Marriage is one of the most beautiful declarations of love within a relationship, bound together in love and should be the most romantic time of your life. But marriage is one of the stressful times in your life too.

Unfortunately most of the wedding preparations are all done by the woman. If your man is anything like my husbands then they will not care much that you want the perfect dress to go with the perfect weather, perfect car, church/ceremony and reception. All that he will care about is that you are going to be his bride and that everyone has a good time.

For the woman, marriage is for most something that has been dreamt of since childhood. The white dress has been envisaged for many years and the dream has to now become a reality. Here is where careful planning and organisation will really play a major part. One of the major stresses will be the wedding dress and so I will concentrate on that here.

First of all decide a timeline, how long is the engagement going to be? Give yourself plenty of time and allow at least a year. Sounds like a long time but really it isn’t, normally when you order a wedding dress it will take at least 2 months to arrive normally much longer.

Start looking for a dress as soon as you can. Buying a few bridal magazines will help you have an idea of what styles are around and what colours are going to look good. If you have a theme you will want to incorporate this into all aspects of the wedding including your dress, bridesmaid dresses, and all accessories.

Make a budget for the wedding, get a few quotes and arrange a budget around what you have available to spend and overestimate the costs to ensure that you wont have any nasty surprises come payment time.

Wedding dresses very greatly in their prices, most ranging from £500 upwards, however it is possible to have the wedding of your dreams without breaking the bank.

Shop around. Have a look at numerous shops on the high street, you may get a great deal online, or can get a second hand one that is equally beautiful from a charity shop, on eBay or in your local newspaper classifieds. Remember that a wedding dress is only usually worn once, and a bargain can be found for the perfect dress if you look for it.

Unless you are very lucky it will have taken you around 1 to 3 months of searching for the dress you want if you bought it second hand or off the peg at a shop make sure the dress fits, remember that your weight can fluctuate so allow enough room for an increase if needed, you can have the dress altered nearer the wedding date. For those ordering a dress, again remember to check how long the dress you want will take to come back, you will also need a fitting and time for any alterations including a last fitting before you take the dress home. Allow for any time lag in your dress arriving, most companies do not make the dress in the UK rather the dress is made in China or Indonesia the couriered to their head office in US before being shipped back to the UK office then to the shop you are ordering the dress from. Any part of the process can have a hiccup so be aware that this could happen so as to not panic if the dress is delayed slightly.

Once you have your dress chosen that is a major part of the wedding completed and you can enjoy the rest of the arrangements.

This article has been submitted in affiliation with http://www.Prye.Com/ which is a site for Wedding Invitations.

Wow, pretty grandiose title. But this is one area where understatement just won’t do. If more companies understood this one concept, their marketing would actually stand a chance of doing its job.

Before we get to this big idea, though, let me define what the job of marketing actually is. Ultimately, it should be designed to convince people to do business with you. That’s it. Every thing else related to marketing should all be done with that end result in mind, because that’s where it should all lead. Product, pricing, placement, promotion, and people need to all point in this direction. Every campaign aimed at increasing mindshare, raising product recognition level, penetrating new markets, or any other specific short-term goal is designed to convince people to do business with the marketer. Or at least it should be.

So how do you do that? I’m not going to talk specific tactics in this article, but rather about the common unifying concept, which if understood, will direct a marketing campaign to success. The idea is actually so simple that you might be disappointed. But it’s so powerful that it will determine the outcome of your marketing.

Here it is: everything you do in marketing should clearly and explicitly tell the consumer how you will make his or her life quickly and dramatically better. If you can communicate that concept in a way that the consumer believes, and more effectively than your competition, you’ll never lack for business.

The problem that the overwhelming majority of businesses I work with have is that they are approaching their marketing from the wrong end. They’re focused on their company and their product rather than their customers. The ask questions like “How can we show people how great our product is?” rather than “How can we show people how much we can improve their lives?” I often get initial disagreement from company owners and managers when I first propose this. To most of them it’s a completely new concept. They have, since the beginning of their business life, been trying to figure out how to outshout the competition. The problem is, they’ve been shouting the wrong thing.

For those who disagree on this point, let me make this statement: the consumer doesn’t care a bit about your product or service. They really don’t. They care about what your product or service does for them. Or in other words, how it makes their life better. The product or service is just a means to an end. Most marketers have gotten comfortable with the idea of selling benefits rather than features. But let me take that one step further by introducing a concept I call the Ultimate Life Benefit (ULB). The ULB goes beyond selling benefits. It shows the consumer how his or her life will be quickly and appreciably improved. And most products have many ULB’s.

