Author: Erick

In an ironic twist of what some are calling damage control public relations, Coca-Cola’s latest campaign is not about selling sodas–it’s about fighting obesity.

In the first commercial of the campaign, called “Coming Together,” Coca-Cola says that it would “like people to come together on something that concerns us all: obesity.”

More commercials from the campaign are set to follow on television starting this week.

Soda: the kiss of death?

Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), says that soda is one of the number one culprits of obesity in the country. But Coca-Cola is singing a different tune, pointing out that 180 of its beverages are low- and no-calorie drinks.

The campaign’s core message is that “all calories count” and that “if you eat and drink more calories than you burn off, you’ll gain weight.”

CSPI, on the other hand, believes the campaign is just “a damage control exercise” and not a valuable or meaningful push from Coca-Cola toward ending obesity.

Moderation, please

According to Jacobson, soda isn’t inherently bad, but moderation must be exercised–a trait that doesn’t seem to come easily to Americans.

“We don’t want to wipe out soft drinks. But we would like to see soft drinks return to the dietary role they played in the ’50s, which was occasionally, and small portions, (as a) special treat. Now, people are guzzling huge containers of soda every day of their lives, practically.”

Coca-Cola has also decided to add calorie counts to the front of soda labels, making it easy for consumers to know what they’re drinking. And the company’s spokesperson Ben Scheidler said they’re dedicated to educating people about “energy balance.”

“We’ve never been more committed to doing our part to help address the issue of obesity,” Scheidler said.

Playing golf is not as easy as it looks. You can’t just pick up some clubs and go out on the course without any practice or training or you are going to be in for a world of embarrassment. And even if you have gone to the driving range a few times, it is a lot different when you are out on the golf course ready to hit your ball, all by yourself, with everyone watching you. If you hit the ball at all you should consider yourself lucky.

It doesn’t help that every club you pick up out of your bag has to be swung differently. Are you teeing off, driving the ball for distance, chipping high and far, chipping short, or putting? All of these have different stances, ways to hold the club, swings, etc. So to help out all of you “newbies”, I’m going to teach you about driving a golf ball for beginners and how to do it consistently so at least you can get out of the tee box.

Driving the ball off of the tee is a crucial part of your game. If you do not hit a good tee shot to begin the hole, then your score will start shooting up faster than you can yell, “FORE!” So read on and master this part of the game before anything else.

Without A Good Stance, You Are Doomed From The Start

Before you can have that amazing feeling that hitting a long shot straight down the fairway can give you, you must start with the basics. And the most basic part of driving the ball is your stance. For a good stance you must start with aligning yourself based on where you want the ball to land.

Start with setting your feet about shoulder-length apart with your body weight on the balls of your feet, evenly distributed over both feet and your knees slightly bent. Position your body so you are aligned with a target down the fairway where you want your ball to land. The ball should be lined up with the heel of your left foot for right-handed golfers and the heel of your right foot for left-handed golfers. Imagine an invisible line between the ball and your front heel.

The next important part of the stance is your upper body positioning. Your back should be in a straight line and you should bend at the hips. If doing this correctly, your butt should be sticking out slightly (just picture doing the hokey pokey). As for your arms, they should form a “V” shape and the butt of your club should angle slightly toward your front hip. This is all going to feel awkward at first, but the more you do it the more natural it will feel.

Proper Grip – Don’t Strangle The Club

The way you grip the club is also very important. Many people feel that the harder they squeeze the club, the farther your shot will go. In fact, it is just the opposite. You should hold it with a very relaxed grip at the end of the club so the club will turn over easily in your hand.

To help the club turn over easily, grip the club with your left-hand first (for righties, opposite for lefties) with your thumb on top. Do the same with your other hand, thumb on top of the club, and place your left pinkie finger between your index finger and middle finger of the left-hand (again, opposite for lefties).

Baby’s Got Back Swing

When you start your back swing, shift your weight back along with it. This will help build momentum and create more power on your swing.

Take your time on your back swing, the faster your back swing the more it will take you out of alignment. Proper alignment is more important than power!

In a sweeping arc motion, bring the club back until it is behind your head. Your front arm should remain straight throughout the entire process.

At this point take a slight pause at the top of your back swing before you start your downswing.

The Downswing – Where The Magic Happens

Even if every other part of the swing is perfect up to this point, if you lose your concentration now you could still end up in the woods or the bottom of the pond. This is the part of the swing where you make contact with the ball so this is the most exciting part, but also the easiest part to speed through.

Start your downswing calmly and speed up the club as it approaches the ball. Best case scenario is that the club is still accelerating when it hits the ball. This should be done in one fluid movement utilizing your entire body which will give you the power you need.

