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E-Myth MASTERY: The Seven Essential Disciplines for Building a World Class Company - Michael Gerber

Innocent — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 22:32:33 +0000

E-Myth MASTERY: The Seven Essential Disciplines for Building a World Class Company - Michael E. Gerber

Today, I bring you an excerpt from the book: E-Myth MASTERY: The Seven Essential Disciplines for Building a World Class Company by Michael E. Gerber.

If you have read the author’s previous book: E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What to Do About It, which was a best seller, you would expect nothing less than a thorough and trusted guide that you can use to build your business to world class.

And he surely delivered!

Here is an excerpt from the book on the topic: Customer Perceptions and Behavior: Understanding How Your Customers Think and Make Decisions

After reading this part, you will understand what it takes to get prospective customers order your product the first time, and get existing customers keep coming back whenever they need what you are offering without hesitating.

These are the same strategies that the big and successful companies use to make millions and even billions of dollars in sales every year. Now, you too can bid poor sales good bye forever.

If you enjoy this piece, then you can be sure that the entire book is great, and that’s why I recommend it.

Please read on…

Customer Perceptions and Behavior: Understanding How Your Customers Think and Make Decisions

The human mind is anything but simple.

But the mind is where marketing happens for you and your customers. in order to do an effective job marketing your products and your company, you have to get an insightful understanding of the minds of your customers. T good news is that it’s fascinating, and you’ll enjoy the discoveries and insights you develop about your customers and yourself.

Where do you start?

You start by understanding the basics about how your customers’ min work, and how you can influence them for their benefit and yours. First, you develop the Central Psychographic Model, the CPM, for your primary target market and important flanker markets. Then you’ll look at purchase decision making and something we call the Purchase Decision Chain, which will lead you to an understanding of customer needs and behavior and how best communicate with customers.

The work you do in this business development process requires a great deal of in-depth thinking about some ideas that may be unfamiliar, possibly challenging, probably fun, and certainly valuable. You’ll develop insights about your customers and target markets that will shape everything your company does.

You’ll put those insights to use immediately in the next three business development processes. You’ll create your company’s “sensory package” (the total impact of sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste that your customers experience of your business and its products and services). You’ll establish your “positioning” (the place you want your company to occupy in the minds of your customers). You’ll select your “marketing mix” (the specific communications, sales, delivery, and customer service activities you will use to attract and retain customers).

And finally, you’ll combine these elements to develop your marketing strategy. The knowledge and insights you gain in this work will be essential later when you create your lead generation and lead conversion processes. Don’t be in a hurry. Take the time you need to get to the core of your customers. It will pay off handsomely-for both you and them.

So let’s get to it.

Watch Out For The “Fatal Assumptions”

There are two “fatal assumptions” that can get in your way as you try to understand the minds of your target market customers-marketing to yourself and being too product-oriented. Marketing to yourself means thinking your customers think and act as you think and act. If you have ever said, “The way I would do it is … ,” or “What I would want is … ,” or “The way they should think is … ;’ then you have been guilty of marketing to yourself.

Being too product-oriented means thinking more about your products and their specifications, and less about what your customers need and how to communicate with them. It’s thinking backward. The idea that “I’ll create a product and then go out and sell it” is the product -oriented approach, and it’s a poor one.

The idea that ‘I’ll learn what the market needs, then I’ll create the product to satisfy that need” is the customer-oriented approach, and it’s the more effective approach. Product -oriented thinking also means focusing your marketing and sales activities on the features of your product or service, rather than on the emotional gratification it provides your customers.

Perception is Reality

In marketing, there is no such thing as reality; only perceived reality. What the customer, or anyone else for that matter, perceives is what is real for that person. What the customer’s mind perceives, accurately or inaccurately, is the truth in the eye of that customer. What the customer’s mind doesn’t perceive, in effect, doesn’t exist. And perception rules all decision making, including of course, purchasing decisions. So much so that you could define marketing as “the art of managing customer perceptions.”

The key to successful marketing is to provide the gratification the customer seeks. If this happens, it is a “win-win” situation. There is a different approach to marketing that should be discouraged because it benefits neither the customer nor the business serving the customer. It’s the view that one should manipulate customer perceptions in order to make a sale, using any method that works, without regard to the customer’s welfare.

Ethical questions aside, it’s a counterproductive approach to business. Customers always come to realize what is happening and turn away from the selfishly manipulative marketer. In the end, ethical marketing is practical marketing. If customers’ perceived needs and preferences are served, the business wins. If not, it loses.

A Tale of Two Minds

Imagine for a moment that you have a pair of tiny twins living inside your head. Their names are “Impulse” and “Reason.” They do all your thinking for you, all your feeling, all your perceiving. They are your mind, but there are two of them-and they couldn’t be more different from each other.

Impulse speaks no language, understands no words, has no ability to reason. She has no sense of right or wrong. She wants gratification; she avoids pain. She feels desire and fear. She is the ultimate amoral pleasure seeker as well as the ultimate avoider of anything unpleasant. She can be embarrassed, she has a sense of pride and shame, and when she’s done something wrong, she is remorseful. She is always completely honest, straightforward-there’s no deception in her. She is pure passion, emotion, and impulsive instinct. And she wants everything now.

Reason reads, writes, and does arithmetic. She is logical and rational. She eeks facts, information, knowledge, understanding. She is not passionless, but her passions are rational and follow her reasoning. She makes unemotional judgments about good and bad, right and wrong, ethical and unethical, moral and immoral, should do and shouldn’t do, can do and can’t do, valuable and valueless. But she can’t be embarrassed because she has no sense of shame, and he is never remorseful. She thinks, she reasons, she judges, but she doesn’t feel.

They’re an interesting pair, these little twins, but the most interesting thing i that Impulse is the decision maker of the two. Believe it or not, every decision you make is made by Impulse. That’s right, the little crazy person is making all your decisions. Unsettling isn’t it?

Well, it’s not really all that unsettling because Reason has a lot to say about it The two of them work together in a very productive way. They both perceive through the senses-sight, sound, touch, smell, and taste. Reason takes whatever meaning is inherent in what it perceives and logically processes it, adding no emotion, drawing conclusions.

The result is passed along to Impulse who interprets the result in terms of expected gratification or pain, and reacts emotionally. Impulse provides the emotional response to Reason’s rational conclusions and judgments. Meanwhile, Impulse is also using her sensory perceptions to make associations with past experience and bring forth the emotions they trigger.

So Reason deals in information and judgment while Impulse deals in associations and emotions. The more information Reason can bring to her judgments, the stronger her influence on a decision. The more associations and impressions Impulse can make, the stronger her influence.

The Conscious Mind And The Unconscious Mind

The little twins are real. Of course they’re not creatures inhabiting your skull; they are the two aspects of your mind. Reason is your conscious mind and Impulse is your unconscious mind. They exist in all of us. They are the key to the way we think, perceive, and make decisions. And they are the key to understanding and communicating with your customers and prospective customers.

If your marketing is to be successful, you have to communicate with both of them. And that’s where most businesses fall short. They communicate mostly with Reason, and she’s not the decision maker.

Unconscious Associations

Associations are as important as they are mysterious and unpredictable. Your mind-anybody’s mind-makes associations that rule your behavior and the way you perceive the world. Impulse is the twin responsible for associations. Associations can be triggered by the most trivial perceptions as well as by major events.

For example, a middle-aged man doing yard work hears the rustle of fallen leaves. He perceives the sound and unconsciously associates it with the rustle of papers at an award ceremony at which he was the guest of honor. He doesn’t consciously remember the award ceremony, but he smiles and momentarily feels good because the association triggered pleasant emotions.

Here’s another, more dramatic example. A young woman-an ice-cream lover-is walking home one evening eating an ice-cream cone. Suddenly she is attacked by a couple of dogs. To this day, more than 15 years later, she can’t bring herself to eat ice cream. Her unconscious mind has created an indelible association between ice cream and brutality, pain, and fear. It’s an extreme example to be sure, but it makes the point.

Marketers seek to create associations favorable to their products or take advantage of existing ones. Think, for instance, of the last time you saw a television commercial for perfume or beer or an automobile. Yes, the advertisement presented information, but the real thrust of the ad was to trigger an association in your unconscious mind linking the product with a pleasant experience or impression.

You never know exactly what associations your advertising, your product, or your sensory package are going to trigger with any specific individual people’s experiences and perceptions are much too varied. But you can tap into the common experiences and perceptions of groups of similar people and be confident that the associations will be pleasant or unpleasant for most of them.

And that’s what you do in your business communications and advertising. You understand your target markets in as much depth as you can, but at least to the extent that you know their major common experiences and the way they generally go about their lives.

That tells you the kinds of things most likely to have positive associations. And that gives you insights into the kinds of messages and images your advertising should carry, the way you should interact with customers, and the kind of sensory experience your customers should have when they do business with your company.

The idea, of course, is that if you have an in-depth understanding of your customers and how they make their purchasing decisions, you can influence their decisions for your mutual benefit. So let’s take all this background information and put it into a framework that will help you understand customer decision making and enable you to establish the psychological profile-the Central Psychographic Model (CPM)-for each of your target markets.

Attraction And Avoidance The Essence Of Purchase Decisions

A purchase decision, or any decision for that matter, is simply the emotional response to all the rational and not-so-rational activities in the conscious and unconscious mind. Yes, decisions are made emotionally by the unconscious mind, but with full attention to both conscious and unconscious perceptions, associations, logic, and judgments.

It’s all a matter of attraction and avoidance. The conscious mind is drawn to purchases that make sense, are rational, and have objectively desirable results. It is repelled by purchases that are irrational and have objectively undesirable results. The unconscious mind is drawn to purchases that result in emotional gratification. It is attracted by pleasant associations, pleasant sensory perceptions, and the promise of good results based on the conscious mind’s conclusions and judgments. It avoids anything unpleasant.

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Do you have any questions, inquiries, observations, or contributions regarding this write up or my blog? Please leave it as comment, I will respond to it.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

E-Myth Mastery: The Seven Essential Disciplines for Building a World Class Company

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L’Oréal’s Business Strategies

Innocent — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 18:47:58 +0000

L’Oréal’s Business Strategies

Here are the business strategies that have taken L’Oréal to world number one position in the beauty and cosmetics industry. As an entrepreneur, business owner or manager, you can actually adopt these strategies to your business and experience similar success.

Continue To Improve On Your Products

You cannot afford not to continue to improve on the value your product gives to your customers. If you fail to improve on your product quality, it would either give room for new entrants with better offers into the market to upstage you, or opportunity to your competitors to create and present better product than yours to your target customers.

If you fail to make your product better from time to time, you may soon find you are no longer relevant in the market place – it’s that dangerous.

Eugène Schueller was able to easily get into, and penetrate the beauty and cosmetics industry in the early 1900s, because he noticed a huge gap between women’s desire and expectation for their dyed hair and the available hair dyes. By improving on the existing dyes therefore to meet women’s needs, he immediately captured a sizeable portion of the market in only two years.

Find Ways To Promote Your Business Affordably

Promoting your business without doubt is very important to its success. Even if you have great product in terms of the value it gives to people who use it, but not many people who would have love to get it know about it, you will not record good sales, and your cash flow will suffer. It may become very difficult keeping the business going because you don’t have the cash to cover overhead and create more products.

You need to find cheap or free means of promoting your business, which are nevertheless effective, especially at the early stage of your business when you are working on a tight budget.

Schueller’s promotional platform, which cost him nothing except for his time and expertise was writing and editing the science column of La Coiffure de Paris magazine, which was first published in 1909. Through this magazine, which he eventually bought in 1912, Schueller was able to bring L’Oréal to the attention of his target market.

Make Your Product Irresistible For Distributors

There are stakeholders or certain people who are instrumental to the success of your business, and who you must recognize and relate with in a win-win situation. One of such people are your distributors. Your distributors can affect your sales positively or negatively depending on how well they are motivated to sell your products.

Give people great offer to distribute your product, and they will consider you first over the competition, and help you achieve your sales goals.

Schueller knew this, and that was why he provided mouth-watering incentives to hair stylist to promote and distribute L’Oréal products. He established a hair-colouring school, which provided training to hair stylists, who in return became motivated to recommend the company’s products to their clients.

Take Position Early On Evolving Trends

You need to keep an eye on evolving trends taking place in your industry and take position early. Most businesses start coming into an industry when it seems to be booming, but they will always be behind those that came first before the boom time. The early comers would have taken the first position in people’s minds, which is a strong competitive advantage to them.

By creating L’Oréal Blanc bleaching powder in 1929 to offer solution to brunettes who Schueller believed would want to become blonde following that trend he observed in the late 1920s, Schueller was positioning L’Oréal for huge gains when the trend becomes matured. And it did happen, millions of brunettes did want to become blonde in the 1930 and 1940s, resulting in millions of sales for L’Oréal Blanc bleaching powder.

Take Advantage Of Events

Many events that take place around you usually hold good opportunity for your business to make money. Take note of these events and think of how possibly your business can benefit from them. With the ideas you will generate, you will be surprised how much opportunities you have been missing all this time.

By thinking about how its company was going to benefit from the first paid holidays introduced by the French Government in 1936, L’Oréal came up with L’Oréal’s Ambre Solaire, which immediately became the leader in the new suntan market.

Develop The Ability To Continue To Create Innovative Products

Attaining and remaining top in your industry require the ability to create and continue to develop innovative products. You therefore need to establish a system that will enable you to do that. You could set up a research and development unit or something similar.

L’Oréal’s success in the several decades of its existence can be attributed largely to its huge investment in research and development, which enable it to create many top selling products. From 500 staff in its research and development unit in 1970 to 1000 by 1984 tells how much serious the company considered it.

Read L’Oréal Business Success Story here

Recommended

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Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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L’Oréal: The Creation Of The World’s Largest Manufacturer Of Cosmetics And Perfumes

Innocent — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 23:57:26 +0000

L’Oréal: The Creation Of The World’s Largest Manufacturer Of Cosmetics And Perfumes

The business success story of L’Oréal is another revelation of how possible it is to build multibillion dollar businesses from the ground-floor, with little or no money. A lot of aspiring entrepreneurs have not been able to start their businesses because they think they don’t have the money or resources to begin. This belief is crushed as Eugène Schueller began L’Oréal from home, and grew it to the billion dollar enterprise that it is today.

This story is full with strategies, and business growth ideas that enabled L’Oréal to grow, expand consistently, and sustain its lead as the world’s largest cosmetics and perfume company, and which you can also apply to your business.

Three years after graduating from Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Paris, France’s national chemical school as chemist, Eugène Schueller bagan to formulate synthetic hair dyes at night from his kitchen in 1907. He had observed that most women of his time loved to dye their hair. However, their choice of dye was limited to the fiery red and coal black colour that were available then. Also, these dyes looked somehow artificial.

By improving on the existing hair dyes to meet women’s needs and expectations, Schueller created hair dyes which not only provided a subtle range of colours, but also looked natural. Making his product in the night, and selling to hair saloons who accepted it in the morning, Schueller’s business kicked off on a bright note. Within two years he found the Société Francaise des Teintures Inoffensives pour Cheveux, which later became L’Oréal.

Aware of the importance of marketing and promotion to business success, Schueller made use of the magazine, La Coiffure de Paris that was first published in October 1909. As part of the editorial team, and head of the science column, Schueller was able to promote his business with the articles he contributed to the magazine. His article on hair colouring, in which he was the first to recommend patch tests, established him as expert and brought him more sales. Seeing the power of the media in communicating with his target market, Schueller bought the magazine in 1912.

Quickly grasping that his success is closely linked to that of hair stylists, in 1910 Schueller began to forge a special bond with the profession, which grew stronger over time. Through his determination and ambition, he succeeded in convincing Paris hair stylists to use his dyes. He established a hair-colouring school on Rue du Louvre in Paris, which he personally oversaw, using a former hair stylist from the Russian Court to demonstrate his ideas. The school trained hair stylists, who, satisfied with his products recommended them to their clients. And with representatives selling his products throughout France, L’Oréal grew rapidly.

The 1920s brought in a new age. Women around the world were now working and earning money for themselves. They were also growing more concerned about their appearance, and looking for ways to prevent grey hairs from revealing their age. This development brought huge success to Oréal hair dyes – sales hit the roof as its products were sold massively outside of France, as far as Italy, Austria, Netherlands, and even the United States, Canada, and the UK and Brazil.

In the late 1920s, Schueller observed an evolving trend that could spin huge profit for his business if he took position early. He noticed that a lot of brunettes were longing to be blonde. To exploit the trend, L’Oréal launched the L’Oréal Blanc bleaching powder in 1929. And true to Eugène Schueller’s prediction when he said, “This little bottle holds a huge industry! One day, millions of brunettes will want to be blonde,” the product became a great success through the 1930s and 1940s as blonde hair became very popular.

Led by the highly creative founder and visionary, L’Oréal continued to innovate and find opportunities for its business from events in the society and economy. One of such events that brought L’Oréal huge profit was when the French Government introduced the first paid holidays for French workers in 1936.

Realizing there will soon be need for suntan lotions by holiday makers, L’Oréal created L’Oréal’s Ambre Solaire, which immediately captured the new suntan lotion market. As the company was making giant strides in product creation, it was also expanding its sales network on both national and international level. The company began to sell its products through pharmacies and perfumers, just as new subsidiaries were opened in Italy, Belgium, and Denmark between 1936 and 1937.

L’Oréal’s rise to the top and domination of the beauty and cosmetics industry was its huge investment in research and development, which enabled it to create market leading innovative products from time to time. By 1950 its research and development team included 100 chemists, which created top selling innovative products such as the first lightening tint, Imédia D, launched in 1951; and the first colouring shampoo, Colorelle, introduced in 1955.

As a result of the huge sales recorded by many of its products, which were equally market leaders across the world, L’Oréal was without doubt the highest earning company in France, with growth twice as fast as the cosmetics-industry average in the 1970s. With more money, the company increased its research and development staff from 500 in 1970 to 750 in 1974, then to 1000 by 1984.

Coming out from this huge investment in research and development were more highly successful products, such as Lancôme’s Niosôme, one of the few anti-aging creams found to be effective by independent dermatologists, launched in 1986. From that success, L’Oréal translated the technology for creating Lancôme Niosôme into developing a mass market L’Oréal skin care line. The line, which was sold under the name Plentitude, was introduced in Europe and Austrialia in the late 1980s and in the US in 1989, capturing 10 percent share of the US market in only two years.

As L’Oréal entered the 1990s, it faced a tough competition from Proctor & Gamble and Unilever over worldwide domination of the mass market for cosmetics and fragrance. To fend off these rivals and maintain its global number one position, L’Oréal stepped up its research and development efforts, as well as its marketing drive.

It increased its advertising budget by up to 50 percent for some products, created new image for most of its colour cosmetics, repackaged its merchandise, and made display cases more accessible and user friendly. And by targeted acquisition policy, L’Oréal expanded and captured new markets and distribution channels.

Some of its popular acquisitions included Helena Rubinstein in 1989, American brand of skincare products that was already well positioned on the European , Japanese and South American markets; La Roche-Posay, also in 1989, a high-tech dermatological product recommended by dermatologists all over the world; Maybelline in 1996, the leader in mass-market make-up in the United States. This acquisition did not only make L’Oréal the clear leader in the United Sates, but the world number one in mass-market make up industry.

Others included SoftSheen, the leading brand of hair-relaxing range of products in the world in 1998; Matrix, leader in the US professional haircare products sector in 2000; Mininurse, a leading mass-market skincare product in China, in 2003; and Yue-Sai, another leading Chinese skincare and make-up brand in 2004.

SkinEthic, The Body Shop, and Sanoflore, the French pharmaceutical company and leading name in organic skincare that specialized in designing, manufacturing and marketing natural cosmetics produced by organic farming, were acquired in 2006, followed two years later with the acquisition of YSL Beauté (2008).

And as L’Oréal celebrated its 100 years in business in 2009, its position as the leader in the cosmetics industry the world over remain unshaken. Having reached this position through total commitment to research and development to create excellent and innovative beauty products that meet the needs of men and women around the globe, the company is poised to keep at it, and even step it higher in the years to come.

Read L’Oréal Business Strategies here.

Recommended

Put your business on the path to success with a solid plan created with Business Plan Pro Software .

Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

………………………………..

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Think Like A Champion: An Informal Education In Business And Life - Donald Trump

Innocent — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 01:29:18 +0000

Think Like A Champion: An Informal Education In Business And Life By Donald Trump

Donald Trump needs no introduction. His name is already a brand almost of equal level as Coca-Cola as a result of his monumental success in business. If you are aspiring to go into business, or you are in business already in business, hearing or reading from Donald Trump about business is actually priceless.

In this book, Think Like A Champion: An Informal Education In Business And Life by Donald Trump, you will be able to reach into his mind and tap his profound business acumen and principles that have brought him the massive success he is living today. In this book, he shares fifty short essays on his experience on business and life, to help you also become successful.

Below is an excerpt from the book, enjoy it. Don’t forget to share it with your friends by using the “share this” button below.

I don’t think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.
- Abraham Lincoln

Experience teaches only the teachable.
- Aldous Huxley

Building Connected Thoughts

Comprehensive education dissolves the line between knowing too much and knowing too little on a variety of subjects - subjects that are necessary for success. I was reminded of this recently when I interviewed a young man who was very well versed in his field of expertise and almost uneducated in every other subject that was brought up. It was like he had tunnel vision, and although I admired his knowledge of his field, I had to realize that, considering the scope of my enterprises, he might not be a great fit because of his limited interests. This gave me the idea for this article, and I think it’s something all of you should consider as you are furthering your education and/or entering your careers.

Aldous Huxley, the great thinker and author of Brave New World, wrote an essay in 1959 titled “Integrate Education” that is still pertinent today. He emphasized the importance of building bridges in knowledge and thought, and the word he mentions for this is pontifex, or bridge-builder. It’s an interesting image to keep in mind as we study and learn. By doing so, we increase our learning capacity to include and connect ideas and subjects that may not specifically pertain to our area of interest, but that may serve us well to pay attention to.

Oddly enough, as I was thinking of this situation, I was looking through the February 5, 2007, issue of Time magazine, which featured a letter written by Huxley in 1954, under the heading of “Classic Letter.” This letter is so right on that it could be contemporary. It addresses the misinterpretations by critics and the press in their reviews, and while he admits their footnotes are “snappy,” he goes onto say that, “Snappiness, alas, is apt to be in inverse ratio to accuracy.” This guy knew what he was talking about on a variety of levels and subjects, and whether you agree with him or not, his ideas are well presented.

We’ve all heard the saying “connect the dots.” I see it as having enough knowledge to be able to connect the dots in a reasonable and informed way. The young man I interviewed could not do this. I wasn’t asking for an in-depth review of each topic presented, but an awareness of at least what the topic was. I’ve mentioned before the importance of keeping up with global events on a daily basis if you are planning to get anywhere in this world. Considering the availability of news, blind spots can’t really be rationalized anymore, no matter where you might be living. Information is available to everyone, and if you aren’t plugging into it, it will eventually work against you-maybe on your first interview. Don’t learn this the hard way!

Another tactic for being your own bridge-builder is to visualize how much time is saved when you cross a bridge, versus fording a river or traversing a canyon. It’s also a safeguard for falling into a gap that might take you weeks or months to get yourself out of. We are not omniscient, and sometimes things work out for a reason in a different way than we had planned, but take the time to prepare yourself for your goals. I work at that every single day. I’ve learned that things don’t just automatically fall into line because I want them to. Be proactive in your pursuit of knowledge.

As I write this, I remind myself that if you are reading it, you are most likely someone intent on improving your intelligence quota and someone who is already motivated. So I want you to ask yourself What is it that you are aiming for? What precisely is your motivation? What’s the point of building a bridge if you’re not sure you want to get to other side, or if you don’t know what you’ll do once you get there? A bridge must serve a specific purpose, and your goals have to be just that specific. Visualization is a powerful tool for bringing your intentions into focus.

I was having a conversation a few years ago with a few people when one guy mentioned that the Trump name had become a famous brand around the world and then added, “What’s in a name?” He then sort of laughed and said to me, “in your case, a lot!” I noticed that one guy seemed out of the loop about the quip. So I said “That’s Shakespeare. ‘What’s in a name’ is a famous line from Shakespeare.” So he still looked perplexed and asked “From what?” And although I knew it was from Romeo and Juliet, I said, “Look it up. You might learn some interesting things along the way.”

I’m not proposing that you spend years studying Shakespeare, but a topical knowledge of certain things will greatly enhance your capabilities for dealing in the major leagues with people who are well educated in a variety of subjects. Don’t be left out! Take a few hours a week to review the classics in literature or history or something outside of your usual range of interests. Limiting yourself is not the best choice. Many topics come up in the course of a business discussion or interview, and while we can’t know everything, we should know as much as we can.

Abraham Lincoln’s statement at the beginning of this essay sums up what I’m trying to get across to you. It also incorporates Huxley’s statement about being teachable. An added bonus to this attitude is that it will keep you young. Being a know-it-all will age you before your time, in addition to making you unteachable, so avoid those pitfalls. And building connected thoughts? Whoever thought that Abraham Lincoln and Aldous Huxley could be so connected? This essay proved that they could be, and we didn’t need any dots to help us-just brain power and the attempt at building bridges between eras, cultures, backgrounds, and civilizations. Let that be an example of how to bridge your own gaps and to get yourself where you want to go. Creative thinking is a must these days. Make it work for you.

Fear defeats more people than any other one thing in the world.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

To ask the right question is already half the solution of a problem.
-CARL JUNG

Confronting Your Fears

Recently, an interviewer asked me what my greatest fears were. I said I didn’t have any. He seemed surprised, but this is how I see it: If you label something as a fear, then it creates fear when sometimes it’s not a fear but a concern. For example, I know just as well as everyone else that New York City experienced a major terrorist attack and the thought of that is a concern for all of us, because it affects all of us. It’s happened in many places, so it’s a worldwide concern. But if we let it become a firmly rooted fear, the terrorists will have won.

The same applies to business. Do you fear owning a business? Translate that for yourself as asking: Are you concerned about owning a business yourself? Why? What specifically are those concerns?

It’s much easier to break down a concern than it is a fear. Fear creates a block that will only hinder your creative thinking. Objectivity will remove that block and allow for creative ideas to flow.

An antidote to fear is as simple as problem solving. Whether you have investing, estate planning, or running a business on your mind, or all of those things, they can be broken down into units of thought and dealt with in an orderly manner. It’s a bit like a jigsaw puzzle–you need to find the right place for each piece of the puzzle until the whole is apparent.

When I began to construct Trump Tower, for example, I had several things in mind that I knew I wanted. I wanted a certain kind of marble called Breccia Perniche, which was expensive, beautiful, and rare. It was also irregular and had white spots and white veins, which bothered me, so I went to the quarry itself and marked off the best slabs with black tape. Action turned this concern into a problem solved. I got exactly the marble pieces I wanted, and sitting around worrying about whether those pieces would be right or wrong was getting me nowhere. As a result of deciding to go to the quarry myself, the pieces of this puzzle fell into place and the finished product was perfect.

Know that if you want to own your own business, you will be doing a lot of the work yourself. That’s just the way it is. It isn’t all about giving orders or having other people do the legwork or brainwork for you. That comes into the picture, but you should always be ready to go at it yourself. If that idea bothers you, maybe you’d be better off being an employee. If responsibility comes naturally to you, or if you enjoy that challenge, owning your own business is a good fit.

Fear has a way of making things bigger than they are. There’s an old German proverb to the effect that “fear makes the wolf bigger than he is,” and that is true. But the opposite of fear is faith, which is one reason you’ve got to believe in yourself and see yourself as victorious. You will know you are capable of dealing with any discouragements, bullies, or problems along the way.

When I was faced with some huge debts in the early 1990s, it was widely reported that I was finished, done for, gone. Looking at the numbers alone made that seem clear to the media. However, I never believed I was finished. I simply saw that situation as a problem I had to solve and went about doing that. I’m not saying it was easy, because it wasn’t. It was a big problem. But I refused to give in to fear or to believe what was being said about my so-called demise. I came back to become more successful than I ever was, and that’s why I believe business is very much about problem solving. If you can learn to deal with and solve problems, you will have a much bigger margin for success.

Do not allow fear to settle into place in any part of your life. It is a defeating attitude and a negative emotion. Recognize and zap it immediately. Replace it with a problem-solving attitude, faith in yourself, and hard work. Put that formula into working order for yourself and you’ll b~ dealing from a position of power, not fear. That’s winning.

People with vision master the ability to see through to the heart of issues and investments. They value transparency.
- Robert Kiyosaki

Imagination: A Key to Financial Savvy

I have the great advantage of having graduated from the Wharton School of Business, which is probably the best in the world. They made sure we were well versed in everything having to do with business. This is not always a guarantee of success, but at least we were well equipped for it.

Having had this advantage, I will explain a few things for those who haven’t. Finance and business is a complex mix of components that embraces a large spectrum of enterprises. It’s like having a technique and then being able to apply it to different mediums. As a builder, I instinctively saw the different aspects of finance fitting and falling into place in a large blueprint-and as I learned more, those blueprints became larger and larger. When I look back, I realize I was thinking big way back in school.

This might sound simplistic, but I’m a firm believer in visualization, and it worked for me. A blueprint might not work for you, but they are something I was familiar with. It might be a Mira painting or some other design or sculpture that works for you. I’ve heard some interesting stories of what people visualized on their path to success. One person used a photograph of bread and salt as his inspiration, and he became vastly successful. To each his own on this one.

Some financial courses are dry-but necessary. I was able to handle them by making them more interesting in my own mind by applying the principles immediately to some imaginary project I would come up with. By doing this, I was already working in the real world while I was in school, which I think saved me a lot of time when I actually got started on my own. I had been multitasking before I knew what multitasking was.

In reviewing my career, I think this aspect of my approach, on top of having the foundation of great schooling, is largely responsible for my success. I didn’t realize I was doing it until much later, when I would somehow know how things worked or where things went in the big picture of any project I might be considering or actively involved in. I had already been working on it years before, and while I still encountered problems, things would somehow fall into place as they should. It’s one way of being prepared.

A lot of people have imagination, but it doesn’t help them because they can’t execute. I’m able to execute with the imagination. Make sure your foundation is there to begin with and then grow from there in your imagination. That’s how vision and transparency work together-and results can be remarkable.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

Think Like a Champion: An Informal Education In Business and Life

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How To Manage Your Time Effectively And Achieve Your Goals For The Day

Innocent — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 20:24:35 +0000

How To Manage Your Time Effectively And Achieve Your Goals For The Day

Time is the currency of life, and we have a limit supply of it. There are only 24 hours of time available in a day for us to use, and that means our success in achieving our goals depends hugely on how well we are able to manage and use this time each day.

Time management is a skill you must develop to be able to get more important things done, and be able to achieve your set goals. If you set great goals for your life and you are not able to achieve them, the improvement that you desire will never materialize.

It is important for you to know that to realize your dream, you need to set and achieve your goals; and to achieve your goals, you need to assign time (from the fixed 24 hours in a day) for their execution, and ensure that the time is used for the purpose.

Effective time management is not easy to attain, but it can be learned, and with consistent practice, it can become habitual.

I want to share with you ways by which you can effectively manage your time every day, and enjoy the feeling of fulfillment that comes with being able to achieve your set goals.

1. Writing a To-do List Daily

This is the starting point in being able to make the best of your time each day in working on your goals. Before starting the day’s work, write down the tasks you would want to accomplish that day in order of their importance. That is, the tasks that relate to your major or most important goals should be first on the list, while those that relate to minor or less important goals, the last.

It is important to list your tasks in this order because, just in case you are not able to accomplish all the tasks at the close of the day, you will still feel happy seeing that the tasks required to achieve your major goals were done. You would be motivated to continue to prepare a to-do list each day before beginning work, and with time it will become a habit, and then you will be able to accomplish a lot more or all of your set tasks for the day. The tasks you couldn’t complete for the day of cause will be moved to the next day’s to-do list where they will be placed in order of their importance.

Notice that the great thing about writing a daily to-do list in this order is that it focuses your time, energy, and other resources that you may have squarely in gradually achieving your goals, beginning with the major ones, rather than dissipating them on other things that do not have anything to do with your goals. And as the day go by, you will gradually see your dream life coming true because you have been able to manage your time well in doing what you needed to do to achieve your goals.

You may prefer to make your To-do list using any of the many electronic task schedulers or organizers, which technology has made available. That’s cool, but I still prefer to take an index card or piece of paper and a pen and write mine down. Somehow, by doing this I tend to complete more tasks for the day.

In fact, psychologists agree that writing down a task to be done makes it easier to accomplish it. And the reason is simply that when you write down your tasks for the day on paper, the process of taking a piece of paper and writing on it makes your whole being to be involved in creating the list, and so it registers more in your mind that the tasks must be done. For this, the cells, tissues, and relevant organs of the body are stimulated to release the needed energy, concentration, and alertness to accomplish the tasks.

Also, having your tasks for the day on paper, pasted on the table or wall, puts it in your view almost every minute. This pushes you to work on them, even when you don’t feel motivated.

2. Assigning Specific Time To Tasks On Your To-do List

Writing a to-do list without assigning a specific time to completing the tasks in it is not enough, the whole essence of preparing the list will be defeated. Since what we are trying to achieve in preparing a to-do list is to manage the limited time we have to use in a day, there is need to allocate time to each task for the list to achieve its purpose.

For each task on the list, state the time the task is to commence and end. For instance, see a short to-do list for the day below:

1. Write the topic for my new book: Five things to do every morning to loss
weight – 7am–11am (4hrs.)
2. Write article for my blog, title: How to choose the right food to
eat – 11:30am–1:30pm (2hrs.)
3. Read and reply emails – 1:30pm-3:00pm (1hr 30mins).

Assigning a specific time to starting and completing a task makes you accountable for the time you have for the day. You know what you should be doing at a particular time of the day, and if you find yourself not doing it, you can quickly switch and get back on track.

However, you should apply some flexibility in working out your schedule. If a task is taking longer time to complete than you anticipated, adjust your schedule a bit and add more time to it. The next time you are performing such task, you would know how much time it will take to complete.

3. Avoid Time Wasters

The major reason lots of people don’t achieve their set goals for the day is that they spend lots of time on activities that are not relevant to their goals. In other words they allow time wasters to steal their time.

There are so many time wasters out there you have to be careful of not giving your time to. These include reading and responding to emails, using social network site, meeting and chatting to friends, watching TV, movie, and making or receiving telephone calls. To identify what time wasters are consider this: any activity that does not help achieve any of your goals for the day is a time waster.

There is nothing wrong with reading and responding to emails, but if it is not an activity in your to-do list that day or within the time period you have set aside to accomplish certain goals, it will be a time waster to be doing it at the time allotted for another task.

Time wasters will always be there, fighting for your attention and time. Sometimes it can be really tempting not to succumb your time to them. There can be serious pressure on you to suspend other things and attend to them, however, to achieve your set goals for the day, you must stick to your gun, and insist that you complete the tasks on your to-do list first before attending to other activities.

How best you manage your time and achieve your set goals for the day will depend on you writing a plan for using your time for the day, and how much you are disciplined not to allow activities that are not in your to-do list to take your time.

I’m sure following this simple guide will help you manage your time well and achieve lots more of your goals each day.

Do You Desire Success in Life?

Would you like a FREE program from Brian Tracy that teaches you how to achieve it?

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Cisco Systems Inc. Business Strategies

Innocent — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 17:05:53 +0000

Cisco Systems Inc. Business Strategies

Building a business from scratch and in less than three decades it is worth hundreds of billions of dollars is no mean feat; it takes generating effective strategies and executing them. It takes taking the right decisions at the right time. Here are strategies that have made Cisco Systems Inc. a multibillion dollar company from a little start-up. You can adapt them to your business too.

Great Business Ideas Can Be Born From What You Are Doing Presently

One of the ways to generate great business ideas is from observing trends, changes, challenges, and needs in your industry or where you are working.

The founding of Cisco Systems Inc. was born out of Leonard Bosack discovering the need for institutions and businesses to link up their computer systems in separate locations with themselves. He was able to know this need existed because he worked in an environment where computers in different departments shared data, and having them therefore in a network would enhance organizational efficiency.

Identify Your Target Customers And Reach Them

A major key to business success is to know exactly who your business is serving, and where they are. Then you will need to come up with an effective strategy to reach them with your product.

From inception, Cisco knew exactly who their customers were: scientists and engineers who used TCP/IP protocols and UNIX-based computers in Universities, research centers, aerospace industry, government institutions, and corporations. It then devised a marketing strategy to reach them through ARPANET.

Make Your Product More Valuable

A sure way to move to the top of your industry is to make your product or service more superior than what competitors are offering.

By 1988, Cisco’s routers supported more protocols than all others in the market. This distinguished it from the pack.

Getting Into An Industry Early Is Key

The ability to recognize a fledgling industry with huge future profit potential, and get in early and take position will certain enable your business to reap great profits when the industry gets matured.

Cisco’s strategy that has resulted more in the astronomical growth of its business over the years has been its ability to pick emerging networking businesses that would spin huge profits in future, and quickly get into them.

Allowing Professional Managers To Run Your Business

To move your business to a higher level from being a start-up, you need to bring in professional business managers, than continuing allowing friends or family members with little business management and marketing expertise to manage the business. Although this may hurt your friends or relations when asked to go, it is however to the interest of the business’ survival and growth to replace them with more qualified and experience managers. And it is a decision you have to be brave to take.

Cisco System Inc. started experiencing serious growth when its management was changed, and headed Morgridge.

Flexibility In Business Operation Is Vital For Survival

Businesses that will remain relevant in the face of technological change sweeping through its industry will be those which can easily and quickly adjust its system or product line to accommodate the change. It is therefore important to build flexibility into your business to be able to accommodate any change that may occur in your industry.

In the early 1990s, there were several new communications technologies, including ATM, introduced into the market. But Cisco System’s business was not adversely hit, as the company was flexible enough to be able to quickly improve on its routers to handle the newly invented protocols.

Expanding Your Market

A lot of businesses record low sales because they are not exploring opportunities to sell their products in foreign markets. The market in your geographical area may already be saturated, while ironically, it is up for the taking in other lands. You need to take opportunity of the fact that the world has become a global village by expanding your business outside of your shores.

Sales from foreign markets account for substantial part of Cisco’s total sales. By 1994, Cisco’s sales from foreign markets was 41.9 percent of its total sales.

Read Cisco Systems’ Success Story here.

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Cisco Systems, Inc.: How Husband And Wife Sold Their House To Create The World’s Largest Computer Systems Networking Company

Innocent — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 14:22:30 +0000

Cisco Systems, Inc.:
How Husband And Wife Sold Their House To Create The World’s Largest Computer Systems Networking Company

Great business ideas and opportunities usually present themselves in our work places or from what we do, but very few people ever notice, talk less of grabbing them. Fortunately, it was different for Bosack and Lerner, the husband and wife who founded Cisco Systems Inc., the world’s largest producer of computer internetworking products.

In December 1984, the couple, Leonard Bosack and Sandra Lerner, both staff of Stanford University, established Cisco Systems in Menlo Park, California. Bosack, who was the manager of the computer science department’s laboratory, discovered a way of connecting his department to his wife’s department (the graduate school of business, where she was the manager of computers) 500 yards apart.

Having tried to sell the internetworking technology to existing computer companies without success, the couple decided to set up their own business based on the technology, and named their company Cisco Systems. They were later joined by two of their colleagues, Greg Setz, Bill Westfield, and Kirk Lougheed, as cofounders.

To get the company up and running under very tight financial situation, the couple sold their house, incurred credit card debts, and delayed payment of salaries to their friends who worked for them. Even after two years, the business was still struggling, and Lerner needed to keep another job to supplement the family’s income.

However, things began to change for the new company when it shipped its first product in 1986 - a router for the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) protocol suite. Cisco’s major product was internetworking router. This is a hardware device incorporating software that automatically picks the most effective route for data to flow between networks. Cisco’s router was the first multi-protocol router in the industry, and could therefore connect different kinds of networks, those having different architectures, and those built on different hardware, such as UNIX workstations, Apple Macintosh computers, IBM-compatible personal computers, and IBM mainframes.

By 1987, with eight employees, Cisco’s sale of routers was up to $250,000 every month. At the beginning, the company’s marketing strategy was to reach computer scientists and engineers in the universities, research centers, aerospace industry, and government institutions, who used TCP/IP protocols and UNIX-based computers, through ARPANET, the precursor to the Internet.

In 1988, Cisco expanded its target customer base to include mainstream corporations with geographically dispersed branches that used different networks. For these customers Cisco created routers that served an even greater array of communications protocols and therefore distinguished its routers by making them able to support more protocols than those of any other router manufacturer.

And when the commercial market for internetworking began to develop by the late 1980s, Cisco’s reasonably priced, high-performance routers put it ahead of the competition that was building up.

Needing substantial amount of cash to meet the sales growth and expansion of the company, the couple, in 1988, contacted Donald T. Valentine, a venture capitalist, who agreed to provide funding, but demanded owning the controlling share of the company, which the couple accepted. As the new chairman, Valentine moved to restructure the company.

He appointed John Morgridge as the new president and chief executive, and Morgridge replaced a number of Cisco’s managers who were friends of Bosack and Lerner, with more qualified and experienced business managers. Bosack was given the title of chief scientist and Lerner was made head of customer service. Two years later, with sales topping $69.8 million, and staff strength 254 Cisco went public.

Due to frequent disagreement between Morgridge and Lerner, Lerner was fired in August 1990, and in sympathy, Bosack resigned, and the couple sold off their stock for a total $200 million.

Cisco’s growth exploded in the early 1990s. It built up a direct sales force to market to corporate clients, to help them connect the computer systems of their branch and regional offices, and headquarters. And as companies of all sizes began installing local area networks (LANs) of personal computers, the demand for Cisco’s routers to link their networks also grew tremendously, blowing up Cisco’s sales and income. The company’s sales increased to $339.6 million in 1992 from $183.2 million in 1991, with Fortune magazine rating Cisco the second fastest growing company in the United States in 1992.

