Wall Street Uneasy in Face of Government Shutdown

J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press Clouds over the Capitol, where members of Congress were at odds over a bill to avert a shutdown.

Wall Street has wearily grown accustomed in recent years to periodic market flare-ups caused by fiscal fights in Washington.

But the current battle — and the looming threat of a government shutdown on Tuesday — is beginning to cause greater unease than past political disputes and are rattling markets on Monday. Stocks in Japan closed down 2.06 percent on Monday. In the United States, stocks were lower in early trading on Monday.

For investors, the chief fear is that a government shutdown would set the stage for a more momentous battle over the so-called debt ceiling. If there is no agreement to raise the borrowing limit by mid-October, the government will not be able to issue more bonds and could default on its outstanding borrowing.

Markets Slide on U.S. Budget Moves While Congress in the past has waited until the last minute to raise the debt ceiling, a growing number of analysts say that the political disagreements appear to be more intractable this time around.

“The threat of a default, however remote, seems to be on the table now,” said Gregory R. Valliere, the chief political strategist at Potomac Research Group.

Still, there have been government shutdowns in the past and the markets have quickly recovered. At the end of last year, Congress approved legislation that averted a series of tax increases and budget cuts known as the fiscal cliff. Stocks fell sharply in the days leading up to that agreement, but they rebounded quickly.

And in past debates over budget issues, investors were faced with other big crises that heightened the sense of risk, including the European debt crisis and a potential double-dip recession in the United States.

Since the beginning of this year, most other serious threats to the global economy have faded and Wall Street has habituated to relatively smooth sailing. The benchmark Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index is up over 18 percent this year.

A Park Service police officer at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington during a shutdown in 1995. Charles Tasnadi/Associated Press A Park Service police officer at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington during a shutdown in 1995. In recent weeks, the primary concern among market participants has been the Federal Reserve and its decision about whether to slow down, or taper, the bond-buying programs that have been used to stimulate the economy.

The Fed’s decision to hold off on tapering was still the main topic of conversation on trading desks at the beginning of last week. But as the week went on, more and more investors began to tune in to the standoff between House Republicans and Senate Democrats. Stocks fell on Friday to close out the first down week in a month.

The main focus on Wall Street is the possibility that the government will stop making payment on its outstanding bonds when the current borrowing limit is reached, which is expected to happen on Oct. 17.

Treasury bonds are viewed as the bedrock of financial markets, thanks largely to the assumption that the United States will always pay its debts. Most analysts say that if that were thrown into question, the consequences would be catastrophic, and largely unpredictable.

“Even if it’s a brief failure, it would forever be a signal to the market that you can’t trust the United States government to make its payment when it’s due,” said Millan Mulraine, the director of United States research and strategy at TD Securities. “That would shake the foundations of the global financial system.”

Before Congress can turn its full attention to the debt ceiling, it will first have to deal with a resolution to keep the government open when the new fiscal year begins on Tuesday.

House Republicans passed legislation over the weekend that would keep the government operating only if funding for President Obama’s health care bill is delayed for a year and a tax on medical devices is permanently repealed. The Democrats who control the Senate have said they will not agree to those conditions.

Most Wall Street economists have said that the consequences of a temporary government shutdown would be relatively insignificant, particularly because spending on essential services — a large portion of the budget — would continue. Citigroup economists estimated on Friday that a one-week shutdown would probably cause a 0.1 percent hit to the national economy.

But many strategists say that the outcome of the debate over the shutdown is important because it will set the backdrop for the battle over the debt ceiling. Mr. Mulraine said that a disagreement this week would most likely mean that “both sides are so entrenched that making progress on the debt ceiling would be much harder.”

In contrast, Alec Phillips, a Goldman Sachs economist, said Friday that a shutdown could “ease passage of a debt-limit increase” because House Republicans could lose their bargaining leverage.

Led by Speaker John A. Boehner, House Republicans have already said that they would demand even more concessions in order to agree to a lifting of the debt ceiling, including changes to environmental and financial regulations.

Economists at Bank of America and Capital Economics wrote on Friday that the focus on President Obama’s health care legislation makes the positions of both sides more intractable now than they have been during other budget fights.

“We have no idea exactly how this standoff will be resolved, and even less of an idea exactly when any agreement might be reached,” the Capital Economics team said in a note to clients on Friday. “At this stage, we would be lying if we said we were confident of a positive outcome.”

If the disagreements persist, the reaction in the markets is likely to become much more pronounced as Oct. 17 draws closer. Mr. Valliere said that in the past, sharp swings in the markets helped to eventually push politicians toward a compromise.

“You have to worry that the one thing that could motivate Congress to step away from the precipice would be an angry reaction from the stock market,” he said.

Original article here: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/09/29/wall-street-uneasy-in-face-of-government-shutdown/?_r=0

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Advertising
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Vital Marketing Goes Back to School

After years of promoting brands like Remy Martin and Nintendo, Vital Marketing is on the other side of the press release: trying to promote its own product line of new back-to-school supplies.

