McLelland Forex Management

 

Situation

An amateur forex trader (foreign currency trader) felt he was ready to build a fund management company. He knew he needed to use what limited time he had to put the finishing touches on his trading system. So, he sought help building the business structure necessary to managing other people's money.

Challenge

To build a fund management company from scratch in a highly technical and ambiguously regulated industry.

Solution

My contributions to this project include:

• Comprehensive Disclosure Document
• Fund Management Agreement & Addendums
• Business Continuity & Disaster Recovery Plan
• Complex Trade Execution Programming
• Strategy Testing Results Analysis & Optimization
• Online Sales Presentation for Remote Fund Aquisition
• Regulatory requirement research & compliance
• Business Entity Type Selection & Articles of Organization
• Client Account Management System
• Fund Distribution System
• Forex Broker Analysis
• Website Development
• Graphic Design

Due to the comprehensive nature of this challenge, only a few selected accomplishments will be featured here. If there is any aspect of this project you would like to know more about, please feel free to contact me.


DISCLOSURE DOCUMENT

The main concern of financial regulatory agencies is to ensure the complete disclosure of all risks and performance information from fund management companies to their clients. As long as investors are able to make fully informed decisions, and the companies do what they say they will, regulators typically allow free enterprise to take place.

The full Disclosure Document is 82 pages of exhaustive risk disclosures, market information, trading plan descriptions, performance results, definitions, explanations, and more. It is the central document to which all other company activities and promotional materials are accountable.

It was essential that the Disclosure Document be accurate, extensive, and clear. The following are sample pages from the document:




CODING

Many forex brokers use trading platforms compatible with the MetaTrader4 (MT4) programming language, which is very similar in format to c++, but includes special functions to handle market analysis and trade execution.

The trader was having difficultly finding a coder who could write an “expert advisor” (an automatic trade execution program) that would function reliably in accordance with his trading strategy. After going through about a dozen variations of the code with two different programmers, I asked if I could take a look at the code and try to write the program myself.

I had never written code before, so I called a friend of mine to show me the basics. He spent about 15 minutes explaining the C++ language structure and gave me a few tips. A few weeks later, I had successfully written the code the trader had been looking for.

The code functioned according to his trading plan and acted more reliably than the previous versions written by the 'professionals'. I am unable share the code I wrote for him here, but I will share a similar program I wrote using the same language.



The code you see here is actually really useful. It is a global take profit program for an advanced 'basket' trading strategy. It continuously monitors multiple trade positions in one account, and when the account as a whole reaches its designated target profit, it closes all the account's positions.

If you're into forex, you're free to use the code if you like, just know that like all trading software, it is not guaranteed to perform any particular trading function and you use it at you're own risk.

Results

Although I would like to report the company is alive and thriving, it is not. In the end, the trader was unable to overcome the challenges of changing market volatility and its impact on his trading strategy.

Without the ability to prove long term sustainability, he responsibly walked away from his dream of managing other people's funds.

However, I still count this project as a success. Utilizing critical thinking, research, analysis, attention to detail and some trademark creativity I was able to develop the infrastructure necessary to establish and run a fund management company.

 

Thank Your Body

 

Situation

A movement therapist wanted to branch out and connect with more people online. She had plenty of ideas of what she would write about, but she didn't know the best way to attract new people to her site.

Challenge

After discussing her goals further, we determined I would help her:

1. develop a look a feel to her site matching her holistic health and wellness perspective
2. implement the social networking tools necessary to attract new followers and regular site attendance

Solution

THE LOOK

Helping design the look of the site was actually really easy. She already had some ideas that matched her lively self, and all I had to do was help her refine the Photoshop files and get everything on her site the way it should be.


THE TOOLS

Drawing upon my organizational communication training, we decided to setup the site to handle two different types of social networking activities: pushing and pulling.

PULLING occurs when a site has a fan or follow type button, where once signed up the user will automatically receive site updates via email, rss, etc. This seems to be the first thing people think of putting on their site when you mention social networking.

However, there is another way to spread the word.

PUSHING occur when a user shares your site with their friends and contacts. It is commonly seen on Facebook as the “Like” button or in this site's case an Add This button.

So, why do most sites with social networking functionality offer only type of social activity button?

I believe the reason is two fold. First, its hard to place both sets of buttons on a page without it looking funny with similar icons so close together. (I think Thank Your Body is a particularly good example of how it can be done well.) Second, most people just don't know the difference between the two and why you would want both.

Think of it this way:

Pulling is a RETENTION activity. You want it to be as easy as possible for others to view your site again and again. I can't think of any better way to do this than to have your site updates automatically delivered their “inbox” of choice.

Pushing is an EXPANSION activity. As readers continue to read your site, they are in fact giving you more and more opportunities to hit them with the silver bullet. You never know when something you write will inspire them just enough to share your site on their facebook or twitter account and BAM!, all 130+ of their friends are instantly informed about you and your page.

(*According to the statistics, 130 is the average number of facebook friends per user.  Active social internet users are likely to have many many more.)

After setting up the necessary feeds, social networking profiles, writing the code, and uploading everything to her site, all that was left was for her to write some posts.

Results

Now, when I say “all that was left” was for her to write some posts, I am being sarcastic. This is probably the hardest part for people do.  In order to be a successful social networker you need to publish quality content consistently – especially at the beginning when you feel no one is reading your site.

But it does pay off, and it can happen quicker than you imagine.

In the past 7 months, since ThankYourBody.com was born into existence, it has already exceeded 3000 natural website hits, and has generated real money from movement therapy jobs procured entirely through the site.

I look forward to seeing how this site is doing in another year, five and ten years down the road!

 

ELS Slideshow

 

Situation

The owner of ELS Productions (a CD/DVD duplication company) wanted to expand his distribution channels to include copy shops. Since copy shops have very similar business clients as ELS, his plan was to turn them into distributors of his product.

Unfortunately, he didn't have the time needed to accomplish such a task on his own. So, he hired me to get his idea off the ground.

Challenge

To expand ELS's CD/DVD distribution channels to copy shops across the nation in a way that could be duplicated once I was gone.

Solution

To sign up copy shops and recording studios as distributors of ELS products.


MARKETING ANALYSIS

ELS has two main types of clients. The first being business clients who use it for things such as presentations, handouts, instructional videos etc. These are the clients I was initially hired to contact.

The second type of clients are independent music artists and groups. This group typically sends ELS their albums to be duplicated for concerts and local shows after they have had their music mastered with a separate recording studio.

After analyzing the market we realized there was great potential in marketing to recording studios to capture the musicians at the source before they even started looking for duplication services.  It was then decided to try marketing to both types of clients.


PROMO MATERIALS UPGRADE

Although ELS's marketing materials had a lot of good information in them, they were cluttered and outdated. The following is a slide show showing the before and after, and the thought process behind, the revised pamphlet I created:

(best viewed in full-screen mode)

DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS

Finally, it was time to sign up some copy shops and recording studios. I took the lead by doing a couple hundred sales calls myself.

Through several discussions with business owners and managers I refined the sales presentations and marketing strategies for each type of clientele. Sales scripts, form emails and online spreadsheets were then created to allow future ELS sales people to duplicate my success.

Results

We found that recording studios were much more responsive to working with ELS than copy shops. By the time I completed the project, 7 copy shops and 29 recording studios had been established as distributors with the expectation of recurring business.

ELS also enjoys the benefit of cleaner marketing materials which can be used in a variety of promotional settings.

 

Link to blog post

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