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  • Ten Ways to Strengthen Your Reading Habit

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    Most people wish they read more. It is an activity that is both fun and enlightening. It can help us be more knowledgeable and successful. However, it is an activity that many people don’t engage in very much. According to the 1999 National Household Education Survey, 50% of the U.S. population aged 25 and over read a newspaper at least once a week, read one or more magazines regularly, and had read a book in the past 6 months. What does this mean? It means that 50% of the population hasn’t read a book in the last six months! Looking at the other end of the spectrum, research shows that if you read ten books a year, you are in the top few percent of all people as readers. Simply stated, it doesn’t take much to be well read, but we do need to know how to get started. The following are ten suggestions to help you strengthen your reading habit – ways to find and make more time for reading. 1. Always have a book around. Don’t go anywhere without reading material. Keep magazines or short stories in your bathroom. Always have something in your briefcase to read. Keep a book(s) by your bed. Having things available makes it easier for you to steal otherwise lost moments. 2. Set a reading goal. Determine how much time you want to spend reading, or how many books you want to read over time. Your goal might be a book a month, one per week, or it might be to read 30 minutes a day. Start out with something attainable but still a stretch. As your habit builds, you might set higher goals. Setting a goal is the first step towards reading more. 3. Keep a log. Keep a list of the books you have read, or keep track of how much time you read each day. You might keep these lists in your journal or your day planner. My son’s log is on our refrigerator. My list and log are kept on my computer. It doesn’t matter where you keep it, just do it. 4. Keep a list. Make a list of things you want to read in the future. Ask your friends and colleagues what they are reading. Watch for recommendations in the newspaper and magazines. Once you start looking for good books, you’ll find them everywhere. This is a great way to keep your enthusiasm up. By knowing what great stuff you want to read, you will reinforce your reading habit. 5. Turn off the television. Many people say they just don’t have enough time. Television is one of our major time consumers. Make your television watching more conscious and less habitual. There is nothing wrong with watching television shows you really enjoy. Where the time gets lost is turning it on, and scanning to find “something to watch.” Those are the times to turn it off and pick up your book! 6. Listen when you can’t read. Use your commute and other time spent in the car to listen! There are great audio versions of all sorts of books. Whether you want to “read” fiction, the latest self-help or diet book, it is probably available on tape. Don’t get locked into the idea that you have to read it – listening to the book still gives you the experience, ideas, and imagination that reading a book can. 7. Join a reading group or book club. Reading groups typically meet once a month to discuss a book they have all decided to read. Committing to the group provides a bit more impetus to finish the book, and gives you a great forum for discussion and socialization around the book’s themes. 8. Visit the library or bookstore often. You have your list, right? So you’ll have some ideas of what you are looking for when you walk in. But there is more to be gained by walking through places where books reside than just to make a transaction. Take time to browse! Let your eyes find things of interest. Let serendipity happen. Browsing will feed your mental need to read, and give you plenty of new things to read. 9. Build your own strategy. Decide when reading fits your schedule. Some people read first thing in the morning, some before bed. Some decide to read as they eat their lunch. And there is more to your strategy than just timing. Make your own decisions about reading. It is OK to be reading more than one book at once. It is OK to stop reading something before you finish if it isn’t holding your interest. It is OK to skim the book, getting what you want or need, without reading every page. Determine what works best for you, develop your own beliefs and ideas–then make them work for you. 10. Drop Everything and Read. My son’s fourth grade class has DEAR (Drop Everything and Read) time. When the teacher calls for it, that’s just what they do. They read now. That is my last piece of advice for you. Do it. Just get started. Make it DEAR time. Now.

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    Source by Kevin Eikenberry

    Views: 0

  • 5 Customer Survey Questions

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    Periodically, it makes sense to address your customer feedback mechanisms and receive some actionable, lived-experience insight into your operation’s strengths and weaknesses. Business leaders need to learn if the delivery of products, services, or other operational processes might be simplified. They need to know what customers would like to see more of. The smartest way to begin the customer feedback process is to decide what you want to know and what purpose that information will serve.

    Are you trying to develop new products or services, so that you’ll be able to give customers what they want before they know they want it? Or is business dwindling and you’re in damage control mode, attempting to win back customers? Some market research questions are best explored face-to-face with customers at a conference table with a leadership team member or two and maybe a front-line staff member present as well.

