 I moved from working in my business to working on my business!
Jim White, Founder Savor Dallas http://www.savordallas.com |
 I found a community of business leaders who make being in business a lot more fun and less lonely.
Jeannine Sandstrom, CEO CoachWorks International, Inc. http://www.coachworks.com |
 I now have a place to be open about my business success and future challenges.
Debbie Mrazek, CEO The Sales Company Author The Field Guide to Sales http://www.the-sales-company.com |
Archive for October, 2008
By Jim Estill
Leadership is about doing the right things, Management is about doing things right. Both are important but without the leadership part, management has little value.
Leadership is about having the map and going the right direction (goals). Management is about going there efficiently. I think about it as looking first at the compass then the clock.
Leadership is about effectiveness. Management is about efficiency.
Leadership comes before Management.
In the 1990s I published an audio tape series on Time Management (a later version became a Time Management CD). Since then, I have come to realize that being efficient has its limits and that working on the right things yields more results than straight efficiency.
A part of this study lead me to my focus on goal setting. I have written often about my favorite goal setting exercise. Having clear goals is the leadership part. Turning those goals into a vision is a key part of leadership.
I titled my book “Time Leadership” because of my views that leadership must come before management (even though management is very important).
The full title is “Time Leadership – Use the Secrets of Leadership for Time Management“.
If you design kitchens, is another kitchen designer your competition? Most likely not. And the sooner you can position and modify your marketing strategy against your real competition, the sooner you will start to see more business come through the door.
So Who Really Is Your Competition?
The answer to that is always–Never the most obvious. So let’s take the example of the kitchen designer. Having decided that another kitchen designer isn’t his competition, he now has to decide who is his real competition.
His Real Competition Could Be A Car Salesman
Is this for real? How can a car salesman be a kitchen designer’s competition? Let’s analyze this more carefully. A kitchen and a car are both fighting for the same thing– The householder’s limited budget.
If the kitchen designer, were able to convince a couple that a kitchen is more important than a new car (which he could easily do if there was a foodie around), he now has a better chance of them dropping the car in favor of the kitchen.
The Advantage Of This Method Of Positioning
The most obvious advantage is that you’re not losing any current customers. All your past advertising is bringing in the customers that are looking for kitchens anyway.
What it does do however, is bring in a new lot of customers that would never have thought about kitchens, if you hadn’t implanted it in their minds. Effectively, you have both, customers who are looking for kitchens as well as customers who are forfeiting their new cars in favor of new kitchens.
How Your Re-Positioning Can Help You Focus
We had a client who ran a laundromat. Her current customers were people who did not have washing machines. Obviously, her business went up and down based on the season and on her customers limited budget. We got her to refocus her marketing strategy on a new target– Customers who had washing machines.
These customers had the money, but no time. By deciding that her real competition was time she decided to target people who had limited time instead.
As a result, she was now targeting busy people while other laundromats were targeting people with washing. This positioning actually helped the laundromat stand out from the rest of the competition.
How The Laundromat Did A Full 180
This re-positioning did a couple of things for them. One, it helped them focus on their target audience. Consequently, they changed their name from just XYZ Laundromat to Bizzie Buggers.
It was catchy and bang on target. It also now meant that busy customers (with the money), were more likely to stop over and drop their washing. Plus they had the regular customers walking through the door anyway.
What You Need To Do
Sit down and write who your immediate competition could be. Then write down what your business is really up against. Here are some examples.
These aren’t necessarily your right targets but they help you see things in a different light and help you determine who your real competition could possibly be.
Cartoonist= Photographer
Computer Salesman= Filing Cabinet
Car Dealer= Expensive Restaurant Meals
©2001-2008 Psychotactics Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Wouldn’t you love to stumble upon a secret library of small business ideas? Find simple, yet electrifying ideas, on copywriting, public speaking, marketing strategies, sales conversion, psychological tactics and branding. Head down to http://www.psychotactics.com today and judge for yourself.
You have spent thousands of dollars developing your new information product and website. All you need now is the waves of people on the Internet to show up and variously consume what you have created for them. You know, so you can retire in two weeks. Oh if it were just that easy… From people who sell get rich quick on the Internet you would think it is just that easy. Build it and they will come! The truth is however it is not that easy. Yes, that’s is right. I have just spoken the words that you hate to hear, the truth that most people on the Internet will only tell you when you read the fine print after you have purchased their marketing product.
You know:
- Your Results may vary
- Your Results will vary
- Results Not typical
- Example Profits are for demonstration purposes only and not reflective of the results you may achieve (My Personal Favorite)
Now you may be sitting there going great, I wish someone would have told me this before I spent my life’s savings. Now what?
