Ever have one of those days?

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I’m changing gears today. Normally I write about cutting edge, yet proven strategies and tips for growing your business and today I’m deviating from that. You see things in life and business are not always rosey and cheery. Things don’t always go well.

Happens to the best of us doesn’t it?

Sometimes it’s for a day, sometimes a week, sometimes a season. However long, it happens to us all. It’s inevitable.

I had a business client come to me recently telling me how his business fell apart and how his marriage collapsed at the same time. Brutal. He’s a good guy and an intelligent and hard working man. Sometimes bad things happen to good people.

So, let me ask, have you ever had one of those days where it’s excruciatingly painful to accomplish anything?

I had one of those this morning. Things don’t go as planned. In fact, they don’t go anywhere as near as planned?!

As you may know, I love doing endurance events – Ironmans, 100 mile bike rides, marathons, you know long distance stuff that only crazy people do. (I had a friend ask me why I just didn’t drive 26.2 miles instead of running it, said I would get there much faster! – he does have a point!!)

And when you do endurance events you have to train. And sometimes there are great days – like the 18 miler I did a couple weeks ago where the weather was perfect, body felt fresh and fast and there was plenty of deer on the trail – and sometimes there are crappy bad days.

That was today. I had a 20 miler planned. I have this wacky notion of doing an ultramarathon and need to get some longer miles in. Figured I would do only 2 more miles than my last long run of 18. Should be no problem. Had the run planned out, would be a nice trail run where there is usually plenty of wildlife to keep me entertained. Weather was supposed to be great – 65F, sunny and breezy. Figured it would be fun.

Instead, here’s how the day unfolded:

  • horrible sleep last night and woke up tired (no problem, this has happened plenty of times before)
  • body was sluggish
  • legs were mush from the beginning and progressively got worse
  • head was out of it – “this sucks stinks, why didn’t I just stay in bed”
  • no deer on trail
  • ran out of water & started getting dehydrated
  • stomach didn’t like PB&J – without taking in fuel on long runs you are a gonner
  • and to top it off I bonked with 3 miles to go! … I walked the last 3 miles repeating the thought “this really sucks, I’m done, I just want to get home”

Everything was out of whack. Ugh.

Oh, since I was feeling so bad, I thought I should push myself to overcome it and ran walked up this nasty hill. It was so steep that mountain goats wouldn’t climb it. So off I went. Thought that would snap me out of it – nope but it did make me hotter and used up lots of my water and only took me 45 minutes to go 1 mile!

… seriously, what was I thinking!

Ok. I got done my run/walk. Was miserable and hated it.

Sometimes you just have those days.

Here’s the point of this story. Because it happens to people all the time. I see it all around me. So what do you do when you have a bad day/month/year/season?

… you just keep moving your feet

I had to get done. The distance was not going to get shorter if I didn’t move. I could wine and complain and say how much I hated it and how I just wanted to get it over with (all of which I did). But the fact remained that I had to cover the distance and get it done.

So I just kept moving my feet.

You can apply strategies, best practices, cutting edge technologies, you can do a lot of things. And sometimes things just get hard. And when they do, just keep moving your feet.

If it happens a lot, then get some help. There may be something you are missing. If I experience consistent bad days (like today) I will get with my coach and work through it with him.

In the meantime, I will keep moving my feet.

And you, if you have bad days, whether it be in your marriage, your business, with your kids, or the relentless mind games that go on in your head, if you have bad days where you feel like throwing the towel in, just keep moving your feet.

Blessings,

One Way to Skyrocket Your Lead Flow Using Your Website

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For Businessowners that Want to Create an Unfair Advantage in the Quantity and Quality of Leads Coming into their Business:

Do you want an in-expensive, highly profitable way to create a continuous flow of new leads into your business?

Today we will cover something that every businessowner needs. And that means you too!

But first, when it comes to utilizing your website there are a couple different approaches…

2 Schools of Thought When Handling the People that Come to Your Website:

  1. Go for the jugular and close the deal
  2. Capture their contact information so you can continue to market to them (called “Lead Generation”)

If  you are going for the jugular that’s fine. Just know that you are leaving at least 33% of the money YOU COULD BE GETTING on the table. It most cases you would be losing 200% or greater.

If you capture their contact information, then you can market to them forever for free until they buy (or die).

In my opinion, school of thought #2, capturing their contact information, or Lead Generation is supreme. This is one thing that every businessowner needs!

