One important question for many businesses is what makes a corporate branding strategy successful? Whether a company is looking to create its own brand or to make it over, ensuring success is a top most goal.
A powerful corporate brand serves to create confidence in your business and your product and service offerings. This confidence should not only be felt by the business owner or the management team but should also be present among employees and, more importantly, the customers. While it may be difficult to weigh intangible values such as confidence, a good way to measure customers perception of your corporate brand is through sales performance. Logically, when you have successfully built an effective brand it will translate to more business – the end goal of any corporate branding strategy.
There are several important considerations in order to develop an effective corporate branding strategy. First, you need to have a thorough understanding of your customers or your target market, your business offerings including your competition. Thorough research on these areas is the first step to identifying how to best position your business.
For any corporate branding strategy to be successful, it needs the attention and commitment of the companys leadership. Confidence in the corporate brand should start at the highest level of management in order to reach all shareholders effectively. If people involved with your business believe in what you offer, this will undoubtedly create an interest in customers. They will want to give your product or your service a try because they associate with your brand a certain confidence that you will deliver what you promise.
Because your corporate brand is a powerful tool, it needs to deliver the right message about your company. That is why you need to plan your corporate branding strategy carefully not only to save time and money but, more importantly, to ensure that your brand is conveying the values of your business as effectively as possible.
If there is one other thing that your corporate branding strategy should have, it is consistency. Delivering the same message about your business every time across all medium – whether it is print, broadcast or the Internet – is the key to establishing a recognizable and enduring brand similar to successful brands such as Coke or Pepsi, Apple, Google, Kleenex, among others.
Lastly, your corporate branding strategy will not work if your goals are only set for a short period. Time is an important element in corporate branding. It took a lot of time for big brands to get where they are, so you need a solid corporate branding strategy that will survive the test of time.
In todays crowded business market, companies – whether big or small – are competing more than ever to deliver their message. As companies launch all kinds of advertising and marketing campaigns to lure consumers, it becomes more difficult for one message to stand out. Additionally, the increasing cost of marketing a new product or service makes it critical for a company to come up with an efficient strategy to promote its business. Companies utilize corporate branding in order to bring out their message effectively and efficiently.
Supposedly you are one of the corporate executives of a large corporation. In a board of directors meeting, it was discussed that the revenues as well as the volume of sales made during the previous month is comparatively lower compared to the revenues and volume of sales made several months ago. The decrease is more than what is expected, and present statistics show that the decreasing trend might continue due to uncontrollable market conditions. Once the problem is not addressed, the revenue of the corporation will suffer and it may even result to streamlining the corporate organization, which will affect most of the employees.
As a corporate executive, what can you contribute to solve the problem of the corporation where you belong? It is your responsibility to get the business back on track as well as ensuring the employees that they still have their work. At this point, what you need is to formulate effective marketing strategies that will address the problem of decreasing revenue and sales volume of your corporation.
Such marketing strategies will serve as the main foundation of your marketing plan. It must contain definition actions that will be implemented to address the problem of the corporation. For instance, you might use the strategy of offering low-cost yet high quality products or services to attract more consumers or convince potential clients to patronize your new product. By using such strategy, there is a high chance that you will be able to compensate previous losses and get the business on its profiting status.
In creating well-sound marketing strategies, you don’t just build it without basis at all. In fact, such strategies must be integrated with your corporation’s marketing objectives, policies, and tactics into a cohesive whole. Keep in mind that you are formulating marketing strategies to effectively carry out the corporation’s mission of providing high-quality products or services at a lowest possible cost yet without sacrificing the profitability of the investment.
Marketing strategies are applicable in all types of investment, particularly on Internet marketing. Given the fact that the Internet is a marketplace with endless opportunities of creating your own niche and maximize any profit that you will earn from it, you need to have effective marketing strategies that will help you achieve your goal of earning more. Keep in mind that there are millions of websites that are competing for success in this lucrative investment. Your Internet marketing business must stay afloat amidst of this tight competition.
What are the Internet marketing strategies that will help you to get more potential customers, earning out of sales that you will make, and declare your Internet marketing career to be a successful one? Take a look on the following and learn how it will affect your Internet marketing business on a positive point of view.
Begin with what you have. What are the possible edges of your product or your business as a whole compared to others? Does it stand out among other businesses with similar product? Being unique will help you get potential clients and eventually make your business a success. Nothing will beat your expertise of developing a product that will satisfy the needs of your target market.
Bring your product and give it a unique image over the Internet. Use the power of words and images in expressing what you are really offering to the public. Make the description of your product as simple as possible yet straight to the point.
One of the keys to Internet marketing success is the “click through” strategy where you will attract a customer to click on your ad and get through your product. The product that you will offer must be significant to the client looking for it, thus the use of online surveys will help you determine the products that are “in” and “out”.
These are just some of the Internet marketing strategies that you can use in your online business. There are still lots of strategies that you can use, but the aforementioned ones are the most basic. All complex strategies root from the basic, thus basic Internet marketing strategies are as effective as the complex ones.
Keep in mind the purpose of marketing getting close or going beyond your return of investment within the least amount of time and the least financial spending possible. These Internet marketing strategies will help you achieve the purpose of marketing, as well as address any future problems that you may encounter along your Internet marketing career.