The introduction of several communications technologies into the market in the earlier 1990s did not affect Cisco’s business, as the company was able to quickly adapt and improve its routers to be able to handle new protocols. The company launched its Fiber
Distributed Data Interface (FDDI), and Token-Ring enhancements, and also launched the first Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) router for the Japanese market, in 1992.

The coming of asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) technology into the industry as a new standard method for multiprotocol data communications presented a challenge to Cisco – ATM can provide high-speed communications of data, voice, video, and image, and does not use routers.

However in February, 1993, Cisco overcame the challenge. It announced a strategy to add ATM to the protocols supported by its products, and the following year, the company launched its first ATM switch.

Cisco also began to explore international markets in the early 1990s. It established subsidiaries in Japan, Hong Kong, and Australia, and a Technical Assistance Center in Brussels, Belgium, to service its European market. By 1994, its international sales accounted for 41.9 percent of its total sales.

To position itself well to be more competitive in the global internetworking market Cisco formed a number of strategic alliances with some of Europe’s biggest telecommunications companies, including British Telecom, Alcatel, Siemens, and Olivetti.

Cisco also partnered with Microsoft Corporation to market Cisco’s first PC-based router card with Microsoft’s Window NT Advanced Server networking software. It equally partnered with Novell to integrate Cisco’s routers with Novell’s Netware software so as to be able to connect Netware and UNIX-based networks; and started working with LanOptics Ltd. to create remote-access products.

To keep ahead of its competitors and to fill the gaps in its product line, targeting providing its customers a one-stop networking shopping, Cisco began its acquisitionist strategy in 1993 when it bought Crescendo Communications, the company that developed ATM technology, for $95 million. Following this acquisition, Cisco was able to develop, and launch in 1994 a new networking architecture, CiscoFusion, which provided the company’s clients gradual transition from routers to ATM and LAN switching, the new switched networking technologies.

Continuing its acquisitionist strategy, Cisco completed 11 acquisitions in 1995 and 1996, which included the purchase of Grand Junction Inc., producer of Fast Ethernet and Ethernet switching products for $400 million, Granite Systems Inc., producer of high-speed Gigabit Ethernet switches for $220 million, and StrataCom Inc., maker of ATM and Frame Relay Wan switching equipment, which could handle voice, data, and video, for a whopping $4.67 billion.

Between 1997 and 1998, Cisco added 15 more companies to its fold, which gave it the opportunity to explore emerging networking sectors, such as digital subscriber line (DSL) equipment, which provides homes and small offices with high-speed access to the Internet via existing telephone lines, voice-over-IP (Internet Protocol), which allows the routing of telephone calls over the Internet.

In 1999, Cisco again acquired 17 more companies, including Cerent Corporation for $7.2 billion, allowing it into more emerging markets, especially the fiber-optic networking and wireless networking. These acquisitions confirmed Cisco as the undisputed world leader in networking systems as its market capitalization surpassed $450 billion in the early 2000, reaching $555 billion for a short period in late March, making Cisco the most valuable company in the world.

Through acquisitions and strategic alliances with such industry giants as Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard Company, and Intel Corporation, Cisco Systems’ revenue reached $36.1 billion in 2009, 9% less than its highest annual revenue.

In the coming years, Cisco’s innovations, proven ability to perceive and quickly enter profitable emerging markets before its competitors and expand its presence, coupled with the keen attention it gives to providing solution to its customers’ problems, are sure to see it maintaining its leadership in the communications and IT industry for a long time.

Read Cisco Systems’s Business Success Strategies here

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The Success Principles: How To Get From Where You Are To Where You Want To Be – Jack Canfield with Janet Switzer

Innocent — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 18:10:55 +0000

The Success Principles: How To Get From Where You Are To Where You Want To Be – by Jack Canfield with Janet Switzer

When it comes to helping you achieve success in life, one of those you must read from or listen to is Jack Canfield. This is a man who brought himself up from a school teacher to selling over 80 million copies of Chicken Soup for the Soul series, which he co-created with Mark Victor Hansen, and helping millions of people the world over change their lives for the better too.

In The Success Principles: How To Get From Where You Are To Where You Want To Be, Canfield reveals 64 principles that are fundamental to achieving success in every area of life - these are the same principles that have changed his life and brought him to the monumental level of success he is enjoying today. Treating each of the principles in separate chapter, Canfield provides exercises, techniques, and visualizations to help the reader break limiting beliefs, and align him/herself with the principle.

Without any doubt, this book will not only open your eyes to see yourself successful, it can also help you realize the dream person you want to be.

Here is an excerpt from a chapter: Develop A Positive Money Consciousness. You may not know it, but certain beliefs from your childhood, which have impressed on your mind, and have shaped your perception about money, may actually be the cause why you are not attracting enough money into your life. After reading this part of the book, you will be able to identify these limiting beliefs in your life, and break them, and start seeing a significant change in your financial life.

Read on, and enjoy …

Develop A Positive Money Consciousness

There is a secret psychology to money. Most people don’t know about it. That’s why most people never become financially successful. A lack of money is not the problem; it is merely a symptom of what’s going on inside you.
T. HARV EKER
Multimillionaire and president of Peak Potentials Training

Like everything else I’ve discussed in this book, financial success also starts in the mind. You have to first decide what you want. Next, you have to believe it’s possible and that you deserve it. Then you must focus on it by thinking about it and visualizing it as if it were already yours. And finally, you have to be willing to pay the price to get it – with disciplined effort and perseverance over time.

But most people never get to even the first stages of accumulating wealth. Too often, they are limited by their own beliefs about money and by the question of whether or not they deserve it.

Identify Your Limiting Beliefs About Money

To become wealthy, you’ll need to surface, identify, root out, and replace any negative or limiting beliefs you may have about money. Though it may seem odd that anyone would have a negative predisposition toward wealth, often we hold these beliefs in our subconscious from childhood. Perhaps when you were young, you heard:
Money doesn’t grow on tree.

There’s not enough money to go around.
You have to have money to make money.
Money is the root of all evil.
People with money are evil, bad, and unethical.
People with a lot of money are selfish and self-centered.
Everyone can’t be a millionaire.
You can’t buy happiness.
Rich people only care about money.
If you are rich, you can’t be spiritual.

These messages from early childhood can actually sabotage and dilute your later financial success, because they subconsciously emit a vibration that’s contrary to your conscious intentions.

What did your parents, grandparents, teachers, religious leaders, friends, and coworkers teach you about money as you were growing up and as a young adult?

My father taught me that rich people got rich by exploiting the working classes. He constantly told me he wasn’t made of money, that money didn’t grow on trees, and that money was hard to come by. One Christmas my father decided to sell Christmas trees. He rented a lot, worked hard every night from Thanksgiving to Christmas Eve, and just broke even after a month of hard labour. As a family, we were left with the belief that no matter how hard you work, you never get ahead.

Anne was in her midthirties when she attended one of my seminars in Australia. She had inherited a lot of money, but she hated it. She was ashamed of her wealth, hid it, and wouldn’t spend it. When the subject of money came up in the seminar, she began screaming about how money had destroyed her family. Her father, who had made a lot of money, was never home. He was either out working hard to make money or out jet-setting around the world spending it. As a result, her mother drank excessively, causing constant fighting and screaming in their household.

Not surprisingly, Anne’s childhood had been a miserable experience. But instead of identifying her father’s greed and workaholism as the actual cause of her pain, Anne had decided as a child that money was the culprit. Because childhood decisions made during times of intense emotional upset tend to stay with us longer – and remain stronger over time – Anne had retained her negative beliefs around money for over 20 years.

There are many other limiting decisions you can make about money that can keep you from making or enjoying the amount of money you deserve or want. For example:

It’s Not Okay to Make More Money Than My Father

Scott Schilling, the vice president of sales and marketing of Pulse Tech Products Corporation in Dallas, Texas, was attending one of my seminars where we were working on identifying and releasing limiting beliefs.

As I asked the participants to review their childhood for the source of a limiting belief, Scott remembered a day in 1976. He was 18 and had just finished his first month as a life insurance agent – earning a commission check of $1,856. His father, who was in his forty-sixth year with the same insurance company and only one month away from retirement, received his own paycheck that day – for $1,360.

Scott said, “When I showed my check to my father, he never said a word, but the look on his face told me he was deeply hurt. I thought, How could I do that to my dad? How could I make such a great and noble man question himself and his value?”

Scott had made a subconscious decision not to earn more money than his father – in order to avoid causing his father the shame and embarrassment Scott imagined he felt that day in 1976. But less than a month after releasing this decision in my seminar, Scott told me he received a contract to do a week’s worth of sales training for a fee equal to one fifth of his previous year’s total salary.

Becoming Rich Would Violate the Family Code

I grew up in a working-class family. My father was a florist and he worked “for the rich.” Somehow the rich were not to be trusted. They stepped on the little people. They took advantage of the common worker. To become rich would have meant becoming a traitor to my family and my class. I didn’t want to become one of the “bad guys.”

If I Become Wealthy, I Will Be a Burden

My friend Tom Boyer is a business consultant who felt like he had hit a plateau in terms of his income. With some brilliant assistance from our friend Gay Hendricks, he discovered the following childhood decision had put a cap on his success:

I grew up in a decidedly middle-class family in Ohio. We never wanted for food or anything, but my dad made lots of financial sacrifices so that I could pursue my dream of playing the clarinet.

I started out playing on my dad’s old metal clarinet, but soon graduated to a Leblanc, a very middle-of-the-road wooden instrument. When I began to really excel, my clarinet teacher, Mrs. Zielinski, went to my parents and said, “Your son has real talent. He deserves a very, very fine instrument. He deserves a Buffet clarinet.” Now understand, there are only two great clarinets on the planet – the Buffet and the Selmer – and in 1964, a Buffet cost $300, which is about $1,500 today. Though that was a lot of money in my family, nevertheless, it was agreed that Mrs. Zielinski would pick out the clarinet for me, and that was going to be my Christmas present.

On Christmas morning I went downstairs, unwrapped the package, opened the case, and discovered this unbelievably gorgeous clarinet with its polished granadilla wood body and bright shiny silver keys, sitting in its regal blue velvet case. It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in my life. I have since seen King Faruk’s crown jewels, and they didn’t compare to that Buffet clarinet sitting in that blue velvet case when I opened it up that Christmas morning.

I turned to thank my parents and didn’t even get the thank-you out of my mouth before my mom said, “We never would’ve been able to afford that if your sister had lived.” (My sister Carol had suddenly died of encephalitis when I was seven years old.)

And in that moment I took on the subconscious belief that the greater a success I am, the greater a burden I will be to those who love me – not only financially, but emotionally.

I now realize this subconscious belief had held me back from attaining the level of success I consciously wanted. I had convicted myself of the crime of being a burden, and now I was punishing myself by not allowing myself the level of success I truly deserve.

You must begin to understand, therefore, that the present state of your bank account, your sales, your health, your social life, your position at work, etc., is nothing more than the physical manifestation of your previous thinking. If you sincerely wish to change or improve your results in the physical world, you must change your thoughts, and you must change them IMMEDIATELY.
BOB PROCTOR, Author of The Power to Have It All

THREE STEPS TO TURN AROUND YOUR LIMITING BELIEFS ABOUT MONEY

You can change this early programming using a simple yet powerful three step technique that replaces your limiting beliefs with more positive and empowering ones. While this exercise can be done on your own, it’s usually more powerful – and more fun! – to do it with a partner or a small group of people.

1. Write down your limiting belief.
Money is the root of all evil.

2. Challenge, make fun of, and argue with the limiting belief.
You can do this by brainstorming a list of new beliefs that challenge the old ones. The more outrageous and fun you make them, the more powerful the resulting shift in your consciousness will be.

Money is the root of all philanthropy.
Money is the root of great vacations!

Money might be the root of evil for someone who is evil, but I am a loving, generous, compassionate, and kind person who will use money to create good in the world.

You can even write out your new money beliefs on 3” x 5” index cards and add them to your stack of affirmations to be read out loud with enthusiasm and passion every day. This kind of daily discipline will go a long way toward helping you manifest success in the arena of money.

3. Create a positive turnaround statement. The last step is to create a new statement that is the opposite of the original belief. You want this “turnaround statement” to be one that sends shivers of delight through your body when you say it. Once you have it, walk around the room for a few moments repeating the new statement out loud with energy and passion. Repeat this new belief several times a day for a minimum of 30 days and it will be yours forever. Try one like When it comes to me, money is the root of love, joy, and good works.

Remember, ideas about financial success never form by themselves! You have to keep thinking the thoughts that build the “thought form” of prosperity. You have to take time each day and focus on thoughts of prosperity and images of financial success. When you intentionally focus on these thoughts and images, they will eventually crowd out the limiting thoughts and images and begin to dominate your thinking. If you want to accelerate reaching your financial goals, you need to practice saying positive money affirmations every day. Here are a few more that I have used with great success:

• God is my infinite supply, and large sums of money come to me quickly and easily for the highest good of all concerned.
• I now have more money than I need to do everything I want to do.
• Money comes to me in many unforeseen ways.
• I am making positive choices about what to do with my money.
• Every day, my income increases whether I am working, playing, or sleeping.
• All my investments are profitable.
• People love to pay me money for what I most enjoy doing.

Remember, you can plant any idea into the subconscious mind by repetition of thought infused with a positive expectancy and the emotion associated with already having it.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

The Success Principles

More Articles.

THE MAGIC OF THINKING BIG - David Schwartz

Innocent — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 20:49:40 +0000

THE MAGIC OF THINKING BIG By David J. Schwartz, Ph.D.

The Magic of Thinking Big by Dr. David Schwartz is a powerful book that will surely change your life. If you want more out of your relationship, business, career, or any area of your life, this book will help you achieve it by setting your mind on the path of success and making all achievements possible for you.

Below is a chapter from the book, HOW TO THINK AND DREAM CREATIVELY for your enjoyment. After reading this chapter, you will find how possible it is for you to achieve anything you want in your life. Your mind will be repositioned for you to be able to achieve those things you have thought you wouldn’t be able to ever accomplish before.

Read on…

HOW TO THINK AND DREAM CREATIVELY

FIRST, LET’S CLEAR UP a common fallacy about the meaning of creative thinking. For some illogical reason, science, engineering, art, and writing got tabbed as about the only truly creative pursuits. Most people associate creative thinking with things like the discovery of electricity or polio vaccine, or the writing of a novel or the development of color television.

Certainly, accomplishments like these are evidence of creative thinking. Each forward step made in the conquest of space is the result of creative thinking, lots of it. But creative thinking, lots of it. But creative thinking is not reserved for certain occupations, nor is it restricted to super intelligent people.

Well, then, what is creative thinking?

A low-income family devises a plan to send their son to a leading university. That’s creative thinking.

A family turns the street’s most undesirable lot into the neighborhood beauty spot. That’s creative thinking.

A minister develops a plan that doubles his Sunday evening attendance. That’s creative thinking.

Figuring out ways to simplify record keeping, selling the “impossible” customer, keeping the children occupied constructively, making employees really like their work, or preventing a “certain” quarrel – all of these are examples of practical, everyday creative thinking.

Creative thinking is simply finding new, improved ways to do anything. The rewards of all types of success – success in the home, at work, in the community – hinge on finding ways to do things better. Now let’s see what we can do to develop and strengthen our creative thinking ability.

Step One: Believe it can be done. Here is a basic truth: To do anything, we must first believe it can be done. Believing something can be done sets the mind in motion to find a way to do it.

To illustrate this point of creative thinking in training sessions, I often use this example: I ask the group, “How many of you feel it is possible to eliminate jails within the next thirty years?”

Invariably the group looks bewildered, not quite sure they heard right and thinking they are listening to a real fuzzy-wuzzy. So after a pause I repeat, “How many of you feel it is possible to eliminate jails within the next thirty years?”

Once they’re sure I’m not joking, someone always blasts me with something like “You mean to say you want to turn all those murderers, thieves, and rapists loose? Don’t you realize what this would mean? Why, none of us would be safe. We have to have jails.”

Then the others cut loose:

“All order would break down if we didn’t have jails.”
“Some people are born criminals.”

“If anything, we need more jails.”
“Did you read in this morning’s paper about that murder?”

And the group goes on, telling me all sorts of good reasons why we must have jails. One fellow even suggested we’ve got to have jails so the police and prison guards can have jobs.

After about ten minutes of letting the group “prove” why we can’t eliminate the need for jails, I say to them, “Now let me mention here that this question of eliminating jails is used to make a point.

“Each of you has come up with reasons why we can’t eliminate the need for jails. Will you do me a favour? Will you try extra hard for a few minutes to believe we can eliminate jails?”

Joining in the spirit of the experiment, the group says, in effect, “Oh, well, but just for kicks.” Then I ask, “Now, assuming we can eliminate jails, how could we begin?”

Suggestions come slowly at first. Someone hesitantly says something like, “Well, you might cut down crime if you established more youth centers.”

Before long, the group, which ten minutes ago was solidly against the idea, now begins to work up real enthusiasm.

“Work to eliminate poverty. Most crime stems from the low income levels.”

“Conduct research to spot potential criminals before they commit a crime.”

“Develop surgical procedures to cure some kinds of criminals.”

“Educate law enforcement personnel in positive methods of reform.”

These are just samples of the seventy-eight specific ideas I’ve tabulated that could help accomplish the goal of eliminating jails. WHEN YOU BELIEVE, YOUR MIND FIND WAYS TO DO.

This experiment has just one point: When you believe something is impossible, your mind goes to work for you to prove why. But when you believe, really believe, something can be done, your mind goes to work for you and helps you find the ways to do it.

Believing something can be done paves the way for creative solutions. Believing something can’t be done is destructive thinking. This point applies to all situations, little and big. The political leaders who do not genuinely believe permanent world peace can be established will fail because their minds are closed to creative ways to bring about peace. The economists who believe business depressions are inevitable will not develop creative ways to beat the business cycle.
In a similar fashion, you can find ways to like a person if you believe you can.
You can discover solutions to personal problems if you believe you can.
You can find a way to purchase that new, larger home if you believe you can.
Believe releases creative powers. Disbelief puts the brakes on.
Believe, and you’ll start thinking constructively.

Your mind will create a way if you let it. A little over two years ago a young man asked me to help him find a job with more future. He was employed as a clerk in the credit department of a mail-order company and felt that he was getting nowhere. We talked about his past record and what he wanted to do. After knowing something about him, I said, “I admire you very much for wanting to move up the ladder to a better job and more responsibility. But getting a start in the kind of job you want requires a college degree these days. I notice you’ve finished three semesters. May I suggest you finish college. Going summers, you can do it in two years. Then I’m sure you can land the job you want, with the company you want to work for.”

“I realize,” he answered, “that a college education would help. But it’s impossible for me to go back to school.”

“Impossible? Why?” I asked.

“Well, for one thing,” he began, “I’m twenty-four. On top of that, my wife and I are expecting our second child in a couple of months. We barely get by now on what I make. I wouldn’t have time to study since I’d have to keep my job. It’s just impossible, that’s all.”

This young man really had himself convinced that finishing college was impossible.

Then I said to him, “if you believe it is impossible to finish school, then it is. But by the same token, if you’ll just believe it is possible to return to the university, a solution will come.

“Now, here’s what I would like you to do. Make up your mind you are going to go back to school. Let that one thought dominate your thinking. Then think, really think, about how you can do it and still support your family. Come back in a couple of weeks and let me know what ideas you’ve come up with.”

My young friend returned two weeks later.

“I thought a lot about what you said,” he began. “I’ve decided I must go back to school. I haven’t figured out all the angles yet, but I’ll find a solution.”

And he did.

He managed to get a scholarship provided by a trade association, which paid his tuition, books, and incidentals. He rearranged his work schedule so he could attend classes. His enthusiasm and the promise of a better life won him his wife’s full support. Together they creatively found ways to budget money and time more effectively.

Last month he received his degree one day and went to work the next as a management trainee for a large corporation.

Where there’s a will, there is a way.

Believe it can be done. That’s basic to creative thinking. Here are suggestions to help you develop creative power through belief.

1. Eliminate the word impossible from your thinking and speaking vocabularies. Impossible is a failure word. The thought “It’s impossible” sets off a chain reaction of other thoughts to prove you’re right.

2. Think of something special you’ve been wanting to do but felt you couldn’t. now make a list of reasons why you can do it. Many of us whip and defeat our desires simply because we concentrate on why we can’t when the only thing worthy of our mental concentration is why we can.

Recently I read a newspaper item that said there are too many countries in most states. The article pointed out that most country boundaries were established decades before the first automobile was built and while the horse and buggy was the chief mode of travel. But today, with fast automobiles and good roads, there is no reason why three or four countries could not be combined. This would cut down greatly on duplicated services so that taxpayers would actually get better service for less money.

The writer of this article said he thought he had stumbled across a really live idea, so he interviewed thirty people at random to get their reactions. The result: not one person thought the idea had merit, even though it would provide them with better local government at less cost.

That’s an example of traditional thinking. The traditional thinker’s mind is paralyzed. He reasons, “It’s been this way for a hundred years. Therefore, it must be good and must stay this way. Why risk a changer?”

“Average” people have always resented progress. Many voiced a protest toward the automobile on the grounds that nature meant for us to walk or use horses. The airplane seemed drastic to many. Man had no “right” to enter the province “reserved” for birds. A lot of “status-quo-ers” still insist that man has no business in space.

One top missile expert recently gave an answer to this kind of thinking. “Man belongs,” says Dr. Von Braun, “where man wants to go.”

Around 1900 a sales executive discovered a “scientific” principle of sales management. It received a lot of publicity and even found its way into textbooks. The principle was this: There is one best way to sell a product. Find the best way. Then never deviate from it.

Fortunately for this man’s company, new leadership came in in time to save the organization from financial ruin.

Contrast that experience with the philosophy of Crawford H. Greenewalt, president of one of the nation’s largest business organizations, E.I. du Pont de Nemours. In a talk at Columbia University, Mr. Greenewalt said, “…there are many ways in which a good job can be done – as many ways, in fact, as there are men to whom the task is given.”

In truth, there is no one best way to do anything. There is no one best way to decorate an apartment, landscape a lawn, make a sale, rear a child, or cook a steak. There are as many best ways as there are creative minds.

Nothing grows in ice. If we let tradition freeze our minds, new ideas can’t sprout. Make this test sometime soon. Propose one of the ideas below to someone and then watch his behavior.

1. The postal system, long a government monopoly, should be turned over to private enterprise.
2. Presidential elections should be held every two or six years instead of four.
3. Regular hours for retail stores should be 1P.M. to 8P.M., instead of 9 A.M. to 5:30P.M.
4. The retirement age should be raised to seventy.

Whether these ideas are sound or practical is not the point. What is significant is how a person handles propositions like these. If he laughs at the idea and doesn’t give it a second thought (and probably 95 percent will laugh at it) chances are he suffers from tradition paralysis. But the one in twenty who says, “That’s an interesting idea; tell me more about it,” has a mind that’s turned to creativity.

Traditional thinking is personal enemy number one for the person who is interested in a creative personal success program. Traditional thinking freezes your mind, blocks your progress, and prevents you from developing creative power.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

The Magic of Thinking Big

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Change Your Thinking Change Your Life: How To Unlock Your Full Potential For Success And Achievement – Brian Tracy

Trump University Wealth Building 101: Your First 90 Days On The Path To Prosperity - Donald Trump

Innocent — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 18:42:17 +0000

Trump University Wealth Building 101: Your First 90 Days On The Path To Prosperity - Donald J. Trump

If it is your desire to build wealth and become free from financial worries, a wise thing to do is to get close to people who have succeeded in building wealth and learn how their minds work.

In this book, Trump University Wealth Building 101: Your First 90 Days On The Path To Prosperity, the billion Donald Trump reveals his wealth building secrets. You will discover Trump’s practical wealth building strategies, and put yourself on the path of making riches and aboundance.

Here is an excerpt from this very valuable book. Enjoy!

Build Wealth-My Way

Through trial and error I’ve learned how to do a lot of things the right way over the years, and I want to share this knowledge with you. To be successful, you’ve got to learn and develop these 12 skills:

1. Get passionate
2. Be tenacious
3. Think big
4. Leverage knowledge
5. Be thorough
6. Take action
7. Take risks
8. Know your audience
9. Learn to negotiate
10. Listen to your gut
11. Enjoy competition
12. Be your own best asset.

Let’s take it one step at a time.

GET PASSIONATE

Passion sounds out of place in business, but it’s at the top of my list. I know for a fact – and from my own experience – that it’s absolutely critical to achieving any kind of long-lasting success.

Exactly what is passion?

Enthusiasm on a big scale. If you don’t have passion, everything you do will fizzle, or at best, be mediocre. You simply have to love what you do to make it big. People with passion never give up because they never have a reason to give up, regardless of their circumstances. It’s an intangible momentum that can make you indomitable.

How do you get passion?

Size up your interests. What do you love doing? Ask yourself, “Can I develop any of these interests into a viable source of income? Can I come up with a personal blueprint? Do I have a foundation in place, or in the works, for this blueprint?”
Cover your bases – and then act. Very often the dividing line between success and failure is a lack of passion. I’ve known people who have had fantastic ideas, but they don’t get them off the ground, and their ideas sit in their head or on top of their desk for a long time. Coming up with an idea is not enough – you’ve got to put your idea into action.

BE TENACIOUS

People think I was born with the Midas touch, and I admit, I’ve been very fortunate. I got a great education from the schools I attended, and from my parents. But I learned to be tenacious when I started in business. That’s important, because most things don’t happen overnight.

As I write this chapter, we’re on schedule to finish Trump Place along the Hudson River in New York City by 2008. With 16 buildings, it’s the largest development ever approved by the New York City Planning Commission and will transform the once-neglected West Side of Manhattan into a very desirable place for residents to live. I bought the land in 1974. That’s a long time to wait. If I hadn’t been tenacious, Trump Place would still be in my head.

Tenacity is when you refuse to give in or give up. You keep fighting the good fight. Very few things of worth are easy achievements. That’s just the way it works.
Tenacity enables you to work through obstacles and problems along the way without becoming worn down or negative. In fact, you should expect problems, so you don’t waste energy.

Tenacity is when you keep moving forward. You don’t allow fear to paralyze you.
Sometimes the most talented people fail, while those far less talented succeed. Why? Because those who succeed move forward with confidence.
I don’t accept excuses in this area, so get to work!

THINK BIG

When you were a child, would you have liked to keep crawling, when everyone else was walking? I don’t think so.

We all have to start with small steps, but the point is: Get to the biggest steps you’re capable of taking. Thinking small will limit your potential. Thinking big will take you places. Thinking big can get you to the top, and I can tell you, it’s not lonely up here.

Successful people like challenges. It’s our nature. Keep in sync with this basic premise, and you’ll begin moving forward with the momentum necessary for great achievement.

Striving from an early age is one secret to success. I learned to work hard from an early age, trying to catch up with my father who was a very successful developer. But you can keep striving no matter what your age or accomplishments.
These three tips will guide you:

1. Ask yourself why your plans are so small. Then begin to expand your horizons.
2. Concentrate on managing your future, not your past. Learn from the past, but don’t stay there.
3. Look at the solution. Don’t focus on the problem.

LEVERAGE KNOWLEDGE

When I was waiting for the opportunity to buy 40 Wall Street, which became the home of Trump University, I spent time studying the building and the area, and kept informed. When the opportunity finally came, I was ready and I knew what I was getting into. I knew the building, and I knew why the owners were having trouble managing it. As a result, I was able to buy this 1.3 million-square-foot landmark, the tallest building in lower Manhattan, for a mere $1 million in 1995.

So when I say knowledge is power, I mean it. Use it to your advantage.
But knowledge is only the foundation of great enterprises. Einstein said that imagination is more important than knowledge. What he meant is: Without imagination and the ability to visualize possibilities, what would be the point of great knowledge?

An example is how I develop golf courses. I get the best experts in the world, and I ask them hundreds of questions. I go over every detail, every tree, every hole, and every idea with them. Fortunately, they love what they do, so they don’t find my questions tedious. By the time construction is underway, I know everything that’s being done, and I can keep an informed eye on the progress.

Put imagination and knowledge together, and in no time you’ll have something plenty big in your “think big tank.”

BE THOROUGH

There’s really no such thing as knowing too much about what you’re doing.
When I was in college, I spent my spare time reading about real estate and foreclosures. I didn’t feel it was a sacrifice of my time, because I was interested in real estate; I wasn’t studying just to pass a test. The knowledge I gained on my own led to my first successful investment. I couldn’t have achieved that if I hadn’t spent the time studying on my own.

In college, I also read something that Rudyard Kipling wrote which I’ve never forgotten: “I keep six honest serving men, they taught me all I knew – their names are What and Why and When – and How and Where and Who.” Finding the answers to these questions will ensure that your information is comprehensive and correct.

On the Apprentice when my associates and I interviewed candidates, sometimes the process went on for hours – one boardroom meeting lasted for over five hours so we could make the most knowledgeable decision possible.

Staying informed is a daily task and challenge, considering how quickly our world is moving. But not keeping up is like agreeing to check out – please don’t do that. Plug in and learn everything you can. You never know when information will come in handy. If I hadn’t studied real estate foreclosures as a student, I wouldn’t have been able to see the great opportunity that led to my first big success.

Resolve to move forward and to learn as much as you can – today and every day.

TAKE ACTION

Knowledge alone isn’t enough. You have to act on knowledge.
That’s why we based one whole season of The Apprentice on this dichotomy, pitting a team of people with higher education who were “book smart,” but clueless in the real world, against a team that was “street smart,” but clueless about the right information.

Learning by doing challenges you to prove yourself.

My first big real estate job was turning around a 1,200 – unit residential development with 800 vacant apartments that had become a disaster. The developers had gone under, and the government had foreclosed. I learned a lot, made a good profit, and got the confidence to take the next step in my real estate career. That wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t put my knowledge to work for me. I studied and prepared, but then I took action.

Did you ever notice how easy some things look until you try them for yourself? Golf is like that. The sport looks effortless and even noncompetitive until you try to play. Suddenly, it takes on an entirely new dimension. The real pros make extremely difficult maneuvers look easy because they’ve spent hours perfecting their technique.
Don’t underestimate anything until you’ve tried it for yourself.
Start practicing!

TAKE RISKS

Many people are afraid to fail, so they don’t try. They talk, but they don’t do. That’s the perfect formula for failure.

My advice? Take some risks, even if you fail.
There has never been, and never will be, an Olympic ice skater who hasn’t taken a spill on the ice, no matter how much he or she knew about ice skating. Skaters acquire their skills by doing, not by watching.

Take some risks, even if you get criticized and are afraid you don’t know enough.
When I was interested in acquiring the (former) Commodore Hotel near Grand Central Station years ago, a friend told reporters my idea was like “fighting for a seat on the Titanic.” Admittedly, I was working against great odds. The area around Grand Central had become really dilapidated, but the armchair critics made me wonder. Why not do something about it instead of just complaining?

Apply this thinking to yourself and to your situation. You’ll not only learn a lot, but by taking risks you’ll learn how much you didn’t know, which is equally important. The new Hyatt Hotel next to Grand Central Terminal was a huge success for me, and sparked the redevelopment of the entire area.

Give yourself a challenge, not once in a while, but every day.

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE

You’ve heard the phrase, “Life is a performance,” and it’s true. No matter what field you’re in, large parts of life and business involve acting. Acting encompasses people skills, negotiation skills, public relations, salesmanship, and the ability to read your audience, whether your audience consists of four people in your office or 40,000 watching your television show.

Start by realizing that your audience can understand and appreciate many of your experiences. Make an effort to find out what you have in common, and lead with it. I may be a billionaire, but I have bad days just like everyone else. I get stuck in traffic jams, too.

If you take the time to think about what your audience wants, and what you have in common with them, you can create a bond that didn’t exist before. It also frees you from being nervous and allows you to focus better. Think of yourself as a performer, with a responsibility to your audience (who may also be your customers). Showmanship means being prepared for every performance, and the more prepared you are, the more effective you will be. Learn, know, and show: It’s a proven formula.

LEARN TO NEGOTIATE

Negotiation is one of the keys to business and life. Think of it as personal diplomacy. It can be complex, but it doesn’t have to be daunting if you take the time to think and finesse your technique.

Learning to negotiate is invaluable if you hope to connect in any way with other people. You’ve got to understand where the other side is coming from if you want to succeed. Sometimes you can size that up quickly, sometimes not.

I remember negotiating with someone I didn’t like very much, which put an invisible wall between us. Then I discovered that he was an avid golfer, like me. Suddenly we had something to talk about that we both enjoyed. Negotiations went much better after that. Comedians know how to play to their audience, so do the best public speakers. Learn from them.

Businesspeople see me as a master negotiator because I usually wind up with what I am aiming to get. I negotiate to win, and then I win. From the outside looking in, it looks simple, but I spend a lot of time preparing for any negotiation.

The first step is knowing exactly what you want. Be clear about your own goals. Then know what the other side wants. Now give that some thought. Whether you’re in baseball or in business, you’ve got to know the strengths and weaknesses of your opponents to negotiate effectively. No two teams or companies are exactly the same.
Don’t rely on generalizations. Find out for yourself.

For example, when I was hoping to acquire 40 Wall Street, I learned as much as I could about the Hinneberg family, who owned the building. Interested buyers, including me, were told to deal with the family’s agent. But I wanted to know the Hinnebergs personally, to figure out what they wanted. If you want the truth, go to the source.

So I flew to Germany and met with them. I told them I would turn their property into a first-class office building. Then I outlined my plans, step by step. I was prepared, hand it showed. It also landed me the deal. That’s how deals get done.

Negotiating isn’t about calling all the shots – it’s about ability: the power to convince people to accept your ideas. Present your ideas in a way that won’t intimidate them. Let them think the decision is theirs. Bulldozing people into accepting your ideas is a recipe for disaster.

I walked into one deal with an aggressive plan in my head, but had to change my strategy when I met the individual in charge, who came from a prominent family. He was insecure and unassuming, not at all the powerhouse type I had expected. So I immediately started thinking how I could build up his esteem enough to get him into the negotiating arena. I could tell that he would walk away to avoid confrontation. I gained his confidence by building up his self-esteem.

Sometimes, you have to be a psychologist to figure out the best approach. Sometimes you have to be stubborn. Sometimes you have to be a chameleon and change your mind. What I’m saying is: Don’t limit yourself.

Learn to balance passion with reason; you need both to negotiate successfully. Passion gets your adrenaline going, but reason keeps you on track.

LISTEN TO YOUR GUT

We all have instincts – the important thing is to know how to use them.
Knowing how to use your instincts is a mystery, even to those with sharp business skills. Some instincts you can’t explain, but there are signs that can guide you to – or away from – certain people and certain deals.

Within a few seconds of meeting Mark Burnett, the creator of The Apprentice, I liked him, both as a person and as a professional. At other times, I’ve met people that I dislike for no particular reason. I try not to be judgmental, but I’ve learned to trust my gut and steer clear.

How do you learn how to do that? Tune in.

Have you noticed when you’re in a situation that produces heightened alertness, how careful you are about what you say or do? Those are your instincts working for you. Trust them. Together, logic and instincts will help you make the best decisions.

When I first started building golf courses, my instincts told me it was a good business decision. I knew that if I combined my passion for golf with my knowledge of the process, I would succeed. So I found the best golf course designers in the world and spent many hours working with them. The results have been spectacular because I paired instinct and logic.

Spend some time with this innate aspect of yourself. Learning how to handle your instincts can give you an edge in many situations, business or otherwise. There are many things we can’t see or hear; that is when we need to use our instincts to guide us.

Listen to your gut, and you will always have a reliable guide!

ENJOY COMPETITION

I like competition. I think it’s healthy.

On July 12, 2005, I broke ground for the Trump International Hotel & Tower in Las Vegas. Starting a new building is always a big deal, but this one was particularly special. It was my first real estate venture in that town, and the fulfillment of a longtime dream.

Adding to the drama was the fact that the building is right across the road from Wynn Las Vegas, the signature property of my one-time nemesis, Steve Wynn, who reinvented the Strip with such mega resorts as The Mirage, Treasure Island, and the Bellagio.

Steve Wynn and I go way back. We squared off over the Hilton properties in Atlantic City back in the 1980S. Both of us have always built big, and we have the egos to match. With us, it used to be like the old Western standoff, “This town’s not big enough for the both of us.” Now we’re good friends. Back in the days, though, the competition was fierce – and I loved our battles.

Competition fires me up.

Competition pushes me to expand and extend my efforts beyond what I thought was possible.

Competition forces me to outdo myself, I love competition because, ultimately, it makes me bigger.

BE YOUR OWN BEST ASSET

Being a brand might sound complex to you, but it’s not. Being a brand simply means that you are your own best asset. I never planned on becoming a brand, but, given my ideas, my aesthetic, and the circumstances that led to an expanding network of interests, “Trump” has become a great brand that delivers luxury and exclusivity.

It all started with Trump Tower, my signature building that serves as the model for my brand. People pay more to live in or rent space in my buildings because of the association with me and my ideals. These ideals are constantly put into practice in ways both big and small, such as the illuminated seven-story waterfall cascading over finely matched Italian marble in the atrium of Trump Tower.

I avoid the commonplace and give tenants and buyers more than they might expect. That’s a big part of the Trump brand. Become your own best asset and adopt the mentality of an investor. Make decisions and take or delegate actions now that will bear fruit later. That’s the key to wealth creation. Don’t jump at the best offers, or slap your name on anything you think people might buy. Believe in whatever you put your name on, and make sure it reflects who you truly are.

GET GOING!

Are you ready for the challenge of creating and building unlimited wealth? You’ve got work to do – work that’s going to teach you how to create and build the wealth you want!

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

Trump University Wealth Building 101: Your First 90 Days on the Path to Prosperity

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Apple Inc. Business Strategies

Innocent — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 20:52:14 +0000

Apple Inc. Business Strategies

Apple Inc.’s rise from the scratch to become one of the world’s greatest business success stories is the result of the quality of its management’s ideas, and strategies. These same ideas and strategies brought out below can also be applied to other businesses for equal success.

Two Heads are better Than One

Whenever it is possible, having two or three people that share the same goals and aspirations, and who are comfortable working together is better than one person doing it alone. They will be able to achieve success easier as they share responsibilities and join resources together.

Apple’s success was almost instantaneous because the company was formed by the partnership of two exceptionally gifted individuals, Steve Wozniak, and Steve Jobs, separately in electronic product creation and marketing.

Seeking Advice from Experienced People

If you haven’t got any experience of doing something before, it is a wise idea to seek the advice of someone who has. They will be able to guide you through the right path to achieving your goal, and to prevent you from making terrible mistakes that could cost you a great deal.

Steve Jobs consulted with Mike Markkula about how to build Apple into a big company.
Advertising is needed

You need to have a plan and budget for advertising, so that you can reach your target market effectively, and they can know what you offer. Having a great product that people don’t know about will not make a company successful. However, if you cannot afford the service of an advertising firm to handle your campaign, you will need to study your industry and consult with experienced people in the industry to create your campaign.

Steve Jobs, realizing the crucial role of effective advertising to business success hired the services of a proven firm to manage Apple’s advertising campaign, which resulted in Apple’s sales shooting above the roof.

Knowing What Buyers Require In a Product

Buyers usually assess products based on certain solutions that they need. For instance, they may want a product that is easier, simpler, or more convenient to use than others available in the market. And they want the product at reduced price.

In your industry, you need to know the solutions a large number of your target users require so that you can create products at lower costs that offer them. Not knowing this first before creating a product will not lead to success, but failure.

Knowing that a lot of people were not technically knowledgeable, and that they needed personal computers they can easily operate themselves, at lower prices than what was obtainable, Apple created the Macintosh personal computer, which was launched in 1984, and which sold two million units a year after it was released.

Remain Focused

Nothing more can fall a business than its management jumping from one unrelated business idea to another. You need to remain focused in your line of business and expand it. Even when you are diversifying, it is better if it is to related industry. Maintaining focus will allow you to bring out the best of your potential, and enable you to come up with the best ideas and solutions for your business.

The decline in fortune of Apple’s business in the 1990s was due largely partly to the company’s management’s involvement in many unrelated business areas than Apple’s primary business. The company became profitable and vibrant again when Steve Jobs refocused Apple on what it knew how to do best: make desktop and portable Macintoshes for professional and consumer customers.

Read Apple’s Success Story here.

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Apple Inc - How 21 And 26 Years Old College Dropouts Created A Multi-billion Dollar Company With $1,300

Innocent — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 16:39:36 +0000

Apple Inc - How 21 And 26 Years Old College Dropouts Created A Multi-billion Dollar Company With $1,300

This is the amazing story of how Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak took the world by storm using their talents, ideas, marketing skill, and $1,300 to reinvent and catalyze the growth of the personal computer, building one of the largest companies in the world with annual sales running in tens of billions of dollars. It is a story that shows the insignificance of needing large chunk of cash to start a business, and how to build a world class business from scratch.

In Aril 1976, Steve Jobs, then 21 years of age, and his partner, Steve Wozniak, 26, founded a company they called Apple Computer having dropped out of college to pursue business. Their business, which started with the creation and marketing of Apple I computer, began with capital investment of $1,300, which the partners contributed from selling some of their most treasured possessions comprising a van and two calculators.

Steve Wozniak, a talented and self-taught electronics engineer was the product creation engine room, while Steve Jobs provided the marketing skill in the business, and together the duo were set to cause a huge ripple in the personal computer industry.

From Steve job’s garage, Wozniak created the company’s first product, Apple I computer, a computer without keyboard or power supply, which was particularly produced for use by a computer hobbyist club in the San Francisco Bay area. Priced at $666 each, the company sold 200 pieces of the computer the first year.

Encouraged by their success with Apple I, the partners immediately started work on another computer that summer, Apple II, which was to appeal to a greater market beyond computer hobbyists.

With the desire to build a big company, Job met with Mike Markkula for advice on how to achieve it. Mike Markkula had managed marketing for Intel Corporation and Fairchild Semiconductor, and Jobs wanted to draw from his experience. Seeing that the future of Apple Computer was great, Markkula bought over one-third of the company for $250,000, and helped Jobs with the company’s business plan.