Lead Generation is designed to do one thing and one thing only – constantly and continuously generate high quality leads for your business.

To create this, you need what one of my marketing mentors, Dan Kennedy, calls “a lead generation magnet”. A lead generation magnet is something of interest and value to your prospects that gets them to say to themselves “Hey, I want that!” and they give you their contact information in exchange for whatever the lead generation magnet is about. A minimum is to get their email address.

Your lead generation magnet can take many forms, some of the most popular are white papers, special reports, free e-books, videos, interviews or a free email course like this one. They are all good and choosing the right one for you depends on your strengths and the interests of your market.

There are many advantages to a lead generation magnet. The vast majority of people aren’t ready to pull the trigger and won’t buy right away. Instead they research to see what’s out there and check out several sites to get a feel for who’s selling what. If you offer them something of interest and value to help them in their decision making process, then you can take them out of the market and follow up with them. In your follow up you can demonstrate why you are the BEST solution for them and separate yourself from your competition. One more lead for you, one less for your competition.

To create a lead generation magnet, you will need:

  1. The lead generation magnet – white papers, special reports, free e-books, videos, interviews or a free email course. This should appeal to the emotions of your market. Find the problems they are having, talk to them about those problems and offer them ways to solve their problem – as in, buy your product or hire you!
  2. A landing page – this is the page on your website where they go to learn a little about what you do and enter their information in exchange for your lead generation magnet.
  3. An opt-in mechanism to capture their information for follow up. Here are a couple of options: Aweber and Infusionsoft (Aweber is cheaper, Infusionsoft is way more powerful and also more expensive. It’s the one I use. Both are excellent. A business just starting off might only need Aweber)
  4. A thank you page – after they give you their contact information you immediately take them to this page to access their information.
  5. Follow-up sequence – this is one of the most important pieces of the puzzle that many businessowners miss. You will open the floodgates by effectively utilizing this. (Again, Aweber or Infusionsoft will do the job)

Here are some questions for you to ask yourself:

  • Are you using Lead Generation?
  • How effectively is your magnet working for you?
  • Would you like to have a River of Leads Constantly and Continuously Flowing Into Your Business?
  • Do you want to free up your time and let technology do all the hard work for you so you can do something fun?

If you have any questions or would like to comment on the information, please comment below.

Blessings,

P.S. In you want to get this into effect now, I have a done-for-you service to free you of all the hassles, frustrations, unknowns and concerns you may have. Contact me and we can discuss this affordable and valuable tool.

P.P.S. Want more bang for your internet marketing buck? … Click Here

A Tale of Two Voices

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Had an interesting dialogue with myself on the trail today… ever have conversations with yourself or am I the only one?!!

It was cool and misty at 8:15 this morning as I laced up my shoes to go for a nice trail run in Aliso Woods Canyon. Was supposed to be an easy 13. I’ve been starting to log some longer miles to get ready for “who knows what event I’m doing next”. Truth be told, running trails is a sanctuary for me. I love being out in nature, free from noise and distractions. As long as I have water and food I’m good.

So off I went this morning. Had my fuel belt with water bottles filled up. My food for today was none other than peanut butter & strawberry jam. Love my PB&J!!! I had enough water and food to be out for just about 2 hours.

As I started out on my familiar route, one voice in me said “lets go and explore a new trail”. The other voice said “it’s on the way to the park entrance where we usually start so it’s no big deal, let’s do it”

So off I went exploring a new trail. As I was nearing the end of this trail I saw another trail shoot out to the left with a nice short, steep climb to a small summit. One voice said “let’s go”, the other said “the path is well worn singletrack (narrow trail), so yes, let’s do it”.

To the top of the hill I went. As I looked down into the valley below, I could see the park entrance. No idea how to get there since there was no path down the hill. I could also see another path I had never seen before. It ran parallel to the one I usually run on, but somehow this one seemed secluded. There was no one on it, the other path I normally take I could see runners and mountain bikers all over it.

Hmmmm, one path is empty, secluded and I would be the only one on it. Scenery looks better too. The other path, has lots of people on it. I gotta do the new path! It was like it was calling out to me.

But how do I get there? There was no way down the hill to get to it. I looked and looked. There was heavy dry brush that would be really hard to navigate and would scratch the heck out of my legs. What to do, what to do…. Then I saw it!