Here it is. The number one thing you need to know about online information product marketing is,
It takes a village.
It is who you know not what you know. Basically just like it was in high school, college, work, and every other thing you have ever participated in.
Here are three categories information product developers fall into and ways to market your information product…
Mr. or Ms. Money Bags
If you have loads of cash or open credit, one of the fastest ways to build your village is to buy your membership to the village. What’s the price of membership? Well, that depends. The top tier with super guru types like Dan Kennedy could be $100K or more. Downline from Dan, you can get in for as little as $19K with mentees such as Alexandria Brown. You can also gather at places such as the Info Product Summit to network with other up and coming info product marketers. Attending conferences, seminars and other places where information product marketers gather grants you access to multiple JV opportunities.
On a Budget
Not as sexy as attending a live event, but can get the job done. Once you locate other people who serve your target market and who offer a complementary product, dial them up or send an email. If you’ve purchased their product and you are a raving fan, all the better – let them know you appreciate what they are doing. Offline, the idea also applies. Network with like-minded companies and professionals, and get to know where you can help them market, and how a joint venture would escalate sales.
Spent All My Money Developing My Product
First, let’s hope that you did some market research before you spent all your money developing your product! Creating a product in a vacuum is a sure recipe for failure. So, you’ve developed your product and there’s no money left. What do you do now? First, focus on what you want. Think about how many of these products you want to sell – focus very hard on this for about five minutes. Then write down all the ideas that come to you. Don’t eliminate any ideas… just be the scribe and write them down. Next, take a look at the list, and consider which ones you can do right now with just time and effort. Let your mind fill in the blanks of how you could accomplish any of the other ideas. Pick one and get moving. As your mind comes up with other ideas, add them to the list.
Beware the get-rich-quick, opportunist mindset that is all-or-nothing. This is a surefire way to go broke and blaze a trail to failure.
If you have questions or are ready for a marketing strategy to accelerate your business success feel free to use the contact form on our blog site and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
Over the years I have seen so many companies go wrong with their portal strategy that it isn’t even funny. To help you with your next portal installation here are some things to remember. As always if you need help with your up-front decision making shoot me an email mark@one80group.com.
1. Microsoft usually targets the marketing and business divisions on a Microsoft Sharepoint installation. If you are a business professional always include your IT group before buying any services. They will know the costs and skills required to keep the system up and running.
2. Microsoft changed their licensing for Sharepoint 2007 so make sure you understand the features you want, you have the money for. Always ask the hard questions like do I get that with the standard license or enterprise license. It can be the difference of millions of dollars.
3. Most organizations look at Microsoft Sharepoint as a communications tool although most and I do mean most organizations use the tool as a extended document sharing system.
4. Document search will be useless unless you come up with a meta data strategy to describe your documents.
5. Don’t get to excited about the mysite feature inside of Microsoft Sharepoint. Most companies have to turn this off because of issues with controlling what people write on a personal site. I have examples of call center people posting customer stories. BAD BAD BAD
6. Try to get cals (client access licenses) included with your office enterprise agreement if you have one. It will save you sometimes upward of 40% or more on standard licensing.
7. Authentication is the number one issue with large organizations and Microsoft Sharepoint. Trusted, Un-trusted, and other kinds of networks and user access must be addressed or you will have wasted your money.
8. If you do have your system split between a communications group and an IT group remember IT can do everything you need but will usually push back. So be sure to use outside resources for documentation if the IT group says something on the system cannot be developed.
9. You need guidelines and rules for anyone having a site on your Microsoft Sharepoint system that also includes quotas etc. If you don’t address this you will end up with a large system full of outdated information that takes terabytes of disk space to back-up.
10. You can use Microsoft Reporting Services to provide reports and dashboards instead of the external data connector add-on for Microsoft Sharepoint.
If you have tips you would like to share about Microsoft Sharepoint send me a note and I will add them.
Imagine you take a trip to your post box down the road today to pick up the mail. To your surprise, you find nothing. Not one word. All you see is just an empty hole in the wall with zip in it. Annoyance would be the prime emotion here. Maybe even a dollop of disappointment.
But what if you find out that all that airy space exists simply because the post office decided to send all your mail back? Now that would get you in a bit of a boil, wouldn’t it? Frothing at the mouth, wouldn’t you want to tear all those bespectacled post office workers into little
vulture-sized meat bites?
And then what if I told you that your email marketing business is going the same way? What if you suddenly learned that the email newsletters you’d subscribed to are now doing the boomerang dance? What if you’re an email marketer and your subscriber isn’t even getting your mail? What if he’s just getting a stripped down version of it?