In 19977, one year after Apple Computer was formed; Jobs hired Mike Scott to be President, and recruited Regis McKenna, an advertising guru and owner of one of the most successful advertising agency in Silicon Valley, to create advertising strategy for the company.

Having designed Apple logo, McKenna started advertising Apple personal computers in consumer magazines, with Apple II placed in retail stores. By June, 1977, Apple’s sales reached $1 million.

The huge and almost instant success of Apple II was not only due to Apple’s marketing effectiveness. It was also largely due to the innovations and functionality, which Apple II had over other microcomputers of its era:

It was the first microcomputer to use colour graphics and a television set as its screen. Also, its expansion slot made it more useful than other computers. Apple II could read and store information on cassette tapes, although slow and unreliable. However, by 1978, Wozniak had invented the Apple Disk II, which was then the fastest and cheapest disk drive available, and which made it possible for Apple to develop software for Apple II.

As a result of Apple’s innovative product creation backed with strong marketing, the company had, by 1978, become one of the fastest-growing companies in the United States, with more than 100 dealers distributing its products. And in December 1980, Apple went public.

By 1981, Apple’s research and development budget reached $21million. This was justified by the release of 40 new software programs and launch of its first hard disk. At the close of 1982, Apple had become the first personal computer company to make $1 billion in annual sales.

In April 1983, Jobs brought in John Sculley to replace Mike Markkula as Apple’s new president. John Sculley was a proven and successful top class marketer, having led Pepsi-Cola as president against tough competitors like Coca-Cola in that industry. Jobs was sure John Sculley experience and expertise would help Apple to break IBM’s domination of the business office market.

Propelled by Steve Jobs’ desire to create personal computers that anyone without technical knowledge can use at lower prices, Apple released the Macintosh personal computer in 1984. Selling for $2,495 a piece, 70,000 Macintosh with a new disk drive that was faster than those used in other machines, were sold in the first 100 days of release.

In September the following year, a new Macintosh with more memory and two disk drives was launched. Sure that anyone who tried the Macintosh would want to buy it, Jobs sponsored a national advertising campaign that asked people to try the Macintosh for free for 24 hours and more than 200,000 did. As the Macintosh and its accessories were selling hot, so also was Apple II, which reached a record of two million sales by 1985.

In the midst of Apple’s success, a bitter infighting between divisions and between Jobs and Sculley caused Jobs to leave the company in 1985 following the board of directors’ support for Sculley, and compulsion on Jobs to resign. Jobs went ahead to found NeXT Incorporated, which later became a strong competitor to Apple in the business computer market.

The 1990s saw Apple falling from grace to grass. The company lost sales and market share almost throughout the decade as a result of poor management decision from different CEOs that led the company during this period. Michael Spindler who replaced Scully in 1993 made the terrible mistake of licensing Apple technology to outside firms, which resulted in the massive production of Apple clones into the market that seriously wore off Apple’s profits.

Spindler also made the mistake of grossly underestimating the demand for Apple’s new product, Power Macintosh, released in 1994. By 1995, unfulfilled order for the product reached $1 billion. Noting this flop, Apple’s stock value nosedived by 15% in two days.

Gil Amelio took over from Spindler after the latter was sacked by the board of directors in 1996. Under Amelio, who seemed to be unable to relate to Apple’s unique corporate culture, Apple’s financial losses deepened, climbing to $816 million in 1996 and $1 billion in 1997. Apple’s stock, which was valued at $70 per share in 1991, crumbled to $14 per share, while its market share, which was 16 percent in the late 1980s had been suppressed to only four percent.

In July 1997, Amelio got the boot. But before then, Apple board of directors, realizing the company could only be saved at that point by its creator, made plans to bring back Steve Jobs to lead it again. Apple bought Jobs’ NeXT for $377 million, and two months after Amelio’s sack Jobs was named Interim CEO.

With the same passion, understanding, and determination that he employed in making Apple the great success story it was in the 1980s, Jobs quickly set out to reposition Apple as a profitable, vibrate, and innovative leader in the personal computer industry.

He stopped the licensing of Apple’s technology to outside firms, streamlined the company’s product line from nineteen products to only four, thereby removing Apple from making such items as printers, portable digital assistant, scanners, and other peripherals. Jobs focused Apple firmly on what it knew how to do best – making of desktop and portable Macintoshes for professional and consumer customers.

Uncomfortable with Apple not having popular computers that sell for less than $2,000, Jobs commissioned Apple’s production team to develop such, and ten months later the iMAC, a sleek and colourful computer, was unveiled in August 1998, which went ahead to be very successful in the market.

By the ending of the decade, Jobs had turned around the company from losses to profits. The company made a profit of $309 million in 1998, which swelled to $601 million in 1999. Its stock value equally exploded by 140 percent, reaching $99 per share in 1999.

The company entered the new decade with interim dropped from Jobs title, and with great confidence, an eye for innovation, and business opportunities outside of personal computers.

With the introduction of the iPod digital music player in October 2001, Apple’s focus shifted to the mobile consumer electronic market, from which it has enjoyed great success and most of its revenue. The iPod is the market leader in portable musical player, selling over 220 million units so far.

From the iPod, Apple has continued to create more innovative hand-held digital electronics that have remained to shape people’s habits worldwide. These include its iPhone, which was launched in 2007, and since held the leading market share of 28 percent. Others are Apple TV and iPad.

As Apple sustains its hold on the mobile consumer electronic market, repeatedly churning out innovative products that meet the desire of its market; and as the company keeps an eye wide open for new business opportunities to exploit arising from the ever changing consumer behaviour, it is bound to remain successful in the years to come.

Read Apple’s Business Strategies here.

Recommended

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Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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PSA Peugeot Citroen S.A. Business Strategies

Innocent — Fri, 28 May 2010 11:12:35 +0000

PSA Peugeot Citroen S.A. Business Strategies

The Peugeot Company has continued to wax strong after more than 120 years of formation because of strategies and ideas its managements have implemented over the many decades in its history.

Today, knowing these strategies, and adopting them to your business’ situation can help you overcome difficult challenges, and achieve great success in your business. Here they are:

Looking Into The Future

If you do not want your business to be pushed behind or totally made obsolete, you need to constantly observe the changes, and inventions going on in your industry, and understand how such could affect your business in future. This will enable you to take the proper steps to position your business to benefit, and not suffer from the developments.

Armand Peugeot realized that the internal combustion engine, which had been newly invented, could replace the steam engine that was then in use in future automobile, and so made sure he got the new technology, even if he had to travel to German in search of it.

What Is Your Business Known For?

If you cannot answer this question in few seconds, it means it will be difficult to achieve success in that business. Your business has to stand out for something, which registers on people’s minds. Whenever anyone desires or needs that thing, your business readily comes to their minds. Decide on what you want to be known for, integrate it into your business, and communicate it to your target customers.

Peugeot vehicles were known for their sturdiness, dependability, and excellent finishing. They were also known for being useful and practical more than being attractive.

Being First In Something Is Important

Being the first in the industry is pivotal to business success. It provides a great opportunity for a business to reach prospective buyers first and win them over before other businesses start coming.

No doubt, there is always a golden place in buyers’ heart for the first business in the market. Therefore, to take advantage of this, you need to be creative and come up with firsts in product design or creation, marketing, and distribution.

By introducing the first diesel-powered passenger automobile in the world in 1921, and the first touring car fitted with a diesel engine in 1933, Peugeot won the hearts of many automobile lovers.

Innovation Keeps Your Business Fresh

Your business needs to continue to remain relevant, and useful to its customers, and attract new prospects. It needs to continually develop products that offer better value and more benefits than they were before. Simply put, you need to make innovation a business policy.

Peugeot has always been an innovative company, and has continually strived to improve on its products. By 1932, it had refined its 201 and 301 model lines, making them more elegant and attractive.

Developing Strategies Against Recession And Competition

It’s not unlikely that you will face difficult economy and tough competition from other businesses. However, you need to come up with strategies to overcome the challenges and remain thriving in business.

Living through the depression of the early 1980s and 90s, as well as the competition from Japanese companies was by the development and implementation of strategies, which enabled PSA Peugeot Citroën to thrive rather than sink.

You Need To Have Cost Cutting Strategy

A crucial aspect of your operation that can affect your profitability and competitiveness is your ability to keep your cost of operation down. Higher cost of operation will not only wear off your profit, it could also make your price higher, and therefore affect your competitiveness. This is why you need to have a strategy to keep your cost down.

PSA Peugeot Citroën implemented certain cost cutting strategies in the 2000s, which resulted in reduction of its operational cost by € 600 million a year.

Read PSA Peugeot Citroen S.A. Success Story here.

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PSA Peugeot Citroen S.A.- From Textile Mill To Bicycle To Automobile Production

Innocent — Thu, 27 May 2010 19:57:11 +0000

PSA Peugeot Citroen S.A.: From Textile Mill To Bicycle To Automobile Production

It is not usual to have family businesses surviving more than a few years from the back of their house because of the unprofessional attitude that members bring to bear on the business. But this wasn’t the case with the Peugeot family, which by the 19th century was already a prominent textile miller in the Alsace region of France.

The family diverted its business to steel making in the early 19th century after the bothers, Jean-Pierre and Jean-Frederic Peugeot invented the cold-roll method of manufacturing spring steel. With the bicycle craze of the 1880s, the Peugeot business, through Armand Peugeot, grandson of Jean-Pierre, entered into the wheeled vehicle industry.

From the manufacture of machine tools, which was largely successful, Armand launched Peugeot’s first passenger automobile in the later part of the 1880s. It was a three wheeled, steam-powered motoring car. Realizing that internal combustion engine, which was then an emerging technology, would become the preferred engine type for automobile production, Armand traveled to Germany in 1891 to look for the perfect twin-cylinder engine, and two months later he found and bought Daimler’s 525-cc version.

With the purchase of the engine, Peugeot went on to build cars and soon became one to reckon with in the industry, as its cars won some of the early automobile races ever held. In fifteen years after the company got into automobile production, it had established production plants across France, producing a complete range of vehicles for all uses, with emphases on sturdiness, dependability, and excellent in finishing. These were features that continued to distinguish the Peugeot brand through the decades in its history.

The company was focused on producing utilitarian models like “Le Bébé” (the Baby), the world’s first compact car (1905), and the Quadralette, which was engineered the same way as the Bébé. From the production of the Quadralette, Peugeot created the model 5 CV, which reached a record sale of 83,000 chasis.

In 1921, Peugeot made a remarkable contribution to the automotive engine market – it introduced the world’s first diesel-powered passenger automobile. The company continued to handcraft its automobiles, even though it embraced the new automotive technologies of the late 1920s.

Peugeot’s first modern automobile was the model 201, introduced in 1929. The model, which began the company’s system of naming its automobile models, brought Peugeot to the limelight as a manufacturer of reliable vehicles, selling about 142,000 units before it was phased out in September 1937.

Peugeot has always sought to innovate and continually improve on its products. By 1932, the company had refined its 201 and 301 model lines, making them more elegant and attractive. It began producing its aerodynamic series in 1935 starting with the 402 model.

The following year, it rolled out the 302 model. This was a scaled-down version of the 402, with innovative features that included synchromesh gearbox – it was also the world’s first touring car fitted with a diesel engine.

As the 1970s unfolded, Peugeot was looking into international expansion so it could compete on a global scale. To achieve this, it bought Citroen, and the new company became known as PSA Peugeot Citroen SA. Two years later, the company added Chrysler’s European operations to its holdings.

The economy recession of the early 1980s caused PSA to record net losses at the beginning of the year, however, by successfully launching a number of new products, such as the popular Citroen BX, and the luxury XM models; and by extending the Peugeot 05 range; as well as entering new markets, including the China, and the fast-developing Pacific region, the company rebounded with a profit of over FFr 8 billion at the close of the decade

The 1990s also came with its challenges. The European and the world economy were once again in recession at the early part of the decade, affecting businesses’ revenue projections. In addition to the negative impact of the recession, the European automobile manufacturers were also threatened by the entrant of Japanese carmakers into the European market.

To avoid falling behind in the fierce competition that was imminent, a number of European companies, including PSA formed strategic partnership, which included sharing the same production platforms among different makes, as well as in sales and distribution. This strategy enabled PSA to maintain its number one position in France, and among the leading automobile manufacturers in Europe.

And by launching several new generation models, such as the extended Peugeot 06 line, Citroen Xantia, and Xsara midrange sadans, PSA ended 1998 with sales climbing FFr 221.44 billion.

As the year 2000 sets in, PSA’s strategy was to increase its sales beyond Europe by twenty-five percent of its total projected sales. To achieve its growth objective and reduce cost of production, PSA Peugeot Citroën developed an industrial base of global dimensions consisting of 15 production centers and 16 powertrain and casting plants (engines, gearboxes, running gear, etc.), and a plan to continuously improve industry efficiency by standardizing parts and making assembly easier.

The company also signed strategic cooperation agreements with other manufacturers to produce vehicle platforms and components.

From these steps, PSA Peugeot Citroën has been able to cut its production costs by € 600 million a year.

And with presence in 160 countries, PSA Peugeot Citroën’s worldwide sales at the close of 2008 reached 3,260,000 units, which looked to go even higher in the years to come as the company focuses on expanding its production base close to its major priority markets – China, Latin America, and Russia.

Read PSA Peugeot Citroen S.A. Business Strategies here.

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Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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The Prosperity Secrets Of The Ages - Catherine Ponder

Innocent — Tue, 25 May 2010 17:16:57 +0000

The Prosperity Secrets Of The Ages by Catherine Ponder

As stated by Catherine Ponder in the book, The Prosperity Secrets Of The Ages, there are certain laws that govern the universe. The knowledge and understanding of how these laws operate will help you in channeling prosperity your way.

This book shows you how you can operate these laws and have prosperity and abundance filling your life. It’s really a great book that teaches you how to tap into divine prosperity. Here is an excerpt from it:

Plan Your Way To Success: The Power Of Planning From Esau and Jacob

What do you want to accomplish and experience during the next week, month, or the next five years? What are you doing about those dreams?

If you have just been living from day to day, taking life as it comes, then you have been pouring large portions of your potential success down the drain of failure, and you have been living a mediocre life. You have also been missing the exciting adventure that comes from planning your way to success.

Here is one of life’s greatest success secrets: You have the power to plan your way to success! When you do plan your way to success, you organize all the powers of heaven and earth to help make your plan a reality.

If you just rock along with the title of daily events, you automatically attune yourself to unnecessary and unwanted experiences. You live on the surface of life, exposing yourself to the disappointments, delays, frustrations, pain, financial difficulties and inharmonies that always follow surface thinking and surface living.

There is nothing new about planning your way to success. Great men of all times have dared to do so. Over and over in the face of insurmountable obstacles, they have succeeded while others without a plan have failed. What they planned for they achieved. You can plan for success and achieve it, too!

Famous Master Planners of History

Much of the phenomenal success of Franklin D. Roosevelt could be attributed to a success plan. Twenty years before he became President, a master plan for his success was worked out, not by Roosevelt, but by a friend named Louis Howe. He became so convinced of Roosevelt’s potential as a great leader that he mapped out a timetable for the future success of F.D.R. He even began to address him as “Mr. President.” He refused to become disturbed about his success plans for Roosevelt even when the latter became ill. Instead he continued to work on his master plan.

Twenty years later when Roosevelt became President, Louis Howe opened a bottle of sherry he had purchased many years earlier, which he had been keeping for a celebration when his friend was elected to the highest office in the land. On that day, Louis Howe had the satisfaction of witnessing an achievement for which he had been planning for 20 years.

Perhaps you are thinking, “Yes, but it was a lot easier for Roosevelt to achieve his goals than for the average person, because he had wealth and influence to assist him.”

A master plan for success works even if you have nothing more than a definite plan. If you can conceive what you wish to accomplish, you should work out a timetable for your success, hold to that expectation, and quietly get busy working toward it. Your master plan will draw to you whatever else is needed to make your life as you wish it to be. That is the magnetic power of a master plan.

We find this was also true in the case of Adolph Hitler, who used the master plan idea destructively. In the 1920’s he was unknown. He had no money, no friends, no influence, nor was he trained for any skilled work. But he did have a plan which he began to invoke while in Jail as he wrote the book Mein Kampf, in which he outlined his master plan.

A recent biographer has said that World War II might have been avoided had the proper authorities taken seriously Hitler’s master plan as outlined in his book. Because he was an unknown, with nothing but a jail record and some fantastic ideas, it hardly seemed reasonable to believe him. But his master plan worked anyway – to the destruction of millions of people.

One of the most famous people of the twentieth century who planned his way to success was Winston Churchill. Early in his career he decided he wanted to prepare for public life, but he was a political unknown. He succeeded in getting some English newspapers to allow him to write for them from the trouble spots of the world. His vivid on-the-scene newspaper accounts attracted a large following, and he became popular with British readers. He then ran for various political offices. Each time he was defeated for an office, he would just run for another one!

Robert Lewis Taylor wrote in his book, Winston Churchill: A Biography of a Great Man, that the most mystifying aspects of the elections was Churchill’s attitude when he lost. His manner was no different from those who had won! After one election in which Winston Churchill had lost, he turned to the winner and said, “I don’t think the world has heard the last of either of us.” This remark, coming from a man who had just been defeated, confused the winner so much that he rushed out to recheck the election returns to be sure that he and not Churchill had really won. The biographer wrote of Churchill, “He was a master planner.”

Your Twin Powers For Success

The earliest master planner in the Bible was Jacob, the son of Isaac and Rebekah. As he planned his way to success, like his father and grandfather, he became a millionaire.

Historians have often described Jacob as a shrewd individual, stressing his faults and mistakes with merciless severity. To be sure, Jacob was no saint, but be became a great man, the father of the 12 tribes of Israel. As he struggled to overcome his faults, as he was patient in disappointment, he turned to God for guidance in his extreme experiences. Jehovah never reprimanded him for his shrewdness, which was a spiritual gift. Instead Jehovah helped him to learn how to use it rightly and he went on to outstanding success. We can learn several important success attitudes from Jacob.

Like so many people who are eager to get ahead in life, Jacob first tried to force his good to him when he stole his brother Esau’s birthright. Actually they were twins, but since Esau was slightly older, under the Hebrew law he was heir to his father’s material riches, as well as his spiritual blessings. The word Esau means “one swept away” or “one who rushes forward wildly and impulsively.” Esau symbolizes man’s physical nature.

The word Jacob means “supplanter,” symbolizing man’s mental nature. Jacob was holding Esau’s heel when they were born, showing that the mental is directly connected with the physical and attempts to hold it in check at all times, even from the time of birth.

Jacob need not have cheated to get the rich spiritual blessings his father intended for Esau. The mental realm (Jacob) is always the connecting link between the spiritual and the physical (Esau) phases of man. Had Jacob been more patient he would have eventually received a spiritual blessing. Esau, in his physical approach, as one who rushes around wildly and impulsively, as one who is easily swept away by appearances, could not have fully appreciated that spiritual blessing, and it doubtless would have been passed to Jacob anyway.

You are like Esau when you are swept away by the challenges that face you, when you rush around impulsively trying to make things right on the physical, visible plane of life only. If you handle challenges from the physical level of life alone, you are often cheated out of your birthright of good, just as was Esau.

Instead, resolve to use more fully your mental powers to claim your birthright of good. Begin to supplant your surface methods by working things out on the mental plan of life first.

However, do not underestimate the importance of Esau, who quietly went his way after Jacob took his birthright. Esau became rich, he had many possessions, and he was the head of a race. Don’t forget that Esau and Jacob were twins. The physical is just as important in your success as is the mental, and you should constantly bless and care for your body, as well as for your mind.

I know of several people who upon learning of the power of thought, decided the body was not important. In their zeal to become mental and spiritual saints they became very pious and self-righteous; they criticized and denied the body its rightful functions in life. In each instance, instead of becoming mental giants, they became nervous wrecks with both mind and body affected.

When cheated of its rightful place in man’s development, the body rebels. Mental hospitals bear witness to the fact that a neglected body will destroy the channels through which the mind is meant to function perfectly in man. The physical cannot be ignored. It must have its place in the fully developed person. Bless your body often, praise it, appreciate it and give thanks for it. Such an attitude heals fatigue, often heals serious disease, and makes way for the mind to work more effectively through the body to produce complete good in man’s world. That mental and spiritual giant, the apostle Paul, emphasized the importance of the body when he said, “Know ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which ye have from God?… Glorify God therefore in your body” (I Corinthians 6:19, 20).

The importance of the mind and body working together is shown by the fact that years later the twin brothers, Esau and Jacob, were reunited. It was a happy occasion and a time of great rejoicing for them. Your physical and mental powers are your twin powers for success, too. When you use both for planning your way to success, the results can be happy and fruitful.

Master Planner Becomes Millionaire

After Jacob took the birthright from Esau, he was forced to leave home. This proved to be a tremendous blessing because it gave Jacob an opportunity to develop his mental powers and to become a success on his own. As he made his way to a new land to seek his fortune, Jehovah did not reprimand him for what he had done, but made him a promise, similar to the rich promises He had made earlier to Jacob’s father and grandfather: “The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it… And behold I am with thee, and will keep thee whithersoever thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee” (Genesis 28:13, 15).

In return for these rich promises, Jacob made a success covenant with God which proved to be his master plan for success: “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace, and Jehovah will be my God… Of all that Thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto Thee” (Genesis 28:20-22).

In this success covenant, Jacob clearly indicated what he would do and what he expected a loving Father to do toward his master plan for success. Jacob boldly asked for definite prosperity, protection and reconciliation with his family. That Jacob received these blessings is clearly shown through later events. He was not only given bread to eat and clothes to wear, but he became a wealthy man. One of his sons, Joseph, became the prime minister of Egypt. Years later when Jacob decided to return from Haran to the land of his birth, he was reconciled with his brother Esau as he had decreed in his success covenant.

Even as did Jacob, you can make a success covenant with God as a powerful invoking of the master plan idea. The marvelous thing to realize is that you and I have access to the same rich promises for a good life which the Lord made to Jacob and to his father and grandfather before him. Knowing our rich heritage, we should not hesitate to get busy claiming it by planning our way to success!

First: A Simple Success Plan

There are six simple methods you can use to plan your way to success. Perhaps the easiest way to invoke a master plan for success is to sit down quietly and write out your desires for success for the day, the week, the month, or the coming year. I suggest that you write down your long-range desires for success for the coming year on one list, and then regularly write down your desires for the current day, week, or month on a separate list which you view daily.

The ancients knew the power of doing this. They found that by putting in writing how you want your life to be, you reach past all fear and uncertainty into a higher realm of accomplishment. Through your definite written words, you dissolve all obstacles and barriers on the visible and invisible planes of life. Your written words go out into the ethers of the universe to work through people, circumstances, and events to open the way for your desired good to become a reality.

By writing down your desires, you are getting definite in planning your success, and you make contact with the friendly visible and invisible forces all about you that wish to help your dreams come true. Your written words move on the spiritual ethers, above time, space, and circumstances, to produce successful results for you.

At one period in my life the words I constantly wrote down describing my desire for a more successful life were these: “I CLEARLY SEE THE PROSPERITY OF MY NEW LIFE NOW. MY LIFE IS FREE, GLAD, POWERFUL. SOME BLESSED GOOD IS COMING TO ME NOW. RIGHT PEOPLE, RIGHT PLACE, RIGHT POSSESSIONS, RIGHT PROSPERITY APPEAR NOW.” This definite description for success seemed to move out into the ethers and bring my good to me.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

Prosperity Secrets of the Ages

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The Five Lessons A Millionaire Taught Me About Life and Wealth – Richard Paul Evans

Innocent — Fri, 21 May 2010 17:17:51 +0000

The Five Lessons A Millionaire Taught Me About Life and Wealth – Richard Paul Evans

There is a path to wealth that all wealthy people follow to achieve financial freedom. Some people find it by trial and error, some by studying the lives of wealthy people, and some from their millionaire mentors.

Richard Paul Evans found out the way to become wealthy from his self-made millionaire mentor years ago as a poor teenager. Having used his mentor’s strategies and made millions, he now shares the exact strategies that he gained from his mentor in his book: The Five Lessons A Millionaire Taught Me About Life and Wealth.

This is a book you will be happy reading. It can help you too to make millions and become wealthy.

Here is an excerpt from it, enjoy it.

The Teacher

When the student is ready the teacher shall appear.
- Chinese Proverb

When I was twelve years old, my father, a building contractor, fell through a stairwell on a construction site and shattered the bones in both of his legs. He had no disability insurance and no medical insurance, and so the financial result was nothing short of catastrophic. I come from a large family, and with eight children, money was always tight; but as my father lay in bed, unable to work for nearly a year, we were in the direst of circumstances. We were forced to sell our home and move into a three-bedroom duplex. We lived off food storage and, to some degree, the generosity of those around us.

During this difficult time, I had a life-changing experience. One of our neighbours, a very successful businessman and financial adviser, invited the youth in our area to a lecture at the neighbourhood Christian Church. He wanted to teach us about money.

We were confident that he knew something about the subject. He owned a professional basketball team, drove an expensive car, and owned buildings and businesses all over the West.

He was also a self-made millionaire. He came from Ashton, Idaho, a tiny farm town with only two thousand residents – “if,” he told us, “you count the dogs and chickens.” He was born during the Great Depression, and like so many others at that time, his family was destitute. They rented two rooms in the back of someone else’s house. They had no running water, and in the freezing northern Idaho climate, the only heat source was the small stove they cooked with. He learned to work as soon as he could walk, toiling as a common laborer picking potatoes on the area farms alongside the migrant workers. He had come a long way since then. He was the wealthiest man I knew.

The first thing he did that day was to pull a hundred-dollar bill from his wallet and hold it up in front of us. I started at it in wonder. I had never seen one before. He asked, “Is money evil?”

Even though it was an evil we all wanted, sitting in the confines of a church we all quickly agreed that it was.

“The Bible,” said a teenage girl piously, “says that money is the root of all evil.”

He smiled. “You are referring to the New Testament scripture in 1 Timothy, chapter 6, verse 10,” he replied. “And it does not say that. It says that the love of money is the root of all evil. There’s a big difference. In fact, just one chapter earlier in Timothy, the apostle Paul says that if ‘any provide not for his own, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.’ How can you provide for your own without money?

“How about the parable of the Good Samaritan? Jesus told us to be like the Good Samaritan, yet how many of you here today could afford to pay for a stranger’s hospital treatment and housing for a week? The Samaritan was able to help because he had the financial means to do so. Without it he could only have offered minor assistance.

“For many, religion seems paradoxical on the subject of wealth. On the one hand, it seems to tell us that money is evil. On the other hand, God often blesses the righteous with wealth and material prosperity. For instance, in the Old testament, after Job endured his many trials and proved his devotion to God, he was given back twice his wealth and possessions. So was God rewarding Job’s righteousness with evil? Of course not.”

Our teacher’s tone became more serious. “Like most things, money can be used for good or evil. The church you are sitting in right now was built through substantial monetary contributions. Every week I see people in our area being helped through the generosity and financial ability of others.

“At your age, you have no idea how much money is spent on your behalf – oftentimes by people you will never meet and never thank. The day will come when you must make a decision: will you be one who helps others or one who looks to others for help? It’s your choice. You can be part of the problem or part of the solution. If you want to be the latter, then listen carefully, because what I have to tell you today will change your life.”

Considering my family’s plight at the time, I listened very carefully. The lessons he taught that day lit a flame of hope within me. For the first time, I believed that there might be more to life than the seemingly endless financial desperation that had been my family’s lot. I thought about his words constantly and began living the principles he shared. I immediately saw a difference in my own life, and that made the belief burn still brighter. By the age of sixteen, I had become somewhat financially independent. I bought my own clothes, my own car, and paid for my own entertainment. By eighteen, I had saved the equivalent of $7,000, enough to finance my schooling and a church mission. By the age of twenty-six, I had saved enough to put 25 percent down on a house on a beautiful tree-lined street. By the age of thirty-one, I had paid off my home.

Less than twenty years from the time my millionaire friend gave that talk, I returned to him with several million dollars I wanted his help in investing. He smiled when he saw me. “I understand that you’ve done all right for yourself.”

“I have you to thank,” I said. “You taught me what it takes to succeed financially.”

“You have yourself to thank,” he replied. Then his smile turned to a look of concern. “I’m afraid you were the only one who listened to me that day.”

“Maybe I was just the only one who thought he had to.”

The Millionaire In The Mirror

Why is it that wealth seems so distant from most people? Recently my eight-year-old daughter asked my wife if she’d ever seen a millionaire. My wife smiled and said that she had.

“Was he wearing a crown?” she asked.

“No.”

“Was he in a limousine?”

“No, he was just walking.”

“Were people dancing around him saying, ‘God millionaire, go millionaire?’”

Millionaires are not as removed as you might think. There are more than three and a half million millionaires in the United States alone. In fact, if you have an average American’s income, you will earn more than a million dollars in your lifetime. So will you someday be a millionaire? According to current financial trends, it’s not likely.

Recent statistics given by the Federal Reserve indicate that household debt is at a record high relative to disposable income. In 1946, household debt was 22 percent of personal disposable income. Today it’s roughly 110 percent. Not surprisingly, personal bankruptcies in America have more than doubled in the last decade. In fact, more Americans now declare bankruptcy each year than graduate from college.

What about our retirement? If we take one hundred Americans and follow their financial path to age sixty-five, fewer than four will have an income above $35,000, while five times that number will live below the poverty line. More than 50 percent will be wholly dependent on relatives, Social Security, and welfare. In America, the discrepancy between the haves and have-nots has never been so wide.

If Americans’ individual financial prospects seem so dire, then who and where are these millions of millionaires? They are not all businesspeople, doctors, lawyers, or white-collar professionals. Some are hairstylists and welders and farmers. So what’s their secret? What is it that makes these people wealthy and others not?

Is It Luck?

“Fickle fate” is a vicious Goddess who brings no permanent good to anyone. On the contrary, she brings ruin to almost every man upon whom she showers unearned gold. She makes wanton spenders who soon dissipate all they receive and are left beset by overwhelming appetites and desires they have not the ability to gratify.
- GEORGE S. CLASON, The Richest Man in Babylon

Wealth is more than just luck. Only 2 percent of today’s millionaires inherited all or any part of their homes or property. Fewer than 20 percent inherited even a small portion of their wealth. And those victims of luck-induced wealth don’t often retain their prizes. One study showed that of those who came into fortunes through lotteries, more than 80 percent were bankrupt within five years. The fate of those receiving other windfalls, such as insurance claims and inheritance, isn’t much better.

Is It Intelligence?

If wealth were simply a matter of intelligence, a disproportionate number of millionaires would have stellar IQs and academic merit badges. This is not the case. Most of today’s millionaires did not graduate with high honors. Most of them did not even qualify for a top-rated college. In light of this, it is not surprising, then, that Warren Buffett, the self-made multibillionaire investor, was rejected by Harvard Business College. In fact, research shows that millionaires’ average grade point average is lower than a B.

On the other hand, highly academic, well-educated people often act like complete fools when it comes to personal finances. It is common knowledge among financial consultants that America’s most educated citizens – doctors and lawyers – are notoriously bad at handling their money.

What is it?

If it’s not luck or superior intelligence that makes the millionaire, then what is the common denominator (besides money, of course) that the wealthy have and the rest of humanity does not? It’s simply this:

The wealthy understand the principles of accumulating wealth and live them.

Some wealthy people learned the principles of accumulating riches through trial and error. Some – like myself – learned from mentors or parents. And for some, it just came naturally. But whatever this knowledge’s source, I do not know a single self-made millionaire who does not understand and apply the five principles my millionaire friend taught us that day.

This is good news for everyone else. Because it means that wealth is less a matter of circumstance than it is a matter of knowledge and choice. It means that we can choose to live the lives we desire. So ultimately it comes back to you. Where do you want to go?

Take Responsibility For Your Money

Money makes a good servant but a bad master
- French Proverb

When it comes to money, far too many of us are asleep at the wheel. Many Americans view money as an uncontrollable, almost mystical entity. It’s not. In its most basic form, it’s just metal and paper. And if you don’t control your money, it will control you.

Taking control of your money begins with taking responsibility for it. That means knowing how much you have, where it is coming from, where it is going, and what it’s doing in the meantime. Taking responsibility for your money means not completely turning it over to a bookkeeper or a spouse. It’s a matter of personal stewardship. It’s like parenting: you cannot leave control of your children to someone else and just hope that they will turn out all right.

It’s not just the poor or uneducated who fall prey to fiscal irresponsibility. An acquaintance of mine with more than ten million dollars to his name woke one day to find himself nearly broke. The group of investors he had hired to manage his money had tied it up in risky investments that had not only wiped out his capital but left major debts in excess of what he owned. He had been too busy in other ventures to watch where his money was going.

Another acquaintance, finding his bank account depleted after burning through tens of thousands of dollars, said to me, “We have nothing to show for it. All I can figure out is that we spent all our money on Happy Meals.”

Unfortunately, most people’s closets are more organized than their finances. If you’re one of the fiscally irresponsible, it’s time for change.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

The Five Lessons A Millionaire Taught Me About Life and Wealth

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How To Be A Great Sales Professional: Sell Your Products, Serve Your Customers, Succeed In A Competitive World - Nido Qubein

Innocent — Thu, 20 May 2010 19:37:21 +0000

How To Be A Great Sales Professional: Sell Your Products, Serve Your Customers, Succeed In A Competitive World by Nido Qubein

No doubt, a pivotal aspect of business success is the ability to sell more of your products. More sales bring in more money, which is the life-blood that keeps your business alife. Nido Qubein’s book: How To Be A Great Sales Professional: Sell Your Products, Serve Your Customers, Succeed In A Competitive World will help you achieve great sales of your products and stay on top of your competition.

This is an unquestionably great material to have in powering your sales and growing your business. Here is an excerpt from the book, enjoy it! Please leave your comments below after reading.

Become A Consultant To Your Customers

Dale Carnegie once called Frank Bettger the best salesperson he’d ever met. Carnegie said Bettger could sell almost anything to almost anybody.

And what was Bettger’s secret of success in selling?

Let Bettger himself tell you:

“The one biggest secret of selling anything is: Try to find out what people want, and then help them get it.”

That’s a powerful insight. It’s also a valuable specimen of selling savvy.

How To Help People Get What They Want

In this chapter, we’ll explore ways to apply that bit of savvy toward making you a very successful salesperson, while you help people get what they want.

Most salespeople approach selling from the opposite position: They decide what they want to sell, then they try to talk people into buying it. That’s almost guaranteed to create sales resistance. It puts the ball in the prospect’s court. It tells prospects, in effect, “Here’s why I think you ought to buy this product. Now tell me why you shouldn’t.”

And since you’re asking your prospects to transfer money from their hands to yours, they’re usually pretty good at thinking of reasons for not doing it. But if your prospects perceive that you’re holding something they want, they’ll look for reasons to move what they want out of your hands and into theirs.

You’re Not Selling Products and Services

The problem is that most salespeople believe that their customers want to buy the products and services they are selling. They think customers want to buy automobiles, insurance, clothing, or some other item.

You acquire selling savvy when you acquire this insight: Your prospects don’t want the products or services you’re selling. They want the things those products or services can do for them.

Many salespeople argue over whether it’s easier to sell tangibles or intangibles. But the salesperson with sales savvy and business acumen knows that we are all selling intangibles.

People Don’t Just Buy Suits

Think about the way you approach buying a new suit. Certainly, you are looking for clothing, but if that’s all you’re buying you can get by with a loincloth or a burlap bag with armholes.

But you’re looking for more than basic covering. Your real buying decision will be made on factors such as how a suit makes you look, hot it makes you feel about yourself, and how it fits your lifestyle and personality.

Those are all very intangible factors. They have to do with your perceptions, your needs, your feelings, and your values. The fact is that you’re not simply buying a suit of clothes; you’re buying what that suit will do for you.

And here’s where selling savvy really comes into play. You might know exactly what you want your new suit to do for you. But if the person trying to sell you a suit doesn’t understand what you want and doesn’t show you what you want, you won’t buy – no matter what the salesperson says or does.

On the other hand, you might not know clearly what you want a suit to do for you, or what kind of suit will produce the results you desire. The salesperson’s challenge then becomes to help you understand what you want and how to get it.

An amateur might try to sell you by lowering the price, by trying to convince you that your expectations are wrong, or even by trying to manipulate you into buying a suit you don’t like.

But the professional – the salesperson with savvy – knows that all those tactics are a waste of time.

Think of Yourself as a Consultant

If you want to be successful in sales, you have to think of yourself as a consultant for your customer. Consultants are people who carefully study their prospects’ needs, concerns, and desires, then show them how to get what they want.

Consultants focus first on solving the client’s most pressing problem or fulfilling the client’s greatest desire. But to become a true consultant, you have to go beyond making the first sale.

Real professionals understand a very important principle of selling savvy: Satisfied clients make the best prospects for future sales.

Therefore, selling professionals target all their efforts at establishing long-term relationships with their customers. They think of them as clients. They see themselves not only as providers of quality goods and services, but also as invaluable resources of information and expert counsel.

Professionals perceive themselves as experts who can offer valuable insights and solutions to their customers’ problems. And they work hard to instill in their prospects that same perception.

Developing this kind of solid relationship with a customer offers substantial rewards.

A $50 Million Relationship

One of the most dramatic illustrations of how this works is a decision Lee Iacocca made when he moved to the Chrysler Corporation.

When he took control of the company, one of his first moves was to dismiss the two advertising agencies that were handling the Chrysler account.

He replaced them with the agency he had worked with so successfully at Ford.

As Iacocca put it, he didn’t have enough time to acclimate Chrysler’s agencies to his way of thinking. It was much simpler for him to bring along an agency he had worked with before. It was a $50 million decision that resulted in the largest single transfer of an advertising account ever recorded.

That agency had become much more to Iacocca than just another advertising company. To Iacocca, that agency was an indispensable ally – a valuable consulting resource.

The salesperson with selling savvy understands the value of such a relationship with a customer and strives to maintain that relationship.

The Secret Lies In Positioning

But how do you establish such a relationship? How do you turn prospects and customers into loyal clients?

Think back to our discussion of positioning in Chapter two. Positioning is the key to establishing a solid relationship with customers.

Professional salespeople position themselves as expert advisers to their prospects. They prove by their actions that they are trying not just to sell to their prospects but also to help them get what they want.

Positioning yourself as your customers’ consultant enables you to establish and maintain secure, long-term relationships with them. It’s the best way to build the kind of solid client base and repeat business that can provide security and steady growth – for you and your company.

Let’s explore two of the central elements of building permanent – and profitable – consulting relationships with your clients.

The First Element: Become An Expert

If you want to earn the respect and confidence of your prospects, you have to position yourself as an expert. An expert is defined as “a person who is very skillful or highly trained and informed in some special field.”

Translated to the sales field, experts are competent professionals who are knowledgeable about selling, about their companies and their products, about their industries, about their competition, and about each of their clients.

How do you achieve this level of professionalism? Here are six pointers:

(1) Become an expert in your field

Professionals don’t just act as if they’re experts; they are experts; they are experts. They make it their business to know everything there is to know about their business.

If you want your customers to see you as an expert, you must be an expert salesperson.

To become a consulting salesperson, you have to become so familiar with the selling process that you can concentrate totally on planning, strategizing, and developing other areas of expertise.

Think about your knowledge of the selling basics next time you watch Olympic ice skaters perform on television. They perform the most difficult of movements with such style and grace that they make it look easy.

Their movements are elegance in motion. When they make a mistake or their routine is interrupted, they pick right up and keep going.

That kind of excellence comes only from practice. They have drilled and drilled until they have mastered the fundamentals so thoroughly that they don’t even have to think about them.

So when the spotlight is on them, they are free to concentrate on expression, on timing, and on communicating with their audiences.

The sales professional has the same kind of command over the basics of selling. The essentials are so ingrained that the professional performs without thinking about them.

(2) Become an expert on your company

If you want to become your customer’s consultant, you must become an expert on your company.

As a salesperson, you may be the only representative of your company that your customers ever see. When customers see you, they’re looking at your company, as far as they’re concerned. If they like you, they’ll like the company. If they distrust you, they’ll distrust the company.

Trust is a vital part of any relationship. Competent professionals know how to build their customers’ confidence in their companies.

Major corporations spend millions of dollars advertising their brand names. They realize that people buy from companies they know and trust.

The more you know about your company, the more you’re able to give information that will inspire confidence in new prospects and keep your regular customers loyal.

(3) Become an expert on what you sell.

Knowing as much as possible about the products and services you sell is the third vital area in which the consulting salesperson must have some expertise.

When customers ask, “How many units can it produce per minute?,” “How much floor space will it take up?,” or “How soon can you ship it?,” they want information, not sales puff.

One of the most common complaints consumers and professional buyers make is that they can’t get straight answers to the simple questions they ask salespeople.

The main reason they don’t get straight answers is that the salespeople don’t know enough about their products or services to provide the answers.

We owe it to our customers to have the information to provide quick and concise answers to at least 99% of the questions they might ask.

In fact, what you know about your complete product line and all of the services your company offers is one of the best measures of your professionalism as a salesperson.

Professionals are inquisitive. They ask questions and are always eager to learn. They know that knowledge is like money in the bank: it pays to have it, and it pays to use it.

Some salespeople like to dance around the questions with fancy footwork. If they don’t know the answers, they fake them. If they’re dealing with knowledgeable business people, they’ll find themselves on the canvas quickly. Today’s customers are informed, and they don’t waste time or money on people who play fast and loose with the facts. When you don’t know the answer to a question, you’ll earn respect by simply saying, “I don’t know, but I’ll find out and let you know right away.” Today’s customers are informed, and they appreciate integrity when they see it.

(4) Become an expert on your industry

Professionals are constantly reviewing these questions:

• Who buys the products or services my company sells, and why do they buy them?
• How do these products contribute to the lives and businesses of the customers who buy them?
• How are these services and products used?
• What trends have affected the industry in recent years, and what trends are emerging that could affect customers in the future?