I could carve a new path around the heavy brush, then there was a stretch of not-so-thick grass I could go through where there seemed to be a very faint path where someone else walked. That was it, I could get there! I could accomplish my mission and had to do it. Would be a fun adventure.

Felt like a little kid again. Full of excitement and adventure!!

Smiling, almost giggling, I set off.

Then the other voice kicked in “You know Chris, the grass is thick there, you don’t know what’s underneath it. Could be ticks, maybe deer ticks with lyme disease. Or worse, you could step on a den of rattlesnakes. Better not go. Better go back and get on the familiar path and play it safe. Don’t want to get hurt you know”

… hmmm, good points, I thought. He’s right. Maybe I should go back. What was I thinking? Oh well.

Then the other voice chimed in “hey! Let’s go!!!! I want to go this way. It’s gonna be a great adventure!! Let’s go!”

…. hmmm, good point. I did want to go! And I needed to resolve it, since both voices made excellent points.

So how did I resolve it? What did I do?

I decided it was time to have a meeting. I brought the two voices together (seriously, you could make a good case that I’m a certifiable nut job at this point! Am I the only one that has ever had this happen to them??!)

I asked the excited voice why he wanted to go. “Because there’s a new, really cool looking trail. We will be the only one on it. Who knows what we will see!! It’s going to be a great adventure. Let’s go!”

I asked the conservative, safe voice why he thought we shouldn’t go. “Because there could be danger there. Ticks. Snakes. You don’t have your phone with you. If you fall and break your leg, smash your head on a rock, or get bitten by a snake it could be game over”

…. good points on both sides.

I asked the excited voice if he would be ok if we didn’t go if it was deemed unwise. His response was a hesitant “yes”. I asked the conservative, safe, fearful voice if he would help us if we went that way and he said “yes”. Then I asked for his wisdom. “Could we make it down there? – yes. Is this something we have done before? – yes. Is it likely there are ticks in the brush? – no. The grass we would have to walk through, it’s short, there appears to be a set of footprints through it, it’s cold and damp, is it likely there will be snakes there? – no”

I gathered all the data. Thought it through. And in my final anaylsis, it seemed like a reasonable thing to do. To go down there.

Both voices cooperated. Both voices were needed as there were some tricky spots to navigate. And low and behold, we made it!

By the way, on this new (to me), secluded and almost private path, I saw many wonderful things I would have never seen…

  • I saw deer. The deer and I were within 10 feet of each other. Neither moving. Simply checking each other out. (I also came across a family of deer later on, momma, daddy and baby. The buck had a nice big set of antlers on him).
  • I saw a really cool owl. About 5 feet away from him. We just checked each other out for a bit before I went on my way.
  • I saw a primitive looking “Man vs. Wild” shelter by a hidden part of a stream. The adventurer in me was feeling very refreshed at this time!

None of this I expected. It was a very pleasant surprise. The trail was simply beautiful.

Don’t go off and draw a conclusion that I saw all this because I took the path less traveled. That would be unwise. I never would have taken this path if it would have been deemed too dangerous and silly. No, I’m not into stupidity (got most of that out of me in my 20’s!!).

Here’s the moral of the story…

When facing a tough decision in life, it’s good to listen to the two voices. You need the one to look for opportunities. You need the other to make wise decisions. Don’t be foolish and only listen to one and tune the other out. If you do, you will miss out on wonderful opportunities or you will make foolish, stupid decision you will regret for years to come.

Here’s the process I use to make decisions:

  1. Pray
  2. Search the Bible to see what it says (seeking wisdom)
  3. Consult people with expertise and perspective I don’t have. Including my wife since she can see my blind spots – just wish I listened to her earlier in life, would have saved me from some painful situations. (again seeking wisdom) There is safety in a multitude of counselors.
  4. Decide what I want while checking to make sure my motives are right and not self glorifying.
  5. I prayerfully consider all the data and do my final analysis. Then I decide and take action.

I have made many decisions in my life. Some good, others I would take back in an instant. As each page on the calendar is flipped, I have resolved to be wiser and more audacious. Isn’t that how you truly have a full life and fulfill your mission?

How do you make your decisions?

Would love to hear your take on this.

Blessings,

The Problem With Success In The New Economy

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… where to start….

This week I read “An Enterprising Life” by Jay Van Andel and re-watched Jerry McGuire for the umpteenth time. Both worthy of the time invested. Both have great stories. Both have been bouncing around in my mind.