The multicultural experiential firm is putting its Street Science line of binders and notebooks in K-Mart and on Amazon.com in time for the start of the academic year.

"Ad agencies have been staking a deeper position in their client's business in terms of helping with product development," said Joseph Anthony, CEO and founder of Vital Marketing, New York. "Now they are taking it a step further and creating their own products and distributing them through connections they have forged over the years."

A number of other small agencies have developed their own product lines in recent years. Josh Taekman, president of Buzztone, Los Angeles, joined with New York City restaurateur John McDonald to create eBoost, an immunity and energy booster. Malbon Brothers Farms, New York, has Frank 151, a culture magazine distributed in 16 countries. And Cornerstone, New York, has the music and lifestyle magazine Fader.

Anthony said the school supply allows him to better relate to clients who are trying to sell products. It also gives the agency president, who is himself a product of public schools, a chance to give back to the education system. Five percent of all profits from the Street Science school line will go to literacy and other educational programs.

So what happens if Staples comes knocking and a conflict of interest occurs? "I would have to decide which had the bigger upside," Anthony said. "At the same time, creating a product line could have a halo effect on my overall business." Vital Marketing pulled in $20 million in revenue last year, per the company.

Google Adsense - How To Make A Real Income From Google Adsense Effortlessly

Google AdSense business can be an excellent source to supplement your income or profits. But, many people make the mistake of using it as their main source of income. The problem here is that Google is pretty harsh on people who try to cheat and will shut out your ads. At times, this can happen even without your knowledge.

Choosing your pick

Monetizing your website need not depend entirely on Google AdSense business. When you provide information value to your content, you can also provide related product reviews or articles on that topic. If these do not engage the visitor, perhaps he will click your AdSense ad.

Affiliate programs

You should do a fair bit of homework before monetizing the topics with AdSense. Searches will reveal niche areas. But, are all the niche areas identified going to work for you and bring in Google AdSense profits or income? Not always, and therefore, identify those niches where advertisers are willing to spend decent sums of money. Don’t get carried away by commission percentages alone. $10×2%x100 = $20, whereas $10×15%x7 =$10.5.

Where do you find the high paying topics?

Well, open a Google AdSense Business account and build a new campaign. Use the estimate traffic button to see what your keywords are worth. Google gives you the cost per click for each keyword. Look for the most expensive keywords in the list and then optimize your own pages for that keyword. Now look at the flow of income and profits from Google AdSense business.

Search Engine Optimization Secrets Of A #1 Google Ranking

It doesn’t matter how great your product is, what a bargain your price is, or how beautiful your website is - Without traffic none of that matters.

So at its most basic, the biggest determinant of your web businesses success is “getting eyeballs looking at your webpages.”

When looking at where the traffic comes from, it begins with others linking (or pointing the way) to your site. Since most people automatically turn to the search engines when looking for something online, that naturally tells me that the most important links that you can easily get are probably from the search engines.

Since Google is currently the search engine getting the most use online, and therefore the one that generates the most traffic, that also means that you need to focus on getting a front page, or ideally a number 1 listing, at Google.

However, your search engine optimization efforts should involve structuring your site, and your other search engine magnets, so that it bring in BUYERS from Google.

At its most basic, and simplest, getting a number 1 ranking at Google that leads to an endless stream of sales boils down to three parts. They are:

1) Targeting The Correct Keywords

2) Optimizing A Page For Those Keywords

3) Getting Links From Sites That Google Loves

Let’s look at each of these.

First, you absolutely have to target the correct keyword. Your webpages and everything that you do needs to incorporate the keywords that your buying customers are actually typing into the search engines.

You don’t want to target the phrase digital camera, or printer cartridge. Instead you want to target a specific model of digital camera or printer cartridge, and you may even want to target people in a specific location looking for a specific model of printer cartridge.

That kind of targeting means that the people who find you are searching for something very specific, and when they find you by typing in that very specific search term, they click through and buy.

Next, you need to optimize your webpages for those keyword phrases. That generally means that you need the target keyword phrases sprinkled throughout your webpages. It also means that you want to use your target keyword phrases in your title and description “metatags.” You also want to include your keyword phrases in anchor text on your webpages (the blue underlined text in hyperlinks).

You basically want to include your keyword phrases in all of the parts of your webpages that tells the search engines what your webpage is about. This includes places such as italicized or bolded text, your menu items, and even alt image tags.

Finally, you need to get sites that Google thinks are important to link to you. Ideally, these sites include your keyword phrases in the anchor text when they link to you.

Many who study search engine optimization full-time are convinced that the external links pointing to your website are THE part that makes the biggest difference in most cases.

Having an authority site link to you is like having a respected authority in your community give you an endorsement. They are telling the search engines, and the rest of the world, that they recommend you. By using your keywords in the anchor text, authority sites are also telling Google (and other less important search engines) that that is what they consider your site to be about.