Jeremiah Patton is a online author and professional internet marketer. For more internet marketing advice visit http://www.jeremiahpatton.com
Build Versus Buy – A Merger And Acquisition Strategy For Information Technology Companies
As a Merger and Acquisition advisor, we regularly dialogue with the top executives in the information technology industry. We have to chuckle when we reach a decision maker with a large IT company and he says, “We have a corporate policy that we do not buy companies.” Does this guy read the industry publications? Is his company’s development group that good? Does he understand the first mover advantage or window of opportunity?
We have gotten past the dizzying array of Internet product introductions, but the pace of technology introduction has again returned to robust levels. Any large company that feels it can keep pace with this force through internal development efforts alone is headed down the path of extinction.
Almost everyone will agree that information technology will be a primary driver of controlling costs in U.S. industry. Technology is our answer to remaining competitive in this world economy. A great deal of the technology development is coming from small, entrepreneurial, nimble, low overhead companies.
There is, however, a huge paradox in the market. The institutional buyers of technology are relatively conservative late adapters. This prevents the expected innovation and commercial success that should naturally follow the innovation and passion of these small technology innovators.
These entrepreneurs respond to a market need and achieve encouraging initial success from the early adopters. They soon hit the wall and are not able to “cross the chasm” from a small group of early adaptors to general market acceptance from the conservative majority. There is little economic value created when good technology is in the control or a failing company and the technology never reaches broad acceptance.
Most of the blockbuster new products are the result of an entrepreneurial effort from an early stage company bootstrapping its growth in a very cost conscious lean environment. Think of some of the new developments from companies like Google. The big companies, with all their seeming advantages have a very high internal cost structure for new product introductions and the losses resulting from those failures are substantial.
Don’t get me wrong, there were hundreds of failures from the start-ups as well. However, the failure for the edgy little start-up resulted in losses in the – million range. The same result from an industry giant were often in the 0 million to 0 million range.
For every Yahoo or Ebay there are literally hundreds of companies that either flame out or never reach a critical mass beyond a loyal early adapter market. It seems like the mentality of these smaller business owners is, using the example of the popular TV show, Deal or No Deal, to hold out for the million briefcase. What about that logical contestant that objectively weighs the facts and the odds and cashes out for 0,000?
As we contemplated the dynamics of this market, we were drawn to a merger and acquisition model that is used in the networking technology market by Cisco Systems. We believe that model could also be applied to great advantage in the Information Technology industry. The giant networking company, is a serial acquirer of companies. They do a tremendous amount of R&D and organic product development. They recognize, however, that they cannot possibly capture all the new developments in this rapidly changing field through internal development alone.
Cisco seeks out investments in promising, small, technology companies and this approach has been a key element in their market dominance. They bring what we refer to as smart money to the high tech entrepreneur. They purchase a minority stake in the early stage company with a call option on acquiring the remainder at a later date with an agreed-upon valuation multiple. This structure is a brilliantly elegant method to dramatically enhance the risk reward profile of new product introduction. Here is why:
For the Entrepreneur:
1. The involvement of Large IT Investor – resources, market presence, brand, distribution capability is a self fulfilling prophecy to your product’s success. The halo of the big secure company helps you cross the chasm to the conservative majority institutional customer.
2. For the same level of dilution that an entrepreneur would get from a venture capital, angel investor or private equity group, the entrepreneur gets the performance leverage of “smart money.” See #1.
3. The entrepreneur gets to grow his business with Large IT Investor’s support at a far more rapid pace than he could alone. He is more likely to establish the critical mass needed for market leadership within his industry’s brief window of opportunity.
4. He gets an exit strategy with an established valuation metric while the buyer/investor helps him make his exit much more lucrative.
5. As an old Wharton professor used to ask, “What would you rather have, all of a grape or part of a watermelon?” That sums it up pretty well. The involvement of Large IT Investor gives the product a much better probability of growing significantly. The entrepreneur will own a meaningful portion of a far bigger asset.
For the Large IT Investor:
1. Create access to a large funnel of developing technology and products.
2. Creates a very nimble, market sensitive, product development or R&D arm.
3. Minor resource allocation to the autonomous operator during his “skunk works” market proving development stage.
4. Diversify their product development portfolio – because this approach provides for a relatively small investment in a greater number of opportunities fueled by the entrepreneurial spirit, they greatly improve the probability of creating a winner.
5. By investing early and getting an equity position in a small company and favorable valuation metrics on the call option, they pay a fraction of the market price to what they would have to pay if they acquired the company once the product had proven successful.
Dave Kauppi is the editor of The Exit Strategist Newsletter and Managing Partner of MidMarket Capital, providing business broker services to entrepreneurs in information technology, software, and high tech. Visit and review our lists of buyers and sellers. The firm counsels clients in the areas of M&A, sales, valuations, “Smart Equity Capital Raises” and revenue enhancement.
A Merger and Acquisition Strategy for Information Technology Companies. Video Rating: 0 / 5
Green IT corporate strategies are quickly becoming an integral part of the corporate world. Viewed as the way of the future, eco-friendly methods are promoted by those who are environmentally conscious while embraced by those who are forward-thinking as well as highly aware of the potential benefits for a company or business enterprise.