Is that smoke coming out of your ears?
The Wild West Lives Again!
In the Wild West the rules were simple. If I didn’t like you, I’d shoot you. Email isn’t dropping to the floor quite that quickly, but there is a definite pattern evolving that you should be aware of. Someone has put your email marketing on a poison drip, and by golly, if you ignore it, you’re one dead puppy! Read how Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are systematically working to weed out HTML mail and what you need to do to minimize your damage.
Who’s Paying for Whose Fault?
Spammers are the baddies, and spammers don’t care. Bandwidth can span the breadth and depth of the Grand Canyon and it won’t make any difference to them. You can be sure they’ll find a way to top it up with their junk. It was also obvious, even several years ago, that control of spammers was improbable. They know very well what they are doing. All they have to do is go to an offshore provider when anti-spam legislation is passed. What’s to stop them? As long as there is one country in the world that will allow spammers to send their poison, they will.
Does anyone really believe that every ISP on the network is going to spend the resources to closely examine the specific content of each and every large-scale email transmission to see if it’s okay or not?
The answer has to be no, since this doesn’t avoid the cost of spam in the long term. It simply transfers it from a cost of bandwidth to a cost of administration.
The harder commercial email pushes, the harder the network will respond by pushing back. “Big” email is a lame duck — and will soon be a stone cold dead one. Even with filters in place, my email account bulges with mail I didn’t ask for, and would never reply to. ISPs (Internet Service Providers) on the other hand, are watching this rainstorm with increasing concern. Every day, the volume of email threatens to blow the dam, and they’re not going to sit back and take it.
How an ISP’s Worry Becomes Your Headache
Bandwidth costs money. The more email you get and send, the more it’s costing your ISP. They can’t charge you more (or may not want to charge you), and so the easiest way out is to send your email à la Elvis: Return to sender!
The biggest offender here is HTML email that clogs up the system with a reasonable amount of imagery. It’s the graphics that generates business for you and me, but it’s also this very factor that is clogging up the pipe. This has led several ISPs to take some very radical decisions that border on telling you what you can and cannot read.
A Growing Menace Called Filters
Filters that are easy to implement seem to beat the system, so that’s the option that many ISPs consider first. In an attempt to control the traffic, they simply install cheap and nasty systems that send any mail that’s considered ’spam’ right back to where it came from. This seems noble until you consider the following. These filters may be stopping legitimate mail from entering your mailbox.
If mom sent you a mail with a word which the filters pick up but don’t like: Bounce, bounce. It would go bouncing back! If you had the word ’search engines’ in it, maybe they’d decide that word signified spam. Kaboom! It’s back to where it came from. Suddenly, your business that depends on the mail getting through is being vetted by an unasked police patrol run by goons. You’re not getting across to your customers, and even worse, your customers’ mail may not be reaching you.
What’s worse is that as an email marketer, you would tend to take for granted that you would get an “undeliverable” note when this happens. I understand it’s not always true; you can send out thousands of messages and remain blissfully ignorant of their eventual fate.
Why HTML-Based Marketing Will Be Easier To Kill
Macromedia Flash went through a fashionable phase and had to be dumped in favor of good ol’ HTML. HTML, while great on the web, is a pain in the neck in your inbox.
To counter this, many a software developer is seriously working out ways to have HTML-like effects within your email without the code and bandwidth that goes with it. This software, though available today, is quite expensive and not a very viable option except for larger companies. The rest of us have to contend with the inescapable fact that any email over a certain size will be treated as an HTML file and fair game for the intrepid filters to play ’shoot the ducky.’
HTML will always be bulky, and is already denied or stripped by some carriers and destination ISPs, so it will always be a hazard. Some companies and email marketers have decided they are cutting out HTML altogether. It’s too much of a risk when you don’t even know whether it’s been dumped or stripped.
How Can You Go Past This ‘Doomsday Scenario’?
Two possibilities: text and online HTML.
Text is faster, and has stood the test of time. But it’s devoid of color and formatting — and more tedious to read. The better bet is to use HTML to link back to the website or online email newsletter. Businesses that get their customers trained to fetch their newsletter off the web will have fewer problems because they’ll have few occasions when they will have to send emails out to their customers — and then only very short notices or informative “drip feeds”.
The kind of email you would then send would rarely have the kind of signature that causes the spam filters to scream. Most of these filters are weighted, and there are very few stand-alone telltales that send email into instant oblivion.
