These billionaires are self-made and have created standards for professionals in their respective fields. Let us look at the top 10.

1. Bill Gates

Bill Gates is one of the two founders of Microsoft and was the richest man in the world at one point. His fortunes have been estimated at $50 billion, making him the most famous individual in the world who dropped out of college. Microsoft was immensely successful when Bill Gates held the reigns. His charitable foundation, the “Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation” is the second largest in the world.

2. Steve Jobs

When one thinks of Apple, one is always reminded of Steve Jobs, the entrepreneur who started the company, lost it and then regained the initial glory and magnified it. In the past, he created hacking devices and is known for his infamous prank calls to the Pope. This self-made billionaire is worth 4.4 billion dollars and counting.

3. Michael Dell

Michael Dell started taking apart computers and rebuilding them as an experiment. He got enrolled in a university in Texas where he started to sell the computers he built on his own. Once he realized how successful his business was becoming, he dropped out and started working full-time. He is among the top 10 richest men in the United States and is worth over $15.5 billion.

4. Ralph Lauren

Ralph Lauren was born Ralph Lifschitz. He changed his last name at 16 as he felt that it would be more appropriate when he became successful. This ambitious young man dropped out of a college in New York and after working as a salesman for a few years, he launched his label, “Polo”. Ralph Lauren is worth over $3.6 billion.

5. Marc Zuckerberg

Marc Zuckerberg is the founder of everybody’s favorite social networking website- Facebook. He started the website along with his roommates in Harvard after he realized that he loved creating computer programs. This 23 year old was voted the youngest billionaire by Forbes magazine and is worth over 1.5 billion dollars.

6. Xiaofend Peng

Once Peng understood the immense potential that renewable energy had, he established a trading company 5 years back. Within a short period of time, this company grew in size and came to be known as the best and most reliable supplier of solar wafers. He has big plans for his company and is worth over 1.6 billion dollars at present.

7. John Arnold

After completing his graduation, John Arnold got a job with Enron where he worked as an oil trader. When the company collapsed a year later, he decided to start his own company, “Centaurus Energy Advisors, LLC” which deals with hedge funds. His fortunes have been estimated at $2.5 billion.

8. Sameer Gehlaut

Sameer Gehlaut graduated from IIT, Delhi in the year 1995. He started India Bulls with a small office which had a false roof and two computers. By 2005, this shack had transformed into a building that sat on plot which stretched across 4,000 acres of land. Today, it is known for its real-estate and financial services in India. At age 34, he is worth 1.2 billion dollars.

9. Larry Page

Larry Page founded Google- the largest and most popular search engine on the web. He launched the website along with a classmate in a tiny garage and went on to make the most successful web technology in the world, before graduating from Stanford University in 1998. Page is worth over $18.6 billion.

10. Kostyantin Zhevago

This self-made billionaire was initially a finance director of a bank in Ukraine. Eventually, he managed to become a major part of the company and owns a majority of the shares. He is worth 3.4 billion dollars.

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Many thought it to be impossible, but they never paid any heed to what other people had to say. They changed the way we used to see the internet and were responsible for the world wide revolution and in turn changing every aspect of our lives. The so called gold rush of the World Wide Web is said to have passed by but the amount of opportunity still being offered is still vast. Here are 10 best inspirational stories of people who have changed the world of Internet.

1. YouTube

It was in February 2005 that three people named Jawed Karim, Steve Chen, and Chad Hurley realized how difficult it was to upload and share videos online and thought of coming up with a solution. After applying various methods to make the videos more viral, it became popular with millions of videos being watched on YouTube. In 2006, Google acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock.

2. Plentyoffish.com

It has become one of the top dating sites in the world. It was launched by its founder Markus Frind in 2003 as a part of a project for him regarding ASP.NET. From a humble beginning, Markus has made it into a site earning $10000 a day. The most surprising aspect remains that Markus was the sole owner of this site until recently.

