Buying for retail is a demanding and challenging job that requires a creative flair, a strong awareness of fashion trends, life trends as well as good interpersonal and team working skills. Buyers and merchandisers have to ensure that the right merchandise is being sent to the right stores, at the right time, in the right quantities. This takes a blend of forward planning and rapid response to consumer demands. In combination with the other areas of the business, success comes from maximizing profit, which is achieved through anticipating customer needs and responding rapidly to immediate issues. It involves complex data analysis, liaison with the stores operation teams and balancing store stock levels. To succeed as a professional buyer, you will need strong analytical and numerical skills, an interest and understanding of consumer demands and strong commercial awareness. You also need to have an ability to understand and prioritize issues quickly and efficiently. Progression into the Merchandising function also involves the ability to manage change. The better equipped you are in your buying function the better you will be able to adapt to these changes. The best change of all is to graduate from a good buyer to an outstanding one! To handle the complexity of data and to enable you to contribute effectively in the critical role of a buyer, you need the right skill-sets and a right mind-set. Both of which can be learned in The Art of Retail Buying. This easy to read guide is written in a concise & pictorial style with colorful images that enables you to follow step-by-step each function of a buyer. The Art of Retail Buying will inspire you, motivate you and encourage you towards merchandising excellence!
The digital era’s new consumer demands a new approach to PR Inbound PR is the handbook that can transform your agency’s business. Today’s customer is fundamentally different, and traditional PR strategies are falling by the wayside. Nobody wants to feel “marketed to;” we want to make our own choices based on our own research and experiences online. When problems arise, we demand answers on social media, directly engaging the company in front of a global audience. We are the most empowered, sophisticated customer base in the history of PR, and PR professionals must draw upon an enormous breadth of skills and techniques to serve their clients’ interests. Unfortunately, those efforts are becoming increasingly ephemeral and difficult to track using traditional metrics. This book merges content and measurement to give today’s PR agencies a new way to build brands, evaluate performance and track ROI. The ability to reach the new consumer, build the relationship, and quantify the ROI of PR services allows you to develop an inbound business and the internal capabilities to meet and exceed the needs of the most demanding client. In this digital age of constant contact and worldwide platforms, it’s the only way to sustainably grow your business and expand your reach while bolstering your effectiveness on any platform. This book shows you what you need to know, and gives you a clear framework for putting numbers to reputation. Build brand awareness without “marketing to” the audience Generate more, higher-quality customer or media leads Close the deal and nurture the customer or media relationship Track the ROI of each stage in the process Content is the name of the game now, and PR agencies must be able to prove their worth or risk being swept under with obsolete methods. Inbound PR provides critical guidance for PR growth in the digital era, complete with a practical framework for stimulating that growth.
There are nine key reasons people fail at retirement—and they’re not what you think. Are you working to avoid these major retirement fails? Every day, people just like you, people who have worked hard and saved carefully for retirement, make decisions that will eventually crack their nest egg. Just because you added to your 401(k) or IRA plan every year, invested wisely, and amassed significant savings, you are not necessarily home free. Ready or not, your decisions all along the retirement path can positively or negatively affect your financial future. In Retirement Fail, top financial advisor Greg Sullivan shares the insights he has gained over his thirty-five-year career in wealth management to help you identify potential pitfalls and learn how to safeguard your hard-earned retirement assets. Because, contrary to what most people think, it is not poor portfolio performance that usually busts your retirement accounts. Rather, it’s the emotional decisions you make that can cause major problems. Whether it’s buying a vacation home that is beyond your reach, subsidizing your adult kids to a degree that is ill advised, or passing on the umbrella insurance your advisor recommended, the choices you make have an enormous effect on whether you’ll be able to enjoy the comfortable retirement you’ve dreamed about. Retirement Fail: Lays out the nine common hazards that trip up otherwise well-prepared retirees, encouraging you to think through your decisions and set a course aligned with your values and your ultimate goals Goes beyond traditional financial advice, using personal stories to illustrate how others have become mired in—or solved—these financial dilemmas Creates a valuable framework you can use to chart your path or begin conversations with your advisor, so that you can act to protect your financial independence The numerical side of financial planning is one thing—the far more difficult task is looking at the way the decisions we make impact our own future and those around us. Whether you are working with a financial advisor or are going it alone, Retirement Fail shows you the points you need to pay attention to and helps you figure out what your priorities are—and what tradeoffs you may have to make in order to achieve them.
