Atlanta Business Radio Interviews Business Owners Anand Goel, Stu Lustman, Annette Curtiss and Doug Billian

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Today we talked to business owners in several industries who are doing some very creative things..

First up we had on Stu Lustman who is from Baltimore, MD where he received his undergrad degree from the University of Maryland and his MBA from Loyola College of Baltimore.  Stu started his financial career as a stock broker, analyst and trader before moving on to financial project work including an asset/liability management for a regional bank. 

After doing these various projects, Stu went back to finance after his MBA (a degree held by less than 10% of his industry peers), this time commercial finance so he could learn about working with debt and helping small business owners.  Stu started Southern Lending Solutions, LLC about 2.5 years ago so he could help these small businesses who were clearly being ignored by the big banks. For more information about Stu and his company please go to his website www.southernlendingsolutions.com

Next up we had on Annette Curtiss with Sales Diagonal. Sales Diagonal was founded in 2007 and they are a Business to Business Consulting firm that specializes in developing and executing High Impact Value Driven strategies to increase sales revenue.  They focus on increasing an organizational's sales revenue by decreasing poor workflow, improving productivity, improving processes and identifying sales tools. The firm's focus is on People, Process and Technology.

Sales Diagonal Consultants are experienced in the Health Care, Manufacturing, Financial Services, Technology, Insurance, Software and State and Local Government sectors.  The consultants have big-company experience and have refined and applied their processes to deliver successful strategies to businesses of all sizes. For more information about Annette and her firm please go to her website www.salesdiagonal.com

Next we had on Doug Billian with Southern Silver.

Southern Silver specializes in new and vintage sterling silver flatware and serving pieces. There’s also a wholesale stainless steel implement (serving piece “blades? without the handles) piece of business that’s pretty meaningful.

Southern Silver has lots of potential growth areas, so please let me know if there are any sterling silver pieces you think might add value to the customer experience… baby gifts, picture frames, corporate gifts, etc.

Southern Silver will not be operating a retail shop, but please visit them online at www.southernsilver.com.

And finally we closed the show with Anand Goel, CEO with Optimized Payments Consulting.

He talked about how they leverage their intimate knowledge of Interchange and merchant services practices while helping businesses that annually process over $5 million in non-cash sales ensure they are getting the best possible value from their payment providers. Optimized Payments does NOT sell credit card processing services and are not aligned with any payment processor, reseller, network or equipment vendor. Their allegiance rests solely with their clients.

Their clients are very busy, and they find navigating the intricacies of pricing, interchange and fees to be time consuming and confusing. Optimized Payments uses a proprietary methodology to identify and implement the appropriate savings strategies for acceptance of all payment types, from credit and debit cards, to electronic checks and gift cards.

They also have a no-risk approach to every client engagement. If Optimized Payments doesn’t deliver measurable results to their clients' your bottom line they the client does not pay a fee. For more information please check out his website www.optimizedpmts.com

Also if you know of a business in Atlanta that we should know about please email Amy Otto at Amy @ atlantabusinessradio.com and we will try and get them on the show.