    Below are five draft survey questions for you to customize. Some apply to customers and others, to company leaders:

    1. What challenges or goals motivate customers to contact your business?

    2. What solutions to customer problems is your organization equipped to supply?

    3. What solutions are offered now? Might you add, re-tool, or drop any?

    4. What do customers most often hire you to provide or do?

    5. What do you (the business leaders) do next?

    Questions 1 and 4 pertain to customers. Questions 2, 3 and 5 refer to business strategy and should be addressed in-house, once you’ve spoken with two or more customers to figure out Questions 1 and 4.

    How you conduct the survey deserves some thought. It might be best for Solopreneurs and small business owners to convene a group interview that encourages comfortable and candid conversation. Larger companies might prefer to host a survey interview that’s facilitated by an outside market research firm.

    Question 1: What are the primary challenges facing (the customer’s) organization?

    Start with a “How are things going in your office?” question, or inquire about their next big project or objective (whether or not it would involve your organization). Find out what’s going on and let the customers talk.

    Questions 2 & 3: Which project or problem do you most want to take action on? How might that be done?

    Given your in-house expertise and resources and guided by the probability that the customer will contact your business to provide needed solutions, what additional customer projects might you be asked to take on (or what can you cleverly position your business to be hired to do)?

    Can your organization successfully deliver the desired outcomes of projects that are on your customers’ to-do lists? Can you discover how your customers are currently managing those challenges? Do your customers do business with any of your direct competitors? Do your customers have projects that are not getting resolved because s/he isn’t sure what to do, or there’s no budget to do the job?

    Question 4: Have our company’s solutions satisfactorily resolved customer needs or challenges?

    What projects have you been hired to do, or what products and services have been purchased by survey participants? What types of projects is your organization most often hired to do, or what are the best-selling products and services? How do customers feel about your company’s performance—is your ability to deliver services trusted and dependable? Do customers send referrals to your business? Does it seem that you could potentially receive more business from any of your customers?

    Question 5: What do you do next, based on customer responses?

    Here is the judgment call for you and your team. The success of the survey is in how you interpret the data received. What can your organization realistically do, based on the customer responses to Questions 1 and 4? Are there opportunities and strengths within your organization on which you might capitalize, as noted in questions 2, 3 and 5? What needs to be improved or discontinued?

    Within a week of the survey, tangibly thank your customers for participating. You may want to send a gift basket, or offer a 15% discount on their next order.

    Thanks for reading,

    Kim

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    Source by Kim L. Clark

    Views: 0

  • Tony Robbins – Personal Power II – Day 17 – Wealth Conditioning

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    “Money is nothing but a means to measure the exchange of value between people.”

    ~ Tony Robbins

    Many of us have pain associated with wealth in an approach/avoidance dance. Because of events in our past, we can call these “wealth wounds”. There can be lots of sensitivity about financial issues and so if these wounds are not healed, it is impossible to gain a ton of financial resources.

    Generally speaking, poverty and lack brings out the worst in people and abundance brings out the best. People who are living in poverty tend to have the highest criminal records, the most drug use and the most unhappiness. Being one of the consistently broke group of people doesn’t help you or the group. You can do more good by becoming wealthy in order to be able to give back.

    There are seven reasons why most people never make it financially.

    1). They associate negative things to having or making money. Remember, the past does not equal the future.

    2). They do not set having an abundance of money as an absolute must. Unless we decide what is a necessity, not an option, how can there be any improvement?

    3). Having an effective strategy of building wealth is non-existent for them. To condition yourself for great wealth, strategies must be developed for

    • attracting money into your life
    • managing your dollars
    • sharing your money, which will give you much happiness

    4). They are unable to follow through consistently on their financial goals. Finding ways for your money to work for you, such as harnessing compound interest which can take a lot of pressure off if you have time to watch it grow.

    5). They depend too much on the “experts.” There is no one who cares more about your money than you do. Experts are valuable, but you need to take care of your money and taxes. If you make errors in these types of decisions and planning, you will be ultimately responsible, not your professional.

    6). They become financially complacent. Many people take their wealth for granted. Whatever you fail to use, you will lose. It is a good idea to note that if you do well with what you have, you’ll be able to get more and, if you don’t actively create welth, itwhat you have will be taken from us. Don’t hoard what you have.

    7). They allow financial challenges go from bad to worse into financial ruin. Most likely, the road to wealth is not a straight line. If and when problems arise, stay in the game and ask great questions to help get back on track.

    Be willing to transform crisis into opportunity. By having financial faith, you can learn from the situation and find even more opportunities.

    The assignment:

    Give yourself a financial checkup to find out your “wealth wounds” so you can heal yourself quickly:

    1). Ask yourself to list the beliefs that you have that hold you back.

