Dan S. Kennedy's Blog, page 16

6 Steps To Creating Info-Products Super Quickly

Many people think that product creation has to be a long and complicated process that consists of tons of brainpower and thousands of dollars of fancy equipment—like a high-end video camera, studio quality microphone, and a fancy post-production.

The truth is that you don’t need to drop thousands of dollars on equipment to create a product. Product creation can be an “ugly” process here at GKIC because we just focus on getting the product out there—vs. spending tons of time tweaking transcripts, adding fancy video graphics, etc. etc.

Trying to strive for perfection when creating a product can stifle progress, so we believe that “good enough is good enough” when it comes to product creation.

Here are 6 steps you can use right now to create a product in as little as 2 hours. This is taken from the actual Product Creation Checklist we use everyday here at GKIC. Remember, you don’t have to get it right, you just have to get it going:

Brainstorm to map out your subject matter. Just sit down with a pencil and paper…or a computer using mind-mapping software…and ask yourself, “What do I do to create the transformation I formulate for my customers, clients or patients?”     List all the steps you use to create that transformation. You can even use sticky notes on a bulletin board, if you choose.


Organize these steps into 6-12 main topics. We always aim for 5-7 topics, but the topics can be as many as you want. You can just create an outline based on the brainstorming session you performed above.   Or you can arrange your sticky notes on a bulletin board in 6-12 “groups” you’ll use to create the sections of your product.


Under each topic, write down 10-15 bullet points. You’ve already done most of this in the first step, but here’s your chance to “fill in the blanks” with more ideas for each topic.   This is the outline you’ll use to create your product!


Record your audio. No fancy equipment needed here. You can easily download inexpensive recording software to your computer and a simple headset microphone. Dave Dee, our Chief Marketing Officer, uses Sound Forge audio, but you can use a myriad of inexpensive programs to record your product.


Speak about your topic. It helps if you stand up since you’ll be more energetic as you speak about each topic. Or you can hire someone to interview you.   You’ll want to use the bullet points you formulated above to guide you step-by-step through each step of your product.


Transcribe the audio. There are plenty of inexpensive transcription services available online. You may also want to read the transcription out loud, reorder the content, or edit the transcript with subheads to make it flow better.

This is a snippet from GKIC’s “Product Creation Checklist” we use everyday.  Ultimately, you don’t want to just give content and call it a day.   You want to design the product so that it brings in, attracts, and creates really good customers.  

You also want to figure out how your product will be sold. In other words, advertising, marketing, sales plans, etc. should precede and drive product development. The “build it and they will come” philosophy of product creation is a surefire way to disappointment and wasted time and money.

Note: This week we are releasing, for the first time ever,  3 powerful trainings straight from the “Bonus Day” at the 2015 Info-SUMMIT where we go in depth on The GKIC Model. Gain exlusive access by clicking here now.

 

 

 

The 5 “Tools of the Mind” You Need to Become a Millionaire Thinker

When most people think about money, they’re thinking about it in negative ways: worry, budget-wrestling, can’t afford, jealousy of others.

So in matters involving the attraction of wealth and opportunity, the DOMINANT thoughts that clutter the grey matter of most are all repellent.   Indeed, when Napoleon Hill wrote, “Thoughts are things,” he meant and went on to explain that dominant thoughts are things. And that is the secret of Think and Grow Rich.

Instead – through rigorous discipline and practice – you need to replace these negative influences on your subconscious mind with positive alternatives. Such a turnaround can have a profound effect.

In and of themselves, mere thoughts don’t somehow “magically” conjure up cash on the barrelhead. But by leveraging these thoughts to initiate substantive, constructive ACTIONS you can in fact kickstart your journey to better finances and a better life.

Here are 5 specific “tools of the mind” that I’ve found useful in helping to shape my own thinking in a much more positive, wealth-attracting manner.

Planning. The discipline of either ending or beginning each morning with about 30 minutes devoted exclusively to planning the goals, objectives, activities, meetings and conversations of the day is an excellent practice. This focuses your attention on productive matters and it gives your subconscious mind powerful directions and instruction.
Environment. I know people who’ve started with nothing and built great empires. True Horatio Alger, rags-to-riches kinds of stories. But one thing I’ve noticed common to those people was that they did their very best to make what little they had into a positive work and living environment. You can’t do million dollar thinking in an environment that makes you feel like a failure. Even if your means are limited, do what you can to make your environment as good as it can possibly be.
Reading. Data Processing experts say input governs output. So to be a million-dollar thinker, you’ve got to regularly give yourself input of that kind of quality and value. My regular reading list includes at least a book a week, over a dozen commercial magazines, a dozen more specialized trade magazines, and a couple dozen newspapers, some of which cost in excess of hundreds of dollars a year. Serious wealth builders HAVE to consume massive quantities of carefully selected information.
The Right Activities. The million-rollar thinker does a great job at separating the important from the trivial when deciding upon what to focus their time and talents. Remember, that we define productivity as the use of your time, talent, energy, intelligence, resources, and opportunities in a manner calculated to move you measurably close to meaningful goals. One successful businessman once told me, “I can tell the depth of your commitment by the ease of your diversions.”


