-private key system. The private key encryption system will implement Rijndael, the Advanced Encryption Standard (http://csrc.nist.gov/CryptoToolkit/aes/rijndael/), the public key system will implement RSA (www.rsa.com) and the hashing function will implement the 256 bits version of the Secure Hash Algorithm (http://secure-hash-algorithm-md5-sha-1.co.uk/ ).

Encryption products can be used to conceal the communications of terrorists, drug smugglers, and others intent on harming U.S. interests. Cryptographic products and software also have military and intelligence applications that, in the hands of hostile nations, could pose a threat to U.S. national security. The national security, foreign policy, and law enforcement interests of the United States are protected by encryption export controls. These controls are consistent with Executive Order (E.O.) 13026, which was issued on November 15, 1996, and the Presidential Memorandum of the same date. (Bureau of Industry and Security, 2007).

DawningStreams also plans to be an international company, as offices now exist in the Netherlands and the US. As part of the strategy, we will ensure we remain compliant by registering our product with any necessary agency and allowing those agencies access to the processes if they feel there is a threat. We will be responsible to monitor (as best as we can) our client base and to put the proper verbiage in our contracts that illegal activities will not be tolerated. We will continue to monitor the BIS site mentioned in previous paragraphs and also sites in the European Union such as the Crypto Law website of legal expert Bert-Jaap Koops (http://rechten.uvt.nl/koops/)

DawningStreams – Technology/Intellectual Property –

The management of organizational strategy requires a comprehensive assessment of the macro environment of the business. Intellectual Property (IP) refers to the original ideas and innovations evolved by an organization in order to haul up its systems and processes. Creation of ideas requires large investments. This necessitates the protection of IP. Benchmarking is the continuous process of measuring products, processes, and systems of an organization against those that are rated best in the industry. It helps in uncovering weaknesses and flaws in the organizational systems, processes, and products. (Watson, 2003)

The study of the global research conducted by McAfee Inc. and MessageLabs Ltd. on security threat in small businesses in the U.S. reveals that 80 percent of small-and-medium-sized businesses (SMB) believe that an information technology (IT) security failure would be damaging in attaining their business priorities. Yet, only few are courageously making steps to fight against infringements due to resource limitations from other business related priorities. The research implies that company size plays an essential part in the way senior management views security. Among the challenges that SMBs face include keeping up-to-date with security solutions and keeping costs low. Small-to-medium businesses’ behavior towards security is very tactical and meets only immediate requirements. (unknown, 2007)

DawningStreams’ relevance to these forces is two-fold. We are a software company—there is an opportunity for us to lose the intellectual property by those who would download and attempt to modify the code. We have competitors who offer functionality similar to ours, however we offer an additional functionality the others do not. It is this ‘specialty functionality’ for which we applied for a patent the United States Patent and Trademark Office. If the patent is granted, there is less likelihood of software piracy or the loss of our IP. Environmental scans should show us if there are other companies trying to do this.

The functionality, which most resembles our competitors’, is the ability to share files. That brings in a different concern with intellectual property- the possibility someone else’s IP could be sent from one of our users to another, as this could seriously damage our reputation, as what happened with Napster. (www.napster.com).

Conclusion

At one company after another–from Sears to IBM to Hewlett-Packard to Searle, strategy is again a major focus in the quest for higher revenues and profits. With help from a new generation of business strategists, companies are pursuing novel ways to hatch new products, expand existing businesses, and create the markets of tomorrow. Some companies are even recreating full-fledged strategic-planning groups. United Parcel Service expects to spin out a new strategy group from its marketing department, where strategic plans are now hatched. Explains Chairman Kent C. Nelson: “Because we’re making bigger bets on investments in technology, we can’t afford to spend a whole lot of money in one direction and then find out five years later it was the wrong direction.”