Using the attributes from real managers and directors who have built successful brands, this book offers a practical program of «workouts» that analyze the fundamental reasons behind the success of brands across a range of business areas. It will help brand managers ensure the healthy life of their brands by focusing on the attitudes, behaviors, and techniques that make sustained brand growth happen.
Internationalization is a strategic issue for companies as it is today the central axis for the development of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Market expansion and the growing importance of emerging markets offer new development opportunities for SMEs to use innovative strategies – such as head-deck strategies – to effectively penetrate these markets. This book focuses on understanding these new strategies. Why do SMEs use head-of-bridge strategies in order to internationalize? How do they deploy such strategies abroad? Based on the example of five manufacturing SMEs, which are at different stages of internationalization, this book highlights the main motivations, stages of deployment but also difficulties encountered in this direction. This book is a tool for assessing potential locations and provide managers with a new alternative in terms of internationalization, enabling rapid identification of key stakeholders, adapting their international development plan and anticipating potential pitfalls.
The Multinational Corporation in China: Controlling Interests addresses the question of how multinational corporations control and coordinate their worldwide affiliates, with a fascinating inside story on contemporary China. Focuses on dynamic management control processes by four large US multinational corporations of their China operations. Based on the author’s own research, including personal interviews with senior managers, and discussions with consultants, lawyers, and government officials. Reviews internal as well as publicly available company documents, and books, newspapers and periodicals dealing with relevant industries and with China. Enables readers to understand how multinational corporations are managed. Facilitates the development of a coherent theory of management control.
Drive profitability, productivity, and accountability To create extraordinary lives, we must learn to “unplug” from the constant barrage of disruptions and “plug in” to the tools, strategies, and mindsets that allow us to harness our attention to reach our highest potential—and this book shows you how. Attention Pays spotlights on the power of attention and absolute focus. Personally: WHO we pay attention to. Professionally: WHAT we pay attention to. And Globally: HOW we pay attention in the world—and to the world. In an on-demand, 24/7 society, where distractions cost millions of people productivity, profitability, relationships and peace, it's time to pay attention to what matters most. • Includes powerful tips and tricks increase profitability • Shows you how to achieve maximum accountability and results • Provides strategies to help you productively manage daily tasks • Offers guidance on improving your daily attention and focus If you’re ready drive profitably, increase productivity and boost accountability, it’s time to tune out the noise, focus on what really matters and learn how Attention Pays.
More powerful than strategy, culture, or innovation, discover the one business tool that is the ultimate game-changer! Leading Clarity offers a bold proposal that changes the trajectory of your business and leadership. Today’s business environment is more complex than at any time in history with greater ambiguity, chaos and uncertainty. Too often, individuals and organizations become bogged down with competing priorities and the constant press of daily demands. This tangled mass of noise effectively handicaps every facet of business. This book provides a proven, time-tested strategy that has brought dynamic results to hundreds of organizations of all scope and size. Informed by in-depth research conducted by the Deutser team, made up of business strategists, social scientists, organizational psychologists, innovation specialists and designers, the framework and methodologies presented will align focus and drive organizational performance. Leading Clarity takes you beyond understanding the strengths and weaknesses of individuals and teams, and guides you through a dynamic process that unveils what is most critical and most enduring about your business. Clarity is the key measure of unprecedented success and a vital factor in productivity, engagement, and performance. Now, Deutser is sharing the secrets of his proven blueprint for creating clarity. With these powerful principles and stories of how to put them to work, you too can leverage the exponential impact of clarity. Learn how clarity can help you: Lead teams and individuals with clear direction and purpose Value inside the box thinking and innovation Identify the impact drivers that keeps your employees happier, more engaged and performing at their peak Infuse positivity into your organization’s DNA as a profitability catalyst Clarity is the dynamic force that aligns and connects the most critical business principles. Leading Clarity moves you beyond any preconceived limitations and sets new direction, expectation and pathways for success.