With IT infrastructures becoming increasingly complex as technology continues to grow and businesses continue to thrive, the need for more effective green IT corporate strategies becomes critical not only for the environment but also for the successful operation of business enterprises. Redefining data systems and streamlining daily operations will quickly lead to reduced energy costs as well as improved performance levels. Green IT corporate strategies are win-win practices for any business enterprise.
Not only will implementing green IT corporate strategies help your business to grow and thrive, but also, they will help your employees to become more aware of the issues surrounding sustainability, increasing their participation in developing green IT corporate strategies. This scenario in and of itself will increase your profitability potential.
Incorporating green IT corporate strategies for the forward-moving leap in the advancement of a business and its primary goals is the beginning of a successful change of direction. The key to implementing successful green IT corporate strategies is centered on the optimal use of existing knowledge pertinent to the environmental sustainability of all of an enterprise’s resources, products, services, and operations. It involves the identification of weaknesses within the IT sector while promoting and improving on the strengths of this sector.
With environmental issues at the forefront of discussions surrounding sustainable practices, coordinating efforts within an enterprise to foster an awareness of such is critical if a business wants to become successful in developing green IT corporate strategies. Understanding the buzz words related to these strategies will give a company a leg up and a head start in their implementation.
Implementing green IT corporate strategies does not mean sacrificing company profitability in exchange. In fact, quite often, these methods will lead to reduced costs as a result of improving energy efficiency with less hardware and improved IT infrastructures.
Taking action in terms of implementing green IT corporate strategies incorporates a wide array of earth-friendly practices. Goals for recycling e-wastes should be implemented as early in the inception of a business as is physically possible. In fact, reducing the number of servers will provide a more effective use of software and hardware resources while limiting the expense. Implementing virtualization practices as part of green IT corporate strategies can lead to the effective management of information traffic as well as a superior workflow.
Streamlined IT infrastructure is perhaps an essential part of a business’s successful growth. It certainly can lead to enhanced performance, positive public image, and lower overhead costs. Identifying the strengths and weaknesses of existing IT infrastructure quickly points to the areas in need of positive changes. Incorporating more efficient cooking systems will lead to financial savings, less downtime, and an increased productivity. Green IT corporate strategies are the way of the future and they should be part of every business enterprise’s overall plan.
David Howard is a Services Practice Leader at thinkASG where he specializes in storage and server Green IT corporate solutions.
In today’s business environment, the personality and the experience of the chief executive officer (CEO) plays a major role in determining and driving a firm’s strategy formulation and implementation with a view to getting the objectives of a company achieved. For instance, the three CEOs David Joos, Jack Welch and Samuel Palmisano of CMS, GEs and IBM companies respectively greatly to attest to this fact. As Robert, (1998) observes the need for the experience and personality in any company emanates from the need to differentiate a leader’s intellectual expertise and clever responsiveness from the ability to make rational decisions and take decisive steps that promote efficiency and reliability.
Before formulating a strategy and implementing it, there are a number of different levels that CEO must accomplish before making a conclusive judgment which Grant, (2000) puts them as: presupposition, setting a motion, appropriate language selection, logical discussion, and the final decision. This process, as Levinson & Rosenthal (2008) put, therefore calls for an ardent CEO since the strategies that will result will have either a positive or negative effect to the company. The base of all this strategy formulation and implementation seems to call for the CEOs to be great critical thinkers who are able to sail through the aforementioned levels with a view to developing a sure-fire critical thinking model in their strategy and policy formulation.
CMS Energy’s David W. Joos who is 56 years old, has served as President and Chief Executive Officer of this company for over five years now. He has also served as President and Chief Operating Officer of CMS Energy and Consumers Energy and still as the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer in the same company. In 2000 he was the President and Chief Executive Officer. Furthermore, David Joos is a director of Steelcase, Inc., the Edison Electric Institute, the Michigan Manufacturers Association and the Detroit Renaissance Inc. it is no doubt that it is his hard earned personality and the experience amassed over the years, that enables him to formulate strategies that have seen the company’s energy businesses, taking into account Consumers Energy, Independent power production and the gas storage and supplies, remain great assets and sources of huge profits.
Samuel Palmisano on the other hand, since 2002, he has been the Chief Executive Officer of International Business Machines Corp. (termed as IBM Corporation) besides being its President for well over seven years now. As a realization of his career, he has also been the President and Chief Operating Officer of IBM Hong Kong Limited for nine years and also couples as its Chief Executive Officer. Samuel Palmisano has also served as the Chief Operating Officer of International Business Machines Corp. He has served in this career since 1973 giving him thirty six years of objective experience and above all attaching a professional tag on his personality as one who has mastered all the requirements of a 21st century CEO.
IBM Corporation is among the leading companies in computer and electronic production and the financial achievements that Samue Palmisano has bought on board for this company can be overemphasized. He brought to realization successful financial initiative like the IBM credit LLC and the IBM Global Services that have gone a long way in marketing the company far and beyond This Company is rated among the strongest in this area of business venture and competes closely with companies like Dell, Samsung, Toshiba and other computer assembling companies. The experience of the various CEO’s in this company gets the attributes for the successes that have consistently placed this company to not only the position of financial stability but also to realms of quality goods production and supply.