If you’re not familiar with Jay Van Andel, he co-founded the Amway Corporation along with his lifelong friend Rich DeVos. Doesn’t matter your opinion on the Amway business model, you’ve gotta admit that they built a very successful business enterprise doing sales of $8.2 Billion worldwide. I’ve never built a company that size and I’m guessing you haven’t either. So obviously there is a lesson or two that can be learned.

One of the things that really struck me was his lifelong relationship with his friend and business partner Rich DeVos. They had some great and entertaining stories of businesses they built along the way. A couple quick ones:

  • They built an airplane charter company when neither one of them knew how to fly. One time, one of their planes ran out of fuel and was forced to land on a lake too small for them to take off on. So they filled the tank, tied a rope around the plane and the other end around a tree, revved the engine and then cut the rope loose with a knife. The plane had just enough speed to barely clear the top of the trees.
  • They sold their plane business, restaurant business, and took a year off to sail to Cuba. They bought a sailboat and set voyage even though neither one of them knew how to sail. (what were they thinking!!). One night Rich took a wrong turn off the coast of New Jersey and ended so far inland on one of the rivers that it left the Coast Guard perplexed as they were towing them back out to sea. They had never seen a ship get so far inland. Crazy. Their voyage to Cuba continued smoothly until they sank 10 miles off the mainland in a shipping channel and had to be rescued by a passing freighter. They did eventually reach their destination.

Made me laugh and shake my head in wonder.

I also admired the camaraderie they had. Sure they were a couple of young entrepreneurs off on a daring adventure. But that’s how their whole life was.

Jay said that one of the keys to success was the relationship he had with Rich. It was so deep that they had a long standing agreement that when one partner was away, the other had full ability to make any and all decisions, even if it was different from what the other had in mind. Jay stated one example of how this played out during a new construction of a building. He said their trust in each other was so deep that they both felt so secure the other partner would make a decision in the best interest of the company. Not out of pride or ego, but out of the best interest of the company.

Man, I admire and respect that.

They also had the same relationship with their key vendors. They didn’t make decisions off of whoever was the cheapest bid. They did’t go after whoever had the latest bright shiny object. They did not go after whoever talked the best talk. That would have been building a house of cards. Instead, they developed key business partnerships with people that shared the same philosophies.

People they could trust.

One vendor, Dan Vos Construction, was with them from the beginning. He did a couple of jobs for Rich & Jay that were way below what they would normally do – installing simple shelves in a building the size of a gas station – that turned into a relationship that awarded them millions and millions of dollars in new building projects.

The list goes on and on from here. I think you get the point.

… switching gears, the movie Jerry McGuire…

Unless you’ve been under a rock you’ve seen this movie. The 2 lines…. say it with me now…. “Show me the money!!!” and “You had me at hello”….

The whole point of the movie was that the industry was in disarray. Jerry was disgusted with it. He saw how corrupt and shallow it became. He wrote his “memo” about less customers, more attention.

I think you see where I’m going with this. Everything seems so shallow on the surface with business today. Especially in the world of marketing and internet marketing. There is so much stuff out there. I don’t know about you but among the many solicitations I get are the ones from companies in India to do SEO for me. They promise to get me top ranked positions. (By the way, never confuse rankings with success, but I won’t get into that today, that’s a topic for another day…).

Business is faster. Speed is everything. So many people pitching so much stuff. It’s so mind boggling.

And that my friend, is the problem with success in the new economy.

As a business owner, you were successful in the past from doing things mostly on your own. It was easier. You just put your mind to a problem, would concentrate your efforts on it and it would go away wouldn’t it? You could accomplish anything you put your mind to.

Worked in the old economy.

In the new economy, not so much. It’s not like that anymore. There is too much to do. And with the digital age everyone is a friggin expert. We are all surrounded with so many things to do, and so many options – SEM, SEO, PPC, Adwords, Social Media, Facebook, Text Messaging, Link Building, Direct Mail, Sales Letters, Website Design, WordPress, Email Marketing, Email Marketing 2.0, Autoresponders, Opt-ins, Lists, Segmenting Lists – does it ever stop?!!

And the list goes on.

So the problem is that you are fully competent of being successful in any of these ventures on your own, you are so busy being successful in the running of your business, where do you find the time to implement ANY of these? How do you find the resources?????

Wouldn’t it be nice to have trusted business partnerships like Rich and Jay had?

Like what they had with their vendors? … having sources that could help you achieve more success more rapidly through relationships built on trust?