    2). Is there a specific amount of money that is an absolute MUST? Is this number the “must” for your life, or is this number the ability to live comfortably by paying your current bills?

    3). “Never leave the site of setting a goal or making a decision without taking some action towards its fulfillment. Make sure you do some action to set you on the course for financial mastery.

    4). Find something in today’s session to start feeling like you’re making progress. Remember, tiny actions lead to a pattern of habits which ultimately can be used to create the financial freedom we all deserve.

    5). You can make a list of financial terms or aspects of financial management that are not fully understood. Find the people or resources who cn provide answers about these things.

    6). Remember we talked about complacency? Write a paragraph about the “why” you will follow through with your plan and avoid complacency. Recognize the excuses you used in the past. Mastery is the only option now.

    7). Ultimately, what frees us from fear, is the belief that we are much more than anything that could ever happen to us financially. Write down one or two situations that seemed very difficult that you pulled yourself through. Remind yourself that you have this capacity to turn challenges into success.

    Sometimes our “wealth wounds” are most tender to try and heal, but the good news is that there are ways to heal them. One way is to find someone who has successfully gotten where you’d like to be. You can “model” after their example if you find out exactly what they did and then follow that pattern.

    Taking the time to do these exercises will teach you more about yourself. Fine tuning the skills in this lesson will provide additional ways to condition yourself for success.

    Onward.

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    Source by Deb Bauer

    Views: 0

  • Holly Mann Honest Riches Review – Is This a Scam?

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    Honest Riches was written by Holly Mann, a mother and disabled veteran. She started internet marketing to supplement her income. After several requests she decided to write the Honest Riches ebook. This book teaches you how to successfully start an online affiliate business with little start up money. Several of the strategies mentioned are free. When Honest Riches was updated, Holly added more information and changed the name from Breakthrough Money Making Secrets Revealed.

    Here is a break down of what you will receive with Holly Mann Honest Riches:

    Chapter 1:

    This chapter is primarily for beginners. It explains how to pick a topic that will yield the fastest results and greatest chance of success by selecting a sub topic (niche). For example, if you are interested in cars, you might want to choose a niche on custom auto wheels.

    The next topic is how to obtain information for free. Holly provides links to several free websites to improve your site’s ranking. Search engine optimization basics and domain name selection are explained. I wish that I would have read this book before picking my domain name. Your domain name is very important. Most people don’t give it enough thought.

    Holly explains how to get inbound links by submitting articles. She gives you the actual links to the best sites. This is very helpful and will increase your search engine optimization. Keyword selection is the next topic. Holly provides links for several tools to help make setting up your website easier. Some are free.

    She provides enough information to help the beginner get started on a budget. This chapter also explains how to see what your competitors are doing. The next section is about setting up a partnership if money is tight. A sample contract is attached.

    Chapter 2:

    This is a relatively short chapter on how to find content that will drive more people to your website for free. Links are provided to search for free content.

    Chapter 3:

    This chapter explains how to get a free website up in minutes. Holly explains how to set up your own free blog. She than provides some ideas on how to make money with blogs and how to improve your ranking. You don’t have to spend any money to get ranked on Google and other search engines. A free tool is provided to update your blog.

    Chapter 4:

    This chapter is about advertising your website. Links to free online advertising directories are provided. AdWords advertising is also briefly mentioned.

    Chapter 5:

    This chapter explains how to get free site traffic from Forums. This technique is completely free and has worked very well for Holly. She also explains how to start your own group or forum. Paid advertising is also mentioned here.

    Chapter 6:

    This chapter lists the top paying affiliate programs to sign up with. This is completely free. Holly provides information about each affiliate program. She also mentions a few of the highest paying affiliates to promote.

    Chapter 7:

    This chapter is about drop shipping and Wholesalers. A list of 6 droppshippers is provided.

    Holly also provides a nice bonus tip for eBayers at the end.

    Holly Mann’s Honest Riches teaches you how to successfully make money online with very little start up money. Holly gives you several methods that are totally free. This ebook is also very easy to understand. Everything is explained well.

    Because I am always looking for free or very low cost advertising, I have used some of the techniques in Holly Mann Honest Riches, and they have worked very well for me. This is one of the best books to get you started if you are on tight budget. Holly has also added a free website and forum for anyone that purchases Honest Riches.

