Value Line Investment Survey ? Save 50% Off Your Subscription

Value Line Investment Survey is one of the most trusted source of investment ratings for institutional and individual investors.

Value Line provides many measures for each stock but its flagship rating is the Timeliness. Timeliness ranks 1700 stocks based on a combined score of Earning growth, Earning surprise and price momentum. Stocks are given a Timeliness rank between 1 and 5 with 1 being best and 5 being worst. Stocks with Timeliness rank #1 are expected to outperform the market in the next 6 months to 1 year.

A portfolio made of stocks with Timeliness rank #1 (include 100 stocks) would have you earned 14.1% from 1965 to 2005 while the S&P500 earned 6.7% during the same period. No wonder Value Line is so popular.

Now, Value Line carries a hefty price: it costs almost 600$ per year and their service is therefore not accessible to many individual investors.

How to save 50% off the Value Line subscription.

The stock market has generally performed much better during the 2nd part of the US presidential election cycle that spans over 4 years (the election taking place at the end of year 4). Here are the average returns of a portfolio made of stocks with Value Line Timeliness rank #1 over the 4 years of the presidential cycle:

Value Line Timeliness Rank #1 performances during the presidential cycle:

- Year 1: 11.7% (standard deviation: 21.1%)
- Year 2: 03.4% (standard deviation: 18.1%)
- Year 3: 31.9% (standard deviation: 16.3%)
- Year 4: 17.2% (standard deviation: 19.3%)

As you can see, it is not worth investing in Value Line in years 1 and 2 of the presidential election cycle. The reward to risk ratio is very low: risk (standard deviation) is high compared to the return. You?ll perform as well by simply investing in an index fund mirroring the market during this period, or even just going to Money Markets or Bonds. However, in years 3 and 4, then Value Line Timeliness really stands out.

Here you go: you can slash 50% off your Value Line subscription by just subscribing in years 3 and 4 of the election cycle. The next year 3 is 2007.

One more tip: many stock market strategies are highly correlated. Investing in a portfolio of stocks with Value Line Timeliness rank 1 has a correlation of 85% with the S&P500. Therefore combining Value Line strategy with most successful Market Timing systems ? such as the presidential cycle ? will work.Jacky Pandion is a DIY investor and founder of http://www.mechanical-investing.com. He advocates a disciplined approach to investing in the stock market. Vist http://www.mechanical-investing.com for more Stock Investing strategies including Stock Picking, Market Timing.

ort For Organ Donation High: Survey

Family consent key

(NC)-Canadians overwhelmingly support the idea of organ donation. A 2001 survey by the Environics Research Group of more than 1,516 Canadians revealed that 96% of Canadians support the idea of organ and tissue donation. They also have a fairly good knowledge of the official way to express their intention to donate with their provinces and territories.

A total of 46% of Canadians have signed their cards or registered their intentions to be a donor with their province or territory. However, 45% remain uncommitted. Only 9% say they have decided not to donate.

89% of those who have signed up (46%) have also discussed their wishes with their families. The challenge facing Canada is to get the 45% who remain uncommitted to take the decision, sign up and then tell their families. It is a life-saving, life-improving decision and it could be your last.

For more information on organ and tissue donation and how you can donate, visit www.healthcanada.ca/organandtissue on the Internet.

News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web.

News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial "fill" items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

An online survey will kickstart your business for 2003 - here's how and why

Online surveys are simple to make, generate excellent response rates and will give you new ideas, insights and directions for your business. Here are 5 essential tips for successful surveys.
How many times have you sat down and thought 'I need more business - should I be offering more products? Are my prices scaring people off? Do I need to do raise my profile?...' etcetera. Rather than getting out your crystal ball, there's only one sure-fire way of finding out what people think of you - and that's to ask them. Before the internet, a customer survey was a pretty tedious task - you had to design your questions, print it out, send the survey to your customers or prospects and hope that they would take the time and trouble to fill it in and mail it back to you. Weeks later, if you were lucky, you would have a little pile of replies to go through and results to collate and interpret. It was more than likely that the sample wasn't large enough to be meaningful, so the time and expense was hard to justify.

With the internet, you now have the possibility of conducting online surveys. And if you're not already, then this is the time to get started. Here are 5 top survey tips to get your business kickstarted for 2003.

1. Design questions carefully around what it is you wish to know

Sounds obvious, doesn't it? But it's easy to be drawn into 'survey cliches' - asking for things such as age and location, just because that's what surveys always seem to ask. Each of your questions should have a rationale - why do you want to know that? To what use will you put that information? And pare it down to as few questions as possible. Finding out 5 key facts is more useful than 20 general ones - and remember the longer your questionnaire the more likely your respondents will be to drop out and leave it incomplete.