And like Jerry McGuire, having vendors that paired down their client list to make a bigger impact with less people.

By the way, if that’s what you’re looking for in a vendor, in a business partner, then know my friend, that is what I have dedicated the rest of my life to do. Helping you achieve your goals at such a rate that everyone will think you’re cheating. Where, at last, you can have a true business partnership built on old-school trust that will deliver the BEST solution possible for your specific situation.

Would love to get your thoughts on this, please post your comments below.

Blessings.
Chris.

NOT ENOUGH PEOPLE TO SELL TO? How to have eager prospects begging for next-day appointments

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Dan Kennedy, one of the top marketing experts frequently says that “one” is the worst number any business can have – one client, one source of revenue, one product, one lead source – you get the point. If you have only one way of getting leads, what happens if it dries up?

Let me tell you a story…

Tony, a friend of mine, has always been a hard working guy. He was in the Marine Corps, recon division, not afraid of much. When he got out he didn’t want to work for anyone else, had too much drive, so he went to business school. One day after class he asked the professor what businesses he owned. The professor said he never owned a business. Confused, frustrated and irritated Tony left. That was the last time Tony was ever seen there.

Tony is also a strong minded man so he decided he would learn business the way he learned to fight – in the trenches. He started up a yacht maintenance company and worked his tail off. Toiling day and night he finally landed a big account subcontracting for a bigger yacht maintenance company. Life was great. Big checks, steady year-round work, wife, kids, house, mortgage, car payments.

Then one day it happened… the bomb hit…

He showed up Monday morning to pick up his list of yachts to clean as he did many times before. This time he was told he was no longer needed. 90% of his income gone in the blink of an eye. It’s a hard pill to swallow, especially when you are a hard working man with a wife and kids looking up to you and depending on you.

I won’t bore you with all the details of what happened next but the short version went something like this…. hurt (crushed is a better word), confused, bills, anger, determination, prayer, supportive wife, strong work ethic, lesson learned, focused. Stayed in same business, printed flyers, hand delivered them, got a couple clients, provided un-paralleled value, knew his competitors were lazier, delivered superior service, treated his customers like gold (wow is that missing in businesses today!), got more customers, raised rates, hired workers, increased customer value by adding more services, continued to diversify, started brokering deals buying and selling yachts, bought a bigger house to support his bigger family.

You may be saying, “great story Chris, but how does that relate to me?”

If you don’t have multiple streams of generating leads, then you may want to start. Here’s the problem I see, too many businesses don’t have enough leads and so they start to look for ways to advertise or get their name out. Everything sounds so darn good that they try to do too much without much thought into anything. Nothing gets done.

Here’s the BIG lesson: develop focus. Draw up a marketing plan and focus on one source of leads at a time. (if you have an abundance of funds then outsource to get more done at one time).

Think about this, if you add one source of traffic every two months, then in the next year you will have 6 different sources of leads working for you, or 12 sources in 2 years. What do you think your business would look like if you did this? If you focused your thoughts and efforts and got one source going every two months, do you think you would have more success or would you be worrying about where your next lead was coming from?

Tony got focused and kicked some butt.
Now it’s your turn to kick some butt!

Hope you enjoyed this.

Blessings

The easiest way to lose 1 lb a week! … a completely different twist on marketing…

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You have read articles and posts by me saying how you can make significant changes in your business through making small incremental changes. The problem is that it’s not glamorous or sexy having focus and doing small things regularly. It’s much more cool launching a brand new initiative using a brand new bright shiny technology isn’t it?

… unless of course you have tried that a few times and didn’t get the results you were expecting. (see my previous post on the Hype Cycle)

In an attempt to make incremental changes appear more “alluring”, I will show you how to use this to fry fat and look fit and fabulous. (you can come up with some great headlines while reading magazines at the checkout counter at the grocery store!)

Seriously, who wouldn’t want to shed a few pounds?

I will reveal to you the best, easiest, most efficient way to lose weight in the whole wide world. Where you can EASILY lose 1 lb a week (up to 50 lbs/year)! Or lose up to 2 lbs/week or more.

No I’m not selling some weight loss product. No this is not some “magic pill”. They had one of those at the turn of the century. You would take one pill to start losing weight, eat whatever you wanted, then take a second pill when you reached your desired weight.

Pretty cool huh?