In 1981, GE company was at the brink of downfall were it not for the timely appointment of Jack Welch as the CEO. Borrowing from his experience and personality, Welch was able to reconstitute the business portfolio and aim of GE by setting elimination of bureaucracy as is objective number one. He targeted to ensure that businesses under GE become and remain the world’s number one (or at worst number two) in production of quality services and goods and at relatively low costs. As many researchers have stated in many work, Welch’s strategy was defined and captured as slogan ‘fix it, sell it, or close it’ that still leaves on.
In a short period, GE sold 71 of its outlets and completed a further 118 business top deals as acquisitions, strategic alliances and investments with the proceeds used as sharpening tool for GE competitive edge. He changed the strategic system of plan by reducing management levels from nine to four while at the same time redefining the role of the staff and doing what Hofer, (19987) calls the peeling off of several layers of the then redundant management. He removed the then unnecessary documentation and replaced it with a more informal review of the company’s planning. He technically managed to unleash the full potential of the staff and ultimately getting high levels of production as a reward, and thus making GE a world class company.
To conclude, there are various examples that can be cited that affirm that the personality and the experience of a CEO count in the formulation and implementation of strategies. The ultimate challenge is for a company that aspires to make it in the this ever competitive world to design top-notch recruiting skills that will ensure that they chance upon gifted CEOs like the ones discussed in this paper.
REFERENCES
Grant, R. (2000). Contemporary Strategy Analysis, New York: Blackwell Publishers.
Hofer, M. (19987). Strategy Formulation, West Group.
Levinson, H. & Rosenthal, S. (2008). CEO: Corporate Leadership in Action. University of Carlifonia: Basic Books.
Robert, M. (1998). Strategy Pure and Simple Two New York: McGraw Hill.
Nzomo Aggrey Kavalu is a Reknowned freelancer who has written many works on the net. He is a Linguistics graduate of Moi University, Kenya. Is currentlyly aged 24 and seeks to get commisioned as an online writer.
On International Corporate Philanthropy Day, February 23, 2009, CECP convened fifty-five leading CEOs at The McGraw-Hill Companies in New York City to discuss corporate philanthropy, peer to peer. NBC’s Tom Brokaw led a conversation with Jeffrey Immelt, chairman and CEO of GE, and Carlos Ghosn, president and CEO of Nissan, stimulating a new level of CEO engagement in corporate social investment. This high-profile program allowed global business leaders to participate in a timely discussion regarding pressing issues impacting corporate philanthropy. In this video, Tom Brokaw involves the audience by asking them to respond to two questions. The first asks them to rate their personal involvement as a CEO in their company’s philanthropy and the second asks them to consider how they face the crucial decision on how to best approach their community investments today.
Personal and Corporate Branding: the Overlooked Elephant in the Room
It is one of corporate America’s major clichés. One of my clients Neal Lemlein, a premier entertainment executive and consultant over the last 20 years even begged the question as a professor at USC is Branding B.S? Well Mr. Lemlein, when it’s a word symbolically thrown around as jargon and doesn’t come with a strategy the answer is indeed yes. However, at Ascendant Strategy Group http://www.ascendantstrategy.net we have created a branding firm that builds a comprehensive strategy. Many of our most successful clients are public speakers, CEO’s and corporations.
So what is branding? We think of it through the lens of brand enhancement, defined as identifying and analyzing brands for undiscovered or underdeveloped opportunities that will translate to consistent messaging, increased image and profitability. Brand enhancement assumes all individuals have a personal brand and corporations have a corporate brand, whether they have identified it or it is undiscovered. Another way to think about branding is what you are best known for. Speakers for instance need to spend serious time thinking about developing their brand before they begin marketing, developing their speaking topics, editing professional videos, developing a personal style and their overall image in the industry. I often find too many speakers motivated purely to make a profit or passionate about speaking but lacking focus. Creating a brand strategy helps generate that focus and it allows others to see a consistent message and get a grasp for who the speaker is and what they offer.
So how does an individual come up with a personal brand? How does a corporation come up with a corporate brand? Our answer is by creating a brand portfolio that identifies different areas for branding with corresponding imaging and marketing strategy, public relations implementation packaging, product funnel and revenue portfolio. For example, let’s take Toyota. Toyota has an overarching brand then additionally they have Corolla, Camry and Rav-4 amongst others, all with separate brands and related strategies. Additionally, Toyota is the owner of Lexus, though you would almost never know it. Toyota wanting to reach into a higher-end clientele realized that their brand was associated with affordable cars, entering a vertical market where retail prices go ,000 and up required generating a prestigious brand. Think about the market relevance here of what Toyota has done over the year. Whether you are a college student looking to purchase a cost-effective high gas mileage first car or a multimillionaire looking to purchase a 3rd car that screams prestige; purchasing a member of the Toyota family is a practical option. Toyota utilizes very different strategies to brand their vehicles and additionally the cars often feature very different options and accessories. A purchaser of a Corolla may see cruise control as a nice option while a Lexus purchaser would consider it as mandatory.
Okay that’s cars; let’s talk about a striking example of a successful personal brand. One of the best brand builders over the 200+ years of the speaker industry is that of the recently deceased Dottie Walters. Her Speak and Grow Rich brand is brilliant. The very name of it creates a crystal clear image. Walters brand promises to teach you to speak and grow rich. Additionally, Walters has had the seminar series of the same name traveling across the country and she always carried herself with conviction and credibility. Walters approach was to have a stand alone name, “Speak and Grow Rich”, which draws excitement by itself and has simultaneously been able to create an experience memorable enough to create lifetime consumers that not only attend seminars and purchase books but also become invested in her product funnel and became top targets for major symposiums and additional product offering.