2. Unless you are a real techie, use an ASP service

There's no need to sweat over Perl scripts and importing tab-delimited files. There are many services which allow you to create online surveys very simply, store the responses in a database and provide you with the results in user-friendly graphical format. You are given the code to insert into your webpage or email which takes the respondent to the survey. You can usual customise the look of the survey, and set the criteria so that people can only fill it in once, for example. Some of the solution providers are more pricey than others, but one that it easy to use and reasonably priced is SurveyMonkey. Their basic service is free.

3. Online surveys enjoy far higher rates of response than offline surveys

Clicking through an online survey really does only take a few minutes. People are simply more likely to fill it in when it's this straightforward. If you combine your survey with a small incentive or 'thank you', or entry into a prize draw, response rates climb even higher.

4. Send your survey to your email subscribers and encourage it to be forwarded

Permission-only email lists already enjoy higher open and click-through rates than unsolicited email. Utilise the goodwill of your list and encourage (or incentivise) them to forward the email to a friend. That way the link to the survey is likely to reach more people with similar interests/tastes.

5. Remember to thank them - and act on the information gathered

The final question should be followed by a thank-you page. Don't forget to gather respondents' email addresses, and permission to contact them again with future surveys. Survey results should be acted on, not sat on for months. Your customers have gone to the trouble of giving you feedback, so the worst thing you can do is to appear to ignore it. You could mention some of the results in your email newsletter, on your website, or in a press release - together with how you are answering the issues raised. Your survey results may even be newsworthy. But if you do make this information public, be sure to respect your respondents' privacy and not mention individual names.

One thing's for sure - you'll learn a lot, and the knowledge you gain will help rejuvenate your business in 2003. Good luck!

Robin Houghton advises small businesses and non-profits on how to make the most of their marketing budget, specialising in online. With a masters degree in Digital Media, she also writes for a variety of offline and online media.

Forget 'I need hits' and start thinking 'how do I get customers?'Robin Houghton

Why search engine marketing should be about attracting customers, not 'driving traffic'. Includes a case study illustrating how 'visitor hijacking' doesn't work.
I've always had a problem with standard online marketing industry terms such as 'driving traffic' or 'generating hits'. When we use search engines we have a goal in mind. We are looking for an answer and the majority of us don't want to be hijacked, hoodwinked or driven down a blind alley. Think of how you use the Yellow Pages. How would you feel if you called what you thought was a plumber, only to be told 'Sorry, we can't mend your burst pipe - but can we interest you in a swimming pool?'

On the internet, this happens all the time when we follow search engine results that appear to be what we are looking for. Whose fault is it when they are not? The accuracy of these results (or lack of it) is for the most part down to website owners. Whether it's due to stealth tactics or plain sloppiness, we are constantly being misled, and certain industries seem more prone to it than others. I have a particular bone to pick with travel sites. Since travel was one of the earliest industries to embrace e-commerce, researching and booking travel online should be a stress-free experience ... shouldn't it?

Case study: searching for ferry information online

September 2002: We wanted to take the car on a day trip to France to stock up on wine in time for Christmas. We preferred the Newhaven-Dieppe route because Newhaven is only a 15 minute drive from home. We knew that during the winter months the Seacat catamaran didn't run - but we HAD seen a big yellow ferry in port. So all I needed to know was whether there was a ferry operating throughout the winter, and the times/prices of crossings.

Solution: go online and search for 'Newhaven-Dieppe ferry crossings' on Google.co.uk

The first result is: 'P & O Stena Line' - hmm, didn't think POSL covered the Newhaven-Dieppe route? Still, I click to see. I'm faced with a page saying 'Welcome to POSL', a menu of 10 links across the top and 13 links down the side, a large ad for a sales promotion blinking at me plus a booking form centre page. No indication of where I am in the site. After reading all the menu links, none of which appear to be what I'm looking for, I decide to just try going through the booking process and see what happens. The first drop down menu is 'Departing from' - and the choice is Dover, Calais or Zeebrugge. Nul points.

Back to Google - 2nd result: Newhaven to Dieppe Ferry Tickets - http://www.cross-channel-ferry-tickets.co.uk/newhaven-dieppe/

This sounded promising. I clicked on the link and then a second link to 'book Newhaven to Dieppe Ferry tickets' which brought up a booking form. This time, although the route is available, I have to specify an exact date, the make of car and even the registration number before I can get a quote. The result? 'Sorry, we were unable to find any matches for your search, please try again.' Does that mean there's only one ferry a week, and I happened to ask for a day when it didn't run? Does it mean there is no crossing all winter? Or that this agent only deals with Seacat and no other operators? I've no way of knowing.