The Right Associations. There’s a principle of association that you can predict a person’s future by evaluating the books he reads, the media he watches, and listens to, and the people he hangs out with. There’s an awful amount of truth in that. There’s really no such thing as an innocuous conversation, a TV program on for just the noise, a card game with the guys just to relax. Because from all those situations, like all other situations, input is collected, stored, accumulated, merged/purged, and used by your subconscious mind.

Bottom line: what you do, where you do it, who you do it with, and what you think while you’re in process ALL work together to program your mind towards some kind of results.

Recognizing this fact – and implementing “tools of the mind” as described above – can give you the means to achieve more control over the direction that programming takes you.

Note: By applying these “tools of the mind” to your life, without a doubt a flood of opportunities will begin to present themselves. If helping others attain their goals and dreams – and getting rewarded in a significant way for doing so – then you should consider leveraging your skills as a consultant-coach. Click here to discover the fastest, easiest way (along with my own “Secret Sauce”) to make that happen.

Five Business Habits You Should Drop Today

If you are spending hours working on your business and not getting the results you want, you may have a “business habit” or two that needs dropped.

Here are five habits to ditch that will help you grow your business and profits—not to mention reduce the amount of time you spend on your business.

1. Churning and burning.  Yes, you want to attract new customers, clients, and patients, but if you are only focused on attracting new customers without paying attention to existing customers, you are wasting a lot of money and leaving a whole lot of money on the table. You must have a system in place for capturing names of customers to build a herd of customers you can sell to again and again.

2. Getting leads without having a follow-up system in place. Getting a bunch of leads can give your business a huge boost, but only if you have a clear, persistent, consistent, easily repeatable path to convert those leads to buyers. If you have leads with no immediate funnel to convert them, or are randomly following up, you are not only wasting time, money and effort, but you could be leaving a bad impression.

(For more on creating the most-effective lead follow-up and more importantly CONVERSION system, check out this free livecast call Building Your Ultimate Marketing Machine. Click Here)

3. Chasing buyers. I’ve seen it time and time again. You get a hot lead and you keep chasing after him while neglecting to put a system in place that will continually attract your ideal clients to you. Stop chasing, start attracting.

4. Doing the same thing. If you aren’t getting the results you want—if you aren’t living your dream life—maybe it’s time to look at doing things differently. Too many businesses look at what their competitors are doing and think they should be doing the same thing. But that doesn’t make sense if you aren’t where you want to be.

One of Dan Kennedy’s primary guiding principles is to do the opposite of what everyone else is doing. It’s a principle that has served Dan, myself and the GKIC Elite very, very well. Thinking differently than most of the people you see doing business can turn out to be your UNFAIR advantage. Thinking differently has created solutions that have generated a boatload of extra profits for Dan, myself, Dan’s clients, etc. and it can do the same for you too.

It’s time to do the opposite of what everyone in your niche is doing and start doing what works.

5. Going it alone. Look, I get it. Working alone can be great. You can do things your way. You don’t have to listen to what anyone else thinks. You feel really good when you succeed because it’s all you.

However, we are so fortunate to have so many resources available that can help with virtually any situation, why would you go it alone? Plus having someone to hold you accountable and a mentor or coach to give you feedback and help guide you means you will get there easier and faster.

By IMMEDIATELY dumping things that aren’t working, you’ll have the opportunity and time to apply strategies to your business that do work. Who knows? Maybe you will be the next person to tell me that your big breakthrough came as a result of getting rid of something that wasn’t giving you the results you wanted.

NOTE: You should never be creating a “once-in-a-row” promotion or ad campaign.  Instead you should be building campaigns that work to generate leads 24/7, on auto-pilot, that then converts those leads into sales so you have predictable, reliable income!  To see one such system and every single piece included, laid out for you in step-by-step detail, click here and join me on the FREE livecast called “Building Your Ultimate Marketing Machine.”

When Should You Go Long?

Over the years many of my clients have asked me about long copy.

They wonder if it makes sense, will it increase readership and will it boost their response rates. They’re thinking about testing a long-copy format across various media channels (direct mail, website, an email campaign) to market their products or services – but they have reservations.

They understand and appreciate the importance of brevity, of being able to grab attention immediately and getting right to the point. They realize that the average person out there has a very limited attention span and will literally only give you a few seconds of their time before tuning you out and moving on.

Before making a commitment to long copy, consider the following criteria:

Identify your target audience. Seniors or well-educated prospects want all the facts and are more receptive to long copy. If initially interested, they will make time to take a long, hard look at what you have to say. Products or services that would normally require long copy include in-home healthcare service, a four-year college education, a motorized wheelchair or a hearing aid.