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    Source by William Miller

    Views: 0

  • Better Customer Service Through Effective Time Management

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    Being able to manage and prioritize is an important skill when servicing customers. Planning events, activities, and tasks on a yearly, monthly, weekly, and daily basis-that is, prioritizing time-can be rewarding from the standpoint of allowing you to be more proactive in preparing to deal with situations. Such planning can reduce your need to be a crisis manager. It is important on and off the job because, if you do not manage your personal life well, you may carry over personal stress into the workplace. This is not only inefficient; it is also unfair to your employer, peers, coworkers, and external customers.

    After you have scheduled key events and tasks using some type of scheduling system (e.g., time management software, written planning system or calendar, or electronic scheduling device that can download information into your computer), review the information regularly to avoid forgetting something.

    One way to manage events, rather than having them manage you, is to create a list of activities each day and assign a value to each based on importance. The key is to be consistent and prioritize each day. Some people make planning the last activity of their workday. When they arrive to work the next morning, they are ready to begin rather than spending time preparing.

    Guidelines for Setting Priorities

    Three guidelines can help you in determining what tasks to do first. These can help you create a realistic and achievable list of daily tasks. As you learned when you read about goal setting in other chapters, goals must be attainable. Use the following standards as a guide when setting priorities.

    Judgment. You are the best judge of what you can accomplish in any given day. You know your strengths and what has to be done. When selecting priorities, remember that the ones having the most impact on customers and others should be placed high on your list. On the other hand, do not put so many priorities on a daily list that you will not get them done. If this happens, you might become discouraged and give up.

    When you find that you have more high priorities than you have time, you may need to ask for help or guidance from your boss. Many times, simply asking for assistance helps develop your relationship with others. They feel respected and trusted by your gesture, as long as you do not abuse their help or appear to be unloading your tasks onto them. Also, consider other resources that you might use to accomplish tasks (e.g., technology, outside vendors, or customers).

    Relativity. Assigning priorities is a matter of relativity. Some tasks and projects are readily rated higher than others. You should be guided by the question “What is the best use of my time?” Many people fill their daily schedule with frivolous or easy tasks and with tasks that they like to do. This produces a hollow feeling of accomplishment. They may get a lot done throughout the day and enjoy doing it, but they have not added a lot of value to customer service or aided in accomplishing organizational goals. Keep in mind when setting priorities in the workplace that your primary focus should be your customers and activities that support them.

    Timing. Reality and deadlines have a way of dictating priorities. The starting time of a project or task also may establish priorities. Once you begin a task, there must be enough time to finish it. If this is not possible, you may have to re prioritize or seek assistance.

    Be realistic about the time it will take to complete a task. Make sure that you schedule that much time, plus a little extra, on your daily planning sheet. Also, consider your peak time period for performance. Each person typically has a period of the day in which he or she has more energy and can get more done. Capitalize on your peak period and schedule high-priority tasks during that time, if possible.

    Prioritizing System

    To set up your own priority system, list all of your pending activities and then group them according to their level of importance. How you assign value to a task is not as important as long as you use the same format each day. Many people use an A, B, C system, and others use a 1, 2, 3 format. Here are suggested criteria for assignment:

    Priority A-Must do or critical items. Some things must be done because of management directives, local, state, or federal regulations, importance to customers or clients, deadlines, or opportunities they provide for your success or advancement (e.g., state tax reports, actions requested by a customer, or application for a position in the organization with a specific cutoff date for submission).

    Priority B-Should do. Items in this category are of medium value. Although they may contribute to customer satisfaction and improved performance, they are not essential or do not have critical deadlines (e.g., mailing an unsolicited information kit to a customer about a new product or developing a proposal for changing an existing system or process).

    Priority C-Nice to do. This is the lowest category and includes tasks that are not a direct link to customer satisfaction. They may even be fun or interesting, but could be omitted or left undone. Postponing or scheduling such priorities until a slower time period will likely have little or no impact on customer service (e.g., meeting with team members to brainstorm ideas for a more efficient layout of cubicles, cleaning old e-mail files, or neatly lining up the products on a shelf).

    Note: As you go through your e-mail and voice mail messages at the times you have scheduled throughout the day, prioritize them, and add them to your list of things to do.

    The key to effective time management is to have a plan and work that plan. If you control your time, you and your customers both stand to gain from your efforts.

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    Source by Bob Lucas

    Views: 0

  • Why You Need to Express Emotion

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    When I was young I was taught that crying was not good. After all, the message was that if you cry too much, “you’re going to get sick.” Crying, especially in public, definitely was bad news. In short, crying, even when grieving, was considered to be a sign of weakness. If you were going to cry, then do so in private.