It’s only when you know the answers to these and other vital questions that you can position yourself as a valuable resource for your clients. Savvy begins with knowledge. And knowledge begins with a dedication to learning.

(5) Become an expert on your competition

If you want to position yourself as an expert consultant, know your competition. The more you know about your competitors, the greater your ability to sell against them.

So, ask yourself:

• Who are my competitors?
• What do they sell?
• How are their products inferior to ours?
• How are their products superior to ours?
• How do they sell?
• To whom do they sell?
• What do they tell my customers?
• What gaps are there in their product lines?

Some of your competitors are well-trained professionals, and many of them know more about you than you imagine.

Professional salespeople don’t lie awake at night worrying about what’s happening in their industries or what their competitors are doing. They just stay alert and observe everything that happens around them. They keep an eye on the competition.

They read trade journals, ask questions of their customers and people within their company, and study ads and sales literature from all the companies that serve their industry.

The more knowledge you have about your competition, the more likely your customers will be to respect you as a consultant, as a value-driven salesperson, and as a problem solver.

(6) Become an expert on your customers

Most important of all, you must become an expert on your customers.

To understand what your customer wants and needs, you have to know your customer the way your family doctor knows you.

You take it for granted that your doctor understands the human anatomy and how the organs work. That’s basic stuff.

But you’re not just a generic specimen of the human race. You’re you - a unique individual with your own physical and emotional makeup; your own pattern of aches and pains; maybe your own set of allergies.

You want your doctor to prescribe medicine that’s appropriate for you and not for some generalized average citizen coming in off the street. If your doctor doesn’t understand your unique symptoms and physical makeup, you may go home with some drug that will set off an allergic reaction or aggravate the condition it was intended to treat.

In the same way, sales professionals research each potential customer to discover the prospect’s unique business or personal needs.

They draw out customers with questions. They observe everything their customers do and listen to everything they say.

A man named Louis Holden got the first donation Andrew Carnegie ever made to a school. In exactly four minutes, Dr. Holden collected $100,000 from a man who opened the interview by saying, “I don’t believe in giving money to colleges.”

How did he turn it around? As a consultant, he had done his homework on Andrew Carnegie. Once he understood Carnegie’s deep desire to help young people get started in life, he was able to show his client how he could fulfill that desire by making a large donation to a college.

Knowing what motivates a prospect is probably the most powerful piece of information a salesperson can have. Professionals learn all they can about their prospects; then they use that information to influence them to buy.

To position yourself as an expert – as your customers’ consultant – you have to become an expert. Expertise requires depth of knowledge and understanding, and that’s something you can’t fake. Customers can sense it when you know what you’re talking about, and they recognize it quickly when you’re talking over your head.

Become an expert requires dedication and effort. But until you’ve become one, you’re minus the first key element in building a consulting relationship with your customer, and you’re somewhere short of being the successful salesperson that you can be.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

How to Be a Great Sales Professional

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Automatic Wealth: The Six Steps To Financial Independence - Michael Masterson

Innocent — Wed, 19 May 2010 23:37:20 +0000

Automatic Wealth: The Six Steps To Financial Independence by Michael Masterson

In this book, Automatic Wealth: The Six Steps To Financial Independence, the self-made millionaire, Michael Masterson gives a road map for anyone who desires to be free financially to build wealth.

It a great book that can help you achieve your goal of retiring early and living the lifestyle that you want, and never have to worry about money.

Here is an excerpt from it, enjoy!

The Eight Habits of Highly Successful People

1. WEALTHY PEOPLE LIVE IN (RELATIVELY) INEXPENSIVE HOMES
How much do you think the typical American worth $6.8million typically pays for a house?

I put this question to the Early to Rise staff. Their guess was between $2million and $3million. Being older and wiser, my guess was closer to the truth. I figured the number was closer to $1million.

But then we checked the IRS records. And the answer was an astonishing $545,000. That’s not a lot of money for someone who’s worth almost $7million. So what’s going on here?

Take a look at Table 3.1. Why would a guy who’s worth $1.4 million live in a $220,000 house? Does he know something that you should find out about?

Table 3.1

Net Worth (In Millions)

Average Net Worth

Average House Value

$1 to under 2.5
$1,470,553
$220,796

2.5 to under 5
3,392,416
354,043

5 to under 10
6,809,409
545,499

10 to under 20
14,045,501
779,444

20 and more
58,229,024
1,073,980

Actually, he knows two things:

1. The cost of your house determines the cost of your lifestyle. Consider this: Property taxes on a $500,000 house are about $4,000 to $5,000 more per year than on a $250,000 house. Utility expenses are also proportionately greater. If you live in a more expensive house, you’ll pay a lot more for maintenance costs. And not just because there is more house to keep. When many contractors see that you live in a nice house in a fancy neighborhood, their fees shoot up. Call it a wealth tax. They figure, “He can afford it. I need it. So why not?”

But taxes, utilities, and maintenance form just the tip of the expense-rising iceberg. The major cost of owning an expensive house is beneath the surface. The number one reason expensive homes cost so much (much more than you’d think) is because they are inexorably attached to a more expensive lifestyle. By lifestyle, I include everything you pay more for now that you live in a nicer neighborhood – furniture and landscaping, automobiles and education, restaurants and vacations, just to name a few. It’s not that you are consciously trying to keep up with the Joneses. It’s just that you can’t seem to find those inexpensive things (or places or service people) anymore.

2. Home-spending decisions are not – or should not be – primarily about return on investment. In buying, fixing up, and furnishing your home, you will spend a good deal of money on things that will have a lot of emotional value but little financial worth. If you want to put a new set of windows in the living room, repaint a bedroom, or buy a bookshelf for your beer can collection, you don’t have to do a financial analysis first.

In contrast, the investments you make for financial gain can and should be decided on such rational, bottom-line thinking.

I bought my first house 20 years ago for $175,000. I put down about $15,000 – which was the sum total of my net worth. Ten years later, I was living in an $800,000 house, which represented about 25 percent of my net worth. Today, I live in a more expensive home, but one that accounts for only about 10 percent of my wealth. And that feels good.

What about the Tax Benefits of Stretching Yourself
Financially When Buying A Home?

It’s true that a more expensive home that has larger mortgage payments will also have larger tax-deductible interest payments. But you’re better off spending less money in the first place. Remember, in order to save money with tax deductions, you have to spend more than you save. If you are in the 28 percent tax bracket, for example, every dollar you spend on mortgage interest is deductible, and that will save you 28¢ in taxes. But you’ll have spent a dollar to get that 28¢ saving and will be 62¢ poorer. It’s better to take that 62¢ and invest it elsewhere. Soon it will be worth $5.

The bottom line is this: Buy a house that accommodates all your needs comfortably, and invest time and care to make it beautiful. Then, take the money you didn’t spend on a more expensive home and invest it in something that will earn money for you. (I’ll give you my recommendations in the next chapter.) You’ll get richer faster.

2. WEALTHY PEOPLE ARE MODERATE IN SPENDING
Carlos, one of my jiujitsu instructors, is living the American dream. He came to this country to compete in mixed martial arts and earn his fortune as a champion fighter. While building a stellar win-loss record, he lived on club sponsorship and fees for giving lessons. For the first three years of his time here, he managed to support himself and his wife on less than $15,000 a year. Recently, he captured three title belts and now fights at the top level in Japan. His typical payday has gone from $500 to $25,000.
“The problem with making more money in America,” he told me, “is that every time you make an extra dollar you spend two.”

How true. The first couch I bought cost $400. I remember thinking, “It doesn’t get any better than this.” And it never did. The couches I buy today give me no more pleasure, comfort, or space. Yet they cost much more.

What happened? Did I miss out on some inflationary spiral? The truth is that my own success victimized me. In earning more, I allowed myself to spend more on things like couches. If I had gotten more out of it, that would have been fine. But I didn’t.

Master wealth builders understand a secret that it took me years to learn: You have to keep your spending down while your income increases.

We’ll talk more about that later. But now, let’s talk about Mike Tyson.

The Sad Story of Mike Tyson: A Spending Fool

During the 20-year span of his career, Mike Tyson’s income exceeded $400 million. Yet in 2004, before his 39th birthday, this amazing moneymaker was $38 million in debt. He had some assets – equity in some mansions, some cars, and some jewelry – but insiders speculated their total value at least than $3million. For the sake of wishing him well, let’s assume it was twice that much. That would have put his personal net worth at negative $32million.

Think about that: minus $32 million.

That could make him the world’s poorest man. With a negative net worth that large, Mike Tyson is 160,000 times poorer than the average wage earner from Sierra Leone, the poorest country in the world, with an average annual income of $200 per person.

“How can a man with a $4million estate in New Jersey be poor?” a colleague asked me.

“He can still make millions every time he fights,” my sister said. “Anyone who can make millions isn’t poor.”

Yet by every recognized standard of accounting, he is poor. Extremely poor.

But he doesn’t think so. And that’s part of the reason he got so poor in the first place. The faster money came in, the faster it went out. Stories about his profligacy are already legendary. Tyson employed as many as 200 people, including bodyguards, chauffeurs, chefs, and gardeners.

He spent:

• Nearly $4.5million on cars and motorcycles
• $3.4million on clothes and jewelry
• $7.8million on “personal expenses”
• $140,000 on two white Bengal tigers and $125,000 a year for their trainer
• $2million on a bathtub for his first wife, actress Robin Givens
• $410,000 on a birthday party
• $230,000 on cell phones and pagers during a three-year period from 1995 to 1997.

The purpose of this is not to shake a finger at Mike Tyson, but to alert you to the dangerous temptation to spend more when you make more. As someone who grew up drinking powdered milk and wearing hand-me-downs, I understand the strength of that temptation.

Why Spending Feels So Good

Why do we do it? Why do we feel the need to spend more when we make more?

Here’s what I think. When you are poor, you are surrounded by things you think you would like to own but cannot afford to buy. After a while, you equate the feeling of unsatisfied desire with poverty. And when desiring begins to feel poor, having seems like it will make you feel rich.

That’s the heart’s logic, at least.

If that’s the way you feel now – if your idea of being wealthy is filled with images of mansions and sailboats and expensive watches – you are going to have a difficult time saving money. And saving money is another one of the common habits of people who know how to build wealth.

6. WEALTHY PEOPLE ARE EXTRAORDINARY AT SAVING
The rich save more than the average person. Relatively speaking, that is. I don’t mean they save more because they have more money to save. I mean they save more in general, because they have a saver’s mind-set.

According to Thomas Stanley, author of The Millionaire Next Door, the average millionaire is much more frugal than you or I would have believed. (By the way, Stanley gets most of his data from the IRS and other government sources.) For example, the average millionaire
• Drives an older car
• Buys inexpensive presents
• Eats at home and seldom dines out
• Takes a vacation every other year
• Wears clothes until they fray and resoles shoes when they wear thin

To develop a saver’s mind-set – a wealth builder’s mind-set – you must change the way you feel about spending. You must teach yourself to feel the truth: that every time you buy a depreciating asset, you become poorer.

Remind yourself repeatedly that most of the junk you buy (1) becomes unused after a few months and (2) doesn’t provide you with that much value anyway. Remember that the best things in life – the picnics you have with your family, the walks you take with your lover, the time you spend with your friends – are free, or nearly so.

There are so many ways to save money. You can spend less on just about anything without giving up either the pleasure you take in buying or the quality you get from your purchases.

Instead of buying new clothes that will be out of style in a year, buy vintage clothing that looks great and distinguishes you.

Instead of signing a lease for an expensive car you can’t afford, find something old but still good that has a personality.

Instead of going out to lunch every day, eat a can of tuna at your desk. (This is one of the things I did. By eating a can of tuna everyday instead of going to lunch with my coworkers, I saved almost $2,500 in a single year. Plus, I went from staff editor to publisher by applying that extra-lunch-hour time to improving the business.)

Don’t worry – I’m not going to try to turn you into a miser. The purpose of spending less is to have more. I enjoy the luxuries that wealth can bring, but – as I’ll explain later – I don’t believe you have to spend a lot more to get them.

You’ll have your cake and eat it, too. You’ll spend less, waste less, save more, and have plenty left over to enjoy life.

7. WEALTHY PEOPLE PAY THEMSELVES FIRST

Many financial advisers recommend sticking to a budget. By categorizing expenses and limiting spending, they argue, you can have enough left over every month to save money and grow rich.

The trouble is that budgeting almost never works.

Budgeting is like dieting: It’s enormously sensible but almost never effective. I’ve tried budgeting myself a dozen times. I’ve also made the mistake of encouraging others to keep a budget. I can’t think of a single case where it worked.

The problem is that when you budget, you pay everyone else first. As best-selling author David Bach says:
[You] pay the landlord, the credit card company, the telephone company, the government, and on and on. The reason (you) think (you) need a budget is to… figure out how much to pay everyone else so at the end of the month [you] will have something “left over” to pay [yourself.]

So at the end of the month, you have nothing left to put in the bank. You promise yourself you’ll do better next time, but you never do. There are always unexpected bills to pay, unanticipated sales to take advantage of, and that impossible-to-figure-out $200 or $300 that seems to fall through the cracks.

Budgeting doesn’t work. But there is something that does: putting some predetermined percentage of your income into a savings account each month before you pay any of your bills.

Think of yourself as a personal corporation and the money you save as your personal income. All the other money you spend on house and car payments and so forth are the expenses of your personal corporation. Only the portion that goes into a savings account is really yours.

Of course, it’s not enough to simply think of your income this way. You must actually do something to effect a change. You might, for example, have a portion of your paycheck automatically deposited in your savings account each month – as soon as the check is deposited.

Paying yourself first in this sense (i.e., saving before you pay bills) is actually, as Bach points out, paying yourself second. He reminds us that withholding taxes are the government’s way of paying itself first. Before your salary is deposited into your checking account, the government has already taken its piece.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

Automatic Wealth: The Six Steps to Financial Independence

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Wealth Making: How Michael Dell Made His Wealth
Ready, Fire, Aim: Zero To $100 Million In No Time Flat by Michael Masterson

A Millionaire’s Notebook: How Ordinary People Can Achieve Extraordinary Success - Steven-K-Scott

Innocent — Mon, 17 May 2010 15:26:00 +0000

A Millionaire’s Notebook: How Ordinary People Can Achieve Extraordinary Success - Steven K. Scott

Are you an ordinary folk - housewife, makeup artist, hair stylist, salesman, teacher, convenience store clerk, marriage counselor, carpenter, doctor, dog trainer, former P.E. teacher, or small business owner - wondering how you can take your life to a higher level of income and success in your career? If your answer is yes, then you have to read Steven Scott’s book: A Millionaire’s Notebook: How Ordinary People Can Achieve Extraordinary Success.

Learn how to achieve extraordinary success even when you have failed several times before, or told you will never make it by allowing Steve to guide you in this book. In this book, he pours out his experience of turning failure (he lost nine jobs in six years) and rejection into self-made millionaire.

If you desire to learn how to achieve life and financial success, I believe Steve Scott is worth listening to – he walks the talk.

Below is an excerpt from the book, enjoy!

Keys To Stellar Success

Unlocking the Doors To Success In Any Arena, Business or Personal

While locked doors are truly impassable barriers to many, they offer no resistance to those who hold the keys.

Anyone can succeed to a certain degree, but what does it take to achieve higher levels of success than you’ve ever thought possible? Success for an amateur rocket builder is buying a model rocket, installing a small engine, launching it, and sending it one or two thousand feet in the air. I did that when I was thirteen and loved it, but had our top rocket scientists of the fifties and sixties used that same standard for measuring their success, our national defense, our communications industry, our entire world would be radically different.

While this may be obvious, the underlying principle that it illustrates has been lost to countless millions: that success is not an inflexible yardstick by which we measure ourselves. Rather, it’s more like a tape measure that keeps lengthening faster than we are growing.

The first and single most critical factor in succeeding is gaining an accurate vision of what true success is for you! If you never get a clear picture in your mind of what you consider true success, you will miss it – and perhaps you won’t even travel in the right direction. What you consider success today is most likely very different from what you considered it to be ten years ago. And what you consider to be success ten years from now will most likely differ from what you consider success today. But we don’t live in yesterday or tomorrow, so we must start with a clear vision and definition of what we consider success today.

Identify or define in general terms what you consider success to be for you.

All of us have different priorities and desires. As a thirteen year-old model-rocket builder, my vision of success was a three-stage rocket where all three stages would ignite, propelling the rocket a thousand feet into the air, and the parachute would then open in time to bring the third stage safely back to earth. At the same time, America’s top rocket scientist Wernher von Braun’s vision of success was building a rocket that would put the first man on the moon and return him safely to earth. While our visions were similar in general terms (we both wanted to launch rockets and bring them safely back to earth), they were vastly different in three ways.

First, they were different in degree (my ship had to travel only a thousand feet up and a thousand feet down. Von Braun’s ship had to travel 230,000 miles, land on the moon, get back into orbit around the moon, and then travel another 230,000 miles and land safely on earth). So as you can see, visions of success differ first in degree. But our visions are also different in terms of personal challenge and ultimate outcome.

In terms of personal challenge, achieving my success involved spending a few dollars in a hobby shop, taking a few hours to build the rocket correctly, and spending a few minutes to launch and retrieve it. Achieving von Braun’s vision required billions of dollars, millions of man-hours from tens of thousands of people, and finding solutions to thousands of problems that had never been solved before. Achieving his vision required an incredible long mental and physical stretch, while mine required no stretch at all.

In terms of ultimate outcome, if I succeeded, I would get a brief thrill, the rocket would be salvaged, and the red ant in the nose cone would live to see another launch. If von Braun succeeded, three crew members would continue to breathe earth’s fresh air, and a whole new era of space travel would begin.

So when you begin to write down your general description of what you would consider success for you, start by thinking in terms of ultimate outcome, attaching the degree of success you’ve envisioned, and then clarify the personal challenge involved. For example, if you’re talking in terms of money, do you define the ultimate outcome of your success as $50,000 per year or $1 million per year? If you are talking in terms of a marital relationship, would you define your successful ultimate outcome as “a marriage that isn’t an emotional drain” or as “a marriage that is the most fulfilling area in life”? Both are legitimate ultimate outcomes to seek but are significantly different in terms of degree and personal challenge required.

Finally, in general terms, clarify the personal challenge involved in terms of ease or difficulty. If it requires too little effort or stretch on your part, your vision of success in terms of ultimate outcome and degree is too low. You need to set your sights higher. If the personal challenge required seems ridiculously impossible, you may have to lower your sights, but don’t do that yet. Even “impossible” visions are often attainable when you seek to bring them about in a planned, orderly way.

When I was making $7,200 a year in my first job after college, it would have been ridiculous to set my sights at making $2 million a year. Today, if my sights were set at $2 million a year, I’d be looking backward. When did “the impossible” become “the achievable,” become a “step backward”? Remember that success isn’t a yardstick, it’s an ever lengthening tape measure. What may seem impossible to you today can become achievable to you sooner than you think.

Identify and define in detailed, specific terms your visions of success (ultimate outcome, degree, and personal challenge).

Now it’s time to get very specific in terms of your vision of success in any area you desire more success. Once again we start with ultimate outcome and degree, and then move into the area of personal challenge. But this time we’re going to get painfully specific. If you don’t go into this kind of detail, the ultimate outcome you desire and the degree of success you desire will always remain out of reach – a dream or a mirage.

Back to our example of your vision of a successful marital relationship. If you’ve defined success in this area as “a relationship that isn’t an emotional drain,” you would now list the specific negative attributes about the relationship that makes it emotionally draining and the specific change to each negative attribute that you think would need to take place for the relationship not to be draining.

For example, you might list the negative attributes you want to change as criticism, complaining, screaming at the kids, and fighting. Next, you would list the specific ultimate outcomes and degrees to which you want each one changed; for example:

1. Instead of constant criticism you would like to receive lots of praise and occasional helpful suggestions.
2. Instead of complaining, you’d like to see appreciation
3. Instead of screaming at the kids, you would like your mate to correct them with a firm but softer tone of voice.
4. Instead of fighting, you’d like to be able to discuss differences of opinion in a more respectful manner.

Next, list the tasks involved in pursuing these ultimate outcomes; for example:

1. Make personal changes you need to make to be an example to your mate (such as replacing your own criticism of your mate with praise; using softer tones of voice and avoiding accusations to keep arguments from escalating into fights; correcting your kids without expressing anger).
2. Determine what you want to say to your mate on each issue and create a positive way to say it.
3. Assign a time for discussing each issue.

Reconsider your definition and vision for each area of success, evaluating the personal challenge that vision requires.

Starting with your general vision, and then working through each specific item you’ve written down, ask two questions:

Is the personal challenge great enough to require a stretch mentally, emotionally, spiritually, or physically?

Is meeting the challenge possible, considering the situation and the internal and external resources available?

If your vision of success does not require enough personal challenge to stretch you, there will be little satisfaction or lasting benefit in achieving that success. If that is the case, this is the time to revise your goal upward. In our example, instead of defining a successful marital relationship as “one that isn’t emotionally draining,” you might want to redefine success as “a marital relationship that is emotionally fulfilling.” Add to the lists you made above those attributes or qualities that would transform the relationship from an emotional drain to one that is satisfying and fulfilling.

If, on the other hand, you look at your general vision and your specific lists and the personal challenge requires significant stretching, you need to look at both the general vision and specific lists in terms of the internal and external resources available to you. For example, if you’ve begged your mate a hundred times to stop criticizing you and the criticisms have only increased, you may deduce that one more request is not likely to change anything. So now you have to consider your vision of that ultimate outcome in light of both the internal and external resources available to you. On the internal side, do you have the ability to create and use an emotional word picture that would help your mate understand how his or her criticism makes you feel? Or do you have the patience to handle a gradual reduction of criticism?

On the external side, Can you get your mate to visit a marriage counselor with you? Can you get your mate to watch Gary Smalley’s “Hidden Keys to Loving Relationships” videos? Or can you recruit the help of friends or family?

Achieving anything significant in life always requires recruiting external resources. Whether it’s enlisting the help of a marriage counselor, borrowing from a bank, or gaining wisdom and encouragement from a mentor or partner, achieving maximum success in any area of our life requires outside sources of help. To think you can maximize your success without outside help means your goals are too low or you’re not being realistic. Show me anyone in America who has achieved significant success in any area of life, and I’ll show you tremendous outside resources that were called on to achieve that success.

If you have reconsidered your vision for success in light of the personal challenge required and the internal and external resources available to you, and determined that achieving it is impossible, don’t lower your sights or vision yet. That may ultimately be necessary but not until you have applied the next two keys.

Find, recruit, and utilize the external sources necessary to achieve maximum success in a given area.

If your vision of success seems out of reach in light of the internal and external resources available to you, your next step toward success is to find, recruit, and effectively utilize the external sources that will enable you to achieve your vision.

First, you have to identify as many possible external sources as you can, in both general and specific terms. So for your marriage, in general terms your list might include the following:

1. Minister or other church counselors
2. Licensed marriage and family therapists
3. Books on marriage or relationships
4. Videotapes on marriage or relationships
5. Other couples that you and your mate respect
6. Mutually respected family members.

Once your general list is completed, get specific and write down the names or titles of the external resources that fall into each general category you’ve listed. This may take a little or a lot of research. For example, there are probably dozens or even hundreds of therapists in your city, but how do you know who the good ones are? That’s where the work comes in. Do your homework, whether it’s seeking referrals or reading book or tape reviews.

Now that you’ve identified your possible external resources, you have to recruit their help. If it’s a counselor, that means a phone call or a visit; if it’s a book, it means a trip to the bookstore. In business, whether you’re trying to enlist the help of a banker, a mentor, or a partner, you’re going to have to create an effective presentation (oral, written, or both) in order to recruit a worthy resource. Strategies and Tips for Creating Irresistible Sales Presentations and Ad Campaigns on page 104 gives you the essence of the elements necessary to a good presentation. If you’re thinking in terms of recruiting partners or mentors, you should review the “Notebook for Success” section of Chapters 4 and 5.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

A Millionaire’s Notebook: How Ordinary People Can Achieve Extraordinary Success

Related Articles:
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What You Need to Achieve Success is Within You

adidas Business Strategies

Innocent — Fri, 14 May 2010 10:10:55 +0000

adidas Business Strategies

The success story of adidas throws up valuable strategies and keys to business success for business managers and entrepreneurs to use for their business.

Here they are:

Starting Business With Little Or Nothing

With knowledge of what to do, the right attitude, focus, determination to succeed and creativity, you can start a business with little or no money. You will be able to discover free or almost free resources you never thought existed.

Adi didn’t have the needed materials to make shoes from, or the electricity to produce his products, but he never allowed that challenge to stop him. With the right attitude he scavenged for materials and creatively made footwear of high value from them.

Marketing Skill Is Needed

To succeed in business does not stop at knowing how to create high quality products, knowing how to sell them is equally important, if not more. Without the ability to sell, your income is stunted, and your business suffers – you need good cash flow to your business for it to be vibrant. To ensure this, you should learn marketing, and continue to find effective strategies to market and sell your products.

Adi’s success in taking adidas to the top of the industry globally is attributed in no small measure to his marketing genius, which enabled him to create innovative marketing campaigns repeatedly.

Continuing To Be Creative And Innovative

To be able to beat the competition and remain top in your industry, you cannot afford not to keep been creative and innovative in your business. With such character, you will always be ahead of the competition.

adidas domination of the global sports shoes industry in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, was the high creativity and innovation in product creation and marketing that it continually churned out.

Market Penetration Strategy

To get into a market newly, an effective strategy you can use is to give out your product for free to some of your target customers for them to sample or test it. This allows you to prove to them what you believe your product will do for its users, and for them to compare it with what is obtainable in the industry and see which is better. This strategy is cheaper and more effective than trying to force your product down their throat using advertising.

This was the strategy that Adi employed, and which worked like magic. Seeing Jesse Owens run and clinch four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games on adidas shoes was enough to make every athlete the world over want to wear it too.

Establish Solid Succession

If you are the owner of your business, you should begin to lay a solid foundation for the business to continue running even after you are no longer there as soon as the business takes shape. It is not wise to put family members who are unqualified and unmotivated in management positions; they will definitely ruin the business. Instead, employ qualified and result-oriented professional managers to run it. With a management system in place, you can be rest assured that the business will continue running after you may have gone to the great beyond.

adidas fell from its glory in the 1980s after the death of its founder, Adi, as a result of his family members in management positions fighting over the control of the business. Perhaps the business would have since died also if it hadn’t been sold and managed by professional managers.

Cutting Costs

To be able to compete effectively, especially in an industry where competition is high, you really need to watch and find ways to cut your costs. If your competitors are selling at lower price and still keep their quality than you because they have found a way to produce at lower cost, you will be losing your market share in no time.

Cutting your costs does not only enable you to sell at competitive price, it also allows you to make good profit, and be healthy.

Part of the strategies that brought adidas out of the woods was its new management’s cost cutting program, which included moving their production to Asia where costs were less.

Read adidas Business Success Story here

Recommended

Put your business on the path to success with a solid plan created with Business Plan Pro Software .

Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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How adidas Was Created From Waste Materials To World’s No.1 Sports Shoes Manufacturer

Innocent — Thu, 13 May 2010 19:45:47 +0000

How adidas Was Created From Waste Materials To World’s No.1 Sports Shoes Manufacturer

The success story of adidas is an amazing grass to grace story. From practically scavenging for raw materials and turning them into valuable footwear, the Dassler family, led by Adi, from the laundry of their house, created and turned adidas into world’s largest maker of sports goods.

It’s a story that will fire you up as entrepreneur, or business manager, knowing that with quality ideas, focus, perseverance, and determination to succeed, nothing can stand on your way to success.

The creation of adidas can be traced to the early 1900s when Adi Dassler started a little shoe-making business at the back of his mother’s wash kitchen in Herzogenaurach, Bavaria, Germany, after returning from World War I. Though a trained baker, his baking skill however offered him little chance of getting a job at the time. Therefore, turning to his innate exceptional craftsmanship, he began making shoes.

Because the country was just coming out from war, shoe-making materials were practically unavailable. To keep his business going therefore, he resorted to using materials from old tires, helmets, army tents, tank materials, and rucksacks, which he could scavenge. Also, to keep his business going in the face of poor electricity supply at the time, the innovative and creative Adi built a shoe trimmer and other equipment powered by a stationary bicycle.

His first shoes were bedroom slippers that had soles made from used tires. However, for his deep love for sports, he later converted the slippers into distinctive lightweight gymnastics and soccer shoes with nailed-on cleats. Demands for the shoes rose astronomically, reaching 100 pairs a day in 1926. With the huge demand, the company was able to build a factory, and Adi’s brother, Rudi, and his father quit their jobs to join him, and the business became known as the Dassler Brothers Shoe Factory.

Adi wasn’t only an expert shoe-maker; he was also a master marketer, whose goal was not only to sell his shoes in Germany or Europe, but the whole world. And his major strategy to achieving this goal was to expose his shoes at the Olympics by persuading athletes to wear them for free and to observe improvement in their performance.

This was a new marketing strategy which Adi was bringing to the industry, and which shot up his company’s sales after the German team to the 1928 Olympics wore his shoes. In the following Olympics in Los Angelis, athletes who wore Dassler shoes all won metals, an observation that brought the Dassler brand name to be synonymous with victory in the minds of athletes.

Then came the 1936 Olympics, an opportunity Adi would never miss to once again show his shoes to the world and intensify the association with winning that his shoes were impressing on the minds of athletes worldwide.

When the Games started, Adi drove to the Olympic village with a suitcase full of spikes and convinced Jesse Owens, U.S. sprinter, to use Dassler shoes in the competition. With Owens winning four gold medals running on Dassler shoes, which the world saw, demands from national teams, trainers, and individual athletes from all over the world for Dassler shoes skyrocketed. The company’s sales drove to 200,000 pairs yearly before World War II broke out.

The company’s factory was commandeered by German forces to produce boots for its soldiers during the war. When the war ended, Adi and his brother were again to start scavenging for materials to use in rebuilding their shoe making business. They cleverly made use of materials from old American tank as soles and army tents as canvas.

Not long after, a bitter quarrel broke out between Adi and Rudi, which led to their separation in 1948, with Rudi going ahead to set up a competing shoe-making business, Puma, which he initially called Ruda. With the brothers agreeing that neither of them should use the Dassler brand name, Adi initially named his Addas before changing it to adidas.

Both companies prospered to become global businesses, however under the leadership of the brilliant, innovative, creative, and marketing genius Adi, adidas grew in the mid 1900s to become the world’s largest and fastest selling sports shoes manufacturer.

Adidas led the global industry for two principal reasons: Adi’s ability to continually create high quality and innovative shoes that kept its competitors far behind, and his profound marketing savvy.

Some of his landmark inventions included, the first shoes designed for ice, and the first multi-studded shoes; his improvement on soccer boot. For decades before 1957, the design of soccer boots was such that they had metal studs mounted in leather. This made them heavy, especially when they are wet. But Adi changed that. His design used nylon sole and molded rubber studs, which resulted in light, and durable shoes, which was launched in 1957. Not long, rival shoe manufacturer, including Puma began copying the innovation.

Another remarkable innovation Adi brought to the industry that took adidas to the world’s number one position was the launch of its screw-studded soccer shoe, which enabled players to change worn out cleats or replace cleats with longer or shorter types depending on the nature of the pitch they are playing. This helped the German national football team to defeat the more favored Hungarian side by 3-2 on a wet, muddy pitch, at the World Soccer Championship in Bern, Switzerland in 1954.

Following this triumph that was facilitated by the innovative soccer boot, the demand for it soared – about 2000 pairs were demanded daily.

Then came the invention Adi declared was his best contribution to the game of soccer. At 77 years in 1978, Adi, recognizing that players spend about 90 percent of their time on the pitch running, rather than kicking the ball, invented an ultralight soccer boot with sole like sprint shoe. The boot also had orthopedic footbed, and wider positioning of the studs to enable better traction. Since the FIFA World Cup was holding in Argentina that year, the boot was also designed to counter the weight-increasing effects of the humid Argentine climate. At that World Cup where it was first used, almost all the participating teams wore it.

Adi is also credited for been the first to introduce the practice of selling branded sports bags and clothing, which is now a common practice with athletic shoe manufacturers.

The company’s excellent marketing strategies well complemented its innovative product creation. Following its strategy of using the Olympic Games to expose its shoes to global audience, adidas, in the 1956 Olympic Games gave away its shoes to competing athletes for free, and at the end of the Games, athletes who wore adidas shoes won a massive 72 medals and broke 33 records. Seeing this, sports teams from all over the world wanted to wear adidas.

At the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo, athletes who wore adidas-shod cleared 80 percent of the total medal. With athletes wearing adidas shoes winning medals upon medals at the Olympics, and other major world Games and sports, adidas became and remained number one throughout the 1950s, 60s, and 70s the world over.

The brand entered and took over the leadership of the U.S. athletic shoe market in the 1950s; and expanded globally in the 1960s and 70s. As the 1970s closes, adidas was selling about 200,000 pairs of its shoes per day in over 150 countries, with 24 factories in 17 countries. The company’s other product lines, including jerseys, track suits, balls, shorts, and athletic bags were equally leaders in their niches.

However, with Adi’s death later in 1978, shortly after his ultralight soccer shoe invention, the fortunes of adidas started nose-diving, no thanks to the weak management team that took over the rein of the company. Adidas management team, which consisted mainly of Adi’s relations, did not have the creativity, innovativeness, marketing skill, and determination to continue leading the industry. And with the strong and aggressive marketing strategies from competitors, such as Nike Inc. and Reebok Inc. mounting, the company found itself lagging behind.

To compound adidas’s problem, family members started fighting over control of the company, causing it to lose more grounds to its competitors, as well as recording financial losses before they sold it for just $289 million in 1989 to a French businessman and politician Bernard Tapie.
Tapie sold the company in 1993 to a group of European investors for $371 million. The new owners implemented a number of severe cost-cutting and reorganization strategies, including moving production to Asia, and increasing marketing budget to 11 percent from 6 to increase brand visibility.

The changes produced positive result for adidas, with profit gradually climbing back from DM 117.3 million in 1994 to DM 244.9 million in 1995. From there, adidas began bouncing back to catch up on lost grounds. The company equipped 6,000 athletes from 33 countries to the 1996 Olympics. And at the end of the Games athletes who used adidas’ won 70 gold and a total of 220 medals.

By sponsoring certain world sports tournaments, including the 1998 Soccer World Cup, and the Women’s World Cup in 1999, adidas achieved high global visibility, which it will equally get later this year as the official apparel sponsor of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. And by making certain strategic acquisitions, such as the purchase of the Salomon Group in 1997, and Reebok in 2006, adidas was set to compete favorably and regain its number one position in the years to come.

Read adidas Business Success Strategies here

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Forex On Five Hours A Week: How To Make Money Trading On Your Own Time - Raghee Horner

Innocent — Sat, 08 May 2010 00:19:06 +0000

Forex On Five Hours A Week: How To Make Money Trading On Your Own Time
By Raghee Horner

Would you like to trade forex only for a few hours a week and still make good profit? Do you have a full time job, and have been wondering how you could add forex trading to it without disturbing your job? If that described you, then you have to listen to Raghee Horner.

Raghee is top class forex trader and teacher who has helped hundreds of people with her effective and profit pulling trading systems. And in her book, Forex On Five Hours A Week: How To Make Money Trading On Your Own Time she pours out her proven strategies to help anyone make lots of profit trading forex only for a couple of hours in a week.

This book will not only help you increase your income through trading forex, it will also save you time for other things. Here is an excerpt from it, enjoy!

Keep Your Trading In Perspective!

I don’t know about you, but I have never wanted to work on Wall Street, or in an exchange, or for a bank, or to be a fund manager, or manager other people’s money for that matter (by the way, I tried it and hated it). That’s not to say those are not important or fulfilling jobs. It’s just that I have never been much of an employee. I’ve always wanted to work for myself, and that really is just my way of saying I want to dictate when and how hard I work.

You’re probably not that different from me. Who doesn’t want that freedom? That’s what trading is to me, freedom. There are plenty of ways to make good living in this world. But I can’t throw a 90 mile-an-hour fast ball, I can’t sing or dance, and I always kick myself for not thinking of putting bird seed in a balloon and selling it as a stress reliving grip ball. Oh well.

So, it ain’t just the money! Trust me when I tell you that trading is the hardest way to make an easy living I can think of.
You don’t need to trade forex full time to start making money

I am part-time trader. I think that people who are employed as traders are professional traders or full-time traders, but there goes your freedom out the window. I have never been great at answering to anyone as my mother will attest. And I do like to sleep in from time to time, as a few of my friends will attest when they have called me in the morning only to wake me up.

So really by that definition I am a part-time trader and darn proud of it. Does that mean that I treat my trading as a hobby? Definitely not! But consider that forex, which is the main topic of this book, is a 24-hour market. I don’t know about you, but I like to sleep, cook, train, golf, play a little Wii, read a book, maybe write a book, talk with friends, do a little blogging, dive, ride my motorcycle, go out to lunch with friends, go fishing, travel, you know, have a life! So obviously there are going to be times that I can’t be in front of my computer and more often, don’t want to be!

Let me tell you now that I was not always so enlightened. When I first started getting into trading, I was totally addicted. Addicted to the action, the charting, getting my hands on everything and anything trading related, and going at it 16 hours a day. No joke. And I’ll tell you the whole tale later, but suffice to say, I’m a chart junkie. My trading wasn’t better with my eyes glued to dual monitors. My friendships weren’t better, and I’m pretty sure my husband thought I had lost my mind. Although he still might be holding that opinion.

So, I eventually unplugged and embraced the life of a part-time trader. You can and should do the same.
There are a few things that will make it clear once you understand them. Just a few simple things are all you are going to need. I will show you how use time frames to your advantage as well as the prime trading times for each pair. I’m going to lay it all out for you.

The forex is a 24-hour market, so do full-time traders ever sleep?
Okay, so now you may be thinking, “Raghee, won’t I miss trades if I only watch the market part-time?”
And I will answer, “Yeah. You, me, and everyone else.”

Even full-time traders have to sleep, eat and well… you know. And believe me when I tell you that I have known quite a few traders with computers in their restroom. So trading forex is all about picking your spots and knowing when the market is most likely to move. This luckily is not completely unpredictable. Markets, like people, have a natural daily rhythm. As a trader, I count on it. In many ways, trading forex is the trading the opinions of seven different financial centers: Sydney, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore, Frankfurt, London and New York.

These seven represents the major financial centers around the world, and each has its own psychology, volatility, liquidity, and rhythm. You can find a time to trade. It’s really going to be more a function of your personal schedule. I will tell you though that all financial centers are not equal. Some are more important (New York) and larger (London) than others. Since the six most traded pairs are U.S. dollars – correlated (they reflect strength or weakness versus the greenback) - EUR/USD, USD/JPY, GRP/USD, USD/CHF, USD/CAD, AUS/USD – the “best” trading time is the overlap between Frankfurt, London and New York. Which makes the forex “prime time” 1AM. EST to noon EST. What if you can’t be in front of your computer then? I’ll show you how to trade it anyway, and that goes for any financial center. With proper and well-thought out order entry and a firm grasp of time frames you can handle just about any market.

Employee Mindset

When you become a trader, you become your own boss. Now for entrepreneurs or those of you with a natural entrepreneurial spirit, this will not be a major adjustment. For those of you who have been employed by someone else for most of your adult life – I won’t kid you – that first step is a lulu.

Traders live in the results economy, which is to say that we get paid not for time spent doing something but for results and results only. Believe me when I tell you that eh market does not care one bit that you or I spent six months or a year learning how to trade, or that we spent the better part of an evening analyzing charts or news and fundamentals or that you got up at 2A.M.to trade Europe. Notice I didn’t say “we” in that last sentence, because I just don’t get up at those silly hours of the morning. Not being rewarded for effort and time is difficult for many new traders, and the lack of return for the hours can be very frustrating for the unprepared. So here I am – preparing you.

This is a particularly tough habit for people with the employee mindset to overcome because time spent doing something is the measuring stick they are familiar with. If that isn’t enough, there are other considerations, too.

It Is Not About Simplicity

It’s not my objective to make trading sound simple and easy, because it’s not. It’s not because the skill is particularly difficult, but rather that we humans love to complicate everything. There are challenges to trading just as in any other skill you are trying to acquire. I mean really, who here plays golf? Could anything be harder or more painful with the exception of childbirth? If you don’t practice what I am going to teach you or think you are going to buy a piece of software that tells you what to do, then seriously, please give this book to some who is going to use it.

All I am telling you is what I have learned the hard way. A smart person learns from her own mistakes. A wise person learns from the mistakes of others.

Accumulation is one of two varieties of sideways markets. You’ll have an easy time knowing the difference once you understand the psychology behind it. Accumulation is the quiet market – it’s on the back burner. There’s likely little news or traders are waiting on news and no one wants to be the tall poppy. The range is narrow as the market creeps along sideways. What’s narrow? Remember, narrow is relative to the market’s current range and typical personality. Each pair has a unique price action behavior so what would be narrow on, for example, the USD/CAD can be very different when compared to the GBP/USD.

Where Is The market Moving To?

When you look at accumulation markets, the Wave should be sideways or traveling at what I call “three o’clock.” That’s right, just like the minute hand on your watch or a clock. When the Wave is traveling sideways you have a visual confirmation of the fact that prices are not trending higher or lower but rather have found a balance between support (buyers) and resistance (sellers).

Distribution is the second type of sideways market. The psychology behind distribution is not as simple as that of accumulation as the psychology behind it involves two distinct groups. Most commonly distribution is associated with the exhaustion of an uptrend and the turmoil often seen once a group of traders exit the markets as another group buys into the selling. What is different however is the fact that the move essentially is over or at stalling and therefore the market cycle “turns over” from the trend to a sideways direction.

Since there is not a bullish bias in forex as there is in stocks and futures, and by bullish bias I mean a predisposition to buy and look for an increase in the value of the market, you can also find distribution at the end of a downtrend as well. Again, it is simply representative of one group of traders exiting the market while another gets in, believing the trend is still in place. Regardless of where the cycle occurs, it is very much the collision that creates a more volatile and wider range. When the market enters distributions, the main difference you will notice, as compared to accumulation, is the volatility.