In such a world we need a planning model that allows us to anticipate the future and to use this anticipation in conjunction with an analysis of our organization–its culture, mission, strengths and weaknesses–to define strategic issues, to chart our direction by developing strategic vision and plans, to define how we will implement these plans and to specify how we will evaluate how well we are implementing these plans. The fact that the world is changing as we move forward in the future demands that the process be an iterative one.

References

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Investor Relations. Retrieved from the Internet on March 31, 2007 at

http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_files/irol/77/77589/bbvarelease.pdf

Cole, Jim. Zions makes small deal, cites growing Arizona market. American Banker, 171(175), 1-1. Retrieved March 31, 2007 from Proquest Database.

Ford Motor Company (2006). Ford Motor Company. Retrieved March 2007,

from the World Wide Web, Web Site: [https://ford.com]

Ford, S. (2004) Adapted from 13 Skills Managers Need to Succeed, Harvard Business School

Press. Retrieved March 31, 2007 from EBSCOHost Database.

Hockenberry, Todd. (2006). Ford implements advanced laser marking. Industrial Laser Solutions, 21(4), 6-7. Retrieved March 31, 2007, from EBSCOhost database

Jacobs, P. (2005) Five Steps to Thriving in times of Uncertainty. Negotiation (p.3) Retrieved

April 1, 2007 from EBSCOHost Database.

McLean, J. (2006) We’re going through changes! British Journal of Administrative Management

54. Retrieved March 30, 2007 from EBSCOHost Database.

Pearce, J. & Robinson, R, (2004). Strategic Management: Formulation, Implementation, and Control. [University of Phoenix Custom Edition e-text]. The McGraw-Hill Companies. Retrieved March 2007, from the University of Phoenix, Resource, MBA 580-Strategies for Competitive Advantage Course Web Site: https://ecampus.phoenix.edu/secure/resource/resource.asp

Author Unknown, Strategic Planning, After a decade of gritty downsizing, Big Thinkers are back in corporate vogue. (2006) Retrieved from the Internet at http://www.businessweek.com/1996/35/b34901.htm

Unknown (2007) 80% of Small-to-Medium Sized Firms Fear a Security Threat. Computer Security Update 8 (4). Retrieved March 30, 2007 from EBSCOHost Database.

Unknown (2006) Strategic Planning, After a decade of gritty downsizing, Big Thinkers are back

in corporate vogue. Retrieved from the Internet at

http://www.businessweek.com/1996/35/b34901.htm

US Department of Commerce (2007), Encryption (ch.10, section 742.15). Retrieved March 27, 2007 from the Bureau of Industry and Security Website at http://www.bis.doc.gov/news/2007/foreignpolicyreport/fprchap10_encryption.html

Watson, G. (2003) Business Environmental Scans for Intellectual Property Strategy (PowerPoint Presentation). Retrieved March 28, 2007 from the Oklahoma State University website at http://www.okstate.edu/ceat/msetm/courses/etm5111/CourseMaterials/ETM5111Session3Part2.ppt#260,1,Business Environmental Scans for Intellectual Property Strategy

Introduction

Contrary to what any Forex “expert” would have you believe, learning how to trade Forex is not easy at all. Forex trading is one of the most challenging skills you can ever learn, which is especially daunting if you are a beginner just starting to learn how to trade Forex. If you’re struggling to learn how to trade Forex successfully right now, you’re probably wondering, “Can a beginner make money in Forex trading?” By the end of this article, you’ll know what you can do to make money from Forex trading right now.

Can a Beginner Make Money in Forex Trading?

If you look at the many Forex websites, forums, seminars and magazines, it seems that everyone is making millions of dollars trading Forex! The thing is, Forex traders love to talk about their winning trades and portray themselves as extremely profitable traders, but the reality is that only 5% of Forex traders consistently make money. Yes, even a beginner can make money in Forex trading, but there is a big difference between making money in Forex and making a full-time income, achieving financial freedom and building wealth through Forex.

