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A Few Life Lessons When I was in my early twenties (just before Twitter, and Google-- still thinking about the Stock Market Engine and how to make money using technology), I learned a few life lessons that have really shaped me over time. In summer of 1991, just after the first Gulf War in Iraq, I decided to join the Military. The economy was bad, and I just got fired from a clothing retail store for drinking on the job. At the time, it was a costly mistake considering the economy; I had succumbed to peer pressure and I paid for it. However, as it turns out, that lapse in judgment wasn't as bad as I might have thought. In fact, that blunder changed my life, but that's wasn't the life lesson that I learned… Being a Private Sucks After passing the initial phases of becoming a "recruit" in the Army, I entered what was called at the time, the delayed entry program within the Army Reserves; which means, I didn't get shipped off to boot camp immediately, I waited a few months before I started training. In between the time I signed up and the time I actual went in to the service, I preformed a myriad of odd jobs to keep myself busy, mostly in the retail sector. After my basic and advanced military training was complete, I reported to my assignment in Baltimore Maryland and perform the said functions of a Private in the Army Reserves. It didn't take long for me to realize that being a Private sucked and I wanted more in life; so, I decided to give higher education another try, enrolled in a R.O.T.C program at the local University and become a full time Active Duty Army Officer. Before my Training as an Officer, I looked for jobs that would help offset my college expenses; telemarketing, construction, retail, anything that would pay the bills but none of them were very rewarding or helpful in the bill department, until I became an ice-cream salesman! Within the ice-cream salesman business there were numerous trucks dedicated to selling a variety of ice-cream, candy and junk food products to various "clientele" that were willing to buy it. The job seems easy enough, driving beat-up trucks into neighborhoods during hot sweltering days and then just again after the dinner hour, playing god awful ragtime music over and over again, enticing kids in the neighborhood to take a break from their fun at the pool. The job was easy; and it paid well and in cash. No credit cards or receipts in this business, which is a good thing and a bad thing, if you are not paying attention. How to Identify Your Target Audience After a week or so of selling ice-cream and junk to kids and adults, in order to pay for college, I learned one of the most important and interesting lessons in my life. The lesson: how to identify your target audience. Keep in mind; this is easy to do when your customer has a physical presence, but not so easy when your customer is on the web. It was fascinating to me, that a certain demographic of people with the least amount of income, bought the most amounts of expensive junk food and ice-cream. Conversely, the high income demographic bought the least amount of junk food from the ice-cream man. And, as a result, the ones who were targeted the most, were the ones the salesmen made the most money from, and these were the ones with the least amount of money to spend: the poor. In-fact, somewhat shamefully, we (the other ice-cream salesmen) would fight for the rights to sell this crap to the poor. And, as it turns out, seniority rule and the rest fought for the leftovers, because, for some, this was their livelihood, but for me, I just needed enough money to get though college. I'm not greedy. They Target the Poor! After one summer of working in southern Maryland as an ice-cream salesman, selling rubbish to the poor, I made enough money to live like a king for a few years at the university in Baltimore, Maryland. Bottom line: the poor love and are attracted to expensive, flashy, sugar-ridden candy, soda, chips and ice-cream, or anything that will make their world a little better for a short amount of time… and who can blame them? But, the middle and upper income rich kids were trained not to indulge in the fatty and pricey short-term stairway to heaven. I think we all know this intuitively, we see it on the television all the time, however, until you see it up and close and person, it may not shape you in a way that it did me, profoundly. Buy low, sell high. The Dividend Chaser is a tool that lets you to find stocks with above average Dividends. The "Too Easy" button is a tool that finds good stocks that are being affected by current events. http://www.stockmarketengine.com
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