To get to this way of thinking, list the benefits of your product or service and then ask yourself “And then what happens?” For example:
Feature: SPF 90
Benefit: Protection from sunburn
ULB: Your kids don’t suffer pain or skin damage. They are happy and healthy.
See what I’m getting at here? If you just go as far as selling the benefit, you haven’t communicated to the consumer how his or her life will clearly be better. The benefit is “Protection from sunburn.” Go ahead and tell the consumer that they’ll be protected from sunburn. Repeat it as many times as you like. Shout it loudly. You’ll get some results, but not great results. Shift your message to showing the results of the benefit, and the mental connection is made quickly and completely in the mind of the viewer. Show them exactly how your product delivers the benefit and produces the ULB and you’ve got them.

The trick here is to show exactly how your product or service leads to the ULB. Don’t just say or imply that it does, but rather demonstrate it explicitly. Don’t assume that the consumer will make the mental connection. I don’t know about you, but most people are too busy to figure out what advertisers are trying to say. Next time you’re watching television, pay attention to what advertisers are showing you. Most national advertisers are showing ULB’s. One of the most frequent and most obvious is commercials that show how using their product will make you more attractive to the opposite sex. Use this razor and get the girl. Use this mouthwash and get the girl. Drive this car and get the girl. Wear these clothes and get the girl. You get the point. The successful ads are the ones that make the connection clear. Car commercials are another good example. They don’t just say that the car is fast. They show you how you can enjoy unlimited freedom with that kind of horsepower. Jewelry advertisers don’t just talk about the total carat weight of their diamond jewelry. They show you the reactions of your friends when they see your new necklace.

A lot of advertisements miss completely, though. The advertiser is trying hard to get us to associate their product with something. But they fail to communicate it in a way that causes the viewer to make the mental connection. The commercial makes no point and is quickly forgotten.

Even the most mundane product can benefit by incorporating a persuasive ULB. Whatever you sell, there are benefits to it. Take copier paper for instance. Your paper may cost less, or cause less jamming, or maybe it’s brighter and sturdier. Whatever it is, it has a benefit. So then what happens? If it jams less, then you can concentrate on the important things, instead of continually fixing the copier. You get more work done, you make more money or get a promotion or whatever you choose to show. The benefit is that it jams less. But the ultimate benefit goes beyond that.

Every product has at least one ULB, most have quite a few. Find them and communicate them to the consumer, and they’ll have no reason to resist. They’ll see that it’s in their best interest to do business with you. And once that happens, just make sure you’re stocked up.

NOTE: You’re welcome to “reprint” this article online as long as it remains complete and unaltered (including the “about the author” info at the end). Please send notification of publishing to derekf@derekfisch.com.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Derek Fisch is founder and President of Velocity Media, a full service marketing and advertising firm. Derek publishes the online marketing e-zine The Marketing Juggernaut www.themarketingjuggernaut.com. More information is available at www.derekfisch.com.

A recent report has found that Americans are more frightened of dying at the hands of their doctor than they are of a plane crash. The overwhelming majority of those who participated in the survey said that information about malpractice suits and medical errors would be the single most deciding factor in trusting a healthcare provider. These people must have heard that medical errors cause more deaths in the United States every year than car accidents, AIDS, or breast cancer.

In fact, for the airline industry to parallel medical errors in mortality rates a 280-person jet would have to crash every day of the year. This would account for the over 100,000 people who die annually due to complications in medical care, not to mention the nearly 2 million who are maimed and disabled. This malady is called iatrogenic disease, a disease that is a direct result of medical care. What is causing this epidemic? Many agree that the cause is over-treatment. More medicine is administered than necessary, people are hospitalized unnecessarily, and doctors prescribe drugs instead of healthy lifestyle choices. This is a major problem and it shows no signs of stopping.

In the ten year period between 1983 and 1993 the incidence of death by medical error, or iatrogenic disease, jumped 260% overall and 850% among patience receiving outpatient care. These statistics could only be an indication of the true numbers, because medical error is not often recorded on death certificates. Some people blame the increased number of deaths on a greater number of prescriptions, but the number of prescriptions issued has increased less than 40% in 10 years, compared with the 260% increased death rate. Instead, some doctors blame increased usage of anesthesia, especially among those receiving outpatient care.

Medical malpractice insurance rates have been skyrocketing, causing a small crisis among doctors who must be insured in order to practice. They complain of medical malpractice lawsuits going out of control, large cities awarding record settlements, too many people filing claims. Well can you blame people for filing claims? Doctors must be held accountable for their prescriptions, and if a doctor writes you a prescription that hurts you they deserve to be taken to court! This is truly an epidemic, and it must be stopped by holding irresponsible healthcare providers responsible. One in five Americans has experienced medical errors directly or has a family member who has suffered a medical error. If you feel you have suffered unnecessarily at the hands of a doctor, seek legal council and work it out with a lawyer.

If you have more questions, contact a medical
error attorney or read about other medical
malpractice cases at http://www.hugesettlements.com.

If you use this article, please include these links.