3. Bebo

The success story of the famous social networking site, Bebo and its founders rank third on the list. It was in January 2005 that Michael and Xochi Birch launched it and immediately tasted success. At present, Bebo has over 40 million members, majority of them in United Kingdom. In 2008, AOL agreed to acquire Bebo for $850 million.

4. Zenhabits.com

The idea of creating Zenhabits.com was to help people with personality development using blogs. Its founder Leo Babauta launched it in January 2007. At present, it caters to over 100,000 of its subscribers needs. This venture has proved to be so successful that Leo has changed it into a full time job.

5. BlueLithium

Blue Lithium, launched in 2004 is an advertising network and was founded by Gurbaksh Chahal. It offers solutions to internet advertising .In 2007, Yahoo decided to acquire BlueLithium for a whopping $300million. At present, Gurbaksh continues his work on new projects which also includes a book.

6. JohnChow.com

JohnChow.com is a blog covering miscellaneous ramblings of a dot com mogul and was primarily launched to express his opinions on various topics. As he learned more about blogging and monetizing he shared the information with the readers which resulted in his site getting a huge popularity. At times, he earns as much as $40,000.

7. Last.fm

It is an internet radio station and music community. Initially launched in United Kingdom, it has now reached over 200 countries having more than 200 million active users. Apart from letting its users share their thoughts on music, it also lets them create and sell their own songs. In May 2007 it was acquired by CBS interactive for $280million.

8. Flicker

This site has become popular by letting its users share their photographs online. It was initially developed as a side project by Ludicorp and has changed into a site hosting over 2 billion pictures. It had become one of the top properties of yahoo after it was acquired in 2005 for a figure which is rumored to be somewhere over $40 million.

9. Weblogs, Inc

Most of its blogs have actually turned to be more familiar to people than this site which actually hosts them. It was launched in 2003 by Jason Calacanis and Brian Alvey. When this network was established, it included about 90 blogs. It grew fast and was acquired by AOL for $25 million dollars.

10. Zappos.com

This site was developed by Nick Swinmurn for the purpose of selling shoes online. Nick received help from another entrepreneur called Tony Hseih who decided to invest in the company. Though Zappos.com received a lot of competition it has managed to reach their revenues from nothing to $ 800 million and is expected to reach the $ 1 billion mark this year.

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The US has retained its pole position as the largest economy with a GDP of $13.8 trillion in spite of the ill-fated slump. Following are names of the largest countries in terms of their GDP.

1. The United States

The United Stated with a GDP of $13.8 trillion is the world’s No.1. A growth of 1 percent was registered by the US economy in the first quarter. However, the U.S has also been badly affected by recession. By June 2008, the economy fell into a recession. About 2.6 million Americans lost their jobs in 2008, the worst since the end of World War II.

2. Japan

With a GDP of $4.37 trillion, Japan is the second largest economy in the world. However it moved further into recession in the fourth quarter as it suffered a great fall in exports. Japan’s GDP has fallen at an annual rate of 0.4 per cent from July to September 2008, marking the second consecutive quarter of negative growth. According to Bank of Japan, the economy will suffer a setback of 1.8 per cent this financial year.

3. China

China has moved ahead of Germany to become the world’s third largest economy after the United States and Japan. It witnessed a growth rate in GDP to the extent of 13 per cent in 2007. China revised the growth rate of its gross domestic product (GDP) for 2007 to 13 per cent from 11.9 per cent. As per the final verification the GDP totaled $3.76 trillion. However China has also been impacted by recession to a great extent.

4. Germany

After holding the third position for several years, recently Germany has been pushed to the 4th position. Its GDP stands at $3.29 trillion. German economy’s GDP fell owing to falling exports by half a percent in July, August and September, which was the second straight quarter of decline. The European economy also witnessed its first recession in 15 years. Europe is facing the worst financial crisis since the great depression. The GDP in the 15 euro nations sank by 0.2 per cent during August, September and October 2008.

5. United Kingdom

United Kingdom, the fifth largest economy fell by 0.5 per cent July and September. Its GDP stood at $2.72 trillion. The economy shrank in the third quarter for the first time since 1992.