What stops beginners from earning

So what’s stopping beginners from making a steady, long-term income from Forex trading? Well, unlike the professional Forex traders working for the big banks and hedge funds, most beginner traders learning to trade Forex are not getting paid a full-time salary to dive into the markets. If you’re just starting out in Forex, you probably have a full-time job that takes at least 8 hours a day, as well as a family and social life outside of that. This means that you have a real shortage of time to get to the level where you can trade like a pro, and believe me, it takes a lot of time and consistent effort.

It takes years of study, practice and real world experience in the markets to learn how to trade Forex successfully and get to the level where you can consistently make money in Forex trading. Not to mention you’ll be taking on, for all intents and purposes, an unpaid part-time job that will keep you glued to your computer while you trade. This is something that will alienate you from your social circle and put a significant strain on your family relationships. No wonder most traders who want to learn Forex trading will give up within 3 months and never make money in Forex trading.

What you can do to make money trading Forex now

So what can you do to make money trading Forex right now? The best shortcut I know is to buy a proven Forex trading system to trade for you. I’m not going to look you in the eye and tell you that you can just go out there and pick any system and make millions because that’s just not true. Winning trading systems are rare and you should choose very carefully. However, if you can find a trading system that works, you can overcome the biggest challenges any trader faces while learning how to trade Forex. You will be able to gain valuable experience in the Forex market, maintain your personal relationships and most importantly make money in Forex trading while learning how to trade Forex.

When you have accumulated capital and income from the operations of your Forex systems and have gained valuable trading experience, you may decide to try Forex trading yourself. Whether you are trading with an automatic Forex system in the short, medium or long term, this is a powerful solution that will allow you to make money in Forex trading, even if you are a beginner.

Being involved with technology solutions professionals see things that could be a real threat to you, your staff or even your business; while the internet can be seen as a wonderful tool (cloud based communications and solutions for example) and all of the other great achievements that the internet has created there is a far darker side to it all; of that there is no doubt and it can be a real threat.

And factually you have in your business nowhere to run or nowhere to hide; sooner or later it becomes a high odd’s bet that employee, you or your company will suffer and in severe cases the effects could even close your company overnight.

Don’t believe this? Read on where examples of actual major threats are shown below. Not worried? You should be!

It’s so dangerous that Deloitte opened a cyber threat hunting service!

But on an everyday level to ordinary SME’s just like your business there really is no amount of anti virus this or anti malware that available that is really going to help; the examples below show you exactly why; things these days have moved on exponentially to levels that you may not believe, but some are revealed that are actual examples highlighting just how bad these threats have become. There will be casualties no doubt but you don’t want to be one of them!

Email has been a driving force that has moved forward communications between every aspect of business that anyone could imagine, from sales, customers, support, management, publicity and many more important areas; but it’s obvious that the underlying technology of email servers are flawed and because it’s now a worldwide transport for communications that’s hard to fix; these communications channels have to be compatible with every other email server in the world and that creates massive inherent vulnerabilities.

In almost every town, city or country, government bodies are working towards combating fraud and other nasty things from many areas, but email is one of the most widely abused platforms there is because of the ease of abuse by non-experts. And if you’re not an expert it does not take long to learn how to be one!

One organisation in the UK is Action Fraud operated by the police and while they handle other areas of fraud, email scams are very high on their list.

But here’s where things start to get nasty. Since the advent of cryptocurrency worldwide fraud has increased exponentially. And in the USA SEC Rejects Bitcoin Exchange Traded Fund because they are very concerned about investor losses in Bitcoin.

However, this article is specific; Bitcoin is being used fraudulently and in both of the cases shown below Bitcoin is clearly involved in the transportation of monies to the perpetrators of these illegal demands on you, your staff or even your business. It’s no joke and anyone ignoring these really bad potential harms to their organisation will sooner or later come unstuck in maybe a really big way. The results could be catostrophic.