So you have an approach and its not working. Or you’re attempting to create your initial brand. Think about some of the most powerful brands in the marketplace over the past 20 years. Nike “Just Do it” when you hear this it makes you just want to do it, it speaks especially well to the athletic demographic. Snickers promises to “satisfy your hunger” and when you’re in the candy section after a work out or in between meals or at the gas station on a long road trip, those words come to your mind consciously and subconsciously as you believe Snickers has an answer for your hunger.
So is that what branding is about, simply coming up with a hot phrase? Absolutely not, let’s look at Starbucks; the coffee chain doesn’t rely on a phrase but rather an experience. When you think about Starbucks it is about more then the coffee it is a place to meet friends, a place to study or a place to just relax. Starbucks has been the sight many a time for meetings, dates and breaks from the hectic pace of the day. This is what effective brands do they create experiences.
For one of our clients at Ascendant Strategy Group, Jeff Johnson we created two brands, Social Architect and Bridge Builder. The Social Architect brand speaks to Johnson’s ambition to create stable institutions that help people, additionally it captures the spirit of his keynote addresses, Johnson doesn’t simply speak on issues he provides tangible solutions and creates an environment where creative energies flow and the crowd is challenged to make their own solutions. The bridge builder brand encompasses his ability to work with people of very different backgrounds and in his speeches he talks about the importance of people with different views working together. So his brand speaks to his background and the experience that is created by his speeches, when you have this sort of synergy it begins to make you a highly desirable and memorable speaker.
To create your brand think about the things you are best at and what people compliment you the most on. Create a simple message that will stick well. Then think about the products that can be generated including web site, book, and CD’s etcetera. Make sure the phrasing generates an emotional image. Unless you are an already extremely successful speaker the phrasing is critical. If you don’t feel like walking through this process yourself, consider hiring one of the many industry consultants or consider ASG. We place a full team around you; we are an ideas firm in the truest sense and specialize in personal branding. Our service has a strong track record in more then doubling and tripling performance within a 12 month period. We have helped corporations improve their stock performance over 700% and stand ready to help CEO’s and public speakers “ascend to greatness.” If you have any questions please contact me at raouldavis@ascendantstrategy.net or go visit us at our web site www.ascendantstrategy.net
Raoul Davis is the CEO of Ascendant Strategy Group (ASG). He is considered one of the upcoming premier experts on branding and is amongst the first to coin the term Brand Enhancement to describe the firms approach.
Non Profit Organizations Takes an Important Place in Social Service in our Society
The main aims of nonprofit organization or non governmental organization is to help better quality of life in all its realms through community mobilization, participatory governance based on sustainable natural resource management. For profit or non-profit organizations, begins by means of well crafted undertaking as well as vision statements. For this NPO Fundraising had become one of the major sources of finances intended for Indian non profit organizations. These non profits in India need to raise funds for their operating costs and in maintenance of programs to facilitate people and the environment. One of the most significant aspects of doing NGO fundraising is the association between people. These non profit earnings are retained by the organization for its future provision of programs and services to people who are in need.
Now-a-days non profit organizations need to establish their web-presence to present the goals of the organization in regard of the projects which had been completed undertaken by their NPO or NGO and the projects that are currently running by them and success rate of those projects have to placed by these non profit organizations so that can probably attract more people to support your organization. This helps in getting donations, building relationships between these non-profit organizations and donors which are very important so that these non profit organizations can help to bring out the people from poverty. And Programs like supporting child rights, natural resource management, tribal development, environment education, social education for freedom of choice, scholarship / stipend are the most important aspects from which are to be solved by these volunteer organizations. And donating to a non-profit charity does not essentially have to engage spending a huge amount of funds but they do usually require manpower.
It is mandatory for the non profit corporation to make use of their revenues, since all these operating expenses are to serve in the public interest. This is one of the reasons why volunteers present in nonprofit organization are not salaried but they may often receive appreciation for their services, as many non-profit organizations make an endeavor to convey gratitude to their volunteers. And these volunteers are people who take care of all the social welfare programs and take participations in social services. In India there are no. of volunteer organizations taking participation in social service activities through which poverty in India can removed and are progressing for having better future in developing good citizens and to build a good environment.
Carped is this non profit organization, non governmental organization or ngo in India for the promotion of participatory development of marginalized communities in the society.
For more details:
http://www.carped.org
http://www.carped.org
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If you’re experiencing menopause, then you probably remember a television commercial a few years back; (ok … maybe more than a few years back); that asked the burning question, “Who made the salad?” The family sat around the dinner table about to begin their meal. Someone would ask that all important question, and after everyone would look inquiringly at the rest of the family, the salad dressing that the commercial was promoting was then prominently displayed, and the happy little gathering would rejoice and begin eating. Typical family meal, right? Actually, my own family meal regularly mocked that commercial by asking “who made” whatever we were having.