The Wave will be sideways but can travel not only at the three o’clock angle but also at what is known as “two to four o’clock angle.”

How To Trade Timing With Signals

Two to four o’clock angles are unique to distribution and are more easily identified by what they are not rather than what they are. Let me explain. If a market is trending, it will be doing so at either a twelve to two or four to six o’clock angle. We already know accumulation is three o’clock. This means that its price action is sideways and the Wave is attempting to transition to three o’clock but is unsuccessful. We can be on the lookout for the two to four o’clock angle. It can’t be flat, and it can’t be trending. So essentially, it is a process or elimination, and we identify this two to four o’clock by what is not.

A few other things to look out for on sideways markets, whether it be accumulation or distribution, is solid support or resistance. “Solid” simply means that the touchpoints that make up the horizontal or static level are within five pips or less. More than five pips and the level can still be considered static, but now it would be “soft.”
How To Move Over Profit

Transitions between any of the four cycles are probably the toughest to deal with. These transitions will look as though one cycle is ending and another is possibly beginning. This is where you are most likely to want to have some sort of definitive way of saying that a new cycle is now set. But it’s not that easy. It’s not going to be easy as my saying count three candles and if all three are traveling at the set clock angle you can say the transition is complete.

But I just did, but that’s not all I want you to do. It’s more than the mechanics of counting candles. You must develop a fell for the rhythm of the market, I know with time ad practice you will. The market is just for the mysterious. It’s not more mysterious than human behavior, and while humans are certainly entertaining, we’re nothing if not predictable, and thus so is the market.

Mastering The Trends

Mark up is just a fancy way of saying uptrend. Uptrends should be defined by support, which is a series of lower highs. Support is the key to maintaining an uptrend even within the context of pullbacks. Pullbacks or corrections are part of a healthy trend, and it’s these moves lowering within an uptrend that actually help perpetuate it. Think about it a moment. If you are waiting for an opportunity to buy into an uptrend, first I must say “kudos” because most people just buy the new highs and that is not an effective way to enter a trend. But if you are one of those smart and patient few who wait for a correction to enter a trend, then you know by your acting – buying into the market – you are in effect supporting the uptrend.

An uptrend can be identified by the Wave traveling up at twelve to two o’clock. Once the trend is underway, it will probably seem unnecessary to confirm an uptrend with the Wave, but please do not let your guard down. It’s the slight nuance in the Wave, the transitions I explained earlier, that are so important to notice. The initial sign of an uptrend, its very earliest states are probably the most difficult to recognize without assistance of a visual tool like the Wave. So make and keep the good habit: confirm all trends consistently – no matter how obvious the trend may look – with the Wave’s clock angle.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

Forex On Five Hours A Week: How To Make Money Trading On Your Own Time

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Siemens Business Strategies

Innocent — Sat, 01 May 2010 05:55:49 +0000

Siemens Business Strategies

Here are the keys and business strategies that have made Siemens A.G. one of the most successful companies in the world from the start-up that it was 163 years ago when it was formed.

Having An Eye For Profitable Business Opportunities

Opportunities to make good profit in your business will always come, but what is important is your ability to recognize it. There are different ways opportunities can come; it can be through contact with certain people or businesses, inventions, and technological breakthrough. You need to develop the ability to see opportunities so you can seize them.

One key to Siemens’ success story has been its ability to see great business opportunities before others. It quickly developed improved variety to Graham Bell’s telephone when it realized the huge market of the telephone. It was also the first to secure patent for an X-ray tube in 1896.

Make Your Business Flexible

To be able to quickly respond to the ever frequent change in people’s needs, taste, and technology, your business needs to be flexible enough to continue to serve the new needs of its customers, else it could be made irrelevant with the change.

Siemens flexibility and ability to quickly change its operations to create fresh in demand products in different high-growth industries, including electric power engineering, communication, and healthcare have greatly accounted for its success over the decades.

Remaining Creative And Innovative

Successful companies are creative and innovative. They are able to churn out highly valuable products ahead of the competition.

Siemens’ ability to create innovative products took it to the top of its industries. It created the disc seal triode that was used in the transmitter of Mariner IV in the mid-1960s; high-speed passenger train in 1965, and other numerous innovative products.

Joint Ventures Can Bring Huge Benefits

Partnering with other businesses can be a great way to get into new markets or to achieve certain goals cheaper and more conveniently.

The joint venture between Siemens and Allis Chalmers in 1977 was the catalyst that shot Siemens to the world number two position in electrical manufacturing (according to a 1978 article in Fortune).

Read Siemens Success Story here

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Siemens AG: From Small Workshop To Global Company

Innocent — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 18:56:31 +0000

Siemens AG: From Small Workshop To Global Company

From a small beginning 163 years ago, Siemens AG has steadily grown over the decades into one of the world’s largest companies, with presence in more than 190 countries; asserting its leadership in the information and communications, automation and control, power, medical solutions, transportation and lighting industries.

Its business success story does not only inspire and motivates, it also provides valuable lessons for entrepreneurs and business managers to discover the keys and strategies that have made its gigantic success possible, and to apply on their own business.

Siemens AG, as it is known today was founded in 1847 in Berlin by the duo of Werner Von Siemens, and J.G. Halske. The business, which began in a small back building workshop was to exploit the booming telegraphic communication system industry by producing and installing telegraphic systems. It was known as Siemens & Halske, and was driven mainly by Siemens, a former artillery officer in the Prussian army, and an engineer who already had a profitable patent for electroplating.

The business grew steadily, and in 1853, only six years after its establishment, it won a contract to build a massive telegraph system in Russia. The following year, the company’s London office participated in developing the first successful deep sea telegraphic cable, leading to the office becoming a full fledged independent company with its name changed to Siemens Brothers by 1865.

Siemens Brothers prospered. It landed a contract to build an 11,000-kilometer telegraph line linking London to Calcutta, which was finished in 1870. The next year, it built a telegraph line from London to Tehran. To facilitate its efficiency and power to deliver, Siemens Brothers acquired its own cable laying ship in 1874, which it named Faraday and laid the first direct transatlantic cable from Ireland to the United States the following year.

With Alexander Graham Bell’s new telephone reaching Berlin for the first time in 1877, and realizing the huge market for the product, Werner Siemens quickly developed an improved variety, secured its patent and began producing it. As the 1880s emerged, Siemens & Halske, using the knowledge of dynamo electric principle, which Werner Siemens discovered, developed and produced electrical lighting and power generating equipment.

In 1892, Werner Siemens died, but this did not stop the company from moving ahead. In the same year, the company built a power station at Erding in Bavaria and established a subsidiary in Chicago, U.S.A, Siemens & Halske Electric Company, which was however shut down in 1904.

With eye for profitable business opportunities from inventions and discoveries to exploit, Siemens & Halske secured the first patent for an X-ray tube in 1896 after Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen discovered the X-ray the previous year.

As the company entered the new century, it showed great flexibility in its operation and product creation, an attribute that was crucial to its continued success in responding to the changing needs of its customers, in a world that was frequently undergoing change.

It set up a subsidiary, Siemens Schuckertwerke GmbH, in 1903 to exploit and focus on the electric power engineering industry. It developed an automatic telephone exchange in Munich to serve 2,500 customers. And when World War I broke out, the company turned its expertise and operations to producing communications devices, fire control system, and aircraft engines for the military. It also made explosives, and gun locks for rifles.

At the end of the War, Siemens lost two of its major foreign subsidiaries. Its St. Petersburg subsidiary in Russia, and Siemens Brothers in Britain were seized by the governments of those countries. Though a very big blow to the parent company at the time, Siemens & Halske soon put the misfortune behind it and started building the company again.

In 1923, the company entered the consumer market by building radio receivers, and realizing the emergence of Japan as industrial power, it established a subsidiary, Fusi Denk, later known as Fuji Electric in Tokyo, Japan.

The decade brought Siemens & Halske great deals. The company won contacts to construct a power station on the Shannon River in Ireland in 1925; construct hydroelectric power station for the Soviet government in 1927; and built railway network in suburban Berlin in 1928. As the decade closes, Siemens & Halske was clearly the market leader in the electrical manufacturing industry in Germany, producing one-third of the industry’s output.

During the great depression of the early 1930s, the company was compelled in order to remain financially solvent to halve its dividend, and cut down large number of its employees.

Having been devastated by the Second World War, Siemens & Halske gradually got back to business. By the early 1950s, the company had started once again to produce railroad, medical, telephone, and power generating equipment, in addition to consumer electronics products.

And in the middle of 1950s, the company set up a subsidiary in New York, Siemens Inc., in 1954. It entered the fast growing data processing and nuclear power industries, introducing its first mainframe computer in 1955, and launched its first nuclear reactor at Munich Garching in 1959.

The company continued to be creative and innovative through the 1960s. Its disc seal triode was used in the transmitter of the American space probe Mariner IV in the mid-1960s; it launched its 03 high-speed passenger train in 1965; and started constructing the first nuclear power station in South America in Argentina.

In 1966, the company was reorganized, and the name changed from Siemens & Halske to Siemens A.G. It formed a joint venture with Allis Chalmers, an American engineering company in 1977 to market turbine generators in the United States.

This union was so successful for Siemens that it quickly moved to the top of world market dominance in electrical manufacturing. According to a Fortune’s article in 1978, Siemens had become the second largest electrical manufacturer in the world only behind General Electric. By the close of the decade, Siemens worldwide sales amounted to DM 10 billion.

To keep pace with, and become a world leading business in high technology in the 1980s, Siemens’s strategy was to acquire relevant businesses, and invest heavily on research and development - It spent $24 billion for this. It acquired Rolm Systems from IBM, which was the third largest supplier of PBX telephone switching equipment in North America.

Entering the globalization era of the 1990s required Siemens to reorganize by changing its slow, and predictable corporate culture to be able to quickly exploit high-growth market particularly in Asia, and be more competitive with Japanese companies.

To achieve this, the company, under the leadership of Dr. Heinrich von Pierer took the following measures: replaced the company’s hierarchical structure and engineering focus with a new emphasis on innovation and service; managers in local markets were given power to cut cost and bid for projects; younger generation of managers in their 40s were appointed; workforce was reduced by 7.5 percent; operating expenses were reduced by $3.6 billion by 1995; and non-core businesses were sold for $2 billion.

The company was being positioned to be flexible and changing, to be able to swiftly respond to change in technology and customer needs. Siemens continued to restructure into the 21st century to remain profitable and more competitive.

Today, Siemens is Europe’s largest engineering company in three main business sectors, including Industry, Energy, and Healthcare, employing about 420,800 people in over 190 countries.

Discover Siemens Business Success Strategies

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How to Overcome Low Self-esteem

Innocent — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 11:25:00 +0000

How to Overcome Low Self-esteem

Low self-esteem will not allow you to bring out your full potential and achieve success in life. It’s a problem that has kept many people below their true abilities and life’s worth, which has robbed them of fulfillment and happiness.

Achieving success in any area of life requires having a high level of self-esteem. No one can achieve anything worthwhile if they don’t believe they are good enough to achieve it. People with low self-esteem always put themselves down, thinking other people are always better.

With high self-esteem, you are confident of yourself; and with confidence and belief in your ability, you can set big goals, and put plans in place to realize them. This is why employers and those needing business partners will not hire or like to associate with people of low self-esteem – they are never in the ranks of top achievers.

No doubt, you need to build self-esteem if you desire a life of success and accomplishment, and I want to help you get there. Here are six ways to overcome low self-esteem and transform yourself from low to super achiever.

1. Accept Your Self the Way You Are

A major reason why people suffer low self-esteem in their lives is that they are ashamed of certain things in their lives. It could be their physical appearance, environment, and family background, or it could be past experiences. They feel what they have, where they came from, and who they are do not measure up with what they see in other people. So they live their lives trying to be other people so that they can be accepted.

It is low self-esteem that drives some people to try to change their physical appearance to amend parts of their bodies they are not happy about through complicated, life threatening plastic surgery, even when there is no medical reason to do so.

You have one life to live, so don’t allow low self-esteem to stop you from living it to the fullest. You must accept yourself as you are. Don’t try to be someone else. Don’t see any defect or limitation in your physical, mental, and psychological makeup. Know that you are uniquely created, with special abilities different from anyone else, irrespective of your family background, or where you came from.

It is a scientific fact that there are no two human beings that are exactly alike, not even identical twins. So crush low self-esteem by being yourself.

2. Don’t Worry About Being Accepted

Another thing that makes some people succumb to low self-esteem is the fear that their views and actions might be rejected by their friends, associates, or people around them. They fear they may be laughed at for expressing contrary views. And this fear goes to implant the false notion that they are not intelligent, smart, or creative enough in their minds.

Don’t expect that everyone will accept you or your views. There is no single person the world over who is loved by everyone that knows them. There are people who will like you for who you are, and the views you hold. On the other hand, there will be people who will not like you, no matter how good you might be. This is absolutely natural, and you must never worry yourself or recline to low self-esteem if some people don’t believe in you – don’t stop expressing yourself.

3. Accept Responsibility for Your Actions

People with low self-esteem will tend to shift responsibility for their actions to others. They will blame other people or things for their misfortunes and failures, and will never consider they could be the one with the fault.

To overcome low self-esteem, and build your confidence high, you need to start taking full responsibility for your actions. If you try achieving a goal and you didn’t succeed, take responsibility for the failure, and think out another plan to fixing it the next time. With this attitude, your low self-esteem is eliminated as you are taking charge of your life.

4. Set Big Goals

Setting and achieving big goals will increase your confidence and wipe off low self-esteem from your life. The process of planning and executing worthwhile goals will bring out your creative energy and special abilities. And as you see yourself achieving the goals, you will be proud of yourself. You will experience happiness and fulfillment, and your confidence and self-worth will soar.

So crush low self-esteem today by setting worthwhile goals for different areas of your life.

5. Take Care of Your Health

Low self-esteem can also result when you are not happy with your health situation. Take good care of your health by maintaining healthy habits like exercising, eating nutritious foods (more natural foods and little or no factory processed foods), resting, and sleeping well.

When you are in good health, your energy level and confidence is high; you feel good about yourself, leaving no room for low self-esteem.

6. Program Your Mind against Low Self-esteem

This is a very important way to prevent and eliminate low self-esteem from your life. I once read somewhere that, “the mind is a terrible thing to waste,” and I have since been careful about what I feed my mind. If you constantly allow your mind to be dominated by negative and limiting suggestions, ideas, information, opinions, and views, you will start believing it, and soon low self-esteem will set in.

When a limiting suggestion, like “you are not good looking enough”, is said to you, don’t think about it all day and all week, because if you do, you will definitely see reasons to believe it’s true, and low self-esteem will come in.

Instead, replace the view with a positive affirmation, which can be, “I’m beautiful and wonderfully made”, and say this to yourself several times a day. Look into the mirror and declare to yourself, “I’m beautiful and wonderfully made,” and low self-esteem will never have room to stay in your life.

Again, I repeat, “the mind is a terrible thing to waste”, don’t ever allow negative and limiting utterances of some people about you to take root in your mind. You must protect it by turning the negative utterance into the opposite positive affirmation. If someone says you are not smart enough, you don’t start thinking about it; you turn it into “I’m smart and intelligent”. Each time you look in the mirror you say, “YOUR NAME, you are smart and intelligent!”

Never allow low self-esteem in your life, crush it to dust with the powerful ideas I’ve just shared with you; build your confidence, and live in your highest creative energy, and ability. Achieve your goals and enjoy the feeling of accomplishment.

I will love to hear from you, please leave your comments, suggestions, or questions about this article.

Do You Desire Success in Life?

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8 Ways Your Business Can Survive Economic Recession

Innocent — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 17:07:02 +0000

8 Ways Your Business Can Survive Economic Recession

Many businesses close shop during periods of economic recession than any other time. This is not surprising since individuals and companies generally cut down on their expenses, or totally forgo certain items they would have bought at other times. This unfortunately reduces the amount of business companies can do, which subsequently brings down their income.

With little money coming in, it can be really tough for a business to survive, especially if it can not also reduce its cost of operation significantly. Here are eight ways you can run your business successfully through the economically lean periods of recession.

Doing Joint Ventures

Joint venture is partnering with one or more people or businesses on a project. This association enables you to achieve the same goal or more, easier, quicker, and at less cost and risk.

There are different projects you can do by joint venture, including product creation, and marketing, and the wonderful thing about it is that it allows you to leverage on the other partner’s resources. Together you will achieve much more at lower shared cost.

Many businesses have not explored the benefits of joint venture, but I tell you, it’s a great way to beat economic recession since you are spending less to achieve the goal. If you were to do it yourself, you will need more funds and personnel, as well as time.

Focusing on Your Main Business

With general drop in business activities and purchases during recession, it is better you concentrate on your major business area that provides the greatest income, rather than dissipating your resources on several businesses that bring in sales in trickles.

Running several branches does not automatically guaranty greater profit for your business. Contrary to this, it may lead to making lose during recession when sales are low and cost of operation high - the total cost of operation from all branches may become higher than sales or income.

Therefore, if your business has grown into several branches and subsidiaries, you may consider restructuring it. Sell off those ones that are no longer profitable or that are yielding little profit, and concentrate on maximizing the full potential of your core, more profitable business.

Cutting Salaries

You should let your staff understand the need for you to cut salaries and save some money to meet operational requirements so as to remain in business. Cutting staff salaries is usually inevitable for the survival of a company having serious dwindling business performance.

Although the staff concerned may not be happy with it, it is still a better choice compared to the business folding up, and some staff will see the need for the action. Besides, this could be a temporary measure, and the situation may change for the better quicker than you think as the business bounces back to profitability.

Cutting Staff

If cutting staff salaries didn’t provide enough savings to keep your business going, then you may consider cutting staff. However, in laying-off some staff, make sure you retain those who have proven record of efficiency, and can do multiple tasks at the same time. This will ensure that the operation of your business is not hampered as a result of the staff cut.

Investing In Technology

Technology helps you to get things done much more easily, conveniently, cheaper, and faster. This will enable you to run your business at lower cost, while also giving you greater productivity.

You need to recognize existing cutting-edge technology that can help you achieve your goals much more quickly and cheaply, and adapt your business to them. For instance, the Internet has provided a great opportunity for businesses to expose their products or services to the whole world, thereby increasing their income potential beyond limit.

Therefore, making the necessary investments to put your business on the Internet is a worthy course.

Prioritizing Your Need

Your earnings are limited during recession; therefore, any dollar you spend should be on items in your top priority. This keeps your focus on the major goals to be achieved, and to avoid wasteful expenditures, or on items that will not contribute to the bottom-line of your business on the short run.

So, you will need to list your needs in order of priority, and guiding your expenditure by this list.

Concentrating On Meeting Short-term Goals

During economy recession, it is better to concentrate your effort in meeting the short-term goals of your business rather than diverting your attention for long-term goals. Your business needs to produce results quickly to keep going, and profitable, and it’s only by meeting short-term goals that can help you stay afloat the recession.

Cutting Expenses

You should generally keep an eye for areas in your business where you can cut cost and save money. You can ask for a downward review of your contract with your suppliers or service providers. You could make some good savings here.

You can review all inputs to your production or operation and note the ones to reduce or completely eliminate. You can also consider selling off or auctioning items which are no longer useful, but which are costing you money to keep or maintain.

There may be other areas specific to your business where you can cut or completely remove cost, the bottom-line is that you need to appraise your business and find areas where you can cut cost significantly, thereby increasing the profit potential of the business.

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Four Must-do Business Start-up Exercises Before Starting A Business

Innocent — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 02:28:48 +0000

Four Must-do Business Start-up Exercises Before Starting A Business

It is a fact that a great percentage of small businesses close shop within three years of starting up, and this is due to a number of reasons. It can be very painful losing one’s business, with all one’s life savings, including loans in some cases, going down the drain, not to add the enormous time and energy one would have put into it, hoping it would succeed.

To avoid getting in the list of “failed business owners”, there are very important exercises or things an aspiring business owner must do before starting the business. These exercises will enable you to see the viability of the business before committing your money and other resources to it. It will also enable you to access yourself to determine if you will be able to run the business successfully or not.

Now here we go:

Assess Yourself

This is perhaps the most important exercise you need to do before ever starting a business. You need to assess your ability, experience, education, knowledge, and skill relevant to running the business in mind. This is no small way crucial to being able to run your business successfully.

If you do not have good experience, knowledge, and skill on the business you wish to do, it is safer not to go into it. If you do, you will most probably lose your initial invested capital because you are surely going to make mistakes that will cost you money, but which you could have avoided if you had some experience, knowledge, and skill about the business.

Even if you have the resources to hire experts or knowledgeable people to run the business for you, your success on it is still brighter if you are knowledgeable and experienced yourself. Indeed, since you are the originator of the business idea, no one can actually realize its success greater than you envisioned it.

You will need to provide the leadership for your team to follow to achieve your set goals. And to lead your team on the right track, you certainly need to have some appreciable experience, knowledge, and skill about the business.

If you haven’t got any experience of the business you want to do, you can get it first from getting a job with a company that’s into it or serve as apprentice for a number of years.

Assess The Environment

Having truly assessed your skill, experience, and knowledge of the business you want to do, and you are okay with it – that’s you have them - the next exercise you need to do is to assess the environment where you want to set up the business to determine if it will be viable there or not.

This is equally a very important thing to do before starting the business if it’s a business that requires people physically coming in to patronize it. A lot of small business owners fail because they never really studied the location where they want to set up their business before they set up shop.

They probably thought with their experience of the business, once they launched their products or services, they would immediately be flooded with orders, only to realize after the launch that there are only a few people in their environment who need their product or service, or that their target customers have little purchasing power, not enough to make the expected income.

A proper assessment of the business location will surely save you from making a terrible mistake setting up a shop only to find the business wouldn’t fly because the environment isn’t right.

To know if the area you want to set up your business in will be viable or not, you can get acquainted with one or two people who are already in the business or closely related business who you can talk with. The information you will need from them should include how much sales they are making each week or month. This will give you an idea about whether the market is big enough there.

Another way to find out the viability of the business where you want to set it up is to be a patron of one or two already existing ones there and observe the flow of customers and what they are asking for. You can take two to four weeks of regular visitation to make your conclusion.

Take Note Of Areas You Can Improve Upon

As you visit and patronize like businesses in that location, you should be taking note of areas in their operations and customer service where you can do better and provide greater customer satisfaction when you set up. This will surely give you a competitive advantage in that locality and help you to build your customer base quickly.

Talk To People Who Have Closed Shop

Another very important thing you can do before setting up a business to know whether it will be profitable or not is to speak to people who have operated the same business before, but have folded up. You will be able to find out from them why they packed up, and the possible pitfalls in the business. This will help you to decide if you can surmount the difficulties or circumstances that led to their failure, and make success of yours, if not, then don’t go ahead with the business.

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Hitachi Business Strategies

Innocent — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 20:43:54 +0000

Hitachi Business Strategies

To be in business for 100 years, surmounting tough challenges and coming out successfully can only be attributed to the strategies and key decisions Hitachi’s management took and acted on over the decades.

Here are the key decisions and strategies that have made Hitachi the huge success that it is today, and which you can adopt in your business too.

Being Confident Of Your Ability

Most people on earth have great capacity to achieve certain tasks, but they are not confident of themselves that they could do it and so never even try. Success in life and business requires believing and applying one’s abilities.

Hitachi was founded based on the absolute belief and confidence Namihei Odaira had for his ability to create certain products that were then heavily imported into Japan. With this confidence he did not only succeed in producing small five-horsepower electric motors, his product could actually compete favorably with imported kinds on quality and durability.

Persevering In Reaching Your Goals

Success doesn’t come on a platter of gold, there will be initial rejections and failures on the way to achieving it, but if you are not overwhelmed by them or quit, you will soon start seeing the ray of success overshadowing you – opportunity for your breakthrough will always emerge somewhere in the future. If you don’t give up before then, you will enter your desired success.

For some years Namihei had only one customer for his electric motors because other companies were already used to the imported kinds and didn’t really think Namihei’s could measure up to them. But Namihei kept on pushing his business until the opportunity came for his product to be tested by large scale buyers, and he didn’t disappoint them.

Anticipating And Preparing For Possible Future Developments

One of the surest strategies to achieving business success is to be able, from past and present experiences, predict the trends and developments your industry may likely experience in the future, and so get your business prepared for it. Because you have taken position, when the future eventually comes and your prediction comes through, you will immediately reap the benefits the new era has in stock before other unprepared businesses start adjusting their operations to also tap into it. This is how discerning companies position themselves to become market leaders in their industries.

The coming of hi-tech industry in the 1950s did not take Hitachi by surprise. The company had well prepared for it when Chikara Kurata, the president, invested heavily on computer research, and instituted a technology exchange with General Electric and RCA.

Flexibility In Your Business Structure And Processes

Change will always take place, and opportunities will present themselves in new dimensions, however if your operating structures are not flexible enough to quickly adapt to the change and new opportunities, your business may be adversely affected, making your business no longer relevant, or shutting it out of great opportunity to make sales.

Hitachi’s operating structure was flexible enough to enable it weather the storm of the OPEC oil crises of 1974. By taking certain necessary cost-cutting measures, and adjusting its operations, it went through the crises successfully.

Recognizing Change And Restructuring Your Business

Many business owners lose their businesses simply because they fail to notice the change that has transformed their industry, and so do not make the necessary changes to their businesses to make them relevant to consumers’ new taste and desires.

You need to be in tune with your industry, and your society and observe the changes that are taking place in technology, consumer behavior, economy, and competition, and to determine how they could be affecting your industry and business. Then you need to make the needed restructuring to put your business in tune with consumers’ present needs.

Hitachi almost lost its business in the late 1980s when it initially failed to realize the changes in its industry that have made industrial equipment and consumer products markets, which were it major businesses, no longer selling. In fact, due to its poor sales, its profit dropped by 29 percent in 1986.

Having recognized it was being sidelined by certain developments, Hitachi, led by Katsushige Mita, immediately took action to redress the situation by restructuring the company’s operations and business strategies.

Read Hitachi Success Story here: The Making Of Japan’s Largest Electronics Manufacturer

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Hitachi - The Making Of Japan’s Largest Electronics Manufacturer

Innocent — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 03:58:09 +0000

Hitachi - The Making Of Japan’s Largest Electronics Manufacturer

Hitachi began in 1910 out of the frustration of a young engineering graduate. Namihei Odaira had just completed his engineering training with the Tokyo Institute of Science and had gotten a job with the Kuhara Mining Company. But soon, Namihei got dissatisfied with his job from seeing the huge dependence his company was having for imported technologies from Europe and the United States.

Confident of his engineering skill to create solutions that can compete favorably with anyone from anywhere, Namihei set out to create small five-horsepower electric motors that stood shoulder-to-shoulder with imported types in both quality and durability.

However, due to the heavy dependence on imports by the Japanese economy at the time, Namihei, for a number of years, couldn’t find another customer for his product except his former employer, but this did not discourage him. Then his breakthrough came during World War I when movement of imported items into Japan was hindered.

A large power company was forced to approach Hitachi when it could not get the three large turbines it had ordered from Germany because of the raging War. Realizing this was the opportunity he had been waiting for to prove his company’s capacity to deliver, Namihei went to work, and in five months produced and delivered the 10,000 horsepower generators requested.

Satisfied with his work, the power company ordered more equipment. Seeing this, other companies followed suit.

In 1920, Namihei incorporated his company and named it after Hitachi, the town where he had made his first sale. Hitachi, which means “rising sun”, grew fast in the midst of the War as the demand for its products increased through the 1920s. To meet the rising demand, the company expanded its operations swiftly by acquiring other companies.

Soon, Hitachi had become Japan’s largest manufacturer of pumps, blowers, and other mechanical equipment. It also got into the metal industry, manufacturing copper cable and rolling stock. And with its building of Japan’s first electric locomotive in 1924, the company ability to help large scale manufacturers meet their equipment needs without foreign reliance was not in doubt.

In the 1950s Chikara Kurata, who replaced Odaira as Hitachi president expanded the company. In anticipation of the coming of electronics he instituted a technology exchange program with General Electric and RCA, and invested heavily on computer research. This saw the company building its own computer and getting into the high tech industry in 1957.

Going stronger, Hitachi produced Japan’s first online computer system in the 1960s, and became the world’s largest producer of analog computers that were used in scientific research to compile complex statistical data. During this era, the company signed licensing agreements with a number of companies to act as their affiliates. By this, Hitachi was able to compete in the global market. Also, in this era, the company started marketing consumer goods, including its own brands of household appliances and entertainment equipment.

Hitachi’s flexibility and ability to adjust to changing economy was seriously tested during the OPEC oil crises of 1974. Japan, which imported close to 95 percent of its energy needs, was heavily affected - its industrial sector, which included Hitachi, was particularly affected.

To surmount the huge challenge, Hitachi embarked on a number of cut-cutting measures, including the company’s executives voluntarily reducing their pay by 15 percent. Except for 1975 when the company recorded a poor financial performance, Hitachi’s sales and profits rose steadily in the following years.

However, for the first time in a decade Hitachi’s profit plummeted in 1986 by 29 percent. This was due to some factors, including the strong Yen at the time, which made its products comparatively more expensive than those from its competitors from Taiwan and Korea, which were already manufacturing at low cost. Other important factors that affected its profits drastically were the decreasing demand for semiconductors, which reduced its sales in that market, and its heavy concentration in mature and low-growth markets.

The two largest markets it was operating – industrial equipment and consumer products – were not yielding much as before. Its big time industrial customers had reduced their purchase as a result of economic recession, and there were now lots of consumer electronic brands in the market backed with superior marketing strategies than Hitachi’s, making the company’s product less choice to customers.

To redress the situation, Hitachi’s new president, Katsushige Mita, in line with his declaration, “We cannot live with tradition alone, I have to make Hitachi a more modern company,” reorganized the company’s operations and business strategies in the mid-80s to be in tune with modern demands and trends.

A number of changes he implemented that brought back Hitachi to the fore of competition included:

Increasing the company’s automation process, which helped to reduce overhead cost significantly, and so enabled the company compete favorably with companies from South-East Asia.

Transfer of production to other countries. This helped the company to escape negative effects arising from the fluctuation in the Yen exchange rate.
Purchase of an American distributor of mainframe computers - National Advanced System (NAS). This helped Hitachi to remarkably increase its share in that market in the U.S.

Increase in the company’s investment in research and development. This enabled Hitachi to remain abreast with current developments in the technological world, and to be creative and innovative in its major business of semiconductors, household electronics, and computers. By the early 1990s, Hitachi had the highest patents in Japan, and created products that were ahead of those of oversea competitors.

But the company’s technological superiority was not reflecting in its earnings growth and profitability throughout the 1990s. In fact, while its profits dropped from ¥230 billion to ¥65 billion from 1991 to 1994, it recorded a net lose of ¥336.92 billion ($3.33 billion) in the 1999 fiscal year.

The reason for this dismal performance was not far-fetched. The company was encumbered with lots of slow-growth, low-margin product lines that were carried over for many decades in its history. With more than 860 subsidiaries, and over 330,000 workers, the company needed massive restructuring by way of huge labor cut, divestment from non performing ventures, and focus only on major profit yielding businesses to remain standing.

And this, Etsuhiko Shoyama, was set out to achieve when he was named the company’s president in April 1999. The company was reorganized into ten divisions, each with its own president whose pay was based on performance; the size of the company’s board of directors was reduced to make decision making faster; a non-performing semiconductor plant in Texas was closed, with 650 people laid off; and some product lines which were no longer much demanded, including mainframe computers, were dropped.

To prevent the continual development of products without appreciable demand, the company’s product developers were mandated to get feedback from its marketing personnel before developing products.

Hitachi also broke its long-held tradition of creating products solely by itself by partnering on specific projects with several of its competitors, such as NEC, United Microelectronics Corporation of Taiwan, Fujitsu, Computer Sciences Corporation of El Segundo, California, Clarity Group, and Fuji Electric Co. Ltd.

It also started acquiring certain well established companies to gain a sizeable portion of the high-tech market in the United States and Japan. One of such companies it bought was the US based e-Business Consulting Group, which it renamed Experio Solutions Corporation.

No doubt, Hitachi’s restructuring efforts have saved the company from dwindling profitability, and drifting into irrelevance with the changes that have transformed its industry. Today, it is more focused on businesses it had competitive advantage, as well as on market-oriented approach, which enables the company to continue to meet the needs of its customers and the society in this age of information.

The Keys and Strategies Responsible for Hitachi’s Success

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How To Make Money Out Of Thin Air - Brian Sher

Innocent — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 04:20:09 +0000

How To Make Money Out Of Thin Air by Brian Sher

Do you want to know how to make money the millionaires way? If yes, you need Brian Sher to show you just how easy it is to make good money consistently in his book, How To Make Money Out Of Thin Air.

Here is just an excerpt from the book. Enjoy!

Twenty Habits Of The World’s Most Valuable Businesses

In contrast to the previous chapter, let’s take a close look at the habits of the world’s most valuable businesses and what makes them so valuable.

The wealthiest companies in the world are capitalized in the hundreds of billions of dollars, which places a huge value on these businesses, and brings great wealth to the owners. However, total capitalization is not the most important thing to look at when you are assessing how valuable a business is: look instead at the price earnings ratio (p/e ratio), printed beside the stock price in the business pages of newspapers. You will see that most of these ratios are somewhere around 15-20, but some are much higher, even reaching the hundreds. At February 2002, Microsoft had a p/e of 55.26, Alliance Data Systems Corp a p/e of 141.10, SmartForce a p/e of 461.47, Precise Software Solutions Ltd a p/e of 554.75.

What this means is that these companies are valued at 55,141,461 and 545 times their earnings. What this really means is that people are prepared to invest in or buy these companies at 55 or 545 times the current profit they are making. Investors are prepared to invest on the basis of waiting 55 or 545 years to get 100 percent return on their money.

Now, why would people be willing to do this, when many such investors won’t even be alive long enough to get the money they put in returned? The answer is the theme of this book. It is the principle about making money out of thin air, and is one that you must learn well.

These investors are not after income return. They are after asset growth, and are investing their money believing they will be able to sell their shares in a short period and make a capital gain. In other words, they buy and sell shares to make money out of thin air.

That’s the game. That’s what it’s all about. This is what stock traders do. They shuffle paper and make money out of thin air. Yet this is exactly what many people who sell their time or start a small business do not do – and therefore never get rich.

To make money out of thin air as a stock trader is a good way of getting rich, but you need to be very skilled at it and be prepared to risk losing a lot, too, as even the best cannot predict market sentiment and other factors affecting stock prices. Making money as a stock trader can be a lucrative business, yet nothing can beat the returns you will get by starting and building your own business from scratch.

Going into your own business, you should be doing what stock traders are doing with other companies’ shares, except do this with your own shares. Set your business up to become valuable and tradeable, and one day soon these stock traders will be buying your shares from you. And guess who would have made money out of thin air from these very traders? You, of course!

Let me now share with you in this chapter some of the attributes that I have studied in the world’s most valuable businesses. We are going to look at many examples of big companies and successful products, to illustrate the points being discussed.

You may think these companies and examples don’t apply to you, as they are so big and well funded that you cannot emulate what they are doing. If this is your thought process it is completely wrong. These companies were not always big. At one stage or another they were exactly the same size your business is now. They have simply grown big precisely because they have addressed the following habits.

The world’s most valuable businesses have all or many of the following attributes in common – and your business should, too.

1. Operate In Large Markets Or Growth Markets
You should not simply go into a business because you like it and think it is a good idea – and your friends do, too. (Having said this, this strategy can work and has worked for others, but they have been fortunate and the growth has occurred by accident in most cases.)

You must think of your idea in context of the market you are entering and ask yourself: is this market a growth market that has worldwide potential? If the answer is ‘no’, then you’re probably already limiting yourself and your ability to make money out of thin air. If, on the other hand, your answer is ‘yes’, then this is an exciting place to start.

The world’s most valuable businesses have in common the fact that they are operating in large and generally growing markets. So should you.

2. Have Unique, Timely Products
Once you have considered your market potential you need to look at your products or services and ask yourself: are they unique or timely or are they commonly available already?

If your answer is that they are not unique or timely, you will find your ability to capture a large market share is limited and this will thus limit your tradeable value. If your answer is yes, however, it will allow you the opportunity to charge premium margins, attract many customers and allow you to expand rapidly.

Let’s look at examples of this. Viagra is a drug that helps men with impotency problems. This product is unique – there is nothing else quite like it. It addresses a worldwide market and is timely. When this product was first offered for sale it became the biggest-selling lifestyle drug ever sold, enormously adding to the value of its owner, Pfizer Inc., a pharmaceutical company.

3. Sell Only Leveraged Products
The world’s most valuable businesses only sell leveraged products.
Generally they do not sell time as their prime offering. They usually sell packages or packaged products they have only made once – the system takes over from there.

It is essential that you heed this advice. No matter how big your market is or how unique your products are, if you do not sell leveraged products there will be a limit to how much you can sell and therefore a limit on the value of your business.

Take Microsoft again, as an example. They design unique state-of-the-art software (making it once), then sell as many copies as their factories can burn onto disk. The disk costs a matter of a few cents, yet Microsoft sell the software for hundreds, even thousands, of dollars.

What an outstanding business. You have no choice but to pay this price if you want the latest windows product, as you can’t get it from anyone else.

Now, contrast this with our service station example in the world’s least valuable business section (page 54), and recall how quickly customers will shop elsewhere because they will save fifty cents. Which business would you rather be in?

4. Have Residual Income
This habit of the world’s most valuable businesses is what helps make them so valuable – having a residual income.

If you want your business to be extraordinarily valuable, tradeable and saleable you must have products that you not only sell once but can sell over and over again. Better yet is the situation where you only need to sell them once and after that your customers continue to buy at regular intervals from you: this is having residual income.

Companies that do this make millions, if not billions, in profits and are worth huge sums of money. Let’s look at a few.

 Telstra, or any well-run telecommunication company, supplies you with a phone and a phone line, then you pay them rental every day for having the right to use the phone line. They don’t have to sell to you again for years, and if they decide to put the price up, you just complain a little but pay their fees and charges. Having competition now in the market has made little difference to this scenario.

 Banks. You open an account with your money, which you give to them, and they charge you every month for this, as well as charging you every time you want to make a deposit or withdrawal. What a great business! Bank loans are similar. The bank sells you a loan product once, yet you end up paying them for twenty to thirty years.

 Credit card companies. They sell you their card product once and you pay them every time you have it, for years and years.

Now you know why these companies have thousands of employees, make huge profits and are able to pay the big-city rents. Speaking of rents… landlords do the same thing. You buy the right to use their home or office space, and you pay them every month, for years in many cases. I am sure you can see the pattern here.

Now, contrast this with the sales strategy of a car dealership, shoe shop or burglar alarm company. I am certain you are beginning to see the difference – and the resulting difference in values these businesses attract.

5. Have Great Systems
Many people are confused about systems. What exactly are they and why are they so important?

Systems are the only way that will allow you to guard your valuable time and use it to build the business, instead of using your time just to keep the business going. Systems move you from being paid for your labour to being paid for your ideas. They allow you to expand comfortably, or to step back from the business and let it run itself. Systems bring you the freedom that probably attracted you to the idea of business in the first place. And with that freedom comes true success.

Great systems are what ultimately make companies valuable. It is the fact that everything in a company is systemized that makes it possible for the owners to leverage time and skill.

By having great systems, companies can get a predictable result with higher quality and lower costs. Great systems mean less-skilled people can be employed to perform higher-skilled tasks – and this is what builds value into these businesses.

The most valuable companies have everything systemized. Nothing is left to chance or guesswork. They have systems and procedures documenting just about everything for design and production, for administration, distribution, hiring and firing, for customer service, sales and marketing… nearly every aspect of the business is systemized in one form or another.

This is so important as it not only lowers the cost of running the business, but it also ensures that the business is not dependent on any one individual. Everyone is replaceable and dispensable, so the show will go on no matter what. Freeing a business from reliance on any individual is the goal, and this goal should be worked on from the very start.

I mentioned earlier the success of Tom Monaghan of Domino’s Pizza. Now, anybody can make a pizza. Yet what Tom set out to do was not to sell pizza at all, but to set up a world-class pizza-making system.

There is a huge difference. Monaghan made a good product at a good price, yet his marketing – ‘there in thirty minutes hot, or it’s free’ – and distribution system – being first in home delivery – when others were just selling pizza in sit-down restaurants, gave him all the edge he needed and a big head start in making money out of thin air, in the pizza market.

When you run a business, you need a wide range of skills. Your time is valuable, you’re highly productive. What systems free you up to do is to pass those skills on to others, through procedures and processes, so they too can perform high-value, high-revenue work at a much lower cost than you could. This in turn frees you up to develop your systems further, to make your business more profitable and to bring in new business and more revenue.

6. Great Customer Service
No company can grow big, become great and succeed without great customer service, especially early in their life cycle.

It’s one of the main reasons customers prefer to deal with a small company rather than a large one, as generally small companies can excel in the area of customer service. When you call a small company you usually get the phone answered by a person, not a machine. When you have a problem you usually speak to a person who can make a decision to fix it, rather than someone who listens but does not have the authority to make a decision and adds to your frustration.

Unfortunately, in many cases this area of business does slip when companies become big. The world’s most valuable businesses still need to offer great customer service, because this is what keeps their customers coming back and adds to their value. As your business grows, this aspect must never be forgotten or it will cost you millions.

Not all large companies lose their focus on customer service: look at the legendary examples of excellent customer service given by major businesses such as Disney, the big US retailer Sears and the Ritz-Carlton hotels, among many others who have gone to great lengths to ensure customer satisfaction. There have been examples of customers coming back to Sears complaining about a product and receiving a refund, only to discover they did not even purchase the product from Sears in the first instance.

You don’t have to go this far. However, your level of customer service needs to equal, if not better, that of great world-class companies in whatever business you do.