    Through the years this and many other natural ways of showing emotion have been stifled by many of the celebrities who always assume a stoic pose when appearing on camera. (I always remember the death of President Kennedy and the way Jackie showed little emotion during the funeral and on TV.)

    Many additional beliefs about expressing emotion were looked down upon for years as western culture had adopted the “rugged individualism” view of dealing with life in all its manifestations. Expressing emotion was out and being strong was definitely in. Keeping emotion within is presently the cultural norm.

    However, psychology and the social sciences have shown time and time again the importance of expressing, in some form, what is happening inside; it can actually save your life. If you have been trained by the authority figures in your life to suppress your feelings or if you are unable to cry (much to do with unconscious beliefs instilled early in life) when one might be expected to do so, consider the following.

    1. We are built to vocalize feelings and tell our stories. This is an inherent and normal human response. Its purpose is to relieve the stress of trauma and massive change that occur in every life. There is a basic human need to externalize the pressure and pain that develops within.

    2. What is the alternative when we bottle the anxiety, anger, fear, guilt or pain that is generated by a major loss? The physical self pays a huge price to perform this task. Stress hormones go into overdrive and every cell in the body is affected. I repeat, every cell in the body is heavily stressed. Energy stores are depleted.

    3. A more vicious result of stuffing feelings is that our unconscious and our memory banks keep them forever alive in full force. Consequently, we are easily thrown into deep pain throughout life when something we see in a movie or on a TV show or read in the paper, cues up the terrible feelings and memories we never dealt with.

    So what can you do? The obvious answer is to find a way to tell your story of pain and disappointment. If you don’t have a best friend who is a good long-term listener, (a resource we all need to develop), then seek out a counselor, clergy person, or support group. You also can express feelings through writing, drawing, painting or sculpting. Reach out to God to unload your burden. You may need several avenues of release.

    Give in to the natural inclination to share the pain of loss. There is nothing weak about doing so. It is not merely highly therapeutic, it will lead to insights into your loss and how to cope with it (verbalizing our feelings often leads to new interpretations and thoughts). When appropriate, request your good listener to give you valuable feedback.

    Make every effort to change the pattern of the way you deal with loss and change and encourage your children to be open with you about their feelings. See the process as wisdom seeking and in making wise choices. Let periodic expression, where you plumb the deepest depths of your feelings, become part of your long-term healing process. We all need the nurturance and feeling of community that sharing feelings naturally brings forth.

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    Source by Lou LaGrand

    Views: 0

  • How to Make Passive Income As an Affiliate Marketer

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    Searching for the perfect affiliate program

    1. Go for affiliate programs, which cover numerous niches. For instance, Amazon affiliate program covers just about all niches possible when it comes to eBooks, physical products and a lot more. On the other hand, you will find some places where you can sign up and they represent as the main affiliate for thousands of companies.
    1. Search for your favorite search engine and enter you niche and the affiliate program. For instance; singing + affiliate program. Then, you will be provided with some options in the singing niche.

    There are thousands of places marketers like you could be an affiliate, which includes online digital items at the same time places where you can sign up and get access to participate in private affiliate programs.

    So How can you Build Passive Income From Affiliate Marketing?

    The key here is very simple. Make a very simple yet a very efficient review product/website/group product. It is important that you learn some SEO and basic traffic generating technique.

    Does it work?

    With commitment, attitude and right training, expect that it will absolutely work for you. Remember that if this whole money-making thing is new to you, it is important that you do not distress yourself with making the website. For instance, if you have a business in a box-training, you could have your site up and running in just less than five minutes along with no skills or prior experience.

    Thus, let’s think that you have your own free site from a trusted and recommended source. Now, what are you going to do? Within the training you will talk more about the niche. You are aware that niche is the category, product, hobby and interest, etc. once you have a site about Golf umbrellas, then your niche would be Golf Umbrellas. Therefore, you could name your site something like Golfumbrellasforyou.com.

    Along with the training, it is better if you look forward a little. You should think about what your new site will look like. For instance, “Classic Golf umbrellas” as a section of the site, “Golf Umbrellas” for all gender for the next section, and more. In this way, you could plan on which keywords you will search for.

    How about the keywords?

    Keywords are the secret words, which only the keyword tools could tell. They are the words utilized by people in the Google Search. As an affiliate marketer your job is to know how many times every month someone searches for the phrases “What is the best golf umbrella” as a good example.