We all laughed back then, but today it has been discovered that salads of all sorts can be the most nutritious part of the day. Certainly many have learned about the weight loss advantages it has when on a diet, but recently there’s been much more information that has been added to the benefits of eating salads, particularly when it comes to dealing with menopausal symptoms.
It’s probably not a surprise that many women are not enjoying the hot flashes, migraine headaches, sleepless or restless nights, moodiness, and all the other symptoms that go along with becoming older. Although some of those same symptoms are uncomfortable and recurring on a regular basis, generally women are not willing to take the hormone replacement therapies that doctors prescribe for them for fear of long-term side effects and cancer. Consequently, they are looking for other, more natural alternatives.
Reassessing what they’re eating and adding nutrients through food changes is certainly a good place to start. So what do salads have to do with menopause? More than you probably realize.
Without becoming technically boring and medically confusing, let’s find out what should go into a good salad to help with menopausal symptoms.
Remember all the things your mother told you about how healthy salad is for you. Unless you’ve developed a taste for them in your adulthood, her constant reminders are probably still ringing in your ears every time you walk past the produce section of your supermarket. You know you should be eating more salads, but in this day and age of working mothers, frozen food, microwaves, and “drive-throughs”, many women have neither learned nor have taken the initiative to begin eating healthier. If you’ve decided to adopt the attitude of ‘better late than never’, welcome to the ranks of all the aging baby boomers who have finally taken the plunge to eat wisely.
Of course you’ll want to start with the “green” parts as your salad base. Rather than using the nutritionally lacking iceberg lettuce however, use romaine, baby greens, red leaf, or spinach. Any of these can go far to give you the antioxidants, magnesium and iron that is so necessary to your optimum overall health. By adding fresh parsley, basil, and tarragon, you can boost your immune system tremendously and ward off any possible “uglies” just lurking around the corner waiting to attack.
Now add your other vegetables. Sure you can use the most popular vegetables like tomatoes, green peppers, cucumbers, and carrots, all of which are certainly good for you, but don’t limit yourself by stopping there. Be a little more creative by adding broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes, zucchini, or asparagus.
All vegetables have vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients that carry benefits for everyone who eats them. What most don’t realize is that each of them has a unique combination of those vitamins and minerals that is not duplicated by other vegetables. What that means then is that each individual vegetable zeroes in on particular systems or organs. Eating a combination of varied vegetables at any given time increases the function of each of those targeted systems, including those that are associated with menopause.
When speaking of your skin, add a little more color to your face by adding a little more color to your salad. Use all sorts of “veggies” to avoid that “washed out” look. There’s nothing like a good, even complexion to help a menopausal woman feel better about her appearance. Besides, don’t you want that makeup to glide on smoothly and evenly without all the dry patches flaking off an hour later?
In addition to the vegetables included in your salad, how about adding the sweetening agent? I’m not talking chocolate here, ladies. I’m talking about the fruits that already have all the natural sweetening any woman could want.
Apple pieces, orange slices, pears, bananas, strawberries, and all the rest of the berry family, will give your salad the sweetest tang. When mixed with the greens of the salad, the sweet juices of whatever fruits you decide to use actually compliment the flavor of the vegetables; so much so, that in many cases any additional dressing isn’t even needed! If you want that fresh new skin color to absolutely glow, add the fruit for a clearer skin tone, too.
Now it’s time to include the protein from the meat category. Actually, there are two groups of protein that you can choose from, or include. For the vegetarian or ‘not-so-meat-eating’ woman, go with low-fat cottage cheese or boiled eggs. For the woman who wants protein in the form of “real” meat as I call it, you’re welcome to partake in grilled chicken, tuna, turkey, or the lean part of red meat.
In either case, adding any or all of these things to your salad will help you feel ‘full’ longer, (which means you’ll not find it necessary to constantly check to see if the refrigerator light is working), and the fiber you gain from the protein is great for keeping your insides on a regular schedule. Basically girls, you can forget about the constipation that often plagues menopausal women.
Let’s talk dressing. What kind you choose can make or break your salad, so before you grab for the traditional type, you may want to grab the “light” versions. In so doing, you can shave 75 to 100 calories off, and reduce the fat content by six to ten grams, before you even take a bite.
If you’d like to take the full advantage of building your salad, make your own dressing. It only takes a minute or two longer to mix but the rewards will last as long as you do. Just mix extra-virgin olive oil, grape-seed oil, or flavored vinegar with a dry seasoning packet or your choice. By cutting the oil amount in half, you can decrease the calories without compromising the flavor.
Now that you’ve completed the bulk of your salad, it’s time to add the “dessert” of it all. You know; those little nut pieces or seeds that just sound healthy in your mouth. However, be careful. Just like those little colorful sprinkles that adorn the top of a double chocolate cake covered with an inch of deep rich chocolate frosting, (ok, so my mind wandered there for a moment); as I was saying, just like too many of those sprinkles, too many nuts and seeds defeats the purpose, too.
By adding just a tablespoon or two of walnut pieces, pecans, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, or pistachios, you can add a wonderful flavor and crunch to your salad to make it a meal instead of an introduction to it. It doesn’t take many of these little nuggets before they gang up on you and increase the calories so much that they reverse all the thought and time you’ve put into your whole salad! So, you want the healthy fat they offer, but without “Tootsie’s roll” around the middle.