One More Tip For The Perfect Drive

The last tip to remember seems like the most simple, but can easily be forgotten. It is the same tip that can be heard in a lot of other sports like baseball, football, basketball, etc. And that tip is to always keep your eye on the ball. During the entire process you must keep your head down and your eye on the ball. Now, you can look up at your target while you are getting in your stance and preparing to swing, but once you are ready to swing your head MUST stay down. You can’t hit what you can’t see.

When you take a great swing you are going to be in a hurry to see how far and how straight the ball is going. This makes it easy to pull your head up early. Make sure you tell yourself before each and every swing to keep your head down all the way through the swing.

Time To Celebrate

If this whole process is followed perfectly, then you will be looking at a great tee shot straight down the fairway and will be ready and willing to start bragging to your golf partners. Unfortunately it is not that easy. Those are a lot of steps to remember each and every time, which is what makes golf such a difficult sport.

So as a beginner do not get discouraged when you are not hitting the ball very well. Go to the driving range as much as you can and continually practice your swing over and over again until your muscle memory takes over. At that point you won’t have to think so much. Instead you can just enjoy the game of golf like it was intended.

Yes, believe it or not, it’s true. Diabetes mellitus, also known as diabetes, it can not dogs. Come about 1 in 500 dogs may be suffering from this disease. The races will most tend to be diagnosed with diabetes, are the German Shepherd, Schnauzer, Beagle, Poodle, Golden Retriever, and Keeshond. The disease usually occurs in middle-aged dogs between the ages 6 to 9 years. Most dogs are affected by type 1 diabetes, a disease where the body no insulin at all. Symptoms of research are alcohol abuse, bulimia, frequent urination, dehydration and weight loss possible or weight gain. If you’re one of these symptoms in your dog, take him to a veterinarian for examination.

The veterinarian will confirm the completeness of testing blood and serum chemistry and urinarlysis to see if your pet has diabetes. If your dog is diagnosed with diabetes, it is not the end of the world. Diabetes can be controlled with a high fiber, medium-carbohydrate diet and insulin injections. You can easily learn how to give daily insulin injections for your dog, and if you and the dog used to it, it becomes a daily routine. It is very important to diagnose and begin treatment for diabetes in the early stages of the disease.

In doing so may cause complications such as blindness and nerve damage. Untreated diabetes can be life threatening. Think about the symptoms and make sure that your beloved dog at least an annual physical examination by a trained veterinarian. A healthy, happy dog is a loyal, faithful friend and companion. You and your dog will not earn less!

In addition to writing Donna has many other interests, was one of them a deep and abiding love for animals. She is also interested in antiques and marble contemporary art glass.

The golfing public knows the Augusta National Golf Club has the reputation of being a stodgy, behind-the-times country club among the non-golfing public. That may be due to the club being ran by business-like old gentlemen, but it’s certainly getting further and further from the truth, at least with respect to technology.

Tech Shots

At least part of this year’s broadcast will be in 3-D. High-Def and 3-D together could be nice, but that remains to be seen. Immediately provable, at least for iPhone owners, is The Masters Tournament iPhone app.

At the moment, as the tournament is still a few weeks away, only last year’s tournament is available, but there’s enough to demonstrate the most of the Masters application’s functions.

Live Video

Historically, the Masters limited viewers to watching play on limited holes. That has changed in recent years, but working fans still can’t squeeze in much of the live tournament during working hours. Live video through the Masters app can change that, quite possibly to the dismay of many employers.

Fans will be able to see live coverage of Amen Corner (holes 11, 12 and 13), featured group pairings, and holes 15 and 16. Potentially best of all Master app users, what is called “Masters Extra,” an extra hour of additional Masters coverage not available anywhere else. It isn’t known what type of coverage that will be, whether tournament play, player interviews or something else, but any coverage will be a nice bonus.

Live Radio?

Yes, live radio. iPhone app users can plug in the headphones and listen to a live broadcast of the Masters. The radio broadcast begins at 2:00 p.m. Eastern each day of the tournament and remains on air until the conclusion of the day’s play.

Leader Board, News and Photos

With the possible exception of having an updated leader board at the fingertips, finding each of these is, well, it would be hard not to find them. Masters news and photos can be found everywhere from Ask.com to Yahoo! and all points in between. Having all three together, though, is certainly a positive.

Pre-tournament news is already being updated with some regularity, but the photos are limited to stock photos related to news, last years tournament, and popular photos from years gone by. Again, that will most certainly change in the days leading up to April 8-11.

