Any coments about these thoughts?

For the conclusions drawn from the article below see your other question. Ran out of word count. Concentrate on Take note when reading.

That's useful information. http://pando.com/2013/02/27/why-increasi... Fortune 500 enterprises and startups alike face constant pressure to increase revenues. Naturally, that’s not surprising.

Ultimately it’s why we found startups in the first place. Meanwhile, investors want to be a part of growing companies, and smart employees want to be part of the next big thing, not the last. (TAKE NOTE) But this intense pressure to grow often pushes management into unhealthy and risky decisions.

Take, for example, the demise of Ecomom.com following the tragic suicide of its founder/CEO, Jody Sherman. Ecomom was a once promising ecommerce startup that had raised more than $10 million in venture capital financing to become the “Zappos of eco-products.” Desperate to meet aggressive revenue targets, it embarked on a deep discounting strategy that led one of its customers to comment on his Facebook page: “With the crazy deals always happening at Ecomom, I wondered how they made their money.

I guess they didn’t. Very sad…” Like many retailers, (TAKE NOTE) Ecomom hoped that its discounting would be offset by lower cost of goods sold from buying merchandise in larger quantities. Unfortunately, this rarely happens.

I struggled with whether or not to dissect Ecomom so soon after Jody Sherman’s passing. He was a dear friend of mine, and, like many, I was shocked when I heard the news. Ultimately, I decided that I needed to.

Jody’s tragedy has further reinforced my commitment (TAKE NOTE) to helping retailers grow their businesses in a sustainable manner. In fact, I started 500friends because I ran into a similar problem as Jody at the previous startup that I co-founded. I had to lay off hard-working team members before I had turned 21.

Competing with Amazon and Walmart is never easy, but I see it as my job to help retailers not only survive but to thrive. Besides relying on the old trick of deep discounting — which may increase the number of customers but dampens margins and hampers profitability — some companies attempt to grow(TAKE NOTE) by spending more on customer acquisition. Bidz.com is an “eBay for jewelry” that succeeded in attaining almost $100 million in sales by continuously increasing its acquisition budget, until it became unsustainable at $50 per new customer.

After investors realized this, the stock continuously declined until it traded for barely above $0.25 a share. The company was eventually taken private for $0.78 a share. Juicing the topline by lowering prices and increasing customer acquisition costs is generally unsustainable.

(TAKE NOTE) Before focusing on growth, companies must first ensure that the fundamentals of its business are sound — that the lifetime value of a customer is a manageable multiple of its customer acquisition cost. Amazon is the poster child for of (TAKE NOTE) a barely profitable company whose revenue growth is sustained by its high customer lifetime value. In 2012, Amazon’s core retail business generated more than $48 billion in sales.

The fact that 30% of online shoppers research Amazon BEFORE buying, compared to 13% for Google, suggests that Bezos (founder of Amazon) & co. Are kicking *** in this area. It would be nearly impossible for Amazon to grow at almost three times the rate of the ecommerce industry(TAKE NOTE) if its growth was driven solely by new customer acquisition.

Sustainable growth isn’t only a concern for retailers. Demandware is a business-to-business-to-consumer commerce site that powers the backend on-demand digital commerce for brands ranging from Pacific Sunwear to L ‘Oreal. Like Amazon, its revenue growth depends on a high customer lifetime value.

In 2012, its subscription dollar retention rate exceeded 100% and customer churn (means customers tend to be loyal not play swapsies) was less than 5%. This means that increases in revenue are more likely to persist over the long term. In fact, Demandware’s customer base is so healthy that even if it were to (TAKE NOTE) completely eliminate its sales and marketing budget, revenues would continue to grow (albeit much slower than 40% ).

This is one of the reasons why Demandware is currently valued at 10-times revenues.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.