How did they do it? … the first pill was actually a tapeworm. It would eat whatever you ate and the pounds would drop faster than a fat boy falling off a cliff. The second pill was poison to kill the tapeworm! … not so cool anymore eh?!!

Instead, here’s the Engineered Marketing approach to weight loss…

  • Pick a goal: Say you want to lose 10 lbs.
  • Now some basic math: 1 lb is about 3500 calories.
  • If you want to lose 1 lb per week. You need to burn off 3500 more calories than you take in on a weekly basis. On a daily basis that’s 500 calories per day (3500/7)

Now there are only 2 things for you to do:

  1. eat 250 less calories per day
  2. burn 250 more calories per day

To eat 250 less calories per day, read the label of what you are eating. If you drink pop (soda), cut out 1 can per day. If you eat 4 meals daily, reduce your intake by 60ish calories per meal – take one less forkfull of food. It is super easy to cut 250 calories when you read the labels on the food you’re eating. For me, the easiest way is to cut out my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches before I go to bed. LOVE PB&J!! (I don’t cut it out all the time, just a few times a week)

To burn 250 calories per day, walk for 45 minutes. A 130 lb woman walking for 45 minutes burns about 257 calories. A 170 lb man will burn about 336 calories.

Easy huh?

Don’t like walking, find something else. Here’s a simple calorie counter http://www.healthyweightforum.org/eng/calorie-calculator.asp

Me, I’ve lost 15 lbs in 3 months following this. I put 4 back on from losing sight of my goal so I re-focused on my goal and will lose 8 lbs over the next 2 months. Nothing glamorous. People are surprised when I tell them how old I am, they think I’m at least 10 years younger. Kinda feels good. You will get that too. Your energy will also go up and you might even start doing crazy things like a friend of mine who lost about 50 lbs and is now running half marathons and talking about doing a full marathon.

It’s simple. Anyone can do it. You just “gotta wanna”

No marketing analogies. You can probably find 3 or 4 solid lessons (they are there) from this simple story.

Oh,I still eat double doubles (hamburgers), I just compensate when I do.

Hope you enjoyed this.

Blessings

The Perils of Positive Thinking and a Powerful Dose of Reality

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The perils of positive thinking and a powerful dose of reality.

How's that for the use of alliteration eh?! My high school English teacher would be proud.

I recently read an article by Perry Marshall about Admiral James Stockdale. He was Ross Perot's Vice Presidential candidate in 'the US 1992 election. Didn't do well as VP candidate but was quite an impressive military man. He was former president of the Naval War College and was the highest ranking officer in the dreaded "Hanoi Hilton" in Viet Nam.

He spent eight years in Hanoi and was tortured numerous times by his captors.

Mr. Thomas Barnett relates:

"Stockdale tells the story of the optimists who never survived their time in Hanoi, simply because they clung far too much to their dreams of release and in doing so couldn't handle the brutal realities of what it took to survive the day to day.

"So instead of dealing with the here and now realistically, they tended to cling to the hope that they'd be home by whatever the next holiday was, and when that day came and went, their spirit would be diminished by that measure.

"Over time, they died because their spirit was extinguished by reality."

Stockdale explains:

"You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end (which you can never afford to lose) with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be."

The problem with so many people who are positive thinkers is that they lose touch with reality. They have high visions of what they WANT their business and life will look like, but they aren't will to bust their behind to get there.

When I train for Ironmans and endurance events, my workouts vary. My easy days are very easy. My hard days are very HARD. I have a coach, a plan, and a strong work ethic. Many people I've met tell me they would love to do an Ironman. Guess it sounds sexy or something. It's no big deal, anyone can do one. As my dad would always say "You gotta wanna".

So whatever your goal is – you do have one don't you? Have faith in it. Believe. Visualize. Seek wisdom. Plan. Prepare. And work.

For the powerful dose of reality…

… if you truly want to do well, here is what you need to do…

  • niche your business
  • KNOW your customer
  • segment your prospect and customer lists
  • up your prices (people will pay more if you can competently make their frustrations, headaches, unknowns and concerns go away AND deliver exceptional value)
  • move to more affluent clients
  • change your language to match your niche
  • craft a powerful USP (Unique Sales Proposition) and UVP (Unique Value Propostion)

Doing those will put you miles ahead of the competition. Many of them are too lazy to do that and will slash prices in an attempt to gain business and complain that times are hard. (they ARE HARD! that's the reality!!)

And while we're at it, let's make some new assumptions.