The Course

The Masters iPhone app displays a table containing hole numbers, an artists rendering of each hole that rivals photo quality, par for each hole, and hole yardages. Touch a cell within the table and to see a detailed description of the selected hole. Touch “Watch the Flyover Video” and see a short video flyover of the hole.

Other Pros and Cons

Fans of the Masters know the feeling. The one that comes back every year when television commercials begin promoting and sports channels start talking about the tournament, accompanied by images from the beautiful old course. The Masters app has captured that same essence. Open the app and from the easily navigable home page it feels like the Masters time of year.

Some of the functions, such as course flyovers and course map, have episodes where they’re not useable. In nearly three weeks of review, those problems have only lately arisen, and it isn’t known whether they are related to the application or to some other technical glitch. Since the Masters is getting closer, the problems could be related to updates in preparation for peak usage.

The only consistent negative has been the quality of the video in hole flyovers. The videos appeared grainy, especially when compared to the quality of the rest of the application.

The Masters Golf Tournament iPhone application, available free for both iPhone and iPod Touch, should be a great competitor for the large sports applications. It surpasses in design and functionality most of the others. It simply gives off that Masters vibe, which means a lot.

Let’s define the strategy of preeminence before we even go any further into this. It is essentially being the superior choice within your market. It attracts clients to your law firm, eager to hire you rather than your competition.

Don’t you want potential clients to feel like your firm is there to help them and not sell them? When your law firm is perceived as the authority it naturally draws clients in and they don’t feel like they are being sold anything. They truly feel that your firm is there to help them – because they see you as the leader.

Once you get on the path to preeminence and authority domination, you will never have to worry about where your next case is going to come from. You will never have to worry about what marketing strategies are losing you money and which ones are barely delivering a ROI. Your business grows exponentially and the financial reward is an added bonus.

So, How Does YOUR Law Firm Get Preeminence in YOUR Market?

Preeminence comes when you completely change the strategy and focus of your business growth. You have to see and position your firm as the local authority in your market. Not only do you need to appear to be the top dog, but you also have to believe it, feel it, and live it daily. This attitude will help you to position your law firm as the most reputable and trusted option in the eyes of anyone seeking legal help within your market.

You also have to love what you do. The business is going to come, the money will follow, and the growth will be rapid. When clients come into contact with your firm they need to sense you have a genuine interest in helping them, personally. When they sense that you care more, they will engage with your firm because they will feel you are a far better choice than any other law firm out there.

It Starts With Genuine Communication

Preeminent law firms are those that are trusted, mainly because they have established themselves as the authority online. When a potential client performs a search in Google and they see one firm occupying the top real estate it is automatically viewed as the best option.

Now, when you combine top Google rankings with authority placements and mentions on some of the largest and most trusted news and media websites, what do you get? When a potential clients sees that you have the search results covered as well as major media exposure they not only feel like they already know you, but they completely trust you before they even speak to you. The power of a digital presence is unlike anything else that you can do to brand your firm.

• How do you get potential clients to feel like they know you before they even meet you?

• How do you get them to feel as if they already have a personal connection to you?

The answer is simple: Personal Branding.

Take a look in your local market for a moment. Chances are that the other law firms that you compete with have absolutely no persona in your market. If you simply step outside the box and work on your personal branding the impact will be substantial.

We have single handedly helped law firms grow from one and two man operations to huge firms that had to change office locations multiple times to accommodate their size as they grew.

Very few law firms understand how to do this correctly. They believe that their degrees and accreditations are enough that cases and clients are magically going to call their firm and hire them. We live in a digital age, where people instantly turn to the Internet when they want to look up information or attempt to solve a problem.

Now, let’s assume that your law firm was in Los Angeles and you practiced criminal defense. What would happen if someone in the Los Angeles area went to Google and typed in “criminal defense attorney Los Angeles” – would your law firm show up? If you aren’t at the top position find your firm in the search results and ask yourself these questions:

1. If I were the consumer looking to hire a law firm would I click on this listing that is down below with hundreds of other search results?

2. Why would they click on my website rather than one of the top search results?

3. Will they feel confident about hiring my firm seeing as we aren’t ranking on top and viewed as an authority in our local market?

Having a digital presence that makes your firm desirable automatically results in consumers taking action.

So, how do you get your firm to that point?

Attract Authority

Many law firms feel that in order to sign a client they need to overwhelm them with information and statistics, but that is not the case at all. Trying too hard to “sell” or impress a potential client will only push them away.

The best way to ”sell” is to not sell at all! When someone can take the information available to them and make a decision whether or not they want to hire your firm or not, it is always going to result in a higher quality client. These types of clients are less maintenance and they are hiring your firm because they truly believe that you are the best choice. They didn’t base their decision on a fancy sales pitch.