7. Powerful Brands
The world’s most valuable businesses have powerful, instantly recognizable brands. In fact, many of the most valuable businesses have brands that can contribute as much as 50 per cent of the value of their entire company.

Billabong is one such brand where the name comprises 50 per cent of its value. Hey, you can buy an unbranded T-shirt for $5-10 at Target. The Billabong name increases the value at least fourfold. This is the power of building a brand.

Telstra’s brand is valued at approximately $9.4billion. Talk about making money out of thin air.

A brand is thin air. It’s nothing more than the cumulative meaning that a particular product or service has achieved in a customer’s mind. Coca-cola is one of the world’s most valuable brands. In 1993-94 its value stood at US$35.9billion, while Nescafe was valued at US$11.5billion, Kellogg’s US$9.3billion, Gillette US$8.2billion.

Harley-Davidson, Rolls-Royce, Xerox, Kleenex, Nike, Sony, Honda, Harvard, Kodak, Mercedes-Benz and Levi’s are amongst the world’s most powerful brands, yet people forget these businesses were not always this way. Many of them have emerged only in the last forty years, build from one-man businesses into companies that have enormous value.

Now, how does this help you if you are just starting out and don’t have millions of dollars to spend on brand building and advertising?

Even when starting out you need to develop a brand of your own, and to be very clear what that brand stands for and why you think customers will want to buy your brand. If you are not clear about this from the start it will only confuse your customers and lessen the value of your brand. There is an excellent book by Al Reis and Laura Reis called The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding which covers this topic at length. I recommend that you read it.

8. Not Dependent On One Person
This point has already been discussed and at this stage it should be clear that there are enormous advantages in building a business that is not dependent on one person.

This does not only apply to small businesses, although they are the most susceptible. Even large businesses that are seen to be heavily dependent on one person can have major shifts in their value from one day to the next.

Newscorp, for example, was made enormously successful by Rupert Murdoch, and is certainly one of the world’s most valuable businesses, with a market capitalization of nearly $73billion. Murdoch’s influence on the future of the company results in massive stock price shifts at the first sight of his ill health.

This is a bad sign for this company and companies like it, as it affects their value greatly. Many great companies have this problem and the owners’ work hard to ensure they let the market know their heirs and successors are equally capable. Sometimes, however, even this does not have the full effect they are looking for and does not protect the company’s value.

9. Usually First In The Market - Market Leader
History has proven that the first established company into the market usually remains dominant for years to come. Once you are the established brand leader it is hard to lose your leadership.

A widely publicized study of twenty-five leading brands in twenty-five different product categories in the year 1923 compared with the present situation showed that twenty of the same twenty-five brands are still leaders today. In the last seventy-eight years only five have lost their leadership.

Most new customers naturally gravitate towards the leading brand. Federal Express? The first in overnight delivery. Domino’s Pizza? The first in home-delivered pizzas. These are great examples of companies that were first in the market, or that created a new market category and dominated it. They have become worth billions of dollars in a relatively small number of years.

10. Attract The Best And Brightest People
The world’s most valuable businesses are usually places that are dynamic, exciting, stimulating places to work, with changes happening all the time due to growth.

This provides endless opportunities for people joining the company to learn and grow personally. They are offered ongoing training, promotion opportunities and clear career paths over a number of years.

Employees are trusted, given responsibility and encouraged to make mistakes without fear of failure or punishment. These are places where people say they love their jobs, and they do. The come to work early, leave late and are respected and appreciated for their contribution. This type of environment attracts the best and brightest people.

Why is this important to help you make money out of thin air and why should you develop this type of culture in your business from day one?

Your people are your greatest asset, not your equipment or products. They are the ones who make your products or services, find your customers, sell to them, and do everything else that makes your business a business.

Yet at about 5p.m. each night your assets get up and leave, and may not even return the next day. When you realize this, you realize business is all about people-nothing else. Look after your people and the business will look after itself. This sounds quite fundamental, I know, but not one in a thousand businesses does this well.

No matter how good your product or service is, your entire business depends on people creating, producing and delivering it to the customer. In this process many things can, and will, go wrong. It’s only the skill and care that your people take in your business that will give your company the edge. If your people are sloppy, careless, underskilled or unmotivated, this will show up in the way they deliver your product or service, and in the way they deal with your customers. A state-of-the-art manufacturing facility is worthless if your receptionist doesn’t answer the phone properly, or upsets customers. What good will the best-looking storefront be, if your sales assistants are ignoring the customers?

If your people are switched on, motivated and totally focused on serving the customer, you are way ahead. Your competitors will never copy the effect of a business whose staff enjoy their work, have fun and genuinely care about customers.

No matter what your competitors do, they can’t go out and create this just because they’ve seen you have it. Getting and keeping good people is one of the most difficult things in business. It’s also one of the most valuable, because it puts you so far ahead of your competition and helps keep you there.

Giving someone a job is easy. Making sure they are the right person for the job is much harder, but much more important. Those people you employ create your business. They create its culture, its service, its quality, its reputation and, ultimately, its profit.

The basic principle is: if you hire someone great, you become great, and your life will become easier. But if you hire the wrong person you undermine your lifestyle and the value of the business. Hire people with better skills and bigger vision than you have, and you create a great business.

To be able to hire the right people, you have to know how to select them, how to test their qualities and how to get the most from them. Like marketing, hiring (especially for key positions) is too important to leave to other people-make sure you do this yourself.

11. Reward Based On Performance Not Longevity/Time
This is one of the most important habits of a successful business: rewarding people based on performance and responsibility, not on their period of employment.

In other words, there should be no such thing as automatic annual pay rises or Christmas bonuses. Increased pay, or for that matter any basis of pay, should be based on performance, attitude and contribution. This should be explained to all employees before they start and they should understand what behavior will reward their performance and what behavior will relocated them back to the dole queue.

In Michael Leboeuf’s book The Greatest Management Principle in the World, he talks about rewarding only those outcomes you wish to achieve. Now, think how simple yet powerful this is, yet so many companies do not do it.

Paying someone an hourly rate is a huge mistake. It is the exact opposite of what Michael Leboeuf suggests, and indeed opposite to what many of the most valuable businesses do.

Your people should be incentive driven and paid as much as humanly possible for achieving a result, not for taking an action. Achieving results is what customers pay for. You should never pay someone simply for showing up and going through the motions.

You must have them set goals or you must set these for them, so everybody knows what is expected. Paying someone on an hourly basis is simply rewarding him or her for showing up and working slower. Think about this: if someone is getting the same amount to process say ten applications that they would get if they processed eight, why would they work up a sweat trying to process the ten?

Sounds simple, yet very few businesses understand this.

12. Have High Margins
If your business addresses worldwide growth markets and offers unique and timely products, then this makes you something of a monopoly, albeit a small one at first. This monopoly status means that if your customers want your products, they have no other choice but to go out of their way to buy them from you.

It allows you to charge higher prices due to the demand and supply equation working in your favour and this means healthy margins, which allow you to afford to fund your rapid growth.

Conversely, if you do not select to go into a business with the habits I am outlining for you here, you will find it difficult to grow because you cannot afford to, and it will greatly affect your ability to make money out of thin air.

13. Have Few Real Competitors

Being a monopoly by pure definition means you do not have any real competitors, and the most valuable businesses structure and protect themselves to hold this position, through continually innovating and keeping ahead of the game.

When you first start out you may have a competitive edge if you are the only one in the market doing what you are doing-your only competition is customer apathy. However, as you get bigger and more successful, you must expect competition and you will need to ensure you are always leading and your competition is always playing catch up. Holding this position makes your business far more valuable.

14. Keep Innovating – A Flow Of New Products
The best companies make this intrinsic in their growth strategy from day one. Their motto is innovate or die, as this is exactly what will happen sooner or later.

When you first start out you may appear to have a competitive edge because no one can be bothered challenging a tiny niche business – until it starts making inroads into the marketplace. No matter how unique your products are at the beginning, as soon as the market realizes the speed at which you are growing and the profits you are making, competition will arrive – and fast.

In an attempt to emulate (or steal) your success, they will begin by trying to copy you. It is important that you anticipate this happening before it occurs and have version or model 2, 3 and 4 ready to go before they have launched their model 1.

This thinking will secure your market dominance and leadership position, and still offer you the opportunity to maintain margins and growth.

15. Have An Investor Entry And Exit Strategy
Most start-up operators have no idea what they will do with the business once it is profitable. They have no exit strategy.

This is one of the weakest aspects of most start-up or small businesses. I have said this before but I’ll say it again, as it is the key point in making money out of thin air. Making money out of thin air requires you to build a business asset and sell it for a profit. However, if you cannot sell it you cannot enjoy getting rich this way. The world’s most valuable companies have built this strategy in from day one.

Furthermore, if you need investor money to start and build your business, remember that investors will never put their money in if they can’t get it out at a profit within a reasonable number of years. If you don’t have an exit strategy, I can assure you no one is going to invest in your business, and neither should you.

This does not mean you have to sell your business, or that investors will want to exit. It simply means you must always have this option from the very start.

Very, very few start –up or small businesses do this, or even think about this, and that is why they find it difficult to attract investors or make money out of thin air.

16. Have A Big Customer Database
Generally, if you are addressing worldwide growth markets, you have the potential to attract a large number of customers. Most small businesses do not have customer information, or their customer information is not in a ready-to-use, accessible form.

The world’s most valuable businesses know at a minimum who their customers are, where they live and what shopping preferences they have. They have a relationship with these people whereby they are repeat-selling them products or services each month.

If anyone is interested in buying your business once you have set it up and expanded it, this is what they are primarily interested in. This is where the great value is, yet so many small businesses do not do build up such customer databases.

That is why they remain small.

17. Have Great Marketing
I see advertising and marketing campaigns on a daily basis, and see thousands of dollars being totally wasted due to their ineffectiveness and misalignment.

If you want to take a simple idea and expand it into an extraordinarily successful business, creating enormous wealth for you and your shareholders/partners, you need to make sure you have great marketing going on all the time. This is one of the big limiting factors that stops many small and start-up businesses from reaching their full money making potential: a lack of great marketing skill and knowledge in their business.

Marketing is the machine that drives your business. Good products can fail, yet second-rate products can monopolise a market. Why? The power of marketing.

Good marketing brings people to your door – people who are happy to part with their money in exchange for your products or services. Marketing is the key function that can quickly make or break any business. And because of this power of marketing, it is too important to overlook or delegate – it’s something you have to understand for yourself.

The reason great marketing will give you a sustainable competitive advantage is that if it is executed well, it is yet another thing that your competitors cannot just copy. Not many people realize this.

Unfortunately, much marketing is wasted and you’re probably paying for the mistakes of so-called marketing experts right now, by under-utilising this important part of your business. Badly managed marketing is the single biggest waste of money you will ever experience, and one of the single biggest frustrations and causes of failure.

Most of us continue to accept less-than-acceptable rates of return on our marketing dollars. Or we throw up our hands at its effectiveness and stop using it at all. That is the most fatal of all business mistakes!

Let me give you an example of what I mean.

Two advertisements costing exactly the same amount can pull a hugely different number of customers and hence generate hugely different profits. A simple difference in one ad can make tens of thousands of dollars of difference a day, a week or a month to your business – depending of course on your business. And that’s only looking at one part of your marketing strategy. Marketing that is used well is so rare, yet so powerful!

What impact does this advantage have on your business? Simply put, you can be five, ten, fifty times more successful than your competitors just through effective marketing. Isn’t that where you’d want to be?

18. Anticipate Customers’ Needs
Have you ever walked into a great hotel or other business and everything you need seems to have been anticipated, as if someone had read your mind?

‘I’ll have a shower when I got to the room…’ and there’s the bathrobe all laid out. ‘I think I’ll wash my hair…’ and there’s the hairdryer. ‘I think I’ll dry my hair…’ and there’s the hairdryer. ‘I think I’ll have a beer…’ and there in the fridge is your favourite brand.

I know it doesn’t happen often, however I am sure you have had this experience at least once. Think back and I bet you this was a great brand, or a fast-emerging one.

The world’s most valuable businesses make a habit of doing this. You see, it’s not that hard really. Just listen to your customers and you will discover there are patterns in their behavior. By understanding those patterns you know what a customer is likely to do or want next.

All you have to do is build this into your systems and it will appear as if you have anticipated their needs. The best companies do this, the worst do not. No matter how big or small you currently are, this works.

For example, someone contemplating buying a Harley-Davidson motorbike is thinking about cruising down the highway with the wind in their hair. This person is not thinking about things like insurance, helmets, gloves, jackets, bike locks, alarms, satellite tracking systems, maintenance, cleaning and so on, which they will need.

But you should know (anticipate) all or some of these needs almost immediately. So why not put systems in place to offer, sell and service the purchaser with these? It does not have to be difficult to do. McDonald’s do this by simply asking, ‘Would you like some fries with that?’ So can you.

This is guaranteed to add thousands or millions of dollars to the value of your business, and your customers will be grateful to you for looking after their needs. Sounds obvious, yet it still does not happen in nine out of ten businesses.

19. Always Add Value To Customers’ Experience
If you want to add value to your customers’ experience, why not throw in a couple of things as an added bonus to them for shopping with you?

The new Harley-Davidson owner would probably love the fact that you offer them a free cleaning service (because you know it’s not cool to be seen driving anything but a shining, well-kept Harley, and this is quite a laborious outcome to achieve). So invest in a high-pressure steam-cleaning unit, and every Sunday employ a student to give your customers a free clean for their new pride and joy. This won’t cost you much at all, and yes, you’ve guessed it, every week they return to your store and you have the opportunity to offer them something new they have not bought yet.

This is the reason why, when staying in a five-star hotel, you get free shampoo, conditioner, bubble bath and bath salts, and if you’ve forgotten your toothbrush or toothpaste, socks or stockings, they will ‘send it right up’.

It’s all about adding little things to the customer experience that don’t cost a lot, yet make a big impression.

20. Educate Before They Sell
You might recall I covered the fact that low-value companies hard sell. This is because they have no other choice if they are going to make a sale.

High-value companies don’t have to. They have the advantage of owning unique products with large market opportunities and take the high road in sales. That is, they do not sell at all, but choose to educate their customers before they buy.

Why go to the time and trouble of doing this? By educating before you sell (or your customer chooses to buy), you are creating a very important bond with your customer, and that bond is the start of a relationship between the customer and you, and more importantly with your brand.

Fundamental human nature and society is based on building relationships, and in business this needs to be fundamental to your strategy. John C. Maxwell summed it up when he said, ‘Never underestimate the power of relationships on people’s lives.’ This is great business advice.

Similarly, in Ernest Hemingway’s story ‘The Capital of the World’s a teenage boy named Paco squabbles with his father and runs away from home. Subsequently the father goes on a long and fruitless search for the boy. Finally, he places an advert in a Madrid newspaper that reads, ‘Paco, meet me in front of the newspaper office tomorrow at noon. All is forgiven. I love you.’ The next day, when the father arrives at the newspaper office, he finds 800 men named Paco, all eager to mend a broken relationship.

People yearn to have honest, trusting relationships. This is so rare today at any level, and companies that work hard to develop these sorts of relationships with their customers will be well rewarded in the long term, with loyalty and very valuable brands.

This relationship-building process begins with ‘edu-marketing’ – educating the customer to buy your product.

It is essential you do this. If you do, your customers will buy from you because you have taken the time to educate them and started a unique relationship that they perceive as trustworthy.

Very few companies take this approach, yet those that do build enormous value into their business.

Conclusion
The above habits are not just a random list of ‘nice’ things that have been plucked out of nowhere. These habits are indeed what makes the businesses that practice them so valuable and tradeable, what makes the owners of these businesses successful and helps make money out of thin air.

It is these habits that others will pay a premium for when buying or buying into a business. Indeed, this is what investors look for in making their investment decisions. And if you have taken an idea from nothing, and created a business with these habits, you would have created a very valuable asset and successfully made money out of thin air.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

How To Make Money Out Of Thin Air

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The Kroger Co. Business Success Strategies

Innocent — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:29:12 +0000

The Kroger Co. Business Success Strategies

Building a successful business entails taking certain decisions. Here are the strategies and keys that are instrumental to Kroger’s business success, which you can adopt in your business too.

Setting Up Business In Area Of Your Expertise

A start up business stands to succeed more if it is founded in an industry where the founder has some expertise. Having a good knowledge of the industry before starting a business in it will help you to take the right decisions in running it, and to avoid costly mistakes.

Before starting his business, Kroger had been in the industry right from when he was a boy.

Looking For Ways To Help Customers Save Money

Successful companies are those who are focused on satisfying their customers, and one way you can really make your customers pleased with your service is if your prices are low, and therefore help your customers to save money. Everyone desires to keep more money while leaving with more articles from a store.

Kroger knew he would be giving his customers huge value if he could provide them quality products at low prices, so he baked his own bread, and later added other products, which his customers bought at low prices.

Sticking To Offering Quality Products

There is no way a business can succeed without offering quality products. You will be gaining the trust and loyalty of your customers if they knew you go all out to provide the best quality product available.

The quest to provide top quality products led Kroger to being the first grocery retailer in the U.S. to test foods and monitor the quality of products sold in its stores.

Knowing Your Customers’ Needs

Knowing your customers’ needs or desires will enable you provide the exact service or product that meet them, and get your customers fully satisfied. Therefore, it pays to invest some of your resources in researching the needs of your customers.

In the 1970s, Kroger had perfected its scientific method of researching its customers’ needs, which provided it the information upon which to plan and advertise its business.

Expanding Your Product Line

Once your business has taken root, the next thing is to develop more products or services. This will definitely increase your revenue and profit and enable you to maximally employ the full potential of your resources. However, be sure that the new product or service will add more perceivable value to what your customers are already getting.

In 1960, Kroger realized that most of its customers also buy drugs, and so would be giving them the convenience of shopping for grocery as well as buying drugs in the same environment, and so it came up with the idea of having drugstores built next to its grocery stores, which brought increased revenue to the company.

Reducing Your Cost Of Operation

No matter how much revenue you are generating monthly or yearly, if you don’t watch your cost of operation, you will discover at the end of the year that you are not making as much profit as you should. And if your cost of operation keeps mounting, your profit may completely be eroded, bringing your business it its knees. To remain profitable you must continually check how much you are spending operating your business, and finding ways to reducing it.

Kroger was able to achieve $1.2 billion profit in 2002 due primarily to its cost reduction program.

Read Kroger Co. Business Success Story here

Recommended

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The Kroger Co.: How Bernard Kroger Turned $372 Grocery Store To Over $70 Billion Revenue Generating Company

Innocent — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:51:38 +0000

The Kroger Co. : How Bernard Kroger Turned $372 Grocery Store To Over $70 Billion Revenue Generating Company

… Now runs more than 2,500 food stores, becoming one of America’s Largest Businesses

The Kroger Co. was founded by Bernard H. Kroger in 1883. A merchant son, Kroger left school at 13 to work when his father lost the family’s dry goods store. At 16, he sold coffee and tea door-to-door, and managed a grocery store in Cincinnati at 20. And with his life savings of $372, he began the Great Western Tea Company at 24 in 1883.

From four stores in 1885, 17 in 1893, and 40 stores and a factory in 1902, Kroger’s exceptional business skill had put the business on the path of success. The company was incorporated and its name changed to The Kroger Grocery and Baking Company in 1902.

Kroger’s business principle, which in no small measure contributed to his business early success, and guided it through the decades to the top of its industry, is: “Be particular. Never sell anything you would not want yourself.” With this mindset, Kroger went on to bring about remarkable innovations in the industry.

The Kroger Grocery and Baking Company was the first to bake its own bread for its stores, and also the first to include meat department with the purchase of Nagel Meat Market and Packing House.

Kroger sought to offer its customers quality products at the lowest price possible. One way to achieve this was to manufacture its own products and selling them at low prices. From his mother’s homemade sauerkraut and pickles, which he sold more to his German customers, to his own French brand of coffee, Kroger continued to develop new products over the decades, including peanut butter, ice cream,, and soda pop. Today, its food processing factories have produced thousands of products, which account for 26% of its total revenue.

By buying over smaller and financially strapped companies, Kroger had acquired more than five thousand stores in areas close to his company’s established regions in the late 1920s. And in 1928, a year before the stock market crash, Kroger sold his shares in the company for over $28 million.

With William Albers taking over from Kroger as president, the company continued to seek ways to help its customers get quality products in addition to helping them save money by offering its own-made products at low price. It became the first grocery retailer in the U.S. to routinely test the foods, and the quality of the products it sold in the 1930s. The company sent its buyers to produce farms to inspect the crops used in making the foods sold in its stores, and so ensure their quality. This effort endeared the company to the public and quenches the frequent complaints that chain stores sold poor quality foods.

In 1946, under the control of Joseph Hall, the company changed its name from The Kroger Grocery and Baking Company to The Kroger Co. This was to reflect the new period of growth the company was going into.

The company initiated a consumer research program that allowed it to gauge consumers’ interests and dislikes. Shoppers left their “votes” at the cash register, which enabled the company’s management to take the right decisions on products to stock and the methods of selling them. The company expanded to other states, including Texas, Minnesota, and California, with sales reaching $1 billion in 1952.

Believing that a huge business potential exists in having a drugstore built next to a grocery store, Kroger began to expand into drugstore business in 1960. It bought Sav-on drugstore chain and made its owner, James Herring, the head of the drugstore division, and in 1963 the company’s revenue topped $2 billion.

In the 1970s, the company’s scientific method of researching its consumers was perfected - it became the first grocer to formalize consumer research. It was interviewing over a quarter-million shoppers each year to find out what they wanted in a supermarket, and from the information gathered, it was able to make strategic decisions that brought it huge benefits, such as the introduction of unpackaged produce and service specialty departments like delis.

The 1980s saw Kroger embarking on a number of acquisitions, including merging with Dillon Companies, Inc. in 1983, and began operating stores coast to coast. It also acquired the Kwik Shop convenience store chain in the same year.

However, in 1988, Kroger received several takeover bids, primarily from the Dart Group Corporation and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, but it rejected them and instead restructured. The restructuring, which was financed by the company selling $333 million worth of unprofitable assets and by taking a loan of $3.6 billion, expanded its employees’ ownership to more than 30 percent of the company’s shares.

With the restructuring, Kroger’s total debt climbed to $5.3 billion, and to tackle it, the company abstained from major acquisitions for several years, except its purchase of 29 Great Scott! Supermarkets in 1990.

Then in 1999, Kroger entered into the biggest merger in its history by merging with Fred Meyer, Inc. The merger brought Fred Meyer’s 800 grocery stores located in 12 western states to Kroger, and enabled it to derive huge economies of scale in purchasing, manufacturing, information systems and logistics.

By 2001, Kroger’s revenue climbed to $50 billion, and then $51.76 billion in 2002, with profit also reaching $1.2 billion in 2002 mainly due to the company’s effective operating cost reduction drive. For instance, the company in late 2001 embarked on a restructuring that eliminated 1,500 jobs and the consolidation of its Nashville division into other divisional offices.

No doubt, Kroger has experienced monumental changes in its business over the several decades it has been in operation. Today, in response to customers’ desires, needs, and convenience, its stores have grown larger to take more products and varieties, with a store’s shelves now taking up to 50,000 products.

With its focus on cutting operational costs and offering its customers quality products at low price, Kroger has continued to be effectively competitive, and maintaining its leading position in the industry, ranking first or second in several of its markets.

Click here to read: The Keys And Strategies To Kroger Business Success

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Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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When To Buy Stocks

Innocent — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 09:54:11 +0000

When To Buy Stocks

So many people do not know when best to buy stocks to be able to make profit. In fact, some people, without knowing what they are actually doing, buy stocks at the time they are already in their peak price, and will soon start falling. Such people buy at high price, only to be forced by the need to cash out, to sell at low price and therefore lose money.

You mustn’t buy any stock without first investigating it and understanding the circumstances surrounding it. There are certain situations a stock is facing that will enable you make profit if you buy it, and then sell later, while on the other hand there are situations when you shouldn’t buy else you stand to make loss.

Below are key circumstances to look out for to help you buy stocks that can make you profit.

Buying When There Is Price Drop

It is better to buy stocks when prices are going down. This will afford you the opportunity to buy them cheaply and sell higher later and make profit. There are times when prices generally may drop, which you have to look out for. Such times include after companies Annual General Meeting (AGM), after companies have given bonuses, after companies have paid dividends, and during bearish market.

Buying During Crises

When a company is having difficulties might be a good time to buy its shares, however, you must be sure its future is bright, that, the present problem it is facing will not affect its future.

Most people will want to sell off their stocks when a company is in controversy or crises, and so the price will drop. However, to a knowledgeable investor who is sure the present crises will end so and the company will bounce back, it is a great opportunity to buy the company’s stock cheap.

Buying When A Company Is To Be Taken Over

Whenever a company is to be taken over, most investors usually panic and want to dispose of their stocks quickly for the fear that the fortunes of the company may be nose diving, which may have necessitated the buying over.

However, this might be a good chance for you to buy the stocks at cheap price, and take position in the new company that will emerge and make good profit selling later at higher price. But before you buy, ensure that the company’s financials are in good standing, and that the core investor who is taking over the company has the ability to move the company to greater height.

Buying During Recession

During recession, people don’t usually buy stocks as much as they sell what they already have. This is because there is little money in circulation, and many people will want to sell their stocks to have cash for other pressing things. Therefore, at this time share prices are usually low. Buying at this time will enable you to make good profit when recession rolls away and you sell at higher price

Buying When Company Performance Is Poor

Most people will like to sell off their stocks in a company after it posted a poor end of year result, and of course, this will lead to drop in the company’s share price. If you have the right information that assures that the company will be pouncing back with good runs inn future, you can go ahead to buy cheap and make good profit later selling at higher price.

Buying During Bearish Market

During bearish market prices are usually very low. This allows you to buy stocks very cheap to sell at higher prices when the bulls return and the market is vibrant again. However, ensure you have an idea of how long the bears are going to run the market, so that your cash is not tied down for too long before the bulls take over.

Buying Stocks At Their Year Low

Looking out for stocks at the point of their year low and buying them enables you to have them cheap because their prices would have fallen. You will be making a good profit when you sell them later when their prices start moving upward. However, before investing, check to see that their fundamentals are good.

Buying Stocks With Good Fundamentals

Stocks that have the following characteristics stand to be profitable in future, and are good buy: good quarterly report and performance, consistent financial performance and growth rate, good management, good earning prospect (EPS and P/E ratio), good reserve and shareholders’ funds, good back-up from government policies, good product in the market place.

Buying Stocks After Year End

Stock prices usually drop after year end. This is because companies would have been marked down and activities at the stock market would be low. This is a good time to buy cheap.

As you can see, it is generally beneficial to buy stocks when prices are low, however, don’t rush buying stocks whose prices keep sliding even when the general market movement is going up or is flat. You have to find out what is causing the continuous downward slide.

Could it be that the company’s products are no longer selling, or that its clientele has dwindled? Or could it be that it is incurring unexpected cost that is increasing its cost of production? Or is it that new competitors have entered the market and are taking over part of its market share? Is change in government policy affecting its operations negatively?

Knowing what is causing the company’s share price to fall, and putting it side-by-side with the proven strength of the company, you will be able to predict if it will overcome the challenge in future, and if so, you can go ahead to buy its stocks.

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Change Your Thinking Change Your Life: How To Unlock Your Full Potential For Success And Achievement – Brian Tracy

Innocent — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:18:59 +0000

Change Your Thinking Change Your Life: How To Unlock Your Full Potential For Success And Achievement – Brian Tracy

To achieve anything meaningful in life, be it financial freedom, happy relationships, career advancement, good health, business success, traveling the world, or helping people in need, it all begins in your thinking. The book, Change Your Thinking Change Your Life, with the rider “How To Unlock Your Full Potential For Success And Achievement by Brian Tracy will help you focus your thinking rightly to achieve your goals.

Brian Tracy needs no introduction. He is credited to have helped millions of people the world over to discover their true potential and change their lives much more than they ever thought possible.

As is expected from Brian Tracy, the book is loaded with ideas and proven principles to help you achieve your greatest goals this year. I encourage you to read it. Here is an excerpt from it, enjoy it!

Unleash Your Mental Powers

The potential of the average person is like a huge ocean unsailed, a new continent unexplored, a world of possibilities waiting to be released and channeled toward some great good. – Brian Tracy

Every change in your life will come about as the result of your mind colliding with a new idea. Ideas are the keys to the future. Ideas contain the answers to all of your problems and the ways to achieve all of your goals. Your need is to become an idea generator, so that you are continually coming up with new and better ideas to deal with the continous changes and opportunities taking place around you.

Fortunately, you are naturally creative. It is an innate quality. You are born with it. But creativity is subject to the Law of Use, which says, “If you don’t use it, you lose it,” at least temporarily. The good news is that you can reignite your creativity by practicing the specific methods and techniques discussed in this book.

PROJECT FORWARD AND THINK BACKWARD
Changing your thinking requires that you expand your ideas and imagination about the person you could be, the things you could do, and the things that you could have. Every person who accomplishes anything worthwhile in life begins with a big dream or a vision of what is possible for him or her. They rise above their current surroundings, their existing limitations and problems, and instead they imagine themselves sometime in the future living the kind of life they would like to live. You need to practice this way of thinking as well.

Earlier, we talked about your ideal future vision. You create this by projecting forward five years and imagining that all of your dreams have come true. What would your life look like if it were ideal in every way? Where would you be? Who would be there with you? What would you be doing? How much would you be earning? And so on.

You then return to the present day and your current situation. You think of specific steps you could take to capitalize on your opportunities and to overcome your limitations and obstacles. This is the primary use of creative thinking. It is to solve your problems and trigger mental breakthroughs that you can use to move faster toward achieving the goals that are most important to you.

Three Minds In One
You think and operate your life with three different minds. The first is your conscious mind. You use your conscious mind to take in new information, compare it with your current knowledge, analyze it in terms of its value or relevance to you, and then decide to act or not to act. This is the mind with which you direct your life. This is often referred to as the objective mind.

The second mind you use is your subconscious. Your subconscious mind is a huge data bank that records every thought, idea, emotion, or experience that you ever have throughout your life. This is called the subjective mind. Its role is to keep all of your words and actions consistent with your self-concept and with your current attitudes, beliefs, fears, and prejudices. Your subconscious mind does not reason; it only obeys your commands.

Your subconscious mind is also responsible for the operation of all of your bodily functions. It controls your autonomic nervous system and your heart rate, breathing, digestion, basic memory, and so on. It is like a huge computer, so powerful and precise that it can process a hundred million commands per second. It maintain a precise balance of hundreds of chemicals in each one of your billions of cells, 24 hours a day.

Your third mind is your superconscious mind. This mind is your direct connection with infinite intelligence. It contains all knowledge, and can bring you all the ideas and answers you will ever need to achieve any goal that you can set for yourself. This mind is the source of all inspiration, imagination, intuition, and hunches. It operates 24 hours a day, and will bring you exactly the right answer to your problem or question, exactly when you are ready for it. It is stimulated by clear goals, vivid mental pictures, and clear, positive commands in the form of affirmations.

When you use all three minds in harmony, with each mind performing the functions for which it was designed, you will accomplish more of your goals, faster than you have ever imagined. The proper utilization of your three minds is central to your changing your thinking and changing your life.

Three Triggers To Creativity
There are three main factors that trigger creativity. You can use each of them regularly, in everything you do. They are: first, intensely desired goals; second, pressing problems; and third, focused questions. When you use them all, you begin to generate ideas at a rate that will amaze you.

By using these three methods of mental stimulation – goals, problems and questions – you activate all three of your minds simultaneously and you begin to function at much higher levels than the average person.

Intensely Desired Goals
The first factor is a clearly defined, intensely desired goal. You must know exactly what you want, set a deadline, make it measurable, and develop a plan for its achievement that you work on every day. There is a direct relationship between how clear you are about your desired goal and how many ideas you will come up with to achieve it.

One of the most powerful ways to harmonize the activities of your three minds, and to activate your creative powers, is for you to rewrite your goals in the present tense each morning.

Get a spiral notebook. Each morning, after your daily reading, take a few minutes and rewrite your major goals in the present tense, exactly as if they already existed. Take a few seconds after rewriting each goal to visualize it as though it were already accomplished. See each goal in your mind as if it already existed. Then, smile, relax, and let go.

This method of rewriting your goals each morning, visualizing them as if they had already been achieved, and them letting them go with complete confidence is a vital part of creating the mental equivalent of the things you want.

By using this method, you will help your goals to materialize exactly when you are ready for them. By writing and rewriting your goals, you burn them deeper and deeper into your subconscious mind. At a certain point, you activate your superconscious mind. At that point, you begin attracting into your life people and circumstances that can help you to achieve them.

Get The Feeling
Emotion is the key. The more intensely you desire a goal, the more rapidly it materializes. Combining your idea of your goal with the intense emotion of desire or excitement is like stepping on the accelerator of your mental potential. Your mind will speed up and generate ideas for goal accomplishment. The more positive, excited, and enthusiastic you are about achieving anything, the more rapidly your mind goes to work to bring it into your life.

Think about how you would feel if you had achieved your goal. Would you feel proud, happy, relieved, joyous, or exhilarated? Whatever the emotion would be, you should confidently and happily imagine yourself enjoying the exact feeling that you would have if your goal were already a part of your life.

If you want to earn more money and achieve a higher standard of living, imagine that you are already there, living the life you desire. Imagine how you would fee. Close your eyes and get the feeling of happiness, joy, and inner satisfaction.

When you can combine a clear mental picture of your goal with the same emotion that you would have if it were achieved, you activate your higher powers of mind. You trigger your creativity. You get insights and ideas that will help you to achieve your goal far faster.

Problems As Opportunities
The second factor that triggers your creativity and activates your positive mind is pressing problems. It is only when you are experiencing the pressure of problems and obstacles that you are motivated to perform at your mental best. Facing and solving the inevitable problems and difficulties of life make you stronger and smarter, and bring out the very best in you.

Most people do not understand the nature of problems. Problems are a normal and necessary part of life. They are inevitable and unavoidable. Problems come in spite of your best efforts to avoid them. Problems, therefore, come unbidden.
The only part of a problem over which you have any control is your response to your problems. Effective people respond positively and constructively to problems. In this way, they demonstrate that they have developed high levels of “response-ability.” They have developed the ability to respond effectively when unexpected or undesired difficulties occur.

Problems of all kinds bring out your very best qualities. They make you strong and resourceful. The more pressing your problems, and the more emotion you invest in solving those problems, the more creative you will become. Each time you solve a problem constructively, you become smarter and more effective. As a result, you prepare yourself for even bigger and more important problems to solve.

Think On Paper
One way to improve your ability to solve problems, and to trigger your creativity, is for you to think on paper. Take a few moments to ask, “What exactly is the problem?” Then write the answer down in such a form that it describes the problem exactly.

You can then ask, “What else is the problem?” You should beware of any problem for which there is only one definition. The worst thing you can do is to solve the wrong problem. The more different ways that you can state a problem, the more amenable it becomes to a solution.

Whatever difficulties, obstacles, challenges, or factors that are hindering you or holding you back in any way, define them clearly in writing. As they say in medicine, “Accurate diagnosis is half the cure.”

Sometimes, when you begin to define a problem, you will find that it is actually a “cluster problem.” That is, it is a single large problem surrounded by several smaller problems. Most problems you deal with will be composed of several smaller problems. Often in a difficult situation, there is one large problem that must be solved before any of the smaller problems can be solved.

The best approach to this type of situation is for you to determine the main problem and then define the individual parts of the problem separately. You identify the core problem that must first be solved and then deal with the smaller problems in order. Sometimes solving one part of the problem leads to the resolution of the entire situation.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life: How to Unlock Your Full Potential for Success and Achievement

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Samsung Business Strategies

Innocent — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 15:50:30 +0000

Samsung Business Strategies

Taking a simple trading business that Samsung was, from a local enterprise to a global leader in several industries, initially without crucial technologies, is no mean feat; it involves taking and implementing certain strategic decisions. Here are strategies that were key to the massive business success of Samsung over the decades, which you can adopt in managing your business:

Having A Business Philosophy

The beliefs you hold about business is very important. They shape your attitude towards the running of your business, make your focus clearer, and motivate you to reaching your business goals.

What is your business philosophy? Do you want to be the producer of the highest quality product in your industry, the most customer friendly company, the most technologically advanced company, the maker of the safest product in your industry, or the most educative company? Whatever it is, you must stand for something.

For Byung-Chull Lee, his philosophy was to be market leader in any industry he entered. This guided his thinking and actions to achieving his business goals.

Investing In Developing More Capabilities

To be more competitive in your business area, you need to be ahead of your competitors in creating more value for your target market. And that means investing in acquiring more knowledge and abilities should be a priority.

To be able to compete favorably Samsung invested heavily in developing and acquiring technology in the early 1970s.

Envisioning The Future

As business owner, manager, or entrepreneur, one of the greatest traits to develop to run your business successfully is the ability to predict where your industry will be in future, and how your business might be affected. This will enable you to plan for the future and position your company to be able to take advantage of the opportunities that will be evolving.

Lee formed Samsung Semiconductor and Telecommunications Co. in 1978 to position Samsung strategically in the chip making industry because he had observed that high-tech was going to experience massive growth in the future. True to his prediction, high-tech did become massive, and Samsung was there to reap the huge profit that was available, becoming the world’s largest manufacturer of DRAM chip in 1995.

Partnership Is Better Than Competition

In partnership ideas and knowledge are shared and so, much more better ideas and knowledge become available to solve perceived challenges and achieve set goals. In competition on the other hand, ideas are hidden, and individual business spend much more resources and time in acquiring knowledge, which sometimes they may not eventually achieve.

Wherever and whenever it is possible, partnering with other companies in your industry on some projects can be beneficial to achieving certain goals.

To achieve the production of higher grade DRAM chip, Samsung partnered with some of its local competitors in a joint research in the early 1980s. From the knowledge it acquired from the joint venture, Samsung moved on to become a major world manufacturer of low-cost DRAM chip.

Preparing For The Top

Success doesn’t happen by accident, if you desire to be at the top of your industry, you need to make adequate plan for it, and work towards achieving it.

When Kun-Hee Lee took over the management of Samsung after the death of his father, one of his goals was to make Samsung the leader in semiconductor industry. To achieve this he partnered with some U.S. and Japanese electronics firms, which possessed advanced semiconductor technology, acquired some companies with the technology, and invested hugely in research and development. Not surprising, this goal was achieved in the early 1990s.

Read Samsung’s business success story here: How Byung-Chull Lee Made Samsung A Global Business

Recommended

Put your business on the path to success with a solid plan created with Business Plan Pro Software .

Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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How Byung-Chull Lee Made Samsung A Global Business

Innocent — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 11:41:32 +0000

How Byung-Chull Lee Made Samsung A Global Business

Founded by Byung-Chull Lee in the late 1930s as a small trading business, and steadily growing over the decades into several industries, covering manufacturing, services, and electronics, and becoming the world’s largest conglomerate by the size of its annual revenue, the business success story of Samsung, which means “three stars”, is no doubt worth studying by entrepreneurs and business owners to draw strategies and keys to business success from.

Samsung Group was founded in 1938 by Byung-Chull Lee, a Korean entrepreneur when he started a small trading company, which he called Samsung, with $2,000 in Seoul. The company was growing gradually until the communist invasion of 1950 forced Lee to abandon his business and flee to Busan.

In Busan, Lee started his business afresh in 1951, and in just one year had grown its assets twenty times over. He floated a sugar refinery in 1953 - the first manufacturing plant established in South Korea after the Korean War. From there, he veered into several commodity businesses, including wool, with all of them doing well, attesting to Lee’s philosophy to be the market leader in any industry he enters.

In the 1960s Lee took Samsung into several service businesses, including the mass communication industry. He started a radio and television station, and also established Samsung Electronics to manufacture television and electronic components. Although the industry was already mainly dominated by American and European companies, Lee was confident that Samsung would find its foot in the local market.

And with his immense business and political connections, as well as strong support from the Park Chung-Hee government, which was committed to protecting local businesses from their huge foreign competitors, Samsung prospered, so much that by the end of the decade, it was generating over $100 million annually as revenue.

In the early 1970s, Samsung invested heavily in developing technology so as to be able to compete effectively in both local and international market. Where it could not develop a needed technology, it borrowed or coaxed it from foreign competitors. Gradually, it went into consumer electronics products and appliances in addition to television.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Samsung Group created a number of electronic related divisions to ensure efficiency and effectiveness in their operations. These included Samsung Electron Devices Co. which manufactured picture tubes, display monitors, and related parts; Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co. which made VHF and UHF tuners, condensers, speakers, and other gear; Samsung Corning Co. which produced television glass bulbs, computer displays, and other components; and Samsung Semiconductor & Telecommunications Co. which produced high-tech microchip.

These divisions were later to be combined into a single company, Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., which became the Group’s major subsidiary by the close of the 1980s.

The formation of Samsung Semiconductor and Telecommunications Co. in 1978 was strategic. Lee had envisioned in the mid-1970s that the growth industry of the future was coming from high-tech, and he was determined to position Samsung to play a leading role in it.

Realizing that South Korea lacked the technological expertise to compete with foreign companies, the South Korean Government enacted a policy that made it mandatory for foreign telecommunications equipment manufacturers wanting to enter the Korean market to give access of their advanced semiconductor technology to indigenous partnering companies. Riding on this policy, Samsung partnered with Micron from the U.S. and Sharp from Japan in 1983, and obtained proprietary technology from them.

Having obtained the technology, Samsung was able to manufacture the first low-cost dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips (64-kilobit) in Korea. The company partnered with some local competitors in a joint research to produce higher grade DRAM chips, and became a major manufacturer and supplier of low-cost DRAM chips to computer and electronics manufacturers worldwide.

As Samsung Semiconductor & Telecommunications Co. was prospering, its other electronics business was also waxing stronger both locally and abroad. The company set up a television assembly plant in Portugal in 1982 to supply 300,000 units yearly to the European market; it established a $25 million plant in New York in 1984 to manufacture about one million televisions and 400,000 microwave ovens each year; and in 1987 set up another $25 million plant in England to produce about 400,000 color televisions, 300,000 VCRs, and 300,000 microwave ovens yearly.