When the cookies, chips, or pastry looks good, or you just want a snack to tide you over until mealtime, reach for the bag of salad you’ve already mixed up. Grab the dressing you blended and eat healthy, both for your overall health, and all the menopause symptoms it will help to relieve. Your mom was right, you know.
Dawn M. Olsen is an Advocate for Better Women’s Health through Education. Visit Menopause A to Z if you need menopause support, or just need to find out more about how to approach your menopause symptoms and life post menopause.
In semi vegetarianism, you reduce the amount of meat and unhealthy food you eat, but the major part of your diet becomes vegetarian. You have to exercise your willpower to forget old unhealthy habits . You avoid the red meat like beef, pork etc. more severely, but can continue to eat some amount of white meat like fish, chicken, lobsters and other sea foods. There are many reasons why someone might want to turn to semi vegetarian diet.
So what are the reasons why people become semi vegetarians?
1. Weight Loss- Everybody wants to remain healthy and have a slim and nice body. But due to our bad eating habits, this dream of many people stays just a dream. Many studies are showing that it can really help if people reduce their meat consumption and add a sizable amount of vegetarian food items in their daily menu
2. Vegetarians Transitioning Back to semi Vegetarianism There are some people who have been a strict vegetarian but want to start including meat in their diet. For many reasons a semi vegetarian diet is perfect for them. Eating white meat is considered healthy by many scientists and is a good source of protein.
3. Health Conditions -Going vegetarian can dramatically and positively affect our health, and can also help in losing weight for those looking to remove the excess fat from their bodies. Many people with health conditions want to give up on the non – vegetarian diet and start a healthier lifestyle to prevent diseases in the future. A semi vegetarian diet is perfect for them.
4. Vegetarian Newbie -A semi vegetarian diet is extremely helpful to those who have been a meat eater their entire life and want to turn to vegetarianism. It is a good start to give up on meat while still consuming some amount of white meat to satisfy that craving for meat.
5. Against Animal Cruelty -Those that are against animal cruelty and environmental depletion turn to vegetarianism to be a part of the solution. Converting into semi vegetarianism is a good start, but their ultimate goal should be becoming a lacto ovo vegetarian or vegan.
You should remember that even if you are determined to include the healthy habits in your life, it can be hard to get rid them in a matter of some weeks, some people are good at breaking old habits quicker than others. Old habits die hard, and they have to be killed slowly but effectively. As many studies have clearly shown to people that eating more healthy can improve a persons current health, the concept of going semi vegetarian is becoming more and more popular with each growing day. But this habit of semi vegetarianism has to be slowly included in our lives through some simple steps.
The simple steps to start the vegetarian lifestyle:-
1) Don’t place junk food items in your kitchen or your refrigerator. As they say, “out of sight mean out of mind”, the most effective way to stop eating the meat is by not keeping much of it at your home.
2) When you go shopping items, try to spend as much time in the vegetarian and healthier food sections as you can. Also, you should avoid going to the restaurants and parties where non vegetarian foods are the specialties. Try to keep yourself away from meat, and you can very well succeed in your goal.
3) Try to make new and tastier vegetarian dishes from the available vegetables to keep your interest in the vegetarian and a healthy diet. There are many tasty vegetarian dishes from foreign cuisines such as Indian, Chinese,Mexican and Spanish etc.
4) If you are planning to go a vegetarian diet, be sure to include some protein rich supplementary foods as vegetables contain much less proteins than the meat food items. You can add milk, soybean, pulses, and beans; you can also go for some protein supplements like whey protein available in the market. Nothing is important than good and healthy life.
5) Do keep consulting your physician or dietician when you go to follow a semi vegetarian diet as he can guide you to the best possible way of getting the full benefits of going vegetarian.
Now that you have decided to turn into a semi vegetarian, you should proud of yourself for taking a big step towards your goal. For whatever reason you have chosen to become a semi vegetarian, you should not give up on your goals and be persistent until you succeed.
To get more free tips on how to become a vegetarian or to start the vegetarian lifestyle to go www.vegetariannewbie.com and claim your special free report “10 Essential Facts For The Vegetarian Newbie”
If you’re experiencing menopause, then you probably remember a television commercial a few years back; (ok … maybe more than a few years back); that asked the burning question, “Who made the salad?” The family sat around the dinner table about to begin their meal. Someone would ask that all important question, and after everyone would look inquiringly at the rest of the family, the salad dressing that the commercial was promoting was then prominently displayed, and the happy little gathering would rejoice and begin eating. Typical family meal, right? Actually, my own family meal regularly mocked that commercial by asking “who made” whatever we were having.
We all laughed back then, but today it has been discovered that salads of all sorts can be the most nutritious part of the day. Certainly many have learned about the weight loss advantages it has when on a diet, but recently there’s been much more information that has been added to the benefits of eating salads, particularly when it comes to dealing with menopausal symptoms.
It’s probably not a surprise that many women are not enjoying the hot flashes, migraine headaches, sleepless or restless nights, moodiness, and all the other symptoms that go along with becoming older. Although some of those same symptoms are uncomfortable and recurring on a regular basis, generally women are not willing to take the hormone replacement therapies that doctors prescribe for them for fear of long-term side effects and cancer. Consequently, they are looking for other, more natural alternatives.