    With these steps on how to generate passive income, you should remember that it would take you some time and effort to achieve the best result. However, through commitment and passion in doing this, for sure you are not far from reaching that goal.

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    Source by Stephen Enis

    Views: 0

  • Breaking Bad Habits – 5 Simple Steps for Changing a Habit

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    “Good habits are hard to develop but easy to live with” and “Bad habits are easy to develop but hard to live with”, according to Brian Tracey, a well-known motivational teacher. You may recognize that to successfully manage habit changes, breaking bad habits may be required in order to develop new ones.

    Breaking bad habits takes at least 21 days. Of course, in difficult cases, it can take as long as a year. Here’s an example of the process of how to change an unhealthy habit to a healthy habit. Suppose you’ve decided that coffee is not good for you and right now, you drink coffee with sugar daily. The new habit you would like to institute is to drink herbal tea without sugar.

    At first, it may be challenging to break the bad habit of drinking coffee. You will have to use self-discipline for the first few weeks but gradually it will get easier. Once you are able to change the old habit to a new healthier one, it will serve you very well. Habits are remarkable because they don’t require thinking. You just “do it” for years until you find yourself changing the habit again.

    Here are 5 easy steps for changing habits:

    1. Awareness: You must become aware of your habits. What is this habit exactly? How is this bad habit or group of bad habits affecting you? How is this habit affecting others? For example, smoking often has negative effects on others as well as on you.

    2. Wanting to Change: As someone with a health problem, you must decide that breaking bad habits through a conscious effort is a worthy goal. You must convince yourself that the change in the habit is worth the effort involved.

    3. Commitment: You must be determined to do whatever it takes for breaking bad habits so that you can better control your life. You make a decision that “no matter what” you will change the habit. You do the work required to stop. Here are some examples of habits you might want to change: Smoking, eating too much, eating processed foods, not exercising, drinking coffee or other beverages with caffeine in them, eating too much sugar or fat, drinking alcohol, procrastinating, etc.

    4. Consistent Action: It is important to focus on changing just one habit at a time. Then, take consistent daily actions for breaking the bad habit that has been causing problems and take the actions to develop a new one. We suggest doing this process one step at a time rather than trying to do it all at once. Sometimes changing a habit can be done “cold turkey” like smoking and sometimes it works better to make a gradual change.

    Be sure to give yourself positive rewards often for taking small actions toward changing a bad habit. Continual day-by-day actions are what are critical. This is NOT about an occasional action or step. It is about being consistent every day.

    5. Perseverance: There will be times when you question whether it is all worth it. You’ll say to yourself that breaking these bad habits is too difficult; that you are too “weak” to change. Your old self, often so comfortable living with the bad habits, is trying to hold on. Breaking your old patterns may require meditation and prayer.

    Visualize regularly the rewards for following through and the costs of not following through on breaking the bad habits and especially the value to your future of building new better habits.

    Get support from others, especially other people who want to make changes in their lives and read about people who have been successful in breaking bad habits. Affirm that, no matter what, you will not backslide into your old bad habit patterns.

    Now, you are armed with a 5-step process for breaking any bad habit or other condition that requires changing. If you have an addiction to something such as alcohol, these steps alone may not be enough. You may require additional professional help or a support group, but for most cases this 5-step process will do the trick!

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    Source by T Mcdonald

    Views: 0

  • What Marketing Strategy Is the Best for You?

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    If you pick the right marketing strategy, you’ll be like that little guy in the middle of my diagram above. Yes! Winning! Fist pumps!

    The problem with marketing today is that there are way too many options and it’s much too confusing. It makes me dizzy just thinking about this stuff and I’ve been immersed in it for 35 years.

    Well, I lay down on my bed last week with a notepad and started to map out my “Unified Theory of Marketing Strategies” with an emphasis on online marketing.

    And I actually came up with something that’s not totally confusing, and might even be helpful to a few people.

    Here goes…

    It’s yet another four-quadrant grid where the vertical axis is a scale from easy to hard and the horizontal axis is a scale from passive to proactive.

    I emerged with these four snappy quadrants:

    Hard and Passive = Multimedia

    Easy and Passive = Publishing

    Hard and Proactive = Presentations

    Easy and Proactive = Email

    Now, all of these strategies can be effective. But, yes some are easier than others. And the passive ones tend to take a lot longer than the proactive ones.

    Hard and Passive = Multimedia (Videos)

    Everyone is crazy about video these days. It’s a challenging, yet passive strategy. You put a lot work into creating a video and then post it on YouTube hoping people see it.