By 1987, Samsung Group’s annual revenue had risen to $24 billion from $1.3 billion that it was in 1977, accounting for about 20 percent of South Korea’s gross domestic product.

With the death of Byung-Chull Lee in 1987, his son Kun-Hee Lee took over the helm of affairs of the company. Recognizing the electronic division as the Group’s major subsidiary, Kun-Hee Lee moved to make it the centerpiece of the Group’s activities. He sold off some operations and consolidated many divisions.

And to position Samsung at the top of semiconductor technology, he partnered with U.S. and Japanese electronics companies, and acquired companies with relevant technologies, such as Harris Microwave Semiconductors and Integrated Telecom Technologies, and also invested heavily in research and development.

In 1994, Samsung Electronics introduced the 4-megabit DRAM chip, which surpassed any chip ever produced by any company. Sales from the chip accounted for the major part of the company’s $14.94 billion sales in 1994, shooting profit to $1.3 billion.

By 1995, Samsung became the largest DRAM chips, flash memory, and optical storage drives producer in the world, and planned to double sales and become the largest manufacturer of 20 products in the world by 2010.

Read the strategies and keys to Samsung business success here: Samsung Business Strategies

Put your business on the path to success with a solid plan created with Business Plan Pro Software .

Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

………………………………..

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Wealth Creation: How Michael Dell Made Wealth

Innocent — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 10:56:51 +0000

Wealth Creation: How Michael Dell Made Wealth

One of the things I really like doing is studying the lives of successful business people. Learning from their experiences one does not only see how to recognise a business idea or opportunity, but also some useful business start up and success strategies. You will equally be able to avoid the mistakes they made and save yourself from making wrong decisions and losing big money. Above all by following their pathway to wealth, you stand a better chance of being wealthy too.

At the age of 12 young Michael Dell had started showing traits of a great entrepreneur by recognising a business opportunity in collecting stamps. With $2, 000 made from this business he knew his wealth was already piled up for him in business. He only needed to continue to apply his remarkable innate ability to identify business opportunities with high money making potential.

At the age of 16 Dell’s business mind pointed out to him that there could be new people living in his Houston neighbourhood who may need newspaper subscription. Therefore, getting the City’s mortgage and marriage license list he made contact with these people and got their subscriptions. This proved to be a very profitable business idea as Dell raked in more than $18, 000 only in the first year of selling newspapers. Though he was still in high school, he had started making real money and building his wealth so much that before he graduated from high school he was already ridding a BMW car.

An important business success factor I don’t want you to miss about Dell’s business experience up to this time is his development of people skill. To be successful, make money and build wealth in business an entrepreneur must be able to reach out and relate with people. They must develop the ability to boldly present their service or product to people to buy. This is critical to their ability to make wealth.

Again, bringing his exceptional ability to spot juicy business opportunities, in his dormitory room at the University of Texas where he was studying biology to become a physician, he birthed a business idea that revolutionised the computer sales industry.

In 1984, with the price of computers at $3, 000, Dell had a business idea. He noticed that if he bought the computer parts separately it would only cost him $600. And if he assembled them he could bring the price down greatly from $3, 000 for buyers and still make good profit for himself. He immediately saw a big business opportunity here to make good money and he left school to set up his business which he named PC’s Limited.

True to his belief that the idea would work, Dell’s PC Limited immediately became a big success. Applying a unique system of building computers for individuals to suite their purpose at a highly reduced price from branded ones, Dell’s PC Limited made $6 million in sales in its first year in business. From then on Dell continued to pile up his wealth into the billions.

The bottom line about how Dell built his wealth is two-fold. One, his exceptional ability to identify business opportunities, which in a nutshell is to render good service to people. Two, his focus on finding a way to bring down the market price of computers. This he did by reaching out directly to buyers and cutting out middle men, thereby allowing more people to have access to his computers, while equally making some money in between.

Do You Desire Success in Life?

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Achieving Your Goals: The Missing Link

Innocent — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 01:33:39 +0000

Achieving Your Goals: The Missing Link

Achieving a goal doesn’t happen by chance, it is the result of setting the goal, putting in place a plan to reaching it, and then going all out to executing the plan. I have previously written about how to achieve your goals, which you can read here: The Seven Keys to Successfully Achieve Your Goals in the New Year, but, my concern here is the fact that lots of people still end the year unable to realize a significant part of their goals (many don’t even achieve any) even though they have the knowledge of how to achieve goals in their finger tip.

But what could be the cause for this, I pondered? Looking at the different stages of realizing a goal, that is, setting it, establishing a plan to achieving it, and working out the plan, I discovered the critical factor that stops all those who never seem to be able to achieve anything.

Setting a goal is easy. Anyone can declare they want to achieve so, so, and so, by the end of the week, month, or year. Brainstorming a plan of action to take in realizing the goal is also what a lot of people can easily do, but when it comes to the third part in the chain, which is the doing part, then comes the problem.

This is where a lot of people actually lose their dream. Doing what is needed to achieve the goal is never easy. Although it may seem easy on paper, and at the beginning of the project, but by the time you meet with one or two initial rejections, loses, and other difficulties that usually show up when one is trying to achieve something worthwhile, not many will still remain with their dream. Rather than stick to it, easier and simpler alternatives will begin to pop up in their minds.

This is why so many fall prey to propagators of “make-quick-money schemes” that you find everywhere on the Internet. A lot of people always want the easy way out. They want to be told they don’t need to do anything to achieve their dream of financial freedom, or other desires. And many others put the responsibility on other people to make it happen for them.

But this is ridiculous, and absolutely untrue. If anyone tells you they know how you can make a million dollars in a month without you lifting a finger, please run away, they are simply after your hard-earned money.

To achieve your goal, the truth is that there are things you must repeatedly do until the goal is achieved – you must continue to work out your plan, with adjustments when necessary from time to time until your dream is realized.

You may not readily see any significant progress in your work for some time, but in due course, if you stay on it, you will start seeing yourself closer to your goal. It is in “doing” that your desired dream can come to life. So, are you ready to do what you need to do repeatedly to achieve your goal?

That is the question you must answer if you will achieve your heart desires. But there is a higher and more important question to answer:

Do you believe you can achieve your goal?

In fact, this is the critical missing link that prevents so many from realizing their heart desires because they don’t really believe they can reach their goals. And it is also the “critical fixing link”, which serves as the ultimate motivation, the energy booster, and doubt crusher for the few who have achieved monumental success.

It is important for you to ask yourself, “Can I achieve this goal?” before you begin to try achieving it. It may seem a funning question, but it is very serious and crucial to your success in realizing your dream. It must be firmly impressed on your mind that the goal is achievable.

If you are not sure it’s something you completely believe you can achieve before going ahead to try working it out, you will never be able to surmount the challenges that will come to prevent you from achieving it. Then you would have wasted a lot of time, and money.

Without much thought, some people jump into projects excitedly, only for them to abandon them later half-way when faced with some challenges. As I said before, there will be tough challenges and difficulties on your way to reaching your goal. There is no doubt about this, you must expect it!

You may not get the funding or support you thought you would, people you know as experts may tell you one million and one ways why the goal is unachievable, your best friends or even your spouse may desert you, people you thought will be understanding and supportive may mock and laugh at you, thinking you have gone mad. Your product or service may fall flat at its launching with nobody wanting to even try it.

There will be real tough times ahead my friend, but if you absolutely believe you can reach your goal if you continue to work at it, then you will find the inner strength to carry on against all odds when things become tough and then reach the goal.

There is no greater power than believing you can achieve what you have set your mind on. This is what makes the difference between achievers and mere dreamers. With strong belief you can climb the highest mountains and swim the largest river to attain your goal.

The story of Thomas Edison and his invention of the electric light bulb may already be very familiar to you. 999 experiments yet there was no electric light bulb. People would have mocked him silly, but his belief that one day he would achieve his goal was too strong against anything or anyone sowing a seed of doubt in his mind. Someone even asked him whether he didn’t think he had failed 999 times trying to produce a light bulb.

But his response was unbelievable. Instead of accepting such perception, he simply said, “I have only discovered 999 ways not to produce electric light bulb.” Amazing answer!

Such perseverance, total commitment, and metal attitude could only result because of the unshaken belief Edison had for his ability to achieve his goal. One million and one people in his shoes would have given up after a couple of trials and no result. But Edison remained on it because he believed it was possible, which he eventually achieved in the 1000th trial.

All great achievements happen because the people behind them believed they could be achieved even when it isn’t so clear how it is going to be realized. Once they could see the goal in their mind, and they are sure it could be achieved, and so they go all out on their plan to reach the goal.

You will achieve your goals for this year if you believe whole heartedly that you will succeed!

Do You Desire Success in Life?

Would you like a FREE program from Brian Tracy that teaches you how to achieve it?

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Live Your Dreams – Les Brown

Innocent — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 01:54:02 +0000

Live Your Dreams – Les Brown

This is going to be one of the best self help books you have ever read. Les Brown in his book, Live Your Dreams, pours out his exceptional ability to motivate and help people set and achieve their goals and live wealthier and happier life.

The book will inspire you to start dreaming of a better life if you don’t have a dream already, motivate you to setting achievable goals, and giving you proven strategies to reaching the goals.

Coming from a poor background without much education or exposures, but resolutely sticking to his dream of becoming a famous public speaker, which he has achieved, Les Brown is indeed qualified to help you discover how much more you are capable of realising your dream because he had been there. In fact, he used his personal experience to drive home some of his teaches, which makes it easier for you to absorb and confidently apply the concepts being taught.

Here is an excerpt of the book. Enjoy it.

Pursue the Dream

To have dreams is the first step toward making them realities. Once you have squared yourself with your past, approved of yourself, and committed to seeking self-fulfillment, next allow yourself to dream. Chart your course. Envision yourself achieving those dreams.

Once you have dared to dream, I believe you MUST pursue that dream. If you do not pursue your dreams they will consume you; the knowledge that you had a dream but did not pursue it is killing knowledge. Consider it absolutely necessary to go after your dreams. Jose Ortega y Gasset said, “Human life, by its very nature, has to be dedicated to something.”

Without goals in your professional, personal and spiritual life, you are just looking. You are not actively engaged in this world. Not having goals is like having no idea where you want to go when you step up to an airline counter to buy a ticket. You lug your baggage up. Life says, “Where will you be flying to today?” And you reply, “Gee, I don’t know.” Without direction, without goals, you can’t BUY a ticket in this life.

Make This Your Decade

In order to make this your decade, you have to set specific goals and you have to be strongly motivated to reach them. Put your goals down on paper. It makes them more real to you. It gives your goals and thoughts weight and permanence.

Write down your five greatest dreams.
1. I want to buy my mother a grand house where she can entertain her friends and sit on the porch and warm herself in the sun.
2. I want to be a nationally known public speaker with a message that will better the world.
3. I want to write a whole series of books that will inspire people in the same way.
4. I want to have my own television show to reach an even greater audience that I can reach in person.
5. I want my children and grandchildren to be able to handle the challenges of life.

Follow Your Dream

When I started working on my goal to become a professional public speaker five years ago, I had no training in a multibillion-dollar industry. I was not a celebrity with some instant entrée to the club. Neither athlete nor actor, I had no proven value in this vast market. I was an ant knocking on the door to the giant’s castle.

I knew virtually nothing about the business. I did know, however, that I loved talking to people. I took pleasure in making them feel good and contributing to their understanding of themselves. Other than that, the only thing I had going for me was my enthusiasm for the work. I wanted to do something that would give my life value and meaning.

On my way to the front door of that dream, I’d lost all my money, I’d lost my car, I’d lost the place I lived, I had NOTHING. Nothing except the certainty that this is what I wanted to do with my life and the sense that it was possible.

As much as you may believe you have selected your goal, I believe your goal selects you. The universe uses you to its purpose. So allow it to happen. Give yourself to your dream and follow it wherever it takes you in glorious pursuit. For a while it may beat you up; hang on over the bumps and rough spots; enjoy the trip.

There will be times when you will feel alone and deserted, when you will feel weak and doubt yourself and wonder if you are stark raving mad, but if you endure and persevere, eventually you will arrive at your dream. The things you want are always possible; it is just that the way to get them is not always apparent. Once you decide to go after them, the way becomes clear.

I started on the way to my goal at the library, which is still the cheapest and best source of information in the world. I found books on public speaking and began reading all I could on the topic. I found a list of organizations for public speakers. I joined as many as I could. I studied the best speakers – their posture, their hand gestures, their inflections and their messages.

I talked with public speakers about their work. I asked them their secrets. They said practice was essential. So I volunteered to speak to school children because I knew they wouldn’t be critical of my technique. I just needed the practice.

I spoke to grade-school students and then high-school students, and then all sorts of clubs and organizations. I spoke to any group that would listen and even many that didn’t. I worked on my dream and I never let up. I may have wanted to. I may have been sorely tempted. But I hung on.

Even I would not have dared to predict five years ago, when I didn’t have a car, a place to live or $10,000 to my name, that I would receive the highest award given by the National Speakers Association or that the 170,000 members of Toastmasters International would select me as one of the world’s best public speakers in 1991.

Goals Get You Going

Goals give you a purpose for taking life on. People who live without goals have no purpose and it is obvious even in their body language. They are on permanent idle, they slouch, they list from side to side. Their conversations dawdle. They telephone you: “Hey, I’m just calling. I wasn’t doing anything, so I thought I’d call you.” Well, don’t call ME. I’VE got things to do.

Many people just muddle through life. They don’t read informational material, they don’t even pay attention when they WATCH television. If you ask them what they are watching, they mumblemouth, “Nothin’, I’m just lookin’.”

What are your goals for your career? For your relationships? For your spiritual life? Develop a schedule for the next month, the next six months, the next year, five years and ten years. Write it all out.

Let’s take one of the most common goals: You want to make more money. If that is your goal, then take some practical steps toward realizing it.
• First, determine specifically how much money you want to make. Then, double that amount and make THAT your goal. Even if you don’t reach the higher amount, you will probably still find yourself making more than your original goal.
• Second, decide the amount of energy you are willing to expend to reach your goal. How many hours are you willing to work a day? How many jobs are you willing to hold down? What sort of work are you willing to do?
• A third step in this process is to develop a practical plan of action and get started immediately. Chart out where you want to be in relation to your goal in the next month, six months, one year, five years and ten years. Get started today. Go apply for that second job NOW! Go enroll in that career training program NOW! Ask for that raise NOW!
• And finally, make sure that you have all of this written down so that you can review it every morning and every night and envision yourself taking these steps, DOING THEM and SUCCEEDING!

Road Maps To Success

Your goals are the road maps that guide you and show you what is possible for your life. Life takes on meaning when you become motivated, set goals and charge after them in an unstoppable manner. Goals help you channel your energy into action. They place you in charge of your life.

One of my goals as a young man was to buy my adoptive mother a house. As a boy, I told my Mama that I was going to buy her a house so that she would never have to work, and she could just stay home and fix me sweet-potato pies. (My mama fixes sweet-potato pies that you can’t eat with your shoes on: You have to take your shoes off so you can wiggle your toes!)

Another goal of mine was to see that my children had a better life than mine. You need deep purposes like that; they drive you. I know my goals have served me in challenging times. Those two goals have had a definite impact on my life.

Once, when I was competing for a contract with a large company, I sat at a table facing two men representing my competition. They sized me up. I overheard one tell the other, “This guy doesn’t have any credentials. We have the advantage. We’ve got TWO Ph.D.s between us.”

Upon hearing that, I got up from the table and went to the rest room. I took myself for a motivational walk. I said to myself, “Les Brown, what do you care about their two Ph.D.s? You have SIX CHILDREN and a MAMA to take care of.”

If I wanted to achieve my goal of getting that contract, I could not let these more educated men intimidate me. I could not afford to worry about THEIR qualifications, I had to concentrate instead on MY goals.

In the rest room, I reminded myself of my goals and then I returned to the boardroom. I walked bold. I looked good. I felt good. I smelled good. I sat down at that table and made my presentation and conducted my negotiations in a spirit of ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY.

I was utterly certain that the corporate officials involved had been BORN to give me that contract.

And I got the contract. Hello, Goal!

Solid Goals

You must see your goals clearly and specifically before you can set out for them. Hold them in your mind until they become second nature. Before you go to bed each night visualize yourself accomplishing your goal. Do the same while you brush your teeth or take a shower in the morning.

Goals are not dreamy, pie-in-the-sky ideals. They have every-day practical applications and they should be practical. Your goals should be:
• Well defined. You won’t know if you’ve reached them if you haven’t established exactly what they are.
• Realistic. Not that you can’t be president some day, but shooting for state representative might be a wiser first step.
• Exciting and meaningful to you. Otherwise, where will your motivation come from?
• Locked into your mind.
• Acted upon. There is no sense in having a goal if you aren’t going to go after it.

How do you find your goals? We all have dreams of what we would like to be doing. What we would like to have, who we would like to be with. Think about your dreams. What goal would you go after if you knew you would not fail? If you had unlimited funds? If you had infinite wisdom and ability?

One of the most essential things you need to do for yourself is to choose a goal that is important to you. If you need to set goals for your career, find a job or profession that is important to you beyond the bills that it pays.

It is vital to your growth as a person that your work is more than a job to you; that you have a higher purpose for doing what you do. I believe that sometimes we get into career paths or relationships that are really not what we want and then we struggle to make them work. As a result, we become frustrated and confused. We feel that we are working to no good purpose.

A woman told me once that when she went in to work at a job that she despised, it was like a refrigerator falling on her shoulders as soon as she stepped inside the door. She knew that she had gone as far as she would ever go in that job, and it weighed heavily on her. Refrigerator heavy.

She was stuck in that job and it was stuck on her. They were paying her just enough to keep her from quitting and she was working just hard enough to keep from getting fired. If you find yourself in that pattern, you must change your thinking and your behavior; otherwise you will continue to carry the weight of mediocrity on your shoulders.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you.

Get Your Copy of Live Your Dreams Here

More Articles.

Unlimited Power: The New Science Of Personal Achievement - Anthony Robbins

Innocent — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 19:00:22 +0000

Unlimited Power: The New Science Of Personal Achievement - Anthony Robbins

Would you like to take control of your mind and change certain areas of your life that need change? Would you like to increase your energy level and achieve much more than you have ever achieved in your business, finances, relationships, career, and life in general? If your answer is years, then you must read Anthony Robbins Unlimited Power: The New Science Of Personal Achievement.

This is one, if not the most impactful self-help books I’ve read so far. Unlike many books in the self-help category, Unlimited Power doesn’t just teach personal development concepts, it gives you the strategies to apply and see measurable changes in your life.

Many of the change producing strategies in the book are based on the science of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). With this knowledge, you can take total control of your mind by programming or reprogramming it to achieve a set goal or to change limiting habits, beliefs, fears, attitude, etc.

This is a must-read book for anyone looking for the secrets of achieving success in every aspect of life. It’s a book for you if you need to change certain aspects of your life that are affecting you negatively and you don’t know just how to achieve it, whatever it is, be it nail biting, excessive eating and drinking, or quarrelsome, applying the strategies in Unlimited Power: The New Science Of Personal Achievement will help you become the better person that you desire.

Here is an excerpt from the book. Sit back and enjoy it!

The Seven Lies of Success

“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.” – John Milton

The world we live in is the world we choose to live in, whether consciously or unconsciously. If we choose bliss, that’s what we get. If we choose misery, we get that. As we learned in the last chapter, belief is the foundation of excellence.

Our beliefs are specific, consistent organizational approaches to perception. They’re the fundamental choices we make about how to perceive our lives and thus how to live them. They’re how we turn on or turn off our brain. So the first step toward excellence is to find the beliefs that guide us toward the outcomes we want.

The path to success consists of knowing your outcome, taking action, knowing what results you’re getting, and having the flexibility to change until you’re successful. The same is true of beliefs. You have to find the beliefs that support your outcome – the beliefs that get you where you want to go. If your beliefs don’t do that, you have to throw them out and try something new.

People are sometimes put off when I talk about the “lies” of success. Who wants to live by lies? But all I mean is that we don’t know how the world really is. We don’t know if the line is concave or convex. We don’t know if our beliefs are true or false. What we can know, though, is if they work – if they support us, if they make our lives richer, if they make us better people, if they help us and help others.

The word “lies’ is used in this chapter as a consistent reminder that we do not know for certain exactly how things are. Once we know the line is concave, for example, we are no longer free to see it as convex.

The word “lie” does not mean “to be deceitful or dishonest” but, rather, is a useful way to remind us that no matter how much we believe in a concept, we should be open to other possibilities and continuous learning. I suggest you look at these seven beliefs and decide whether they’re useful for you.

I’ve found them time and again in successful people I have modeled. To model excellence, we have to start with the belief systems of excellence. I’ve found that these seven beliefs have empowered people to use more, do more, take greater action, and produce greater results. I’m not saying they’re the only useful beliefs of success. They are a start. They’ve worked for others, and I’d like you to see if they can work for you.

Belief #1: Everything happens for a reason and a purpose, and it serves us. Remember the story of W. Mitchell? What was the central belief that helped him overcome adversity? He decided to take what happened to him and make it work for him in whatever way he could.

In the same way, all successful people have the uncanny ability to focus on what is possible in a situation, what positive results could come from it. No matter how much negative feedback they get from their environment, they think in terms of possibilities.

They think that everything happens for a reason, and it serves them. They believe that every adversity contains the seed of an equivalent or greater benefit.

I can guarantee you that people who produce outstanding results think this way. Think about it in your own life. There are an infinite number of ways to react to any situation. Let’s say your business fails to get a contract you had counted on, one that you were certain you deserved. Some of us would be hurt and frustrated. We might sit home and mope or go out and get drunk.

Some of us would be mad. We might blame the company that awarded the contract, figuring they were a bunch of ignorant individuals. Or we might blame our own people for ruining a sure thing.

All of that might allow us to let off some steam, but it doesn’t help us. It doesn’t bring us any closer to our desired outcome. It takes a lot of discipline to be able to retrace your steps, learn painful lessons, mend fences, and take a good look at new possibilities. But that’s the only way to get a positive outcome from what seems like a negative result.

Let me give you a good example of possibility. Marilyn Hamilton, a former teacher and beauty queen, is a successful businesswoman in Fresno, California. She’s also the survivor of a terrible accident. When she was twenty-nine, she fell down a rocky cliff in a hang-gliding accident that left her in a wheelchair, paralyzed below the waist.

Marilyn Hamilton certainly could have focused on a lot of things she could no longer do. Instead, she focused on the possibilities that were open to her. She managed to see the opportunity in tragedy. From the start she was frustrated with her wheelchairs.

She found them too confining, too restrictive. Now you or I probably wouldn’t have any idea how to judge the effectiveness of a wheelchair. But Marilyn Hamilton could. She figured she was uniquely equipped to design a better one. So she got together with two friends who built hang gliders and started working on a prototype for a better wheelchair.

The three went on to form a company called Motion Designs. It is now a multimillion-dollar success story that revolutionized the wheelchair industry and went on to become California’s Small Business of the Year for 1984. They hired their first employee in 1981 and now have eighty employees and more than eight hundred dealers.

I don’t know if Marilyn Hamilton ever consciously sat down and tried to figure out her beliefs, but she operated from a dynamic sense of possibility, a sense of what she could do. Virtually all great successes work from the same frame.

Take a moment to think again about your beliefs. Do you generally expect things to work out well or to work out poorly? Do you expect your best efforts to be successful, or do you expect them to be thwarted? Do you see the potential in a situation, or do you see the roadblocks?

Many people tend to focus on the negative more than the positive. The first step toward changing that is to recognize it. Belief in limits creates limited people. The key is to let go of those limitations and operate from a higher set of resources.

The leaders in our culture are the people who see the possibilities, who can go into a desert and see a garden. Impossible? What happened in Israel? If you have a strong belief in possibility, it’s likely you’ll achieve it.

Belief #2: There is no such thing as failure. There are only results. This is almost a corollary belief to number one, and it’s equally important on its own. Most people in our culture have been programmed to fear this thing called failure. Yet, all of us can think of times when we wanted one thing and got another.

We’ve all flunked a test, suffered through a frustrating romance that didn’t work out, put together a business plan only to see everything go awry. I’ve used the words “outcome” and “results” throughout this book because that’s what successful people see. They don’t see failure. They don’t believe in it. It doesn’t compute.

People always succeed in getting some sort of results. The super successes of our culture aren’t people who do not fail, but simply people who know that if they try something and it doesn’t give them what they want, they’ve had a learning experience. They use what they’ve learned and simply try something else. They take some new actions and produce some new results.

Think about it. What is the one asset, the one benefit you have today over yesterday? The answer, of course, is experience. People who fear failure make internal representations of what might not work in advance. This is what keeps them from taking the very action that could ensure the accomplishment of their desires. Are you afraid of failure? Well, how do you feel about learning? You can learn from every human experience and can thereby always succeed in anything you do.

Mark Twain once said, “There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist.” He’s right. People who believe in failure are almost guaranteed a mediocre existence. Failure is something that is just not perceived by people who achieve greatness. They don’t dwell on it. They don’t attach negative emotions to something that doesn’t work.
Let me share someone’s life history with you. This was a man who

Failed in business at age 31.
Was defeated in a legislative race at age 32
Failed again in business at age 34
Overcame the death of his sweetheart at age 35
Had a nervous breakdown at age 36.
Lost an election at age 38
Lost a congressional race at age 43
Lost a congressional race at age 46.
Lost a congressional race at age 48.
Lost a senatorial race at age 55
Failed in an effort to become vice-president at age 56.
Lost a senatorial race at age 58.
Was elected president of the United States at age 60.

The man’s name was Abraham Lincoln. Could he have become president if he had seen his election losses as failures? It’s not likely. There’s a famous story about Thomas Edison. After he’d tried 9,999 times to perfect the light bulb and hadn’t succeeded, someone asked him, “Are you going to have ten thousand failures?” He answered, “I didn’t fail. I just discovered another way not to invent the electric light bulb.” He had discovered how another set of actions had produced a different result.

“Our doubts are traitors,
And make us lose the good we oft might win,
By fearing to attempt.”
- WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Winners, leaders, masters – people with personal power – all understand that if you try something and do not get the outcome you want, it’s simply feedback. You use that information to make finer distinctions about what you need to do to produce the results you desire.

Buckminster Fuller once wrote, “Whatever humans have learned had to be learned as a consequence only of trial and error experience. Humans have learned only through mistakes.” Sometimes we learn from our mistakes, sometimes from the mistakes of others. Take a minute to reflect on the five greatest so-called “failures” in your life.

Fuller uses the metaphor of a ship’s rudder. He says when the rudder of a ship is angled to one side or another, the ship tends to keep rotating beyond the helmsman’s intention. He has to correct the rotation, moving it back toward the original direction in a never-ending process of action and reaction, adjustment and correction.

Picture that in your mind – a helmsman on a quiet sea, gently guiding his boat toward its destination by coping with thousands of inevitable deviations from its course. It’s a lovely image, and it’s a wonderful model for the process of living successfully. But most of us don’t think that way. Every error, every mistake, tends to take on emotional baggage. It’s a failure. It reflects badly on us.

For example, many people get down on themselves because they’re overweight. Their attitude about being overweight doesn’t change anything. Instead, they could embrace the fact that they’ve been successful in producing a result called excess fat and that now they’re going to produce a new result called being thin. They would produce this new result by producing new actions.

If you’re not sure what actions to take to produce this result, take special note of chapter 10, or model someone who has produced the result called being thin. Find out what specific action that person produces mentally and physically to consistently remain thin. Produce the same actions, and you will produce the same results. As long as you regard your excess weight as a failure, you’ll be immobilized. However, the minute you change it to a result you produced, therefore one you can change now, then your success is assured.

Belief in failure is a way of poisoning the mind. When we store negative emotions, we affect our physiology, our thinking process, and our state. One of the greatest limitations for most people is their fear of failure. Dr. Robert Schuller, who teaches the concept of possibility thinking, asks a great question: “What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?”

Think about it. How would you answer that? If you really believed you could not fail, you might take a whole new set of actions and produce powerful new desirable results. Wouldn’t you be better off trying them? Isn’t that the only way to grow? So I suggest you start realizing right now that there’s no such thing as failure.

There are only results. You always produce a result. If it’s not the one you desire, you can just change your actions and you’ll produce new results. Cross out the word “failure,” circle the word “outcome” in this book, and commit yourself to learning from every experience.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you if you desire to gain control of your mind, change whatever you need to change in your life, and achieve much more.

Get Your Copy of Unlimited Power : The New Science Of Personal Achievement Here

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The Keys and Strategies to Sears Business Success

Innocent — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 01:38:52 +0000

The Keys and Strategies to Sears Business Success

Coming from a little, one-man business to the multibillion dollars retail chain that Sears is today requires careful study by entrepreneurs and business managers who desire to have their businesses experience equal success.

Here are the key decisions, strategies, and actions that were instrumental to the company’s monumental success over the decades.

Preparing For Great Business Ideas And Opportunities

Nothing really happens by chance. You have to be prepared and ready to be able to perceive great business ideas and seize the opportunity. Most people miss out on golden opportunities to plant profitable businesses because they cannot see it that way, which is as a result of the fact that they are not prepared for it.

By using his spare time to trade on coal and lumber, Richard Sears was preparing his mind to perceive profitable business ideas and opportunities when they do come. And when the rejected watches came to his attention in 1886, he immediate saw a good business opportunity.

Looking For A Dire Need To Meet

Any business that seeks to continue to provide solution to a serious need of large number of people at a reasonable cost to them stand a great chance to continue to thrive. This is the foundation upon which successful companies are built.

Sears, Roebuck and Co prospered right from its beginning because they enabled rural duelers who were more in population than those in the cities buy items at far reduced prices than they were getting from the few rural retail stores available.

Knowing Your Customers Deeply

Your business will succeed if you know your customers (the people it is established to serve) very well. And there is no other way you can truly have this knowledge than to live, work, play, school, sleep, and eat with them for long. By this, you will have a true understanding of their feeling, expectations, and desires, then you will be able to serve them to their full satisfaction – and you will continue to get their patronage.

For the fact that Richard Sears knew the needs and desires of farmers (his customers) so well, he was able to write ad copy that strongly appealed to them to order from him.

Recognizing Your Limitations And Getting Better Hands

No one can be master of all things, and no one can run a business all by themselves. To have a business established you must recognize the functions of your business where you don’t have the skill or expertise to produce the best result, or don’t have the time, and get people who have the ability to give you the quality that you want.

This saves you lots of time and money, as well as from losing your customers. In all, it helps you build a solid business structure that can keep functioning without you physically present.

Sears realized he wasn’t that good at setting organizational structures, managing orders economically and efficiently, so he sold a part of his company to Rosenwald, an experienced manufacturer, in 1895.

Expanding Your Business Is Crucial

Successful companies always have plans to expand as quickly as possible. This brings in more revenue, and saves your business from totally depending on sales from just one market (the founding location of the business).

Sears expansionist program, which began in 1906 continued in the 1940s with the company spreading to foreign countries.

Recognizing The Changes Taking Place Around You

As the days and years roll by, people’s taste, behavior, and way of life will undergo changes. Societies don’t remain the same forever, changes will definitely take place, and it is therefore important that you observe how your business is being affected by the changes so as to make the necessary changes on it too; otherwise it could be made irrelevant with time.

Sears recognized how fast American societies were changing by 1925 with lots of people leaving for the cities. The company’s management realized the enormous negative impact it would have on its business and decided to also target city duelers instead of remaining as it was and be left with a tiny population of rural duelers to serve.

Working Towards Being More Efficient

Being more efficient in running your business will save you lots of time and money, and it will also rub on the satisfaction you give your customers. It is therefore important you continue to seek ways of improving on your business operation’s efficiency.

To increase its efficiency at running retail stores, Sears developed a comprehensive code of retail operating techniques for use by its staff.

Recommended

Put your business on the path to success with a solid plan created with Business Plan Pro Software .

Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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Quotes on Optimism

Innocent — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 18:14:01 +0000

Here are my best quotes of the day. They are about being optimistic in difficult times, and I want to share them with you to inspire and motivate you to success over whatever challenges you may be facing right now in your life, business, career, or relationship.

Quote 1:

“The doors of opportunity are open to the optimist. Gates of achievement swing wide for the person who sees infinite possibilities in the insignificant.” – Dr. William Arthur Ward

Quote 2:

“Deep optimism is being aware of problems, but recognizing the solution; knowing about difficulties, but believing they can be overcome; seeing the negative, but accentuating the positive; being exposed to the worst, but expecting the best; having reason to complain, but preferring to smile.” - Dr. William Arthur Ward

Quote 3:

“There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist.” - Mark Twain

The take-away in these quotes is that if you are faced with any problem, and you are optimistic rather than being pessimistic that all would be well, your mind would be opened to finding the solution to the problem – optimism opens the mind to receiving solutions, while pessimism locks it up from any solution.

I will continue to edit this quote category by adding new related quotes that inspire me, so do keep checking for fresh ones.

Related Articles:
“Life With Woody” 10 inspirational quotes than can improve yourself

Sears: Creating Multi Billion Dollars Business From Spare-time Activity

Innocent — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 19:49:12 +0000

Sears: Creating Multi Billion Dollars Business From Spare-time Activity … With Lessons On Starting And Growing A Business To Global Enterprise From Little Or Nothing For Entrepreneurs.

Business ideas and opportunities come in different ways; however, if you cannot recognize them, or are not prepared for them when they show up, you would have lost the chance to own perhaps a multi million dollar business without knowing it.

The founding of Sears, which has grown into one of today’s world’s largest retail store chains was not actually planned for. It came by chance dressed in not so attractive garment, but because Richard Sears had already prepared himself to see business opportunities where many couldn’t, the business came to be.

It was in the 1880s, an era when most Americans, about 65 percent of the population, lived in the rural areas. Richard Sears was working as railroad station agent for the Minneapolis and St. Louis railway station in North Redwood, Minnesota. To occupy the free time which his job allowed him, he sold lumber and coal to local residents and made extra income from it.

Then one day in 1886, a Chicago jewelry company shipped some gold-filled watches to a Redwood Falls jeweler, who didn’t want them. Having been buying and selling stuffs in his spare time, he saw an opportunity to make some extra cash, and so went ahead to buy the watches.

He later sold them to other station agents and made a good profit. With more demand for the watches, Sears ordered more of it, sold them, and ordered even more – he was in business, he had found a fast selling product.

Quickly, he founded R.W. Sears Watch Company in Minneapolis, and the following year moved to Chicago where he sought a watchmaker and found Alvah Roebuck, a highly knowledgeable watchmaker in his twenties (same as Sears) from Indiana, with whom he took his business to the top.

The business, which became known as Sears, Roebuck and Co in 1893 prospered. Its model was mail-order service, which enabled farmers to obtain goods at lower prices compared to what they would have paid at retail stores. At the time, prices at rural retail stores were almost 100 percent more than what they were at wholesale, and farmers didn’t find it funny.

So when Sears, Roebuck and Co and other mail order services came into operation, taking advantage of volume buying, availability of railroads and post office, rural free delivery and parcel post, to offer their products at lower prices, it was a pleasant welcome to farmers.

Richard Sears understood the needs and desires of farmers very well and was exceptionally talented in writing advertising copy that caused them to make orders. By 1895 his catalog had grown into 532 pages featuring other items, in addition to watches and jewelry. These included shoes, women’s garment and millinery, wagons, fishing tackle, stoves, furniture, China, baby carriages, firearms, and glassware.

Sales climbed to $400,000 in 1893, then over $750,000 two years later. Realizing he needed someone who was better than him at organizing the company to be able to manage orders economically and efficiently, Sears sold part of the company to Rosenwald, a Chicago clothing manufacturer who became the Vice President of the company in 1895 with Roebuck resigning due to ill health.

The company became publicly owned in 1906 when Sears and Rosenwald went to the stock market to raise more funds to expand it. With the needed funds at its disposal, the company’s $5 million mail-order plant and office building on Chicago’s West Side was opened that year, and was the largest business building in the world with 3 million square feet of floor space.

Also in 1906 the company opened its Dallas office, which transformed into a full-fledged mail-order plant in 1912, that provided customers incentives such as lower freight rates, faster delivering, and reduced damage to their merchandise.

By 1925, America was changing fast. With cars and modern roads across the country, a lot of people were leaving for the cities abandoning their farms. This meant Sears customers who were totally the rural population were declining. And even those left behind were no longer limited to shop by catalog as they could move on their cars to shop at retail shops far away.

This development posed a grave danger to the survival of Sears, and it needed to change fast to avoid been made irrelevant. And that change, driven by the company’s new president, Robert E. Wood was to see Sears moving into the cities with retail stores rather than using its traditional mail-order business model as city duelers were not used to buying by catalogs, but at retail stores.

So with one store opened in Chicago to test its new business direction, which became an instant success, Sears was set for the top in the retail store industry. By the end of 1927 it had floated 27 stores, then 192 a year later, which became 400 in 1933. For the first time, sales from its retail sales (53.4 percent) were greater than sales from its mail-order service, with total sales reaching $180 million.

It developed a comprehensive code of retail operating techniques that increased the efficiency of its operation, allowing store managers to concentrate on selling and proper ordering. It also set up store planning and display department, which was responsible for all elements of the store - tables, fixtures, space requirements for the different merchandise lines, customer flow and width of aisles.

The department came up with the innovative idea of building retail stores from the inside out around merchandise, instead of fitting merchandise into buildings, which was the norm. The first of such buildings was the Glendale, California store opened in 1935.

Sears’ expansion continued outside the shores of U.S. It opened its first permanent retail store abroad in 1942 when it opened a store in Havana, Cuba, and another in Mexico City the following year. As the years went by, the company expanded to Central and South America, Europe, and Canada.

Today, Sears operates over 863 mall-based retail stores, 1,200 retail locations, which include hardware, outlet, tire and battery stores, and independently owned stores mainly in smaller and rural markets. And as majority owner of Sears Canada Inc., one of Canada’s largest retailers, Sears has no doubt established itself as world leading retailer.

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Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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Super Brain Power: 6 Keys To Unlocking Your Hidden Genius - Jean Marie Stine

Innocent — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 14:19:36 +0000

Super Brain Power: 6 Keys To Unlocking Your Hidden Genius - Jean Marie Stine

Most people struggle through life because they either do not know how powerful their brains are, or try to improve on accessing the power. They therefore cannot tap into the enormous wealth of intelligence and creativity available to them by the power of their brains, which is there to enable them provide effective solutions to whatever challenges they might face in life.

There is proven evidence from researchers that most people use only about ten percent of the capacity of their brains, which explains why most people the world over are not so successful in their businesses, relationships, finances, and careers. The more access you have to the power of your brain, the more intelligence that will be available to you to overcome any challenge confronting you.

Here, I share with you an excerpt of the book, Super Brain Power: 6 Keys To Unlocking Your Hidden Genius written by Jean Marie Stine, the popular national workshop leader who has helped thousands of people across the country access their hidden brain power to achieve tremendous success.

This book will enable you to reach deep into your brain’s six distinct forms of intelligence: Visual, Verbal, Logical, Creative, Physical, and Emotional, and achieve success in every area of your life – this might just be the best brain improvement book you have ever read.

Excerpt:

Reversal

Originality is the essential difference between those who go all the way to the top and the rest of us. While others flail away blindly with their heads against a wall with the same failed approaches, there are no limits for someone who can find an original way, under, around, through, or over.

Whatever you are working with the public, managing a department, shepherding your company through the rocky waters of today’s business climate, hoping to be the next bestselling hip-hop group, or aiming for early retirement, originality is the grease that makes the going easy.

You can use today’s technique to tap your creative genius any time you are in urgent need of a fresh idea, or when you’re simply drawing a blank over a long-standing problem. It’s also an ideal method of jump-starting your creative juices when they aren’t flowing as well as you like, or when they are stubbornly refusing to flow at all.

You Have It – And It’s Worth One Million Dollars

It’s not unusual to get stuck for ideas. It kind of goes with the territory of being human. You might consider this tendency the downside of being able to learn. Here’s how we become blocked in our efforts to create fresh, original notions.

During childhood, when our minds are learning for the first time about the world around us, each day is a constant succession of new and unfamiliar situations, discoveries, reactions, and assumptions.

By our twenties, however, most of the basic situations in life have become all too familiar – angry bosses, being short of cash, rejection in love, someone swerving into our lane on the freeway – and we have developed an established set of responses to them.

Familiar responses are terrific for dealing with familiar situations, most of the time, allowing us to respond quickly, without wasting time and energy reasoning out how we should react.

But they have disadvantages, too. For instance, we can come to rely on familiar responses and assumptions to carry us through situations, and we have a hard time deciding how to respond to something that’s without precedent in our lives. Worse, we tend to become blind to any outcome that does not fit in with our normal perceptions and assumptions.

The age of computers is just as guilty of this kind of blind, unthinking response in the face of change. The first computers in the early fifties were operated by typing in long sequences of command numbers and letters, and computer experts and designers got used to its being that way.

So when it came time to design the home PC, they fell back on the familiar way of operating it – typing in long commands. The result was the near failure of the home PC. It was only when Steve Jobs broke away from the familiar responses and assumptions that he realized the PC could be made to type its own commands; all the user should have to do is click a cute little icon to initiate the process.

As you can see, original ideas are so fundamental to success you can’t afford the lack of them to stand in your way for very long. Luckily, there’s a blindingly simple process for overcoming the limiting, but familiar assumptions that prevent you from scheming up fresh, original notions. I call this technique “reversal,” and it draws on a mental skill you use every day.

“Reversal” gives you the same ability that has enabled tens of thousands of people to become millionaires. (This is another of those claims I know you will find difficult to believe. But suspend your disbelief until the end of the chapter, and you will discover every word is true.)

How You Can Strike Creative Paydirt With Reversal – Every Time

The goal of today’s exercise is to free you from the limitations of familiar assumptions so your creative intelligence can come into play. A great way to do this when you are at a loss for a new idea or solution is simply to take one’s bedrock assumptions and reverse them.