 

  • assume your clients will take longer to make decisions
  • assume it will take longer to get paid
  • assume vendors will be slower than they promised
  • assume your biggest account will dry up
  • assume your biggest source of leads and customers will dry up with no advanced notice
  • assume some unforeseen circumstance like a legal challenge or financial setback will pop up

Prepare for these and put things in place to avoid them. And once you've planned for them and determined to push forward. With your vision in front of you. Your faith in tact. Ready to work. THEN you can look forward to great success. Anticipate it.

When you adopt this thinking, you will speed up the pace of accomplishment. You will gain focus and creativity. You will attract the right people into your business.

With the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be, you will make it out of Hanoi and reap rewards that will leave many people wondering "How did they get so lucky?" When that happens, just smile. :)

Hope you enjoyed this.

Blessings

Is your business with or without wax?

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Is your business with or without wax?

… and just as important, what do your customers think?

I did a talk this week for a group of successful businessowners on internet marketing. I revealed why most internet marketing fails to deliver the results that most were led to believe. In a meeting I had afterwards, a business client was telling me about how he was promised the moon and delivered garbage instead. This is an all to common problem many unsuspecting businessowners are falling prey to. (side note, never confuse rankings with results)

In a relatively short period of time I explained what caused the bad results. You could see his whole energy shift from confusion to contentment as he got it. I won't get into the details of what happened or what he was missing, I will tell you this, ONE of the missing components was congruency.

I learned something interesting at church last week. The Pastor was talking about sincerity. Like many, I've been taught to be sincere since I was a young boy. But what I didn't know, what was completely new to me was the origin of the word.

"Sincere" is derived from the Latin words: "sine" and "cera". Sine means "without" and cera means "wax". So "sincere" means "without wax".

In ancient Greece or Rome, dishonest sculptors and merchants would cover flaws in their work with wax to deceive the consumer. They would use wax to cover up cracks in their work and would be able to make their pottery or sculptures appear better than they really were and thus would charge a higher price. The customer would get screwed. Therefore, anything that was honest and pure would be tagged "sine cera", or "without wax".

Have you ever seen a business that looks good from the outside but when you get into it, you find they used wax? A client of mine was researching a vendor he was considering using. From the outside the vendor looked beautiful. Bright. Shiny. Clean. Said all the right things and made him feel good. Fortunately my client is a wise businessowner and through his due diligence found a whole bunch of wax. Saved himself a whole bunch of money and headaches.

So how does this apply to you?

2 things,

First, check yourself. Make sure you are without wax. Meaning you don't try to come off as something you're not. I worked with a number of big name speakers, several you would know. Sadly many of them were not the same off stage as they appeared to be onstage. The Canadian Rock Trio, Rush, said "all the world's a stage and we are merely players" (Shakespeare said that too). Just be sincere in who you are. Don't be the overhumble guy that downplays himself to his own advantage. Also don't make yourself appear to be bigger or something your not just to win a piece of business. Don't worry about others that do this. Sure they may get a piece of business for now, but they will get what's coming in due time.

Secondly, check your business. You may be "without wax" but is the rest of your company? For example, sometimes sales people can over-promise and under-deliver to win a deal. I've witnessed this many times in sales. I recommend calling in to your business and see how you are being treated. Are the things that are being said true? Do they match the values of your business? Call some of your customers yourself and survey them. Find out from their perspective.

One way of avoiding having your customer wonder if you are with or without wax is to be very clear and upfront about who you are, who you're for, and you aren't for. (Simple tactic: don't do this in a pure sales-y, all-inclusive way, but in a legitimate, defining way)

How can you tell if someone is with or without wax? One way is to look for consistency over time.

Hope you enjoyed this.

Blessings
 

 

The Queen, the Time Clock, En Passant, and what this means for your business

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The Queen, the Time Clock, En Passant, and what this means for your business

What the heck am I talking about and what does this have to do with anything? Maybe it doesn't. At least you will be entertained for a few minutes and look smart at a friend's this weekend.

But there are marketing lessons in here…

I had the privilege of spending some time with a Chess Master this week. Name is Tak. Brilliant mind. He just got back from a tournament in Hungary. He told me he plays up to 2 matches a day and each match takes about 5-6 hours. That's 12 hours of intense mental activity each day. Now I've done 10, 12 hour endurance events, but this is completely foreign to me. When you are doing an Ironman, you can turn your brain off and just move your body for 12 hours. That is tiring. I can't imagine having to be intensely focused mentally for that long. To me that is purely amazing.