6. France

France holds the sixth position among largest world economies with a GDP of $2.56 trillion. The economy of France shrank by 0.3 percent in the second quarter of the year. However, the gross domestic product grew by 0.1 per cent in the third quarter of 2008. A 0.5%percent fall of the French economy has been forecast by the International Monetary Fund in 2009.

7. Italy

Italy is the 7th largest economy in the world with a GDP of $2 trillion. The Italian economy shrank in the third quarter of 2008 for the second consecutive quarter. Its GDP fell by 0.5 per cent before a quarter, after a revised drop of 0.4 per cent in the second quarter.

8. Spain

With a GDP of $1.42 trillion, Spain is the eighth largest economy. It got trapped under a recession for the first time in 15 years. The economy of Spain fell for the first time since 1993. While the gross domestic product of Spain fell 0.2% in the third quarter from the second quarter, it rose 0.9% from the third quarter a year earlier.

9. Canada

Canada is the 9th largest economy in the world with a GDP of $1.32 trillion. In the next 2 quarters Canada is expected to register negative growth. The unemployment rate of Canada is set to hit a high of 7.4 per cent in 2009.

10. Brazil

With a GDP of $1.31 trillion, Brazil is the 10th largest economy in the world. Brazil is also badly hit by recession. Its industrial output fell by 6.2 per cent in November. Brazil’s unemployment rate dropped to its lowest point in seven years.

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With the economy reeling under recession, many people are finding various ways and means to improve their income. But many jobs that promise to pay real money are also fraught with risk and danger. The following is a compilation of the top 10 worst ways to make money which can help you to avoid them at all costs.

1. Helping Nigerian millionaires

The advance fee fraud otherwise known as the “419 scam” involves a polite preacher, Nigerian widow or political prisoner emailing you seeking your assistance in safeguarding his riches. They promise you a portion of their fortune and all you may have to do is pay a bribe or a fee. This is a proven massive scam which must be avoided at all cost and is one of the worst ways to make money.

2. Gambling

There are problems which come with gambling namely you can end up losing quite a lot of money if you do not know the art of gambling.

3. Paid medical testing

Paid medical testing has their own drawbacks and cannot guarantee sufficient returns. You have to understand the extent of physical harm you are interested to risk in this process.

4. Blogging

Though blogs make money from advertising, most of the blogs which make large sums of money are professional in nature. This can be attributed to column writing by great industry magnates or well accomplished people. By being an ordinary blogger you may be able to make only enough money to cover your hosting cost.

5. Online gaming

Playing online video games also does not guarantee good returns. In this type of money making you may have to compete with a lot of Koreans and Chinese people who may make big money because of large number of hours devoted for this job. You may end up making just a pittance.

6. High-yield investment opportunities

HYIPs are unsustainable after a few years and are definitely unlawful. You have to stay away from any such schemes which promise a very high return over and above the normal rate of return.

7. Online surveys

Filling online surveys may seem a simple task which promises a great deal of money. Whatever price is quoted, you must understand that even this arena is filled with scams. As the job involves no ability or talent of any kind, you may not get much work or pay. You may also be required to pay for some of these opportunities and some of these may never pay you properly.

8. Foreign currency Trading

Forex trading involves a lot of risk as you may have to work with people who may have more capital than you and who are into this for a living. It also is a zero-sum game in which you will stand to benefit only when someone loses their cash. You cannot be guaranteed profits in this type of trading and fraud in this area is more prevalent.

9. Real estate Flipping

Flipping real estate is also a not very desirable way to make extra money. Flipping has become rare these days with the fall in price of houses. It also involves a lot of risk and you have to seek professional advice before choosing this method of earning an income.

10. Day trading

Day trading involves a lot of risk and can be done only with practice and training. It is seen that day traders earn a lower rate of return than the average investing household. Hence it is actually a complicated and stressful way to make money. Instead you can just give cash to experienced people who will know exactly what they are doing and help you improve your earnings.