    It’s difficult to do well. It’s time-consuming and it can be expensive. And most videos are pure crap. If you want to do it well, it takes a chunk of change and a lot of time.

    Throwing up a lot of little videos on your website can be a nice touch, but they usually don’t get people to call you in droves.

    So, as you can see, I’m not crazy about a video strategy for self-employed professionals. I’m not saying they can’t work, but it’s a whole lot of work to do right.

    Best example: A non-duality teacher named Rupert Spira (non-duality.rupertspira.com/home). He does live workshops and films everything. Then his staff chops them up into questions and answer segments and posts them on YouTube. They’re five to fifteen minutes long. And what you see is what you get. No pitch, no hype. It’s his teaching unadulterated.

    He has hundreds of videos on YouTube with hundreds of thousands of views. Does it work? Well, his workshops are always full and all he does is a low-key email announcement to his list every month or two.

    I like this approach a lot. Got a lot of good content? Look good on video (unlike yours truly)? Then you may want to emulate Rupert.

    Easy and Passive = Publishing

    I happen to like this strategy a lot as it, ahem, built my “Empire.” It’s relatively easy: Write a how-to article on your subject matter once a week, send it out to those on your e-list and publish on your blog. Fame ensues.

    But online publishing can be a lot more than that. You can take those same articles and publish them on Medium, LinkedIn, and Ezine Articles. And then you can announce them on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. Sometimes you can get big exposure when writing an article for a major online publication. Web traffic multiplies.

    The cost is zero; an article takes from two to five hours to write (unless it takes you several days). And your ideas are online for eternity to be discovered by those looking for practical ideas. Some will opt-in to your e-list and perpetuate this virtuous marketing circle.

    The downside, of course, is that, according to my extensive research, (a 10 second Google search), there are 2 million articles published online every day. The mind reels. So your stuff will be out there, but somewhat lost in a very big haystack.

    I’m still a big advocate of online publishing, but the mountain is getting steeper and steeper. Just writing an article or two here and there won’t help you much.

    Best Example: Well, other than mine, of course, check out Henneke of Enchanted Marketing. She has a wonderful, readable, fun blog on business writing and blogging. And she walks her talk. It’s all about well-written, relevant content. If you don’t have that as a foundation, it’s a total waste of time.

    Hard and Proactive = Presentations

    I built my business on presentations in front of live audiences at professional associations and chambers of commerce. It got me attention, added people to my mailing list and generated warm leads for marketing coaching.

    And I still do presentations today in the form of webinars. I just filled my recent group program with the help of a couple webinars (also called video conferences). They most certainly do work.

    But I put presentations in the hard category, not because they are all that hard to give, but can take a long time to prepare. The last one I did took me two full days. There were about 200 slides (whew).

    Yes, that’s not the only way to do a webinar. You can just go live on Zoom Video, and that can work as well. You ultimately have to find your style and test what works.

    Presentations are proactive in that at the end you can ask for the business. And, of course, you can turn the recording of the webinar into a video in a snap and send it out to those on your list. Watch it here.

    So presentations will always play a big part in my marketing toolkit.

    One other thing though – If you don’t have a LOT of people on your email list, good luck in getting much of an attendance. Yes, you can do guest presentations hosted by others, but you don’t have the same control and ability to pitch your professional services.

    Best example: John Nemo of LinkedIn Riches (linkedinriches.com). His webinar is a blast. There are a lot of them out there in the online marketing world. And many, Like John, have set them up as evergreen webinars that are scheduled to play automatically several times a day. These are kind of a hybrid between publishing and presentations.

    Easy and Proactive = Email

    In my opinion, email is the most powerful overall marketing tool. And it gets the least respect. But I can’t imagine even being in business without email marketing.

    Social media gets all the PR and all the attention, but email gets the business. A recent study showed that email generated 40 times the business results of Facebook and Twitter combined.

    Email is the online tool that’s been around the longest, and I think it’s taken for granted. Promotional emails have expanded exponentially over the years, but most of it isn’t very good.

    We wade through our email boxes like we sort our mail over the trashcan. Delete, delete, delete. Why? Because it’s either not relevant or it’s boring. Usually both.

    I feel that email has the greatest potential of all the online marketing strategies because it’s both relatively easy and the most proactive marketing medium of all. Your message goes right into the mailbox of your potential client. Nothing else can do that.