My guess is that small emails, even if numerous, will escape filter security, because it requires a certain minimum amount of text to make a spam offer. Emails, smaller than this minimum will probably not be checked at all, owing to sheer volume.
The Hero Doesn’t Die In The End
The saddest part of this whole scenario is that people like you, me and a dog named Spammer are all trying to achieve the same thing — bulk up the profits. And in doing so, we are all part of the gloomy picture. But don’t despair.
Unlike you, Mr Spammer doesn’t want to be traceable. You do, because you’re legit. Make use of your legitimacy, and drive your customers back to your online newsletter or website.
And simultaneously drive the spam merchant out of business!
©2001-2008 Psychotactics Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Wouldn’t you love to stumble upon a secret library of small business ideas? Find simple, yet electrifying ideas, on copywriting, public speaking, marketing strategies, sales conversion, psychological tactics and branding. Head down to http://www.psychotactics.com today and judge for yourself.
Are you afraid of alienating your customer with your marketing? Do you always feel like a stranger in their inbox? Do you have marketing strategies specifically designed to tell you when to keep marketing, and when to stop? Well, stop looking so puzzled. In the marketing article below, I’m going to bring home to you exactly how to join the dots. You will learn just how much to market, and when to stop. Yes, it is a science and marketing strategy, and it applies to online as well as offline marketing. So, pay close attention.
Why Dennis Was Fuming
Dennis McConnell was going nuts, literally. He sailed merrily into the office this morning only to find seven unsubscribe messages in his inbox. This was in response to an email he sent out marketing his upcoming Power Photoshop workshops. His merriness took instant flight. His mood transmogrified into the color of winter, and the sunshine outside didn’t seem to count for much. (Yes, it’s still summer in New Zealand!)
From Angry To Stupid In Twelve Minutes Flat
Like most marketers, Dennis spun around 180 degrees. He pulled the plug on his marketing and decided to send even fewer emails to his subscribers. Why anger them, he thought? The longer he thought about it, the deeper he swam into his turgid pool of fear.
That Is, Was, And Will Be His Big Mistake — And Yours Too!
Why? Let me paint an alternate scenario for you. Imagine you had to give a speech to a hundred people. Say the speech was at the end of the day, and the participants were now tired. Let’s suppose about thirty of them left. Would you give the speech or start crying for mommy, because those thirty walked out?
Without question, you’d still give a stupendous speech, wouldn’t you? Your job is not to focus on the people who are leaving, but on those who have stayed to listen to you.
Dennis was like every one of us. He paid attention to the exit, forgetting there were hundreds of people who were quite happy to receive the information. Are you doing the same? Are you focusing on the goodbyes, when in reality you should focus on those who are sitting tight? Do you even understand the psychology of how people react, when they don’t want to do business with you?
The Psychological Difference Between Unsubscribers And Complainers
Why do people complain? Have you even thought about it? The only time people complain is when they DON’T want to leave. Complaining is their way of communicating to you to spruce up your act.
Unsubscribers, on the other hand are mostly either freeloaders (they came on because you offered something free), or they recognized themselves not to be your target audience. You are never, ever, not in a million years, going to sell them anything. They are just keeping you from wasting your time with them. Understand this concept and you are on first base, but wait…we still have to get to second base.
Second Base Comes Before First Base
Look at mum. When she told you to take the garbage out, you complained. But did you ever unsubscribe? You didn’t unsubscribe from mum because she was putting food on your plate. If you knew what was good for that bottomless pit you called your stomach, you’d stick close to home. It’s exactly the same with your customers. If you consistently give them information that is useful to them, they will stick with you through all the marketing messages you send them. Heck, they’ll even buy!
Don’t Be A Bloomin’ Miser With Your Information
You see this article. It’s not a couple of scraps that fell off the table. It is the full story. Every plot, every twist and turn. That’s what has kept you reading so long. If you send out information that’s half-baked, you get half-baked subscribers. You’ve heard the saying, ‘Pay peanuts and you get monkeys.’
Most advertising is fluff. Most marketing tells an incomplete story. And most articles on the Internet actually edit for space. If you were selling a product, where would you stop your sales pitch? Would you count the words and say, stop at 300 words? Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? So why is it different when you’re selling a concept? (At this point, you’ve read 718 words and are still reading. Doesn’t that prove the point?)
So How Much Do You Give?
Lots and then when you’re done, heap some more on the top. Would you be happy if I left half the questions unanswered in this article? As an expert in your field, you’re way ahead of your customer. Knowledge grows in leaps and bounds. Why not give it away? Give away tons of the stuff, and you will find within yourself, an unending reservoir of information. If you give away loads, it means you have a lot more. Inevitably, customers will see that and actually pay to learn more from you.