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The following list of the Top 10 ad icons of the 20th century is in recognition of those images that have had profound resonance in the marketplace. The criteria include longevity, effectiveness, cultural impact and recognizability.

1. The Marlboro Man –Marlboro cigarettes

The Marlboro Man is the character used in tobacco advertising campaign for Marlboro cigarettes. It was used between 1954 and 1999 in the United States, where the campaign originated. The character of the Marlboro Man was designed by Leo Burnett in 1954. The image involves rugged cowboys, in nature with only a cigarette.

2. Ronald McDonald – McDonald Restaurants

Used as a primary mascot of McDonald’s fast food restaurant chain, Ronald McDonald is a clown character widely known by everyone. In the commercials shown on Television, the clown inhabits a fantasy world called McDonaldland. He is seen to engage in adventures with his friends the Hamburglar, Mayor Mcheese, Birdie the Early Bird, Grimace and The Fry Kids.

3. The Green Giant – Green Giant Vegetables

Green Giant refers to the vegetable brand owned by General Mills. This advertising campaign has two mascots, the Jolly Green Giant and his friend Little Green Sprout. The company not only sells canned vegetables but is also the largest purveyor of frozen vegetables both under the Green Giant and Le Sueur brands.

4. Betty Crocker – Betty Crocker Food products

A cultural and personal icon, Betty Crocker is the trademark and brandname of American Fortune 500 Corporation General Mills. In 1921, the name was conceived by the Washburn Crosby Company as a method of giving personalized response to consumer product questions. Betty being a cheerful all American names was chosen for the character.

5. The Energizer Bunny – Eveready Energizer Batteries

The Energizer Bunny is the mascot and marketing icon of Energizer batteries in North America. It is depicted as a pink, toy rabbit wearing white and blue striped sandals and sunglasses. It beats a drum having the Energizer logo. It is a parody of the earlier released Duracell Bunny, seen in Europe and Australia.

6. The Pillsbury Doughboy – Assorted Pillsbury Foods

The Pillsbury Doughboy”, otherwise called as Poppin’ Fresh, is the mascot and advertising icon of The Pillsbury Company and appears in many of their commercials. Though his is mistaken for a bunny by some children he is actually a small anthropoid character apparently made out of dough.

7. Aunt Jemima – Aunt Jemima pancake mixes and syrup

Aunt Jemima is the selected trademark for syrup, pancake flour, and other breakfast foods presently owned by the Quaker Oats Company. The Quaker Oats Company first registered the Aunt Jemima trademark in April, 1937, though the trademark dates back to 1893.

8. The Michelin Man – Michelin Tires

Created in 1898 by a German hermit named Berthold Heinz-Dieter, The Michelin Man is the mascot of Michelin Tires based in Clermont-Ferrand in the Auvergne région of France. Michelin is mainly a tyre manufacturer and is presently the world’s second-largest tyre manufacturer.

9. Tony the tiger – Kellogg’s sugar frosted flakes

Tony the Tiger is the advertising cartoon mascot for Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes otherwise called Frosties breakfast cereal. The mascot appears on its advertising and packaging. Very recently, Tony has also become the mascot for Tiger Power and Tony’s Cinnamon Krunchers.

10. Elsie – Borden Diary Products

An unofficial mascot of the Borden Company, Elsie the Borden Cowis now used to promote the Dairy Farmers of America’s Borden cheese products. Borden was named after Gail Borden, Jr a businessman, philanthropist and inventor who is famous for developing a commercial method of condensing milk first and foremost.

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The main aim of advertising is to reach a large group of people and attract customers economically. Advertising when done correctly can bring about success in your business. The following are ten advertising tips that you have to pay attention to.

1. Know your target audience.

You must know your target audience towards which you have to gear your advertising campaign. You must refrain from making generic ads which most often fail to grab the attention of your potential customers.

2. Accentuate your competitive advantage.

You must know all about the pros of your company and accentuate all those factors that give you your competitive edge. It is a well known fact that although several ads are clever, they fail to sell the benefits of the service or product.

