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ProActive Financial Planning

A Consumer Advocacy Organization

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Advertising in the Yellow Pages:

Expensive:  A full-page color ad can easily cost $30,000 per year per publication (6 to 9 cities). An ad the size of a business card cost approximately $1,000 per year.

To be listed in ProActive's on-line customer referral directory, we offer a free, do-it-yourself, option or for the cost of having your car detailed or a dinner for two, we can save you time by creating a web page for you.  Click here (Current Charges) to view our one-time set-up charges.  There are no on-going fees nor are there referral fees.

Competitive:  Each additional business that lists in the yellow pages reduces the effectiveness of your ad.  In addition, the smaller your ad is, the less effective it is.

In ProActive's on-line referral directory, only your business is featured as our exclusive referral partner.  ProActive will not refer any of our visitors to your competition within your geographical location.  Non-competing affiliate ads may be on your page as well as Google sponsored ads that may periodically show a competing ad.  These ads subsidize your cost.  In other words, the cost of your listing is being paid by others (and periodically by your competition).  These ads are optional and can be removed.  However, your business will incur the cost.   

To be ProActive's Exclusive Referral Partner, your company must be competitive offering the best value to consumers relative to your competition.  The purpose of this is to save consumers time and money when seeking a business that offers your product or service.  We challenge you to find a better value than the values currently offered by our referral partners.

No Accountability:  With the advent of the internet, fewer and fewer people are using the yellow pages and this trend will continue. This begs the question, how many potential customers are actually looking at your ad and how effective is it?

Each web page in ProActive's on-line referral directory has a counter so you can see how many potential customers have actually reviewed your listing (Example).

Limited Functionality:  Printed pages are not interactive and once printed no changes can be made until the next printing.

ProActive's web page designers continue to add new and exciting interactive features that can't be offered on a printed piece of paper.  Interactive links can increase traffic to your website, provide valuable and time-saving information to the consumer, allow prospective customers to email you with just a click, another click pops up a map to your place of business that can be printed and so much more (Example).  In addition, your web page can be updated as frequently as you like.  There is a nominal fee charged based on a per/hour basis.

Paper Campaigns - Mailings and Flyers:

Cost effectiveness:  Flyers and mailers have to be designed, printed, and distributed.  What does it really cost from design to distribution per piece - $0.30 to $0.50?  Perhaps.  The problem is the effectiveness.  How many pieces are discarded without being read and if they are read, how many customers will act upon them - 2% to 3%?

To improve the perceived value of ProActive's on-line referral directory, your listing has a guaranteed lock for a specified period of time or for a specified number of page views whichever is longer.

Keep in mind, visitors that land on your page want to be there and are more likely to review your information unlike a piece of junk mail or flyer.  In addition, if no other business replaces your business as an exclusive referral partner, your web page will continue to receive views further reducing the perceived cost per view.  Remember, ProActive is not charging a per view or per click charge.  This is just an example to help you value our program.

Business Cards:

First of all, if you are paying more than $0.025 per business card ($25.00 per thousand) you may want to contact our exclusive referral partner for business cards, click here (Business Cards).  Business cards are a must for any business that can't really be substituted.  

If you can easily justify paying $50 dollars for 2000 business cards why wouldn't you pay $50 to have the potential for thousands of page views.  Keep in mind the effectiveness of a business card versus an interactive web page that can be book marked (Example).

Participating in Referral Groups:

Business referral groups are a great way to generate new business.  However, there is a cost.  Not only are there usually both initial and on-going fees, but there is usually a time commitment.  What you get in return is a "potential" client.

With ProActive's program you essentially pay for only the referrals that become a paying customer.  You don't physically compensate ProActive for the referral.  What we encourage you to do is to pass what you would pay us for a referral to your new customer in the form of a discount or rebate.  This allows you to be more competitive relative to your competition by offering lower prices without having to compromise profit margins.  Another way of looking at this is if you were to pay us a commission for a referral, we would pass it on to your new customer or return it to you if no business became of it.  As a result, you are only paying for referrals that do business with you.  Please review: Recommended Discounts/Rebates.

How is ProActive able to offer such a great offer:

It is simple.  We are not profit motivated.  All profits go to charities or charitable organizations - everybody wins.

How does ProActive make money?

• A one-time setup charges,
• Fees charged for web page updates and
• Affiliate & Sponsor ads.

How does your business become an Exclusive Referral Partner?

1. Check our on-line referral directory to see if your competition is already one of our Exclusive Referral Partners.
2. If you are the first business to offer your product or service in your geographical location, click here to sign up as our Exclusive Referral Partner. 
3. If your competition has already established an exclusive relationship with ProActive in your geographical location, you must compete by offering a better value to our members after their guaranteed lock has expired.  

(ProActive Financial Planning reserves the right to deny any request to participate in our Exclusive Referral Program for any reason).

(ProActive Financial Planning reserves the right to deny any request to participate in our Exclusive Referral Program for any reason).

Special Request

In order to increase referrals, ProActive needs to increase our website traffic.  In order to increase our traffic, we need to expand our network of exclusive referral partners that are willing to pass on the cost savings from our referral program to our visitors.  If you know of other businesses that could benefit from or Exclusive Referral Partnership program, please forward this URL (http://www.open-ira.com/ERP.htm).  ProActive pays referral fees to consumers or business that can be identified as a referral source.

For additional information, visit:

• About ProActive Financial Planning
• Additional Information
• The Big Picture

 * As of 02/01/2007, ProActive Financial Planning reserves the right to discontinue this program and agreement at any time.

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Contact: ProActive Financial Planning

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