To market to your customer, you must be a brand in their heads. And to be a brand, you must earn their respect. The only way you can do that is to give them the full dope.
Ask mum. How many recipes did she give away? Would you live long enough to see the end of the recipe list, even if you lived to be a hundred? Is she the goddess of recipes, or what?
The Curse Of The Unsubscribe
Sales is a transfer of enthusiasm from one person to another. Say that out loud. Most marketing doesn’t have enough What’s- in- it- for-me factor. Most of it has no enthusiasm, and looks like it was written by someone who speaks Greek as a first language.
If your marketing, advertising or sales pitch is boring, your customer yawns. Several yawns later they leave, unsubscribe or make you a permanent resident on their delete list. If you cannot be enthusiastic in the medium you choose to market, get a professional to do your marketing. This is your bread and butter, don’t muck around with it.
It’s Mindless Marketing Without Technology
Some customers jump ship because you aren’t smart enough to use technology. Too many times, right after a client has attended a workshop, you sell them the same workshop again. How dumb is that? And dumber still is the fact that most people will try to work their lists by physically removing the names.
You cannot afford to make mistakes here. Invest in software that filters through the mess and does it flawlessly, instead of you picking at names one by one on your list. This eliminates mistakes and gives you a clean list to market to. Ergo, customers aren’t mad, and your bank account is jingling away.
Customers Are Waiting To Be Led
Don’t let the Unsubscribers worry you. Customers want to improve their lives, their businesses and their careers. If you believe you can do that, tread the intelligent road by educating them in great detail.
Put in all the goodies to make your customers stay. If they’re sick and tired of you, they’ll complain. They’ll say NO. Till then, you keep on marketing to them.
It’s that simple.
©2001-2008 Psychotactics Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Wouldn’t you love to stumble upon a secret library of small business ideas? Find simple, yet electrifying ideas, on copywriting, public speaking, marketing strategies, sales conversion, psychological tactics and branding. Head down to http://www.psychotactics.com today and judge for yourself.
Article marketing can be a powerful way to improve search engine rankings, drive targeted visitors to your website, and improve your company’s brand. Over time, I’ve learned a number of important lessons when it comes to article marketing.
Article Marketing Success
- Secret #1: Only Submit to Popular Article Marketing Websites
Not all article directories, websites, and blogs are the same. Submitting your articles to sites that have a low Google PR or very few inbound links doesn’t do a lot to promote your content or pass along any value back to your site. Consider the sites you submit your content to carefully.
- Secret #2: Submit Your Article on a Regular Basis
When I don’t train consistently because of traveling or personal issues, I lose karate tournaments. If you want to achieve your business goals online, you have to consistently write and submit articles. You have to be in front of your audience on a regular basis. Otherwise you will lose sales to your competitors.
- Secret #3: Manage Through The Ups and Downs
Not every article you write and submit online will be a success. You will have ups and downs with your article marketing efforts, but you have to keep writing consistently. It’s the only way you will win in the long term.
- Secret #4: Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy
It took me a long time to become successful at article marketing. I learned that there are no obstacles that I couldn’t beat if I consistently persevere. How many of us secretly wish our success would be handed to us on a silver platter? Get real. There is work involved. The solution is to make the hard work fun by doing what you love to do (sharing your expertise) and delegating what you don’t (the mind boggling, manual article submission.)
- Secret #5: Model Others Who Have Succeeded Online
Find someone who’s already been successful at article marketing. You will find that individual adapts his or her techniques, forms and strategies to continually improve his success. When writing your articles, model article templates that work for others and then adapt it to your own writing style.
- Secret #6: Diversify Your Content
Article marketing is a great technique for promotion, seo, and other benefits. However, it’s only one tactic to be used as part of a comprehensive online marketing campaign. You can easily turn your articles into products like blog posts, white papers, e-books, and podcasts.
- Secret #7: Use the Right Tools
If you’re serious about article marketing, then consider the many tools (free and paid) for writing and or distributing your articles. I used to spend about 5 – 6 hours submitting articles to directories and can now achieve the same outcome in as little as 30 minutes. I personally use Article Submitter Pro, but any article submission software will do.
About the Author
Michael Fleischner is an Internet Marketing Expert with more than 13 years of marketing experience. Find Good Marketing Tips at Michael’s Blog. You can also receive search engine optimization tips for improving your search engine rankings by downloading a free chapter of Michael’s latest book, SEO Made Simple: Strategies for Improving Your Search Engine Rankings.