The first example shown below included personal details of the recipient that have been removed for security reasons. But this email (that passed every check through a company’s infrastructure) is threatening the life of an employee and should never be ignored.

Note that bitcoin and email addresses are edited for security purposes throughout this article.

HERE IS EXAMPLE ONE VERBATIM:

“From: kristin*********

Sent: ******

To: *********

Subject: How to save themself

Read this warn carefully, since it can be the last in your life.

People are by nature envious. Given the fact of successful development of your business, people (your contestant ) paid me 30,000 Pound Sterling for your head on a stick.

It’s not the first time I’ve done this kind of work, but I’m already tired of these envious bastards and your life will be the last one I’ll take or will not do, it’s up to you.

Under normal circumstances, I would just do the work for which I was paid without going into the details, but I’m going to get away from it and go on a long-awaited vacation.

You have 2 versions for deciding this problem.

Adopt my proposal or refuse.

You pay me 5 thousand GBP for safe your life and you receive all the information about the customer with whom you apply to the police and thus you save your life and the lives of your relatives.

The second option is you ignore my proposal and turn to the police, but by the same token you will only postpone your judgment day, even if I can not do the work, then somebody else will do it, not within a week and say in a month or half a year, but order for your head will be fulfilled sooner or later.

Thus, you will be afraid of every rustle, walk around looking and thinking that you are being persecuted.

If you want such a life, your choice, but if I were you, I would think very well.

Tickets to England have been taken for July **, and you have exactly 3 days to transfer money to an anonymous account bitcoin 1QJNjRmon3iD3RwdjaGomFLHs25B******.

I can check the last time receipt of money before the flight to you, on the **th

In the event of receiving a reward, I will not come to take your life, but will also pass all the information about your customer (Let the bastards get what they deserve) and you can protect yourself, otherwise you know the consequences.

The well-being of the future life depends on your choice.

Think about your life, you family.

on all will of Allah”

END OF EMAIL MESSAGE ONE

The above email is unedited except for recipients details and Bitcoin account numbers. It can be clearly seen in this email that there is a threat on the life of the recipient. While some recipients would simply brush this type of email off, others become extremely concerned; it’s easy to see exactly why. Indeed some recipients will go and pay the demanded money and not think twice. Imagine that a key employee received this email and they completely believed its contents? The resultant downfall of the employee could be extreme. This email threatens the recipients life and mentions their family etc.

Notice that the spelling is incorrect for English on this example (undisclosed but its in the content) and somehow the writer suggests that the email is the ‘will of Allah’. Probably not. But the user identified the recipient was in ‘England’ likely from the email address so the recipient could believe some of the contents.

The above email passed numerous checks throughout the receiving companies infrastructure. Now it’s easy to see if you are tech savvy, but most email users are not. And if you’re a small SME then things could happen that could literally create very serious effects on your business even though the email targeted an employee. But if you’re not tech savvy and a company owner, would you believe the above? and send money? Many will have and that ‘feeds’ the criminals for millions of pounds or in this case $US.

Bitcoin in the above example is used because Bitcoin CANNOT be traced to the ultimate recipient of the payment. This is a major flaw in crypto currency and one reason (irrespective of some suggesting it’s an easy way to make money) you really should have nothing to do with it. Criminals use Bitcoin all the time.

As suggested, you just might not believe the above email if you received it, but there is no doubt that you might well believe the next example because it has information in it that is only known by you!

HERE IS EXAMPLE TWO VERBATIM:

From: “Gloriana Feany”

To: *********************

Date: *********

Subject: (HERE WAS THE USERS NAME AND THEIR PASSWORD)

I know ****** is your password. Lets get right to the purpose. You may not know me and you are most likely thinking why you are getting this email? Nobody has paid me to check you.

actually, I actually setup a malware on the X videos (porn material) web site and you know what, you visited this site to have fun (you know what I mean). While you were viewing videos, your web browser initiated operating as a RDP that has a key logger which gave me access to your display and webcam. Immediately after that, my software program gathered every one of your contacts from your Messenger, social networks, and emailaccount. And then I created a video. First part displays the video you were watching (you’ve got a fine taste hehe), and 2nd part displays the recording of your web camera, yea it is u.