As with other super brain power techniques, this may sound simple in principle, but don’t be fooled, the results will seem to be far out of proportion to the effort.

In fact, fortunes in professions far outside the arts or sciences – in construction, real estate, pharmaceuticals, computers, the food-service industry, and a thousand other businesses – have been founded on ideas that consisted of nothing more than a normal, everyday assumption someone turned upside-down and backward.

A retired southerner named Harlan Sanders took the idea that restaurants should offer a varied fare so as to have something for everyone and reversed it. The result: Col. Sanders Kentucky Fried Chicken, a restaurant that served only a single entrée.

Everybody goes to bookstores for books. Amazon.com reversed that assumption. The result: People began shopping virtual bookstores, their purchases delivered by mail. Retail industry wisdom was that to make a profit with a chain store, it must be located in an urban or suburban area with a dense population near a major traffic artery.

Sam Walton stood that assumption on its crown, and Wal-Mart, the result, was the world’s most profitable discount chain, with operations thriving in smaller communities starved for low-cost shopping.

Creative Intelligence Builder: Reversal

The reversal exercise is remarkably simple. It takes only a couple of minutes of thought, and it will kick-start your creative IQ.

You will need a pen and a sheet of paper at first. But once you have learned the technique, you will be able to do it easily in your head.

1. List your basic assumptions about your problem, or whatever you need a creative nudge with, as a series of “is” statements that describe how something “is” or how it “is” related to something else.

This will help you focus your assumptions by putting them into clear, declarative statements. (If you were an entrepreneur with a yen to be a restaurateur and you were looking for an original concept that would stand out from the competition, you might write your assumptions as: “A restaurant is an establishment where people come to eat food.”

“A restaurant is an establishment where people pay for the food they eat.” “A restaurant is an establishment where people can find varied fare to please any palate.”)

2. Beginning with what you consider your most important assumption, write a sentence reversing each assumption to create its opposite. This is another reason for using “is” sentences.

It makes turning them back on themselves easier. (Take our first restaurant assumption; Thomas Monaghan, founder of Domino’s Pizza, might have reversed that by writing, “A restaurant is an establishment that sends food out to people.”

Or take the second assumption: Earl Clifton, founder of Los Angeles’s legendary Clifton’s Cafeterias chain, might have reversed it by writing, “A restaurant is an establishment that gives food away.”

That’s what he did in the 1930s, serving millions of bowls of a free, if slightly flavorless soup stock fortified with every essential vitamin, protein, and mineral. Defying the odds, the act brought him appreciative paying patrons, Clifton prospered where many failed, and the chain lased well into the 1970s.

As for the third assumption, Col. Sanders might have reversed it by writing, “A restaurant is an establishment that has a limited menu, focused on a single entrée.”)

3. Review each of your reversed assumptions. Ask yourself, is there evidence that supports or contradicts it?(Thomas Monaghan might have noted that people were often willing to drive several miles for take-out Chinese food and pizza on Friday and Saturday nights; that might support the notion of a restaurant that delivers its food to the customers.

Earl Clifton might have said that goodwill and word of mouth are the two main ways restaurants build their customer base, and giving the poor thousands of bowls of nutritious soup that costs me only pennies could be the ideal way to generate both. Col.

Sanders might have observed that pizza and barbecue restaurants were becoming very popular in the post-World War II era and that an establishment specializing in the kind of old-fashioned, finger-licking fried chicken grandmother used to make just might attract a clientele, too.)

4. Try out any of your reversed assumptions that seem as if they might have validity.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you if you desire to harness the full power of your brain and create a world of all round success for yourself.

Super Brain Power: 6 Keys To Unlocking Your Hidden Genius

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Is Stock Investment Ponzi Scheme?

Innocent — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 19:09:33 +0000

Is Stock Investment Ponzi Scheme?

I have previously wondered whether stock investments weren’t actually a Ponzi scheme. And I’ve had cause to ponder deeply how the money is generated when one makes a profit in their stock trading investments. You buy a company stock for $1 and a couple of weeks later the price goes up to $2 and you sell it to make a dollar gain.

The reverse happens if the stock price goes down, to say $0.50 where you lose $0.50. You only make a profit when the stock price goes up. Now what makes a stock price to go up or down?

I’m neither a stock broker nor stock investment expert, but having invested in stocks the first time without adequate knowledge about how it works and got my fingers burnt, I needed to sit down and ponder on this thing called stock investment.

In my simple understanding, stock prices go up when investors think the price will rise in future, and so start buying. At this instance, more people are looking to buy than those wanting to sell, therefore, the price goes higher as the law of demand and supply is obeyed (the higher the demand, the higher the price).

On the other hand, if investors think the price of a stock will fall in future, the tendency is for them to start selling to avoid selling low later. This will result to having more people wanting to sell out than those wanting to buy, and again, the law of demand and supply will be obeyed with the price falling (the higher the supply, the lower the price).

As I wondered on this thing, I realized that what determines profit or loss for investors is purely Speculation. It’s all about how people think about the future price of stocks, which you don’t have control over.

If you own a stock that you wish to sell and other investors don’t think its price will appreciate in future, you will have to hold your stock until the time they will think so or be prepared to sell at a lower price.

The critical point about making money from the stock market is that if money doesn’t come into the market by way of new investors buying, no profit can be made by other investors.

This is why I agree absolutely with Robert Kiyosaki’s assertion in his latest book, Rich Dad’s Conspiracy Of The Rich: The 8 New Rules Of Money that the stock market is a Ponzi scheme. (By the way, I strongly recommend you read this book if you are an investor or are interested in investing.)

Just in case you don’t know what Ponzi scheme is, I will explain briefly: Ponzi scheme is “a fraudulent investment that pays investors from their own money or pays investors from subsequent investors’ money.”

The term “Ponzi scheme” was named after Charles Ponzi after he was convicted of deceiving investors in 1920.

A Ponzi scheme entices people to invest with the possibility of making huge returns on their money without doing anything. The first set of people to invest is probably paid from their own money or from the operator’s purse. With this fraudulent evidence that people have been paid, the next thing that will happen judging by human behavior is that the scheme will be stormed by thousands of people hoping to make money from it too.

The scheme will continue to thrive, even for many years as long as new people continue to invest – there will be money to pay those who invested earlier. It was not until December 2008 that the world got to know about Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, after operating for many years, and stealing more than $65 billion belonging to investors.

Ponzi schemes operate using different models, and you can find them anywhere, both online and offline, but, you will know them by one feature: they always require new investments to come in for existing investors to make profit. And this is same for the stock market.

As Robert Kiyosaki well observed in his book, for prices to go up in the stock market, new money must come in, if it doesn’t or if people pull out their money, the market crashes, as was experienced recently. For this, the stock market therefore seems to be a legalized or government supported Ponzi scheme.

Therefore, to play and win in this legalized Ponzi scheme, you really need to know what you are doing. You need information – you need to know why you are buying a particular stock, and not because everyone thinks it’s hot. I followed what everyone said and lost lots of money buying some stocks before getting to understand what I was doing.

There are those I will refer to as hawks in the market who are big and experienced traders. They usually take position to offload their stocks on unknowledgeable fellows. They make huge profit and move quickly out of the market, leaving the unsuspecting investor with stocks that will soon begin to fall in price.

Again, I emphasize: to play and win in this legalized Ponzi scheme that the stock market appears to be, you need deep information about how it works, and the stocks you want to buy before going ahead to acquire them.

I will like to stop here, but I want to hear from you. What is your experience about the stock market? Please leave your comments.

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Halliburton Company Business Strategies

Innocent — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 18:47:28 +0000

Halliburton Company Business Strategies

Here are strategies which Halliburton employed in going from ground floor to one of the largest companies in the world. The idea is to adopt these strategies to your business and also experience great success.

Setting Up Business Along Your Area Of Knowledge And Experience

Your success in business is surer if it is in the industry where you have gained some knowledge and experience by completing apprenticeship or understudy program or having worked as an employee. These knowledge and experience are very important to the success of start-up businesses.

One of the reasons why most start-up businesses fail in their first year is that the owners have little or no knowledge or experience of the industry they are into. They may have been enticed to get into such business because they saw other people succeeding and making lots of money in it.

Erle Palmer Halliburton had garnered a good amount of knowledge and experience of the oil well cementing industry before deciding to set up his own business. Even though he had no money to start the business, yet his knowledge and experience of the industry proved to be his greatest asset that enabled him to move to the top.

Unyielding To Initial Rejections

Know that as a new comer to the industry, the first prospects you may approach to use your product or service may not give you any attention to talk about your business. Some may even tell it to your face how poor your product is compared to existing ones, that you may start wondering if you have not wasted time and money creating it.

I have been there before, and every successful entrepreneur has experienced it. You must never be discouraged when this happen to you. Move away from such people and continue reaching out to more prospects. You will be pleasantly surprised to find customers who will think your product or service is the best thing to ever be created.

Having been rejected in Burkburnett, Halliburton didn’t feel dejected or sorry for himself, instead he moved to Oklahoma, where he found patronage.

Providing Quality Product Or Service Assures Huge And Continuous Patronage

If you want to experience monumental success in business and retain it, you will have to strive higher to always offer your customers the best quality product or service they cannot get elsewhere. This will make them to build trust in you, and have you occupying the number one spot on their minds whenever they need the kind of product or service you provide.

The rising demand for Halliburton’s services at the early stage of his business was as a result of the quality of service that he provided consistently.

Raising Capital To Expand

As your business takes firm root, the next stage is to expand it. You really need to expand it as quickly as you can to prevent other people from copying your business model and reaching new markets before you.

There are different ways to raise funds to expand a business, but the one that is not so commonly followed, although very effective is selling part of the business to investors or other companies.

When the Halliburton couple wanted to expand their business in 1924, they sold 48 percent of it to some oil companies to raise the capital they needed.

Identifying Your Competitive Advantage

You should know what your competitive advantage in your industry is. This is what you do, or the value that you provide customers that no one else in your industry can do as well as you do.

You should assess your business deeply and discover the special skills or abilities that enable you to create high value products or services so effectively and efficiently, which none of your competitors have.

Having discovered these skills, you can then develop and use them to the fullest – they will allow you to be on top of the competition as you can satisfy customers more.

Halliburton’s competitive advantage in its industry, which made it indispensable in the Oil servicing industry all through its history, was its uncommon ability to develop processes and specialized equipment that reduced cost.

Protecting Your Work Legally

Don’t take the risk; ensure you protect your inventions, books, software, and other intellectual property by legally documenting it. This is very important, if someone else gets the patent before you, it means you will not be allowed to make money from the invention even if you think you were the first person to have created it. But if you are the first to get the patent, you will have the right to produce the item sole for a number of years before other people are allowed, by then you would made a lot of money from it.

Halliburton was smart enough to patent all his company’s inventions. This enabled the company to make money anytime someone needed oil well cementing service, as they could either be hired or their patented equipment rented, either way they are making money.

Investing In Research And Development

To have an edge over others in the industry you need to possess certain capabilities that can enable you create uncommon and not-easily duplicated products, services, processes, and systems that will keep your competitors far behind you. To possess these capabilities, you will certainly need a well funded research and development unit.

Having a research and development department should be a priority need for any business that desires the top position in its industry – it is indeed pivotal to business success.

No doubt, Halliburton’s success and continued dominance of the oil well cementing and stimulation service industry is traceable to the work of its research and development unit, which it funded heavily. In the course of the company’s history, the department created innovative equipment and processes that enabled it to be highly sought after.

Read Halliburton Company Success Story here.

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Halliburton: The Making Of A Global Company From A Borrowed Pump And Wagon

Innocent — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 20:29:43 +0000

Halliburton Company Success Story

The Making Of A Global Company From A Borrowed Pump And Wagon
… Now One Of The Largest Oil Services Businesses In The World With Operations In Over 100 Countries

The beginning of Halliburton is no doubt an unmistakable proof of how courage, determination, and absolute belief in one’s self and ideas can lead to business success.

Erle Palmer Halliburton had been with the Navy, where he learnt and gained some experience in engineering and hydraulics before getting a job with the Perkins Oil Well Cementing Company in 1916. But before the year ended, he was fired! The company’s management couldn’t tolerate his continual suggestions for change in operational methods any longer.

To give vent to his ideas of how better an oil well cementing service could operate, he decided to start his own business. Without any money to begin with, and unyielding to allowing it to stop him, Halliburton borrowed a pump and a wagon which he collateralized with his wife’s wedding ring.

He then moved to Burkburnett, Texas, to seek the patronage of the oil industry for his well cementing method. But no one gave him any attention. Instead of giving up, Halliburton moved once more to Oklahoma, and after a while he got his first client, and then another. Not too long his business was booming.

To be more organized to cope with the rising demand for his service, Halliburton in 1920 formed the Halliburton Oil Well Cementing Company as a partnership business between him and his wife, Vida. And by 1921, Halliburton’s service was ordered by a number of oil companies in Louisiana, Arkansas, and other areas rich in oil.

The rising demand for his business was generated by his resolute insistent on providing quality and reliable service. Halliburton also invented and patented new equipment and processes for each project the company carried out, and this over the years made it indispensable where oil well cementing was concerned, as you will either hire Halliburton for the job or rent their equipment.

One of the company’s inventions, the Jet Mixer revolutionized the oil industry. It was a mechanized mixer that replaced hand-mixing of the minimum 250 bags of cement and water slurry required for each well. This machine removed the occurrence of wasted slurry that usually solidified before it could be poured, as a result of the fact that it could regulate the proportions of cement and water mixed.

By 1924, the Halliburton couple decided to expand their business. And to raise the needed capital, they converted their partnership into a corporation and offered other oil companies a large chunk of their business – the Halliburtons held 52 percent of the stock, while the Gulf, Magnolia, Texas, Sun, Pure, Humble, and Atlantic oil companies held a combined share of 48 percent.

The Halliburton Company invested hugely on research and development. In ten years of its existence, it has improved its processes and equipment up to the point when it could make a mixture of with 2,500 sacks of cement and inject into a well in 48 minutes.

More demand for Halliburton’s service continued in the 1930s with increase in automobile production and use of domestic oil heating, which increased fuel consumption and benefited the oil industry. To keep pace with demand, the company expanded. It established four new branches that allowed it to send 75 cementing and well-testing crews to sites in seven states in 1932, and introduced bulk cementing in place of hand-moving of heavy cement sacks.

In 1940 Halliburton bought over the founder’s former employer, Perkins Cementing Company, and stretched its operations to the West Coast and the Rocky Mountain region. Also in the course of the year, Halliburton opened a branch in Venezuela, taking its earnings to $13.5 million a year later.

As the 1940s drew to a close, Halliburton had firmly established itself as a formidable player in the oil services industry, with enormous competitive advantage in its ability to develop processes and specialized equipment that brought effectiveness and efficiency in the industry, thereby reducing cost.

In the 1950s, Halliburton diversified its business into other areas, including the rental and sale of specialized equipment such as formation testing tools, well completion operation equipment, wall cleaners, depth measuring equipment, and production packers. It also offered services such as electronic logging and sidewall wellcoring, and the transporting of cement and fracturing sands to drilling sites.

In addition to almost 200 operating centers in the United States, and 32 service locations in Canada and subsidiaries in Venezuela and Peru, Halliburton’s operations also reached Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Sumatra, Italy, Germany, Australia, and Cuba in the 1950s.

Again, Halliburton’s huge investment in research and development paid off handsomely as the company created a number of innovations in the industry, including new composition for cementing deep wells, and a method for making the fracturing sand radioactive. As a result of these innovations, the company’s sales figure climbed to $152.4 million at the close of 1955.

Erle Halliburton died in 1957 leaving behind a fortune of close to $100 million – he was cited by the New York Times asone of the richest people in the United States then.

In other to remain competitive, enter new markets, and to lead the industry, Halliburton embarked on acquisition drive. By 1965, it had 16 autonomous units that were coordinated into three main businesses: oil services and sales; engineering division that focused on international construction projects; and the specialty sales and services division that supported general industry.

Each of these three divisions was subdivided into smaller subdivisions, with the subdivisions further divided into several hundred profit centers administered by field managers, who kept headquarters in touch every month using a monthly report system that monitored specific financial goals.

The 1980s saw increased well drilling as a result of the removal of oil price control. This meant more demand for well cementing and stimulation. To gain from this demand, industry giants such as Dresser Industries, and Schlumberger Limited began diversifying into the cementing and stimulation industry, giving Halliburton some tough competition.

To fend off competitors from eating through its market share, Halliburton ensured its prices were kept at competitive levels, and employed its incontestable strength in drilling muds and well logging. By 1980, Halliburton’s revenue reached $8.3 billion.

The 1980s also saw Halliburton continuing to invest heavily in research and development, including the development of horizontal drilling techniques. By the close of the decade it had over 40 research and development projects it was engaged in.

After taken over the helm of affairs of Halliburton as CEO in the later part of 1995, former U.S. Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney launched what can be said to be the most ambitious acquisition program in the company history. The company acquired Landmark Graphics Corp., OGC International Plc, NUMAR Corporation, and the biggest of them all, the merger with Dresser Industries Inc. in February 1998.

These acquisitions made Halliburton more competitive as expressed by Cheney in a Forbes’ 1999 article: “What we got was a significant improvement in our product lines,” which was viewed as crucial to remaining competitive in the somewhat turbulent oil industry.”

However, in the early 2000, the company’s earnings was hit hard by a combination of factors: dwindling economy, falling oil price, and reduction in North American gas production. Halliburton reported a loss of $984 million in 2002 away from a net profit of $809 million it made the previous year.

To curb the negative run, the company’s new CEO, David Lesar began a cut saving measure, part of which was selling off non-core businesses. The company was restructured into two main groups: Halliburton Energy Services Group and KBR (the engineering and construction group). The plan was to build each of the two groups into independently run companies.

Halliburton has continued to wax stronger and dominating in the industry, and today offers the world’s broadest array of products, services and integrated solutions for oil and gas exploration, development and production.

Read Halliburton Company Business Strategies here.

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Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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Ready, Fire, Aim: Zero To $100 Million In No Time Flat by Michael Masterson

Innocent — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 17:57:44 +0000

Ready, Fire, Aim: Zero To $100 Million In No Time Flat by Michael Masterson

Bringing his wealth of knowledge and experience in building dozens of multimillion dollar businesses, including one whose revenues exceeds $135 million and another still growing at $300 million, Michael Masterson provides an invaluable guide to business owners on starting and growing their businesses to multimillion dollar enterprise in his book, Ready, Fire, Aim: Zero To $100 Million In No Time Flat.

Reading Ready, Fire, Aim is a golden opportunity to get into the mind of a fabulously successful entrepreneur and discover the skill you need to create powerful marketing campaigns that ensure you gain sizeable market share and direct continuous flow of cash to your business. You will also find out how to create and implement innovative cost saving operational procedures that will enable you to save much more money and keep your profit high.

This is a great book for entrepreneurs and business owners. You will find it a very valuable guide.

Here is an excerpt from the book, enjoy it!

SPEED

Putting Ready, Fire, Aim Into Your Business

A Simple Formula For Second-Stage Growth

To change your company from a mom-and-pop, one-dimensional business into a product-producing machine, you will have to become good not just at innovation but also at speed. It probably took several years to produce and market your first product. To take your company to the next level, you will have to move faster – at least twice as fast as you are comfortable moving right now.

I am talking about increasing the velocity of innovation. This includes the time it takes to brainstorm, develop, test, and produce new products. In chapter 10, I talked about how you can get better at coming up with good ideas. But I also pointed out that if you don’t execute good ideas quickly, they will degenerate over time.

Innovation matters. And so does speed. Combined, they give your business extraordinary growing power. Incorporate them into your company’s culture, and you will have no problem breaking through the one-product, million-dollar barrier.

Let’s put this in mathematical terms:
80% of G = IV2
Where G equals second-stage growth, I equals innovation and V equals velocity.

If you prefer verbal axioms, remember it this way:

The amount of growth a company can expect at the second stage of its development is directly related to its ability to generate and test new-product ideas quickly.

As your company’s leader, you are responsible for its growth. Therefore, most of the time you spend during this stage of development should be given to generating and executing new-product ideas. You don’t need to spend tons of time brainstorming.

If you run your creative sessions as suggested in Chapter 10, you will be able to come up with plenty of good new-product ideas by spending just a day or two every two or three months drumming them up. But you will need to spend a good deal of time pushing those new ideas along to fruition – conducting follow-up meetings, sending out follow-up memos, making phone calls, and reading reports.

There are, of course, plenty of other things you feel pressured to do during your typical workday, but you should do as few of them as you can. By now, you should have at least half a dozen people to whom you can delegate important responsibilities. Let them be in charge of operational tasks. Let them worry about customer service issues. Let them market your existing product(s). They should know how to handle all those things. If they don’t, you have not been teaching them properly.

There is a time for everything, and now is the time to develop new products. Imagining and effecting improvements is now your most important role.

Three Things That You Should Feel Passionate About

To succeed as a product innovator, you should have or develop passionate feelings about three things.

First, you should love good ideas. And it shouldn’t matter a whit to you whether the idea is yours or someone else’s. If it sounds like it can effect a big change, love it.

Second, you should hate sluggishness. When working with new ideas, you should feel anxious about time passing. The moment a new idea surfaces, you should have a strong impulse to begin working on it right away. You should feel anxious if weeks go by and you hear nothing about it. You should get angry when you discover that someone has been letting it sit.

Third, you should enjoy the process. Taking a new idea from concept to execution is often a long and laborious procedure. If you find it tedious, you may pull away from the action and leave too much to chance. Allow your executives to do most of the work, but identify key decisions that you can participate in making. Set deadlines for making those decisions and keep them.

Teach your key people that when ideas are left in limbo, details are forgotten. Obstacles arise. Enthusiasm wanes. And, finally, the idea is forgotten or – worse – executed so weakly that it fails. The space of time that stands between the conception of an idea and its execution is filled with the potential for failure.

“Money Loves Speed”

Joe Vitale, author of Buying Trances: A New Psychology of Sales and Marketing, is a big proponent of speed.

At an EarlytoRise.com seminar, he told an amusing story that illustrated a principle he espouses: Money loves speed. To boost traffic to a new website, Vitale came up with the whacky idea of selling Elvis Mermaid Dolls on eBay. What was an Elvis Mermaid Doll? He wasn’t quite sure. But he knew that every month, millions of people go online and do a search for the word “Elvis.” What would happen if they saw something that said Elvis Mermaid Doll? How would they react?

It felt like a very good idea – maybe even a tipping-point idea – so Joe didn’t waste any time. Within 24 hours, he had created an image of an Elvis mermaid (by using Photoshop) and posted it on his website.

Within seconds, he said, he had hundreds of people visiting his site. “If I had stopped to think about this for very long,” he admitted, “I probably would have realized that there were problems with using Elvis’s name. There are legal issues involved in using any celebrity name for commercial purposes. If I had the habit of moving slowly and carefully, I’m sure I would have found them out. But, luckily for me, I moved quickly. I didn’t fool around with anything. I just moved. The idea turned out to be a huge traffic builder for me.”

When it comes to implementing new product and marketing ideas, Vitale told the seminar audience, “keep one thing in mind: Money loves speed.”

That’s the right instinct for a business builder: to implement good ideas as fast as possible.

Faster Testing Means More Products, Which Means More Profits

At a business retreat that I recently attended, the CEO of a publishing company explained how her newsletter division led her company’s growth over the past five years.

“Historically, we’ve been very good at recognizing good ideas,” she said. “Because we have a license to emulate successful publications of a sister company in the United States, coming up with breakthrough ideas has never been a big problem. The process, in fact, is pretty easy: See what’s hot there, adapt it to local conditions, and test it. More often than not, if it works in the States, it works here.

“So we have that advantage in terms of innovation,” she continued. “But for many years, our growth was hampered because of how long it took us to get new products going. Even with the advantage that our idea-borrowing program gave us, it took us, on average, over two years to test and launch a new product.

“We were hamstrung by all the regular things,” she explained, “a limited budget, a limited staff, and lots of accounting and legal regulations. But after so many years of putting up with how long it took , we came up with a new idea.”

Her idea was very simple:

“If we could decrease by half the time it took us to bring a new product to market, we could double the number of new products we could test. Doubling the new products didn’t guarantee a doubling of sales or profits, but – based on our track record of successful efforts – it seemed like a very good move.”

When she introduced the policy, a few people quit because they didn’t want to do the extra work. “But almost everybody else was excited by the challenge,” she said. “And it turned out that once we got the system figured out, we were able to have more fun producing more products in less time.”

Borrowing from something she had seen another division in the company do, she replaced the old, laborious, two-year launching program with a new, streamlined approach that takes only a year from start to finish.

When her team gets an idea for a newsletter, they create a short business plan that requires them to answer some very basic questions – such as how the publication is unique, how it fits into the existing product line, and to whom it will be marketed.

“This doesn’t tell us if the new product will succeed,” she said, “but it does indicate if we’ve made any major errors in thinking, such as planning a product for which there isn’t a sufficiently large market or projecting sales without a realistic marketing plan based on past performance – selling similar products to the same market.”

Next, they create a rough sketch of what the newsletter will do, how it will look, who will write it, and so forth, and they write ha short sales piece for it, based on that rough sketch.

Then they hire the person who will write the newsletter and give him a three-month contract to produce prototype issues. At the same time, they get a good copywriter to produce a relatively short (four-to eight-page) sales letter announcing and selling the new product. They run this ad on their website, offering 100 readers the chance to get the newsletter for free for 90 days in return for their willingness to provide feedback.

Several hundred people usually volunteer right away, she said. They select 100 of them and begin delivering the new product to those sample subscribers through the Internet (even if it is intended to be produced in print later on).

“During this time, we ask them a lot of questions about what they like and don’t like about the newsletter,” she told us. “And at the end of the 90-day trial period, we bring everybody together for a full-day focus group.

“By the end of the trial period, we end up with a much better and more focused product than we had at the beginning, because of all the specific feedback we get from our test group,” she said. “And we also have better ideas about how to sell it.”

When asked what she felt was the biggest obstacle she overcame in growing her division, she had an immediate answer: “It was the idea that going fast is risky,” she said. “We have a reputation for liking exactness. So getting everybody used to moving so quickly was a big challenge.”

But by cutting in half the time it took to test and launch new products, she was able to reduce costs (the average cost of testing decreased by approximately a hundred thousand dollars) and radically increase her division’s sales. The result: in five years, sales went from $5million to $22million, while their profit margin actually increased.

How Testing Can Lead To Speed, Safety, And Profits

Not every business has the option of launching new products by testing them first with existing customers – but if you can do it, you should. It is fast, safe, and profitable. Here’s why:

• Your existing customer base should always be your best market. If the new product launch doesn’t sell quickly (for free) to those customers, it almost certainly won’t work if you advertise it elsewhere.
• Because the new product is advertised as a test and given away for free, it doesn’t have to be polished. That saves a lot of money.
• Test-launching the product this way gives you customer feedback before it is officially launched. All that feedback has got to improve the product.
• It gives the marketing team compelling personal testimonials about the value of the product – some of which might be expressed with dramatic stories that can be used in your advertising.
• And, finally, the announcement to your existing customers that a new product is being tested creates anticipation that can result in higher responsiveness when you market the product to them later on.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you if you desire to find out how to become super rich.

Get Your Copy of Ready, Fire, Aim Here

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Why You Must Have A Business Plan

Innocent — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 17:14:09 +0000

Why You Must Have A Business Plan

Even though you can run a business successfully without a business plan, your success is however surer if you have one. Apart from using it to achieve your business goals, business plan is one document you will be required to present in certain situations.

Here are the reasons you need a business plan for your business, and the situations you will be required to have and present one.

For Loan Application

If your business needs loan to start up or to expand its operation, you will be required by creditors to present a business plan. Bankers and other loan givers will be interested in reading your business plan, from which they will be able to determine if your business is viable or profitable or not.

Although they don’t always ask for a business plan from existing businesses, however, it is still advisable to have one prepared and presented - it will increase your chance of getting the loan. For start-up businesses, business plan will be required to access Small Business Administration (SBA) loan.

From your business plan, they will be able to see if you have a management team with enough expertise and experience to run the business successfully. They will also observe your market potential and competition, and how well your product or service is uniquely positioned to stay on top of competition.

No doubt business plan is a document that enables creditors to assess the risk in a business with high degree of accuracy before offering it loans, therefore they will surely ask for it to assess any business loan application.

If you are therefore in need of loan to start or run your business, writing, or having someone write a solid business plan for your business that will satisfy the needs of bankers, venture capitalists, and angel investors, will definitely increase your chance of getting the loan.

To Win Equity Funding

If you need someone to fund your business and own part of it, then you must have a written business plan ready to show because they will surely want to read your business plan. They will want to know the kind of business they are getting into before putting their money down.

You see, nobody wants to lose their money, even if they have millions or billions of it. To be sure they are not going to lose their money in a bad business investment, they will demand to study your business plan. And that means if your business plan doesn’t impress them you will not get their funding.

To Achieve Business Goals

The best way to achieve your business goals is to have a plan written for it. Writing a business plan for a goal or project will enable you to clearly define the goal and articulate the actionable steps you will follow to achieve it.

With such a plan, you have the road map to use to successfully reach the goal. You are also highly motivated and excited to continue working out the plan in the face of daunting challenges because the plan focuses your mind on the goal to be achieved and you know you will get there.

If you haven’t been writing a plan for a goal that you desire to achieve, I encourage you to start now, you will be amazed just how much energy and enthusiasm you will feel pursuing it, and how much more you will be able to achieve.

To Assess Business Performance

A business plan enables you to periodically review and assess your progress in reaching your goal. You will be able to see if you are meeting target, if not, you will know why and then adjust necessary parameters.

If in your business plan you projected you would have 2,000 new customers in three months from newspaper and television advertisements, but you only got 1,000, you could sit down to find out why you couldn’t meet the target. Your plan had given you the basis to ask questions and find solutions to move on to achieving the set target.

You will discover what works and what isn’t effective, and so concentrate on the one that produces result. Without doubt, having a business plan allows you to remain on course as it enables you to identify and implement certain changes that are needed, rather than quitting in the face of little hitches.

To Define A New Business

One of the benefits of writing a business plan for a business idea before going ahead to starting the business is that it gives you strong clarity of the business. It allows you to have a deep understanding of the business – the exact service it will be offering, who it will be serving, and how it will be offering its service.

With clarity of the purpose of your business established, success can be assured because you know exactly what you will be doing. A lot of small businesses fail in their first year because they were not well defined. In other words, the founders didn’t sit down to think through the business and write a plan for it. If they had tried writing a business plan for it, they would have been compelled to define the purpose of the business.

To Detail Agreements Between Business Partners

Due to the thoroughness and specificity by which business plans are written, agreements between partners in a business venture are explicitly stated and explained.

Therefore, if you are going into partnership with other people to run a business, you will need to produce a business plan for the business, where everyone’s responsibilities as agreed upon by all will be unambiguously stated.

To Place Value On A Business

A well written business plan with realistic projections based on factual data can be used to put a value on a business, which is necessary if you are placing the business for sale or if the value of the business is needed for legal purpose.

To Assess Performance Of New Products, Promotion, Or Expansion

Writing a business plan for a new product launch, promotion or expansion project will enable you to measure your progress periodically, and make whatever changes you find necessary to reaching your goal, as you implement the plan. Without a business plan for these kinds of projects, there will not be a tool to gauge your progress and make corrections where necessary.

In rounding off this article, I want to emphasize the importance of business plan to starting and running your business successfully. It’s a road map and highly valuable tool that helps you achieve your goals. It’s a document you must have to run your business or projects for surer result.

Recommended

Put your business on the path to success with a solid plan created with Business Plan Pro Software .

Experts in business and technology, as well as daily users rate this software higher and above others. Click here to see why.

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The Wal-Mart Way – Don Soderquist

Innocent — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 11:26:00 +0000

The Wal-Mart Way: The Inside Story Of The Success Of The World’s Largest Company – Don Soderquist

A lot of books have been written about the success of Wal-Mart, but none will give as much insight as one coming from someone who was right in the heart of idea generation, decision making, and strategy implantation that brought about the monumental success of Wal-Mart.

No one will probably be able to tell us what exactly enabled Wal-Mart to go from $1.25billion in sales in 1979 to $44 billion in 1992, and to $256 billion in 2004, than Don Soderquist, former Vice Chairman and COO of Wal-Mart.

And in this book, The Wal-Mart Way: The Inside Story Of The Success Of The World’s Largest Company, Don Soderquist unveils the actual principles and strategies that took Wal-Mart farther from being the largest retailer in the world to the world’s largest company.

Don Soderquist shares the 12 reasons behind the success of Wal-Mart for entrepreneurs and business managers to copy for their business success.

Here is an excerpt of the book, which is a must read for business owners and managers, enjoy it:

A Passion For Excellence

Leadership is the art of accomplishing more than the science of management says is possible. - Former Secretary of State Colin Powell

I joined Wal-Mart Stores in April 1980. Our sales were strong going into the holidays that year, and we had a tremendous selling season between Thanksgiving and Christmas. When I came into the Friday morning meeting the week after Christmas and confirmed that sales had risen nearly 40 percent from the same period in the previous year, I was amazed and extremely excited. I had never seen such a large increase with an established company, especially during what was already the highest sales volume period of the year.

If this had happened anywhere else I had ever worked, it would have been cause for a major celebration. Little did I know that I was about to enter Sam’s Wal-Mart Way classroom once again.

Excellence Means “Correction of Errors”

Sam began the meeting by thanking everyone for a great job. We discussed a few of the very positive things that we had done, but after only five minutes of modest self-congratulations, we began discussing what we could have done better.

We talked about everything we had “left on the table” – that’s when you lose sales due to a lack of merchandise. Sam asked why we had run out of Christmas wrapping paper a week-and-a-half early in some stores. We also discussed overstocking – why we ended up with way too much merchandise in other categories.

We spent a full two hours talking about how we could improve our decision making and operations, and we began making specific and detailed plans for the next Christmas season right then. Leadership assigned people to specific tasks and asked them to report back on how they were going to solve some of these problems.

This was a profound learning experience for me and introduced me to Sam’s simple concept of “correction of errors.” This is how we approached every major merchandise season, every company initiative, every major event we were involved in: review everything while it is still fresh in your minds, discover errors, and don’t make the same mistake twice. Sam rigorously applied this process to every part of the company and helped us to keep improving everything that we did.

Does this mean we didn’t reward and celebrate success? Absolutely not. But Sam didn’t see the value of sitting around and talking about how good we were, when there were things we could do better. This was one of my most important lessons on what passion for excellence really looked like.

Passion for Success Means High Expectations

By setting high expectations, we were always raising our performance standards to a new level. That’s how we were able to keep improving our numbers from year to year. But the real focus was always on being the best we possibly could be; the numbers would take care of themselves.

One of the keys to setting your expectations high is a spirit of optimism. We had a very optimistic view of America’s future, of the business environment, and of ourselves! We believed that there was always more potential than what we and others could see at the moment. That is why we addressed problems and challenges with poise and opportunism. Sam had a positive point of view. Sam was a living example to us of what we could accomplish if we set our minds to it.

Passion for Excellence Means Believing the Impossible Is Possible

High expectations are a powerful driving force, helping you become better than you already are. Sometimes you need to go one step further and step out on faith, even when you don’t have history or research to predict success.

As the biblical writer said: “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” (Heb. 11:1). Yes, past performance is the greatest predictor of future performance – but if we lived by that credo alone, no one would do anything bold and new. Sometimes we need good, old-fashioned faith!

Wal-Mart grew 2,000 percent in the seventies and passed the $2billion mark in 1982. Many retail analysts predicted this as our peak - the more established stores would leave us behind. But that was really only the beginning of the coming Wal-Mart revolution. People continue to be amazed by what we have accomplished in Wal-Mart since that time. And honestly, sometimes in reflecting back on our next period of unbelievable growth, I shake my head and pinch myself to make sure I didn’t dream it.

When I joined the company in the first quarter of 1980, Wal-Mart had just completed a year with sales of $1.25billion, Wal-Mart’s first billion-dollar year.

When Sam passed away twelve short years later, in April 1992, our sales had reached $44 billion, making us the largest retailer in the world.

By the end of fiscal year 2004, sales topped $256 billion – an increase of $212billion over the past twelve years. We had become the largest company in the world. Truth is stranger than fiction, and what I just described to you is impossible. But we did it.

The concept of “impossible” can do funny things to our thinking. We really do limit in our minds what people working together can accomplish in organizations. The extraordinary, the “impossible” things that Wal-Mart accomplished were done by ordinary people. I don’t believe that such results are limited to Wal-Mart.

I believe there are hundreds and thousands of stories just waiting to be written by organizations and companies who have leaders that inspire people to accomplish things that seem impossible. The only way that can happen, though, is if the leader believes it is possible – has even a mustard seed of faith – and can convince his people that the seemingly impossible is indeed possible.

Passion for Excellence Means Communicating, Communicating, Communicating…

Every year we had a different annual theme, which we introduced at the year-beginning meeting held in late January. But our theme didn’t fade away when the banner came down; we repeated it over and over again throughout the year. These themes were more than neat little slogans – they were really a focus point to drive home an idea, a rallying point to engage everyone’s thoughts.

It was an emotional appeal to help us realize we could achieve even higher goals than we had in the past. It was even a way to share our beliefs with everyone in the company – to communicate our culture – and bring everyone in alignment with a high goal. Several examples of the themes for past years are:

We’ve Only Just Begun!
You Can Do It!
Yes We Can!
Let’s Make It Happen!
It’s My Wal-Mart!

In 2001, our theme was “Imagine the Possible.” Some of us were like little kids getting in trouble for having too-active imaginations. (Usually there was some mischief involved.) All of us have been told in one form or another to get our heads out of the clouds and our feet on the ground.

I think to succeed in business and life that there are times when we need do the exact opposite: get our heads back in the clouds and our feet off the ground. In other words, stretch your mind and just imagine, envision, dream of how much better you and your organization can be than you are right now.

When was the last time you sent your mind wandering beyond today to imagine a brighter tomorrow? Let your mind go, dream a little, and you might just discover that anything is possible.

Too many leaders are afraid of letting their minds wander too far; they put fences around their dreams. If you want to accomplish great things, you must dare to venture beyond today’s realities.

The thinking behind “Imagine the Possible” was that we needed to push even further, beyond the self-imposed limits of our current thought processes and previous experiences.

My first thought was Imagine the possible by striving for the impossible, because that’s what we had actually done in the past; why couldn’t we do it in the future?

In preparation for my talk to all our store managers about the new theme, I looked the word impossible up in dictionary and found the following definition: “Felt to be incapable of being done, attained, or fulfilled.”

The key phrase in this definition that jumped off the page to me was “felt to be.” There have been many events in history that people perceived to be impossible but then accomplished. Consider:

The Pyramids of Egypt
We still don’t know how they were built. How did they get those big rocks on the top levels? Modern engineers still marvel. This was an unbelievable accomplishment for the ancient Egyptian civilization.

Beethoven’s Fifth
In 1804, Beethoven completed his Fifth Symphony in spite of the fact that he was completely deaf. He went on to write several other symphonies after losing his hearing. How is it possible to write music when you are deaf? You can’t do that – wouldn’t you have to know how it sounds? He accomplished what seemed to be impossible.

Breaking the Four-Minute Mile
Track athletes viewed running a mile in under four minutes as impossible. Some doctors believed that it was past the threshold of human potential and would lead to death.

Then one day, a young medical student, Roger Bannister of England, ran a mile in 3:59:4. In the next several years, runners achieved the four-minute mile over three hundred times. Once Bannister broke through the barrier, people believed it could be done – and did it.

The Heart Transplant
When I was growing up, it seemed like science fiction to think that you could take a heart out of one person and transplant it into the body of another. Then, Dr. Christian Barnard of South Africa did it. Today, organs are being transplanted hundreds and thousands of times a day all across the world.

Land a Man on the Moon
When I was a child, I read the popular comic strip Buck Rogers. Rogers wore a funny-looking outfit and traveled around in space in a shiny rocket. I liked reading Buck Rogers because it was like magic – the world of make-believe for young people. But later, the U.S. actually did it: we landed men on the moon and we got them back to Earth. In the 1950s two Harvard scientists conclusively proved that space travel was impossible (because of the weight of the fuel). Today we take space travel for granted.

These achievements were all perceived to be impossible, but they were accomplished. If these things were possible, what else is possible? Are there things in your organization that you or your people may think are impossible that in actuality could be done? No one believed that it was possible to build the largest corporation in the world in Bentonville, Arkansas, but we did it. If you can recognize that what others feel is impossible is actually possible, you can open up the boundaries of your mind. Who knows what you may be able to do?

A Passion for Excellence in Wabash, Indiana: A Snapshot

On Monday, October 25, 1999, a fire started in the furniture department on the lamp counter in our Wabash, Indiana, store. The store manager was alerted, and he attempted to extinguish the fire but was unsuccessful. He discovered later that lamp oil on the counter fueled the fire.

The fire department arrived and was able to put out the fire fairly quickly. Unfortunately, however, there was extensive smoke damage throughout the store. All of the merchandise had to be removed from the store and salvaged, all of the ceiling tile had to be replaced, and all of the store fixtures had to be cleaned off or repainted.

In essence, the entire store had to be cleared out and cleaned up before the new merchandise could be brought in and set in place. This was a major undertaking, almost like setting up a whole new store.

The store manager called the executive vice president of operations and said he would have to close the store for approximately twenty-one days. The executive vice president indicated that three weeks was too long for the store to be closed for our customers and challenged the district manager and store-planning vice president to do it in no more than seven days. The race was on.

Recommended Resource

This is a great book by all standard, and I very much gladly recommend it to you if you desire to find out how to become super rich.

Get Your Copy of The Wal-Mart Way Here

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Net Worth (In Millions)	Average Net Worth	Average House Value
$1 to under 2.5	$1,470,553	$220,796
2.5 to under 5	3,392,416	354,043
5 to under 10	6,809,409	545,499
10 to under 20	14,045,501	779,444
20 and more	58,229,024	1,073,980