3. It pays to have an image.

The McDonald’s arches can be recognized by anybody while whizzing by on the highway. Similarly there are lots of other products which can be recognized through their packaging or logo. When it comes to promoting or advertising your business, the image counts a lot. Many advertisers do not take efforts to create a consistent image.

4. Spending money helps to make money.

Advertising is not the place where you can effectively work on a tight budget. It will affect the bottom line and also the sales. The fact is that advertising works despite its expensive nature. Hence the more money you spend on adverts, you can hope to increase your chances of improving your business.

5. Advertise in the appropriate places.

You must take care to advertise in the proper places such as radio station, favorite magazines or television program. For doing this effectively you must know what your audience read, watch, and listen to, and advertise in the proper place to reach your target market.

6. Your advertising campaign must not be determined by your budget.

Though it will be easy from a book keeping perspective to earmark some amount towards advertising expenses, it will not work out effectively always. If your business has seasonal highs and lows like plenty of other businesses, you may be spending lots of money during down times on advertising and not much when you really want to have customers. Many entrepreneurs fail to budget as per their seasonal advertising needs.

7. Diversify.

You must take care to spread your advertising money around and not put all eggs in the same basket. Many entrepreneurs select the best area to advertise based on potential rate of returns and price and then stop. This may not be the right thing to do.

8. Don’t spread yourself too thin.

Not every service or product will appeal to everyone. Many entrepreneurs including corporate executives try to devise ways and means to reach every market. This does not work. It can be disastrous for small businesses, who cannot afford to spread themselves too thin. Therefore, find your target audience or market and do everything possible for satisfying that group.

9. Check your ads in advance.

You must test your adverts on other people. You can do this by investing in focus groups if you have the time and money for investing in the same. You must try and find out if those people accept or understand the message you are trying to convey.

10. Monitor your ads.

You can easily find out from new clients or customers how they knew about you. Though this method seems to be simple not many entrepreneurs bother to do this. It is better to know which ads generate business.

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There are hundreds and thousands of multinational companies all over the world that are thriving today. It is very interesting to see which of these companies are topping the list, even at the most critical economic time that the world has ever faced. There are certain companies that have kept their reputation for a decade or more, while other newly emerging companies are just now reaching the top due to their hard work and perseverance. Many of these newcomers are IT companies. 
Here is the list of top 10 IT companies all over the world:

1. Microsoft:
Microsoft is a company that has reached the doorsteps of houses all over the world. These days it is not difficult to find a computer even in a remote village. To run that computer it is necessary to have an operating system, and the operating system that is most often installed is Microsoft’s Windows OS. This company has software revenues of $49453.

2. IBM:
Founded in the year 1896, this company has worked its way to the top-ten list entirely because of its hard work. It has reserved its position in the international top 10 companies for several years. It has software revenues of $22089.

3. Oracle:
This particular company came into existence in the year 1977. Since then it has expanded its share in the market and has reached the third position just within a few decades. It has software revenues of $17560.

4. SAP:
This company was launched in 1970. From then on, it has reached new heights every year and has made it to the top 10 of multinational companies, while grabbing the 4th position in the list of top 10 IT companies. It also has software revenues of $11604.

5. Nintendo:
This company was a cards company that was founded in the year 1886. Later, it grew to become a multinational company that developed gaming consoles. It has software revenues of $7245.

6. HP:
HP, or Hewlett Packard, was founded in the year 1939 by Packard and Hewlett. The company did not go public until the year 1957. It is one of the major multinational companies and has created a mark in the printer manufacturing industry. In fact, everywhere you go the printer you will most often see is of the HP brand. Many offices, homes, schools, etc have HP printers. It has software revenues of $6243.

7. Symantec:
Symantec was founded in 1982 and is largely known for the Norton Antivirus packages. In fact, it is one of the best Antivirus software products available on the market today. There are several other products such as Norton Internet Security, Norton Ghost and more, that have very good returns in the market. Symantec has software revenues of $5692.