    Marketing email holds great opportunities for improvement in several areas:

    1. How to incorporate humor as the most powerful attention-getting device in existence (that almost nobody is using).

    2. How to telegraph your value proposition straight to the minds and hearts of your prospect.

    3. How to make your emails clear, focused, and easy-to-read.

    4. How to craft a compelling call-to-action that is hard to resist.

    5. How to get emails to thousands of your prospects without looking like spam.

    If you’re not working on ALL of these, your emails will not get the attention and response you want.

    Best Example: Therapy Practice Accelerator. Visit this site and get on the list just to see the brilliance of the email marketing. It’s all about demonstrating results.

    What marketing strategies will you choose?

    Take the four marketing quadrants into consideration. The easier a marketing activity, the more likely you’ll actually do it. And the more proactive a marketing activity, the faster the response you’ll get.

    Cheers, Robert

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    Source by Robert Middleton

    Views: 0

  • Questions Are the Key to Success in Business and Life

    Questions Are the Key to Success in Business and Life

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    It was Kipling who gave us what was perhaps the greatest advice for business success and, in fact, success in life that has ever been given. He told us the key to success in all areas when he said “I had six honest serving men. They taught me all I knew. Their names were: where and what and when and why and how and who.”

    The late great Earl Nightingale suggested we add two more friends to this group. They are, which and if.

    Whether you are seeking to find ways to increase sales or control and reduce costs, questions are the key. Whether you are striving to improve your customer service or the quality of your product, or your life, questions are the key.

    Asking the questions and developing the answers are the keys to any and all success you will have in business and in fact life.

    Questions like:

    If we do this, what happens?

    Why do we do it this way?

    Why don’t we do it this way?

    Who else can we sell to?

    Where else can we get this?

    What can we do to reduce costs?

    What can we do to improve productivity?

    What can we do to improve quality?

    What can we do to improve our service?

    How else can that be done?

    How can we do it better, faster, cheaper?

    How can we improve quality, service, and profits?

    How can we cut costs?

    If we do this, will we improve quality?

    If we do this, will it improve service?

    If we do this, will it increase profits?

    Which provides us with better quality?

    Which is best for our customer?

    What do we get in return for this cost?

    Who else can provide what we need?

    Why are we paying that much?

    Why do we not deal with another company?

    Why are we dealing with them?

    How many other bids have we gotten?

    What if?

    How can we replace that with equal or better quality for less?

    What are other companies charging for that product or service?

    What are other companies paying for that product or service?

    Will this process or step add value to our product or service or does it produce added profit?

    When would this investment pay off?

    You see my point I am sure. You must ask questions and seek out the answers. You must also justify the answers.

    You must never stop asking. If you are not continuously asking the questions and reacting to the answers, you are either assuming or stagnating. Either one can be deadly to your business.

    You must review every phase of your business. You may be very surprised when you see how little effort it will take to find huge savings and to make major improvements in how you conduct business.

    You can always improve how you do things. You must find ways to conduct business more efficiently, eliminate needless steps, improve quality, increase productivity, reduce errors, increase sales, ways to increase profit in a business, reduce expenses, and control costs.

    Let me give you one small example of how an assumption proved to be very costly at one company. One of the many products this company offered was a holiday label strip. This was simply a strip of peel off labels to affix to holiday presents showing “to” and “from”. Banks around the country would buy them and give them out one strip at a time to their customers around the holidays.

    For years this company shrink wrapped these in packages of 250 and sold them in a minimum quantity of 1,000. The shrink wrapping was time consuming and costly. I asked them why. Why did they need to be shrink wrapped? How did they know if this was important to the customer? What, if any, difference did packaging make to their customers?

    They asked the questions and found the answers. The answer in this case was that the customer either couldn’t have cared less about the packaging or did not like the shrink wrap as it simply meant more work for them to unwrap. After years of doing it the way they always did and assuming that was what the end user wanted, they found out differently. They now bulk package. They save between $20,000 and $30,000 per year and their customers are either happier or neutral about this change.

    Did this company sacrifice quality in any way to save money? No, they improved productivity, improved customer satisfaction, and, by doing so, improved profitability.

    Ask the questions. They are the key to the door of improvement.

    You should constantly be reviewing every area of your operation to seek ways in which you can improve. Use common sense. From office expenses to customer service, from distribution and production to quality control and shipping, you will be shocked at how little effort it will take to improve your operations, reduce waste and redundancy, and realize huge savings.

    From the way you sell things to the way you buy things, it is up to you to improve things. Improvement is always possible in everything we do.

    You possess the greatest power ever created and it sits right between your two ears. You own it, free and clear. All you need to do is put it to work.

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    Source by Derrick Welch

    Views: 0