This factor is so powerful that I have personally often gotten a number 1 position on Google for my most important keywords by just tapping into one free website optimization tool… one authority site! In fact, I recently did an interview with David Preston, an expert at teaching offline businesses to tap into the web in ways that most of their competitors never even dreamed of. In the interview with David, we discussed in-depth, how I easily get free front-page listings at Google in a day, and how I often get #1 listing for my ideal keywords in just hours.

I mention David and that interview because he taught me another CRITICAL part of effective search engine optimization. He taught

me how to focus my efforts on the buyers with lots of money to spend… customers who have already budgeted that money for what I have to offer.

So there you have my very simple three-part search engine optimization formula for getting a free number one ranking in Google in as little as a few hours. That fourth part, focusing on the buyers actively looking to spend money is a bonus

How To Find Your Ad In The Search Engines

You’ve set up your ad campaign and now you want to see your ad live. What do you do?

Well, not to be snide, but you do the obvious. Perform a search.

Go down your list of keywords. Start with the keywords that have the highest bids as those are likely to be displayed first. Search for them one by one and see if your ad pops up on the SERPs when you enter those keywords. Go beyond page 1 because your ad may not always appear on the first page. Scroll down several pages to see if you can find your pay per click AD.

After looking through your most expensive keywords, try searching for the most relevant keywords. Those are the keywords that are most often used on your landing page. Pick the top 5. Search for them as well.

After that, go through the rest of the list.

Be sure to conduct a search at different times of the day. Because the search engines spread your ads out across the day so as not to expend your daily budget before noon, you may not see it at certain times. If you chose to show your ads only at a certain time of day then perform a search during those times. Otherwise, try it several times throughout the day to see when your ads may be appearing in the SERPs.

Pay-per-click Advertising: The Top 100 Keyword Phrases How about $51 per click?

Last time I checked, Spyfu.com is reporting that someone is bidding $51.66 per click for phrase “conference calling companies.” Are you bidding on words like this, which is one of the most expensive keyword phrases? Let’s take a look at the most expensive pay-per-click keywords and what you can do to reduce your overall PPC costs.

If you are in a niche that includes “conference calling,” lawyers, insurance, loans, or mortgages, there is a good chance that the keyword prices (what companies are willing to pay per click, what they’re bidding per click and what they’re paying per click) gets pretty expensive. At last check, the “cheapest” of the top 100 most expensive phrases is $43.75 per click. And at those costs, it pays to make sure that you are providing your users the optimal web experience when they come to your web site via those expensive keywords.

Let’s take a look at some of the top 100 most expensive keyword phrases:
Expensive keyword phrases; cost per click
conference calling companies $51.66
purchase structured settlements $51.48
home owner secured loan $50.36
mesothelioma patient $50.23
austin texas dwi lawyer $50.03
phoenix dui lawyers $50.01
insurance auto $50.00
secured loans $50.00
phoenix dui attorney $50.00
car free insurance online quote $49.96

Even if you are not paying $50 a click for a visitor to your website, you need to realize that you are charged for every click. So it pays to make sure that you provide the optimal experience but also convert as many of those visitors as possible. There are several things you can do right now to make every click count.

First, take a look at your web analytics. Make sure that you have the proper conversion tracking in place so that you know exactly which phrases are converting into a lead, a sale, or however else you track a conversion. For example, when someone clicks on your pay-per-click ad, what do you expect the visitor to do? Do you want them to look at your website, add something their shopping cart and purchase something? If that is the case, then perhaps you would set up your web analytics goals so you can track which keywords are driving the most sales. If you have this list, then you can compare that list with the keywords you are bidding on and consider dropping the bids on keyword phrases that bring visitors but do not bring in sales. If your goal is to have a visitor fill out a lead form then that also could be a goal, then put a price on each lead (how much is each lead worth to you?) and start tracking the keywords that are bringing in leads.

An audit of your web analytics should reveal the keyword phrases that are most valuable to you, the phrases that are bringing in conversions. Once you are able to determine this, compare the list with the bid prices and compare that list with your list of negative keywords. Consider adding keywords to your negative keyword list if they do not convert into sales or leads for you.

Consider taking your keyword list of your best performing keywords and testing them on a 2nd tier pay-per-click search engine. (See related article, “2nd Tier Search Engines – Are They Worth It?” Determine which keywords are performing (bringing in sales or leads) and which keywords are not performing. After all, some keywords do better on Yahoo! or Google and some perform better on the 2nd tier search engines. You must test each one by setting up the proper analytics.

It’s all about the bottom line. If you have a good handle on your web analytics and which keywords are converting, then raising your bid prices (even on the 2nd tier search engines) on the keywords that are converting should not be a tough task. Take a look at your “average sale” or the value you have put on each sales lead. How many of those pay-per-click visitors convert into a sale or a lead? How many “clicks” does it take to make a sale or to get a lead? If the numbers work out, then consider raising your bid prices. You just might find yourself bidding on one of the top 100 most expensive keyword phrases.