8. Activision Blizzard:
Activision Blizzard merged with Vivendi Games in the year 2007. It has achieved success in the video game industry and has gotten into publishing games through subsidiaries. It has software revenues of $4622 and has grabbed the position number 8 in our top 10 list of IT companies.

9. Electronic Arts:
Electronic Arts was established in the year 1982. This company is known for developing, marketing and distributing video games. There are several games such as cricket and soccer that have been well received by the gaming crowd, and EA Sports is a well marked identity on the market today. It has software revenues of $4268 and is currently at the ninth position on our chart.

10. CA:
This is a company that produces IT management solutions and software. CA released its first product called CA-SORT in the market in the year 1976. It has software revenues of $3936.

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When you think of franchisees, you immediately think of restaurants. This is because restaurants are some of the most successful franchises out there. The following is the list of the 10 restaurant franchises which got the highest score in the AllBusiness AllStar franchise rankings.

1. Subway
The first branch of Submarine Sandwich Restaurant Chain was opened in Connecticut by Fred De Luca and Peter Buck in 1965. They started franchising it in 1974. Subway established franchisees all over the country and even abroad because of the healthy and fresh-alternative to junk foods provided by them.

2. Dunkin’ Donuts
The company recently launched a $100 million ad campaign for successfully weathering the economic downturn. In 2008, Dunkin’ focused on increasing the number of nutritive food options it serves. Dunkin’ Donuts was initially called Industrial Luncheon Services started by William Rosenberg in Boston in 1946. The Donut shop started by him in Massachusetts was called Open Kettle and two years later its name was changed to Dunkin Donut’s. Now it is located in over 40 countries.

3. Buffalo Wild Wings Grill and Bar
Started in 1982 as a small time sandwich shop and wing eatery, the aim was to open at least more than 1,000 restaurants nationwide by the year 2012. Presently there are at least 500 such restaurants. The number of units was nearly doubled by the company between 2007 and 2008. The restaurants has consistently won awards for “Best Sports Bar ” and “Best Wings” from restaurant visitors from the world over.

4. Smoothie King
This restaurant is greatly profiting from Americans’ growing health conscious population. The company focuses on giving the franchisees a strong foundation for success through the maintenance of strong business systems. Smoothie King has greatly benefited from this approach and has reported a growth rate of 27 percent for each of the past four years.

5. Denny’s 
Since 1953, Denny’s has been in business and it has been franchising for 46 years. When it comes to recession, its strong brand and value-oriented menu has seen it tide through. With the aim of improving sales, Denny’s created four new regional VP of operations positions last year. This was also undertaken to improve brand awareness through innovation and local marketing efforts.

6. Long John Silver’s
A part of the strong parent company, Yum! Brands which also owns KFC, A&W, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut, Long John Silver is another top restaurant franchisee. To foster growth opportunities and cut costs, Yum recently restructured its U.S. business. Yum is also engaged in working towards re-franchising underleveraged stores or trying to improve their performance.

7. McDonald’s
This hamburger chain has been recession resistant and is the most powerful brand in the industry. McDonald’s has continually posted stronger-than-expected sales both abroad and domestically. McDonald’s same-store sales had increased for 55 months in a row as of November 2008.

8. Hardee’s
When CKE Restaurants Inc. purchased Hardee’s in 1997, their main re-branding effort concentrated on improving the menu. Since then Hardee has offered quality menu items and premium burgers. The sales of its thick burgers continue to be strong in spite of the recession.

9. Jimmy John’s Gourmet Sandwich Shops
Although many restaurants are floundering because of the tight economic conditions, the sandwich sector has by and large remained unaffected. Since its inception in 1983, Jimmy John’s Gourmet Sandwich Shops have enjoyed impressive growth. The company’s main focus is on fresh gourmet sandwiches and quick delivery.

10. Carl’s Jr.
The company is still enjoying positive growth in sales despite aggressive discounting on the part of its competitors. The company is known for its attention-grabbing ads aimed at young males who are their important target market.

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