For everyone who wants to find keywords that don’t require a lot of money but have some traffic here is a free tip. There are two different ways that you can use these steps to find great low cost keywords. I recommend that you use both before placing an ad on Google Adwords for your site.
Using Google Adwords keyword tool, and Microsoft excel to find cheap words for your site.
Option one
1. Think about the keywords that people would use to find your site or product and type them into notepad one word per line.
2. Go to the following URL to open the Google Adwords Keyword Tool
3. Copy Your Keywords from notepad and paste them into the enter keywords one per line box. and make sure that descriptive word or phrase is checked. Type in the text on the image verification window and click get keywords.
4. Wait for up to a minute and then a list of keywords you typed and related keywords will appear in the box below. Scroll down to the bottom of the list box where you will see links to export the information. Select the Link that says export to excel.
5. You will then be prompted to download or open the file. The choice is yours but remember where you save the file.
6. Now open the file in excel and expand each column so you can read the text. You have now created a list of keywords related to your site with all the information you need.
7. Now we need to sort the information so that you will have the cheapest keywords first sorted by search volume. In excel 2007 you want to go to the top menu and select data then sort. You then want to have it sorted by advertiser competition first smallest to largest and then add a new level filter that says sort by average search volume highest to smallest.
8. You now have a list of keywords with the lowest competition and cost with highest search volume that you can use for your Adwords campaign. I have been able to get words for as cheap as .05 a lick using this technique. The lower the number the less competition for the word. O is the cheapest and 1 is the highest. Verify if the word is worth it by looking at the average search volume column.
On Option 2 you use the same technique but select website content as the options in the Google Adwords tool and input your URL or a URL of a competitor. You will then follow the steps as normal.
If yo have any questions let me know. Have a great day everyone.
The other day a client was talking with me and was wondering how my wife and I are able to pick up systems, new businesses, and more so easily. And is there a way that they can become better at what we are able to do.
The connected mind is a mind that knows it is part of a spiritual, universal, and above all else human connected system that is partially based on perception. From a very early age I knew we were part of this grand connected game called life and everything, and I mean everything has a life chain (like biological systems in science) and the human life chain like some other animals has a perception based component to it. I know these are some deep thoughts so I will try to visually describe it to you as best I can. This way maybe just maybe you will be able to move in and out of the different planes of this game and take your life and business to the next level.
In a typical mind that has been forced into focus by the way we teach in schools around the world there are set options. You are taught about things, and some cause and effect, but only to a very narrow degree. Meaning if you throw a ball off of a building, it will fall down because of gravity for example. You never take it to the next level by merging the norm with the interaction to the world, you, the people around you and even the universe.
In a connected mind every time something happens you start to see patterns kind of like the matrix and everything is connected in this weird fabric that we call life and I am part of it. Now my wife and I both hatted school because we never thought there was one way to do something.
So in the example above. If I were asked to drop a ball in science class, since I have no set rule ,I can do the action, but my mind is free to move through emotion and association. So I might notice the ball in my hand, I may ask why am I doing this experiment because I know it is silly, or the ball may remind me of a bolder, and then a planet, then a meat ball, and then I may smell it, and then notice the people around me and how they are acting in the same experiment etc. or is there someone on another planet doing the same thing right now having the same thoughts, how many people will talk about this later in a good way or make fun of the teacher. Much of this is called associative thinking. The main difference is you are not trying to connect the points like with a therapist, you are allowing what you know to fill in the connections while being open to find out what you don’t know.
Have I lost you yet… LOL
Have you every heard you can’t see the forest for the trees, well imagine being able to see the forest, the trees, the sky, the ground, the planet, the streams, the people in it, the outside perspective of the world from space and on and on. If you were able to do that, do you believe you would be able to have an advantage over your competition in business 
This is why most people look for us to help them with their marketing and business strategy.
How you can start to become more connected.
1. Ask what if whether you are invested in a belief or not.
What if I were Christian, Muslim, Hindi,New Age, non believer…..just what if. What if my parents were? I used this one quiet a bit in college when people would say these people or those are going to hell or whatever. I would say, “what if you were born in a Muslim country?” You would most likely be Muslim until you had discovered yourself and were old enough to decide what is right for you Muslim or not. My favorite one was, I never met a baby that popped out and said I am Christian or whatever. FYI I am a happy graduate of Dallas Baptist University.