Back to Google - the next two results turn out to be short break operators selling 3 or 5 day packages - not what I'm after.

Next up was 'Ferry Crossings :: SUSU Travel :: Travel at its finest' - but it brought up only a 'Error 404 - this page cannot be displayed' message. Grrr.

Finally I try clicking on 'Yahoo! Travel Deals Ferry Savers' - this took me to a page with a list of current deals from a variety of operators. One is 'Newhaven - Dieppe, standard return for car and up to 9 passengers - 318 book before 30/9/02' Although this seems expensive, I click on it anyway and am taken to the homepage of Ferrysavers.com. This lack of a specific 'landing page' is particularly annoying since it means starting the search all over again. And, - surprise, surprise - the advertised fare is not to be found.

The result: half an hour later, no one had answered my question, and my negative impression of online travel agencies in general had been reinforced. The internet is my profession - so if I can't navigate my way through the murky online travel waters successfully, who can?

What we can learn from the mistakes of others

In an ideal world, good search engine marketing helps both advertisers and customers. It matches up needs with solutions, it filters out timewasters (from an advertiser's point of view) and it makes searching a simple and fruitful task. Higher standards of professionalism would up the credibility and reliability of the internet for many people. It would encourage more of them to actually use it, more often, and for humdrum, daily tasks.

I can only plea to advertisers: re-craft your search engine key phrases and descriptions so as not to waste people's time. Make sure search results link to the relevant pages on the destination site, not the homepage. Give visitors a site map. It makes sense not only from the customers' point of view, but from a commercial one also.

C'mon, folks - this is 2003! Why are so many websites still applying mediocre and unprofessional tactics? I for one am looking forward to the day when website owners think less about 'I need hits' and more about 'I need customers'.

Robin Houghton advises small businesses and non-profits on how to make the most of their marketing budget, specialising in online. With a masters degree in Digital Media, she also writes for a variety of offline and online media.

Paid Surveys and Focus Groups - The Secret to Free Money

Paid surveys and focus groups are a little known way for individuals to make money for free. There are businesses ranging from Fortune 500 companies to advertising agencies and market research organizations who look for the opinions of regular consumers and business professionals for their product lines or customers. What is great is that a good number of them pay cash to the participants and it is free of charge to join these types of studies. Paid surveys are generally given online and can range from $2.00 to $70.00 for each survey completed. Focus groups are closely observed groups of participants and mostly pay from $50.00 to $200.00 depending on the topic for 1 or 2 hours of your time.

Anyone can join up with these organizations that provide survey opportunities, and people with specialized business professional backgrounds such as IT, business management, law, accounting, etc. are ideal for this line of research. Average consumers who drink coffee, taste ice cream, buy power tools or electronic products, watch television or own a certain type of car can benefit from numerous surveys and focus groups. The possibilities for different types of surveys being offered are as endless as there are ways to create and market products to the public. The Internet is your best source of finding places to join for either one of these kinds of surveys, free of cost. Some businesses advertise to do all the footwork for you and will charge a fee for doing it. So it's a good idea to learn as much as possible on these services in order to understand what you will receive if you decide to pay for the information.

The paid surveys are mostly given over the Internet. With this method you will receive e-mail most of the time with links to the survey being given. Because they are given over the Internet, it will take generally between 2 to 4 weeks for your honorarium check to arrive either through the mail or by an online payment solution like PayPal. Signing up with as many survey organizations as you can find can result in a stream of invitations. When filling out their online forms, give as much information about yourself and your background to maximize your chances. And if you are married, have your spouse sign up if they are interested. Sometimes if one doesn't qualify for a survey, the other may. Plus when filling out the forms for signing up, if they ask if you can be contacted by phone for opportunities, say yes. This can help to expose you to higher paying focus groups.

A focus group survey is generally performed with a number of participants consisting from 5 to 50 people that meet in a designated place to give a more in-depth opinion on tasting food, driving SUV's, drinking certain brands of water or the like. Sometimes they pay cash on the spot after you are done. One can sign up online with some of the focus groups that have websites. There are times that you may have to call the centers that offer focus groups to let them know you want to participate. (If you are in a rural area, a long drive may be what it takes to get you involved so be sure the money is worthwhile to you.) And remember that most of the time they call you at home, so if they do call take them up on the offer. You will enjoy it and get paid too!
Tom Howze is a webmaster for 9 sites that relate to 2005 World Series of Poker and World Poker Tour events, updates and information on how to gamble for free