There are two different possibilities. Let us take a look at each one of these options in details:

1st alternative is to skip this message. In this case, I most certainly will send your very own video clip to all your your contacts and visualize concerning the humiliation you will see. Moreover if you happen to be in a committed relationship, how it will affect?

Next choice should be to give me $3000. We are going to call it a donation. In this scenario, I most certainly will quickly remove your videotape. You will continue your way of life like this never took place and you will never hear back again from me.

You will make the payment through Bitcoin (if you do not know this, search for “how to buy bitcoin” in Google search engine).

BTC Address: 18PvdmxemjDkNxHF3p3Fu9wkaAZ********

[CASE sensitive, copy & paste it]

In case you are thinking about going to the law enforcement officials, very well, this e-mail can not be traced back to me. I have covered my actions. I am also not trying to charge you a lot, I simply want to be rewarded. I’ve a unique pixel in this e-mail, and at this moment I know that you have read through this email message. You have one day in order to pay. If I don’t get the BitCoins, I will certainly send your video to all of your contacts including family members, colleagues, etc. Having said that, if I receive the payment, I’ll erase the recording right away. If you really want evidence, reply Yup! then I will send out your video to your 7 friends. This is the non-negotiable offer, and thus please do not waste my personal time & yours by responding to this e mail.

END OF EXAMPLE TWO EMAIL:

This is an entirely different threat. The recipient picked this email up because of a multitude of reasons that were simply incorrect and not representative of their actions on the internet; however, the stated password was about 80% shown (and it would be reasonable to assume the perpetrator knew the rest of the password). This could be seen by many as a factual document and it’s credibility is created in the recipients mind by the inclusion of the password in to the threat.

Imagine owning a SME business that might indeed be a larger business, the threat demanded much more money and the recipient had viewed what was suggested in the email? People do. It could be seen as likely or at;east a possibility that the recipient might well pay the money to the perpetrator through Bitcoin. And again Bitcoin rears its ugly head.

Again in this second email instance shown the email passed all checks and tests in the company where the email was received. So these are real threats to individuals or business.

But consider this; how did the perpetrator get the recipients password? (it was an old password but nevertheless was mostly valid). The perpetrator suggested key logging on a site known for pornographic video and images. But that is most likely not where the perp got the details from.

When reading about companies like Facebook, TalkTalk, Dixons Carphone Warehouse, Equifax, Adobe, AOL, Apple, AT&T, British Airways, Mastercard and Visa, Compass Bank, Dominos Pizza, DVLA UK, Dropbox, Kmart, Hewlett Packard, eBay, Experian, Trump Hotels, Gmail, Vodaphone, Walmart, Morgan Stanley, NHS, Ofcom, SnapChat, Adidas, Macys, Sony Pictures (and the list goes on) is it really no wonder that most personal details of importance (even financially) of individuals and businesses are all over the internet. There is a Wikipedia about these breaches of data that is extremely concerning reading as these breaches involve all kinds of information that will no doubt be available to buy on the internet. With the incredible reductions in share prices at Facebook maybe that might be the start of a mass exodus from those sort of ‘social media’ sites; but of course Facebook is merely one of the very long list of companies that have let you down through not protecting your data properly as the list above clearly demonstrates.

Its easy to see why GDPR has become law and countries will continue to pass GDPR legislation accordingly. Thank all of the companies mentioned above and many more for allowing this ridiculous situation that could be the start of the downfall of the internet as it is known today.