2. Learn Learn Learn
Be a life long learner watch people, watch educational TV, read on the Internet, Great blogs, Newspapers, religion, and look for the connections in things, thoughts, and always ask why or why not. If a politician says you should vote this or that way ask why and learn. Please don’t say I am a this or that and not have a real answer why…
3. Pretend that the world is all connected (IT IS) until you start to feel it automatically.
Play the chain game. Like the story of the butterfly that flapped its wings and started a hurricane. Find something that you know in your business or other wise and look at it like a game and track it forward and back and then out
Example:
I sell Marketing Strategy
It is a Service
It helps people get their message out
The message helps people find this product
The product is making their life better
They are spending more time with their family
My client is less stressed
They are able to be themselves
They have more money
They give a lot to charity
I am helping them make more money for charity while helping their customers have a better quality of life.
I am giving more to charity by helping them be more successful
The people that are being helped by the charity are having a better quality of life
I am helping the world be a better place
etc…
4. Be an actor
Let your thoughts go into whomever you want to experience. If you want to be a fireman or sell a product to them, let your thoughts go into everything you know about it, and write the story as far as you can in your mind. DREAM BIG, YOUR MIND KNOWS NO DIFFERENCE! Think about going to school, taking the exams, putting on your clothes the first time to go to work, seeing the firehouse for the first time, feel the experience. This is what method actors do and why they are so good. Then see how this job makes a difference in so many peoples live, see the people you save, the property you save, the hope you provide, the fear you may have for your own life, or how your product can address all these things. If you do this even a few times you will never look at a profession, or experience the same.
5. Related all of these experiences to your business
I know right know you are probably going how does this relate to business. Well you will be amazed by doing just these few things how much you really have seen and know about the world, people, and business that you didn’t have a clue was there. You will flush out who you are, who your customers are, how you relate to the world and double or triple your revenue.
I am no the best writer so if you are still lost shoot me an email or just hire us to help you have the business, clients, or life you always dreamed of.. SMILE
Technology rules. Yeah, for about five minutes–then natural instincts take over. Are you stupid enough to fight Mamma Nature? Well go ahead and rewrite the rules if you can, cause the Big Mamma knows one thing. She’s tried and tested it all. And if you want to play by her kooky rules, she is willing to teach you a thing or two.
The question is, are you willing to learn?
Do You Pay in Advance?
Have you noticed how big a brand Red Bull is today? Or how insignificant their advertising is? Red Bull shuns print advertising and has never done a triple back flip on a web campaign. Yet, it has found roots in over 50 countries. And has cemented its loyalty in the fickle land of teenagers.
So what’s Red Bull’s big secret?
It’s called GIVING.
Their marketing strategy was simple. They enticed students with free cases of Red Bull, if they threw a party. Guess how many students need an excuse to have a party? With a simple act of giving away free cases to the right target audience in the right universities, Red Bull became a very rich Red Bull.
Yet Where Are Most Marketing Plans Aimed?
Too often marketing is aimed solely at GETTING. Look at all those marketing plans, those many advertisements blaring away on the radio and TV. It’s get, get — all the time!
Yet, nature pooh pooh’s the stuff. Putting a carrot (not cart) before the horse, nature works on the giving part first. In its own little marketing and advertising way, a flower works contrary to most marketers. Using the bait of color and nectar, it draws the bees, knowing full well that its very existence depends on giving bees what they want first, so the bees will carry their pollen.
Wander down the supermarket aisle and you’ll see what I mean. Fifty thousand brands stare at you, screaming at you to buy them. Then a little ol’ lady offers you a sample of a product. Fifteen seconds into your tasting session, she gives you another sample. Then, for no apparent reason, a bottle or two of the product finds itself in your cart. Were you sold? You betcha!
Giving works for a simple reason. Nature hates imbalance. If the deer get faster, so do the cheetahs. It’s a classic system to keep things in balance. Which effectively means that to create an imbalance in marketing in your favor, you’ve got to give first.
Are You Ready To Do the 1-2-3 and Cha-Cha-Cha?
Do you play the dating game? Or do you rush in to conquer most of the time? Mamma Nature knows that haste makes waste. Yet marketers think nothing of blowing billions of dollars on various hare-brained, get-rich-quick schemes that achieve far less than their potential.
Here’s an example. Harley Davidson has been to hog hell and back. Just in time to save its bacon, it decided to work on the cha-cha-cha instead of the wham, bam method. The reward has manifested itself in thousands of die-hard Harley fans that would go all the way on their Harleys. Even today, despite being in an enviable position, Harley still finds time to wine and dine its customers while thumbing its nose at traditional media.
Another good example of cha-cha-cha marketing is how the British operated in the 19th century. Instead of slamming their way into conquering new lands, they went as traders. Whether history likes it or not, they maximized their potential in a systematic and natural marketing manner.