Reassessing what they’re eating and adding nutrients through food changes is certainly a good place to start. So what do salads have to do with menopause? More than you probably realize.
Without becoming technically boring and medically confusing, let’s find out what should go into a good salad to help with menopausal symptoms.
Remember all the things your mother told you about how healthy salad is for you. Unless you’ve developed a taste for them in your adulthood, her constant reminders are probably still ringing in your ears every time you walk past the produce section of your supermarket. You know you should be eating more salads, but in this day and age of working mothers, frozen food, microwaves, and “drive-throughs”, many women have neither learned nor have taken the initiative to begin eating healthier. If you’ve decided to adopt the attitude of ‘better late than never’, welcome to the ranks of all the aging baby boomers who have finally taken the plunge to eat wisely.
Of course you’ll want to start with the “green” parts as your salad base. Rather than using the nutritionally lacking iceberg lettuce however, use romaine, baby greens, red leaf, or spinach. Any of these can go far to give you the antioxidants, magnesium and iron that is so necessary to your optimum overall health. By adding fresh parsley, basil, and tarragon, you can boost your immune system tremendously and ward off any possible “uglies” just lurking around the corner waiting to attack.
Now add your other vegetables. Sure you can use the most popular vegetables like tomatoes, green peppers, cucumbers, and carrots, all of which are certainly good for you, but don’t limit yourself by stopping there. Be a little more creative by adding broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes, zucchini, or asparagus.
All vegetables have vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients that carry benefits for everyone who eats them. What most don’t realize is that each of them has a unique combination of those vitamins and minerals that is not duplicated by other vegetables. What that means then is that each individual vegetable zeroes in on particular systems or organs. Eating a combination of varied vegetables at any given time increases the function of each of those targeted systems, including those that are associated with menopause.
When speaking of your skin, add a little more color to your face by adding a little more color to your salad. Use all sorts of “veggies” to avoid that “washed out” look. There’s nothing like a good, even complexion to help a menopausal woman feel better about her appearance. Besides, don’t you want that makeup to glide on smoothly and evenly without all the dry patches flaking off an hour later?
In addition to the vegetables included in your salad, how about adding the sweetening agent? I’m not talking chocolate here, ladies. I’m talking about the fruits that already have all the natural sweetening any woman could want.
Apple pieces, orange slices, pears, bananas, strawberries, and all the rest of the berry family, will give your salad the sweetest tang. When mixed with the greens of the salad, the sweet juices of whatever fruits you decide to use actually compliment the flavor of the vegetables; so much so, that in many cases any additional dressing isn’t even needed! If you want that fresh new skin color to absolutely glow, add the fruit for a clearer skin tone, too.
Now it’s time to include the protein from the meat category. Actually, there are two groups of protein that you can choose from, or include. For the vegetarian or ‘not-so-meat-eating’ woman, go with low-fat cottage cheese or boiled eggs. For the woman who wants protein in the form of “real” meat as I call it, you’re welcome to partake in grilled chicken, tuna, turkey, or the lean part of red meat.
In either case, adding any or all of these things to your salad will help you feel ‘full’ longer, (which means you’ll not find it necessary to constantly check to see if the refrigerator light is working), and the fiber you gain from the protein is great for keeping your insides on a regular schedule. Basically girls, you can forget about the constipation that often plagues menopausal women.
Let’s talk dressing. What kind you choose can make or break your salad, so before you grab for the traditional type, you may want to grab the “light” versions. In so doing, you can shave 75 to 100 calories off, and reduce the fat content by six to ten grams, before you even take a bite.
If you’d like to take the full advantage of building your salad, make your own dressing. It only takes a minute or two longer to mix but the rewards will last as long as you do. Just mix extra-virgin olive oil, grape-seed oil, or flavored vinegar with a dry seasoning packet or your choice. By cutting the oil amount in half, you can decrease the calories without compromising the flavor.
Now that you’ve completed the bulk of your salad, it’s time to add the “dessert” of it all. You know; those little nut pieces or seeds that just sound healthy in your mouth. However, be careful. Just like those little colorful sprinkles that adorn the top of a double chocolate cake covered with an inch of deep rich chocolate frosting, (ok, so my mind wandered there for a moment); as I was saying, just like too many of those sprinkles, too many nuts and seeds defeats the purpose, too.
By adding just a tablespoon or two of walnut pieces, pecans, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, or pistachios, you can add a wonderful flavor and crunch to your salad to make it a meal instead of an introduction to it. It doesn’t take many of these little nuggets before they gang up on you and increase the calories so much that they reverse all the thought and time you’ve put into your whole salad! So, you want the healthy fat they offer, but without “Tootsie’s roll” around the middle.
When the cookies, chips, or pastry looks good, or you just want a snack to tide you over until mealtime, reach for the bag of salad you’ve already mixed up. Grab the dressing you blended and eat healthy, both for your overall health, and all the menopause symptoms it will help to relieve. Your mom was right, you know.
Dawn M. Olsen is an Advocate for Better Women’s Health through Education. Visit Menopause A to Z if you need menopause support, or just need to find out more about how to approach your menopause symptoms and life post menopause.
www.Innovative-Results.com This is a great place to start for anyone looking to start eating health. A 4 minute entire grocery tour of what to eat and what to avoid by an orange county personal trainer. Start grocery shopping the correct way.