But is it time to go back and retrospectively fine each and every company involved in the dispersal of personal details? Are those companies any less ‘guilty’ now? It seems for many companies that the only thing they understand is when they are faced with very large fines; and even the fines might be irrelevant to organisations like Facebook and Google because large fines seem to be ‘petty cash’ to some of those companies. But shere price reduction wakes them up.

If anyone is concerned about a ‘key logger’ from the above email example getting your information Kaspersky latest offering of internet security includes software that stops key loggers from logging your information as you type.

A third example of fraud covered in this article relates to a company that received an email pro-forma invoice to pay from one of its regular suppliers. One day the finance department received a pro-forma invoice that needed to be paid immediately. The email address and the invoice itself looked entirely unremarkable. The sending company advised the finance department that they had recently changed banks and that the new details were on the invoice attached. Finance paid the £60,000+ ( $US 80,000) invoice.

The only problem was, that the invoice was completely fraudulent, the email address did read correctly unless you looked close (instead of wonderful.com it was wonderfull.com (just made up example to illustrate the methodology used) and the recipient in the finance department saw and read what they were used to seeing. The real question is, how did the perpetrators get all that information about what an invoice should be like, the real suppliers details, etc., their website and email addresses and more; it’s food for thought and make no mistake it can be so easy to allow one of these scams through your business; the chances are pretty high and the consequences could be dire and even bankrupt your business if taken to the extreme.

There is no doubt that the underlying email systems are no longer fit for purpose in general and have not been for some time. Notice that in the first example the scammer sent mail from ‘mail.bg’ and the second one (even more concerning) was from ‘outlook.com’. While the sending email addresses can be ‘replaced’ with any email address upon examination those two shown emails seemed to be real; indeed one of the perps even used Google to advise how to use Bitcoin for payment. But there are multiples of very large companies that every day offer a service but allow their email servers and systems to send out such threatening emails to users. Maybe it’s time to pressure these organisations (outlook.com, gmail.com and there are multiples of others) to actually filter their emails properly as well as the sendersbefore these sort of threats go out and create serious harm that these sort of messages could easily do.

Of course there are millions of other examples of fraud through an outdated abused email system (and other related internet technologies) that could be shown here, but the aim of this article is to educate readers so that they don’t fall foul to these sort of appalling scams.

One company, Network Systems has seen many of these sort of internet related issues and offers a cybercrime service to SME’s to help to create a safe environment for empolyees and business as they work on the internet today.

Hopefully this article will at least make the reader think very hard about how they are going to ensure protection of employees and their company and if nothing else that is a wothwhile objective. Using specialist companies will always help more than by just trying to put solutions in place created by someone without experience in this area and could actually save your company.

Blockchain is a technology that is booming at an incredible pace. When Bitcoin was launched, blockchain technology was limited to cryptocurrencies. Today, more industries are exploring the benefits that come with this technology. Marketing is one of the industries benefiting massively from blockchain. This technology solves big problems facing the marketing industry.

Moreover, every business wants to establish a strong online presence in today’s highly competitive digital market. As such, businesses want to ensure they are well prepared with their marketing strategies. This is where blockchain comes to the rescue as a technology that can change the marketing and advertising industry. Blockchains can be programmed in most programming languages ​​of your choice ie. C/C++, Java, Python, Solidity, etc. If you want to learn these languages, you can find the best programming tutorials recommended by the community on Hackr.io. For example, here are the best tutorials for learning Java. To learn more about Blockchain, one can always refer to several online blockchain tutorials online and get good at it. Read on for more details on how blockchain can drive marketing.

Understanding Blockchain

Blockchain is comparable to a database. A blockchain consists of multiple blocks that are linked together to form a chain. Each block stores information. The information stored in these blocks can be shared with desired users in a peer-to-peer (P2P) network.

Blockchain is secured using cryptographic technologies to prevent data tampering by unauthorized people. The data stored in the blocks follows a set of consensus-based algorithm. This means that once the data is stored by mutual consent, users are not allowed to edit, delete or add data to the blocks.