I was intrigued by the competitiveness of these tournaments. I love competition. I played competitive hockey and in high school played competitive chess too. (got on the chess team as a result of a detention I had, but that's another story). We also got into the history of chess.

King Arthur's Chess Set:

Chess is a game of kings. It has been around for approximately 2000 years. It was used by the military to teach war tactics and strategy. A lot of the movement of chess pieces as we know them now didn't really happen until the game first spread in the Middle Ages from India to the Arab world, and then from there across the Mediterranean (Turkey, Italy, Spain) and further into Medieval Europe. Chess is a heavily-stylized version of Dark Ages warfare at its heart.

A game of chess could take days to play. There have even been documented matches where one player would take ONE DAY to make a move. To speed up the game, a couple of hundred years ago, the time clock came into play. For example, International rules call for the clock to be programmed to allow 40 moves to be made within the span of 2 hours. This dramatically increased the speed of the game. … do you have a time clock you can implement to speed up the game in your business? You will be amazed at how much more you can accomplish when you do.

There were other changes made prior to this around 1475. One of them increased the power of the Bishop allowing him unlimited diagonal movement. Prior to this, he could only move 2 squares diagonal.

Another big change was increasing the power of the Queen. I've always wondered "how come the Queen is more powerful than the King?". The Queen was inferior to the King and could ONLY move one square diagonally. Modern day rules allow the Queen to move as far as she wants in whatever direction she wants.

Why was this change put into place? Nobody seems to know. I have my own theory… remember the quote from the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding, "the man is the head of the household but the woman is the neck. She can turn the head anyway she wants".

I'm guessing that one of the Queens around that time turned the head to influence the rule change. Thus the Queen in chess has greater power and range than the King. I've been married for 11 years and that theory sits fine with me! :)  … lesson here … if you're married, listen to your Queen, she can help you be a better King! She can see things you can't and has skills and intuition that you don't. Remember these 4 words… "happy wife, happy life!"

The last rule change is a little known rule called "En Passant". If you look it up, it means "in passing". This little known rule can change the shape of a match. It gives you the ability to strike and defeat a pawn that is trying to sneak around you. (If you're interested in it, here is a short video on my blog that explains the move. You can fast forward to the 1:33 mark of this 3 minute video)


The lesson from En Passant… are there little known tactics that you can employ in your business that can completely change the playing field and give you the competitive advantage you are looking for? (Hint… answer is YES!)

Hope you enjoyed this.

Blessings

Yummy Chocolate Chunk Oat Bars!!

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Chocolate Chunk Oat Bars – yum!!!!!!!!!

My kids rate these 2 chocolaty thumbs up!!

Love cooking with Naomi (my wife) and the kids. This is the tasty treat we just baked up. (That's the "tester" piece missing from the middle).

You are only 30 minutes away from pure love with this "healthy" treat. It has Oatmeal in it, so of course it's health eh!!! :)

Here's the recipe…

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1 egg
1 tablespoon water
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups uncooked old-fashioned oats
2 cups semisweet chocolate chunks (or chocolate chips)

Directions:

  1. Preheat oven to 375F. Lightly grease 9-inch square baking pan. Combine four, baking soda and salt in small bowl.
  2. Beat brown sugar and butter in large bowl with electric mixer until creamy. Add egg, water and vanilla; beat until well blended. Stir in flour mixture and oats; mix well. Stir in 1 1/2 cups chocolate chunks.
  3. Spread dough (c'mon, this stuff is not dough, it's a goo-ey mixture of pure sweet sugary heaven!) evenly in pan; sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup chocolate chunks (mmmmm). Be sure to eat a couple of chocolate chunks between munching on fingerfuls of the gooey dough. Bake about 30 minutes or just until center feels firm – or until you just can't stand waiting any longer and have to have them now!!!! Cool on wire rack while you are burning your mouth gobbling up a tasty "tester" piece.

I found it is best to either workout directly before making and eating these so you won't feel guilty. Or, the other option is to take a nice nap so you are ready for the sugar rush. Serve with a nice cold glass of milk! Optional, servce with an insulin shot if you are having more than 3 at a time.

Also, these are best served up around midnight after the kids are sound asleep. (more for you!!) :)

Enjoy eh!

Chris.

P.S. Feel free to comment below if you find anything to add to these yummy delights.