What Happens When Nature Goofs Up
Even nature loses out when it fails to obey its own rules. As long as it sticks to its spring, summer, autumn, winter routine, we go along with the “relationship.” Yet every time it does the 60-second prime time TV spot on us, we absolutely hate it. Oh sure, there’s great color, drama and pizzazz in a whirling tornado, but there’s zero empathy and a whole lot of defiance.
Turn on the music, move those feet. This isn’t some behemoth CRM program we’re talking about. Diamonds are a girl’s best friend, but flowers arouse less suspicion. Do the cha-cha-cha and the getting to know your customer. It’s cheaper, it follows steps, and it works.
Is Your Target Audience “Everyone?”
Nature would laugh at you and laugh heartily. Are you setting yourself up for disaster or what? Even a pimple-ridden 13 year old knows exactly who her knight in shining armor is. While the concept of being in the company of 20 gorgeous men would set her eyes alight, her brain knows better.
Yet most businesses horrify the heck out of Nature. In an apparent suicidal move, they go after a general audience in order to maximize their returns. Some of the biggest brands today are built on single-minded focus. Mercedes, Volvo, Rolex, McDonalds, Red Bull and Playboy all have a clearly defined target audience.
If you doubt it, take a look at a wild dog attack on a National Geographic broadcast. Have you noticed the focus and strategy of their attack? They single out the prey and go after it in a pre-defined relay system. It gets results, and isn’t that what you want?
Cotta Keep on Dancing
When was the last time your heart stopped beating? And isn’t that good, because if it did, you’d be taking harp lessons in a big hurry. Nature doesn’t stop its marketing campaign and neither should you. The first thing businesses do when the economy takes a downturn is pull the plug on marketing. Fat good that’s going to do you! That’s like telling your heart to work at half the heart beats when things aren’t good.
The planet doesn’t stop rotating, the trees don’t stop growing and the fish don’t stop swimming. Yet in an absolute violation of the most basic law of nature, we stop and start like some trainee driver.
There Ain’t No One Like Me!
Nature doesn’t brand-extend. It creates something and then it throws away the mould. When it creates a product, it makes sure that product thrives, grows and multiplies. It adds color, shape and size for a bountiful variety, but brand extension is a no-no.
Yet look at some of the biggies out there. They put out their brands and then put their names on everything from computers to soap. Dove still stands for soap with 1/4th moisturizing cream. Yet, in the supermarket, Dove tries to take on the full force of nature by brand-extending.
Does it work? Yes and no. People have too much clutter in their heads already. To add to that clutter is asking for trouble. Our brains identify with one object when we are given a name.
From Nokia to Chimpanzee
When I say Nokia, you say mobile phone. Yet Nokia sold everything from gumboots to computers — even TV sets. Then one day it dawned on them that they could conquer the world with a brand name that stood for one thing and one thing alone.
Sure a chimpanzee and a baboon are both monkeys, but they’re essentially different products. You won’t find a chimpanzee light or a chimpanzee diet in the species. They’re either chimps or they’re baboons! Besides, their unique brand name allows you to identify them with zero confusion every time! Uniqueness is your brand’s birthright. Use it well.
Here are some “Au Natural” guidelines to business and marketing strategy:
1) Pay in Advance: First you shall sow, and then you shall reap. And you must sow in fertile ground not on rocky soil. Give, and you shall receive. Does this all sound familiar? Are you giving away anything worthwhile on your website, through your advertising, in your brochures?
2) Do the dance one step at a time: You’ll just make a fool of yourself if you don’t build up your reputation with your customers. Give them the best you possibly can. When nature puts on a beautiful butterfly, it starts with a worm.
3) Put on the glasses: Get focus in your life because Nature will make sure you pay big time if you don’t. Sure you can get business, but think of what’s possible if you focus. A l
ittle focus right now reaps long-term rewards. It’s your choice.
4) She’s only happy when she’s dancing: Is that a Bryan Adams song? Or is Nature telling us what we should be doing? She’s on the floor. Go on and boogie.
5) And then there was one: Is your fingerprint different? Is your iris different? Do you have a clone? Nature doesn’t think it works in real life. Why do you think differently?
6) And finally: Take off your headphones and look at what nature is saying.
It’s showing you the color of money!
©2001-2008 Psychotactics Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Wouldn’t you love to stumble upon a secret library of small business ideas? Find simple, yet electrifying ideas, on copywriting, public speaking, marketing strategies, sales conversion, psychological tactics and branding. Head down to http://www.psychotactics.com today and judge for yourself.