Every time a transaction takes place, whether it is contractual agreements or the exchange of information or money, the transaction takes place as a block. The block must be validated by all users within the P2P network, and after validation, a permanent digital record is created. Once you’re done, the block is added to the chain.

The technology behind the blockchain made it fully auditable and transparent. It has no central point of authority and also lacks a single point of failure or control. Thus, transactions made using this technology are completely secure and transparent.

Blockchain and the Marketing Industry

Blockchain technology has changed today’s marketing industry. Here are a few ways blockchain can improve your marketing strategies:

1. Target and engage the right audience

When it comes to online advertising, the majority of advertisers struggle to target the right consumers despite having their behavioral data. Most marketers have a lot of user data and still pay exorbitant fees to middlemen involved in advertising. Despite doing all this, they still can’t engage and target the right audience.

Blockchain is useful as an effective means of getting the right audience to see an ad. Blockchain creates a decentralized search engine where advertisers can easily reach their target audience. Through blockchain, advertisers can also compensate targeted customers using tokens when they provide their personal data to advertisers. Every time a person clicks on an ad, they get paid. People only see the ads they’re interested in, so only the right audience is targeted and engaged.

2. Prevention of ad fraud

Ad fraud is increasingly becoming a serious problem for marketers and advertisers. Paying for fake impressions and clicks is a common trend today. Consequently, ad fraud distorts analytics and this affects marketing strategies and decisions.

Blockchain technology is coming to show clicks on advertising platforms in real time. It also helps marketers by renting out their ad platforms and driving quality traffic. In this way, clicks are authenticated, thus preventing ad fraud.

3. Establish reward systems and loyalty programs

Customers never forget when they are made to feel special. Loyalty programs work well with sales because they make customers feel special. Blockchain can be used to create an unforgettable customer experience. Gift cards can be attached to the blockchain, thus creating a secure platform for maintaining and issuing loyalty programs and gift cards.

If customers accumulate gift cards and cannot redeem or use them, they will have a negative brand experience. With blockchain, gift cards can be converted into digital wallets or coins, making it easier for customers to use or redeem them. Additionally, different gift cards and coupons can be combined and redeemed in one transaction. This concept can save marketers thousands of dollars in their marketing strategies.

4. Crowdsourcing and data collection

Good data is extremely powerful for marketers. Despite having dozens of marketing tools at their disposal and trying different marketing strategies, most marketers are still unable to get accurate and quality customer data. Only the customers themselves can provide accurate data.

But how would a marketer get customers to share their data? This is where crowdsourcing and blockchain come in handy as a way to encourage customers to share their data. In return, they get some compensation, making it a win-win situation for both parties. In this way, the data obtained is very relevant and authentic.

5. Decentralization of e-commerce

Blockchain decentralizes the way consumers buy things online. The technology can be used by merchants to create decentralized marketplaces where merchants can sell their products or services directly to consumers without the need to use expensive third-party platforms.

6. Influencer marketing

Consumers tend to believe what other consumers say about a brand rather than what the marketer claims. Blockchain makes it possible to take advantage of influencer marketing. Through blockchain technology, marketers can verify the identity of influencers, validate their followers and receive a guarantee of their investment.

7. Eliminate the need for intermediaries

Marketing involves finance and that means transactions through banks. Blockchain technology comes with digital wallets and eliminates the need to transact through banks. Blockchain ensures that transactions run smoothly and reduces the costs associated with transactions through banks that act as middlemen.

As competition in the digital world continues to grow, marketers must look for innovative ways to boost their marketing strategies. Blockchain technology has proven to be a great tool that can boost marketing strategies. Although this technology is still new in the marketing world, it is already becoming a reliable alternative to other marketing tools such as Google banner ads and pay per click. Harnessing its full potential can certainly benefit markets by creating a transparent, authentic and secure customer experience.