Ways to Make The Decision Easier For Potential Clients

1. Rank on top of the organic Google search results

There is nothing more powerful than showing up on the top of Google’s organic search results. This instantly gives your law firm major credibility and a potential client is automatically going to believe in his or her mind that your firm is the best.

Complete domination is key, ranking on top for several keywords that pertain to your location as well as the areas of law that your firm practices. If a client is searching a generic term like “lawyer in (your location)” as well as “personal injury lawyer (your location)” and sees that your firm is listed on top for both they are going to instantly see you as the best choice. It is human nature to see impressive search results and automatically associate them with being the best. There is a reason why the majority of Google searchers never navigate past the first page, and why the majority of clicks go to the top three results. Naturally, we want the best, or at least what we assume is the best!

2. Compliment your organic rankings with paid search rankings

While organic search rankings deliver an incredible value it is also a good idea to occupy the top of the paid results as well. Implementing a PPC campaign into your marketing effort is a way to make sure that you completely own the top of the Google search results.

There is going to be a small percentage of individuals that gravitate towards the paid results – after all they wouldn’t exist if they didn’t receive a large percentage of clicks. By dominating the organic as well as paid results it ensures that your firm will receive the majority of search traffic from both the organic and paid channels. When you are just getting started you can focus on organic rankings, but once the revenue and growth is on the rise you need to ride the wave and keep up with the exponential growth and allocate advertising funds toward pay per click marketing. It will actually

3. Build authority through PR

Public Relations outreach is very effective for helping you to build that authority and image as the best choice. When we take on a brand new client for our law firm SEO services, the very first thing we do is syndicate a news worthy press release throughout network of journalists and media contacts. This gets picked up by some of the largest news media outlets, including ABC, Fox News, CNBS, and others. How do you think prospective clients would view a local firm that received press in these major news outlets? Are these outlets currently featuring your competition? The answer is most likely no.

This media trust can also be leveraged on your website as well. A simple “As Seen On” section complete with logos from the major news outlets that featured your firm builds instant credibility and a potential client is going to be more comfortable picking up the phone and calling your firm or submitting your consultation request form after seeing them. These are outlets that every consumer interacts with almost daily, so the familiarity factor combines with the trust and authority factor to make them completely comfortable.

4. Leverage media placements for branding and link building

Being features on huge websites such as The Huffington Post, Business Insider, and Inc are great for what we just discussed above, public relations, but they also help to enhance the SEO effort. Links from these types of major authority websites are virtually priceless. They are the links that your competitors would love to get but they have no idea how to get them. They are the links that every SEO company will tell you they can get, but none of them can deliver them.

Law Firm Authority can get you those links using our strategic outreach, and these are the types of links that help to push your law firm to the top of the Google search results. A single link from an authority source such as The Huffington Post is worth more than thousands of low quality links that the other SEO companies are building.

As SEO switches gears and more emphasis is place on actual PR and natural link building rather than spammy keyword heavy anchor text, these placements become extremely valuable. Automated software isn’t placing these links all over and a team of link builders isn’t building them. They are earned and placed by the media outlet. Leveraging a piece of custom content or a recent case that your firm handled allows us to get picked up by these outlets and earn the most highly desirable links.

You want these links, don’t you? You want major media coverage, right? You want to completely dominate your local market and be able to pick and choose the most appealing and profitable cases for your firm, right? If you answered “Yes,” then you need to contact us today and schedule a free strategy session, where we will review your current digital footprint and develop a custom strategy to have you controlling the search results and being the authority law firm in your market.

Achieve Greatness Using The Strategy of Preeminence

Every law firm wants to be the best. They all want to have more business rolling through their doors than they can handle. They want to be able to grow. Nobody wants to be average, but not everybody is willing to take the steps necessary to reach greatness. It doesn’t happen without the hard work and strategic planning.

Step #1: Picture what you want to achieve in terms of growth and revenue

All of your competitors that aren’t achieving greatness are stuck in a rut because of this first step. They simply can’t picture in their mind what complete domination looks like. They can’t even fathom what being the authority firm in your market would be like.

You have to be able to envision what it would be like to be the top firm and have your phones ringing off the hook. Take a look at some larger markets and look at the biggest and most successful firms. If you can’t picture yourself in that position it will be difficult to ever achieve it. In fact, if you can’t envision greatness you will never experience it and know what it feels like.

Step #2: Establish the solution to help you reach your growth and revenue goals

You need to identify what is going to help you achieve your goals and experience greatness. Dominating the digital space will help you reach your goals, and Law