Long-form copy usually makes sense when you are trying to educate your target market. If it’s a new market, prospects are probably unfamiliar with what you offer, how it works and most importantly why they need it. So go ahead and walk them through the sales process. If interested, they will read what you have to say several times.

If you’re selling something exotic or complex that requires lots of description, try a long copy approach. Don’t just gloss over the features and benefits. Spell it all out. Examples of exotic or complex include a once-in-a-lifetime vacation like an African safari, a luxury automobile, solar heating panels or a limited edition coin collection.

If you have a big or unusual offer, long copy will increase your chances for a strong response rate. This might include a private pre-sale of collector stamps, an initial offering of vacation homes with no down payment or an ironclad money-back guarantee that the competition can’t beat.

Why test a long copy approach?

Generally speaking length is not as important as content. If you have a big story to tell, tell it in a dramatic, compelling manner.


It’s a new market – prospects are unfamiliar with your product/service and want to know how it works and more importantly why they need it.


Long-form copy makes sense when you are trying to educate your target market.


When it comes to business decisions, business people need all the facts.


Under normal circumstances, it’s better to give more information versus less. If prospects have questions that are unanswered, they are more likely to hold off making a purchase. Long copy normally answers many of their questions and overcomes doubts or hesitation on the part of the prospect.

There are many examples of long-form copy pulling an impressive response rate, including:

A popular credit card company relied on a direct mail package with a three-page letter that remained the control for many years and became a recognized standard within the credit card industry.


A travel and resort company successfully markets an exotic getaway adventure on the Amazon River with a four-page letter. Space for the trip is limited and many respondents are turned away on a regular basis.


A well-known home correspondence school normally includes a four-page letter and copy heavy brochure in their fulfillment kit. The strategy behind their success is to give a prospect as many good reasons as possible to sign up for a home study course.


The U.S. Mint regularly issues a limited number of rare coins and uses a long form letter in its direct mail along with a copy heavy print ad. Collectors can’t get enough facts or information concerning the latest series, and quantities of the product (usually a one-time limited run) traditionally sell out within a few weeks of introduction.


One of the largest worldwide marketers of collectibles normally relies on long form copy to sell plates, music boxes, figurines and other collectible products. Their mailings give a detailed background about the history of the particular product, its creation, facts about the artist, and more – probably more than most of us would ever want to know. This approach transformed a cottage industry into a multi-million dollar operation.

When it comes to direct response techniques that work, there continues to be a time and a place for long copy. Be sure to take into account your target audience, your product or service and your offer when trying to decide if long copy makes sense. And above all else, be sure to test it. Anyone can make predictions. Test results should always dictate where you’re at and more importantly, where you should be going with your copy content.

For more insightful information about the art and science of copywriting, be sure to ACT NOW and order Influential Communication and Writing Workshop. This package includes 13 CDs, a 311-page presentation manual, a 213-page transcript of the workshop and 205 pages of selected attendee samples you can swipe and use to increase revenue and pump up your business.

Order today, while you’re thinking about it, and you’ll also receive a special double bonus worth $694. Get a pair of CDs, Midas Touch Marketing, covering proven direct mail techniques. And you’ll also get an audio MP3 of an interview I did with Dave Dee about setting goals, time management, a positive attitude and more. ACT NOW ‒ this special offer expires Monday, January 18, 2016 at midnight.

Hand Drawn Sketch That’s Worth Ten’s of Thousands…To You!

While I’m certainly not artist in the traditional sense, I have created masterpieces that have brought in ten’s and even hundreds of thousands of dollars.  The more important thing is, the masterpiece I’m about to share, can be worth ten’s (or hundreds in the right hands) of thousands to you as well! 

This little sketch is something I call “The Ultimate Marketing Machine”.  Let me ‘splain.

While it may not look like much at first blush, it’s actually a blueprint for how any business owner can create a automated system for attracting their ideal prospects and converting them into customers, clients or patients on auto-pilot.  (If you’re interested in a full blown look, I’ll be doing a one-time only, livecast that you can join by clicking here.) 

Let’s start where I like to start, at the beginning…

LEAD GENERATION

Leads are the life-blood of any and every business and they are where the Ultimate Marketing Machine begins.  In the sketch above I drew for proven ways to attract leads that are working today.  They are postcards, flyers, facebook and business cards…YES business cards. 

Using the right, simple phrasing, these four types of media can generate all the leads you’ll ever need.  But notice I said the right simple phrasing.  That’s where most business owners go wrong.  They create generic ads that look like everyone else’s and are missing key components like:

An Attention Getting Headline
A Benefit Laden Offer
A Clear Call To Action

When these three components are used, along with a few others I’ll go over on the livecast, you’ll have all the leads you can handle.  Notice though that I’ve included a minimum of four, you never want just one lead source, but more on that later.  Let’s move on to step two where all the little arrows are pointing. 

TURNING LEADS INTO PROSPECTS

Leads in and of themselves are worth nothing.  You need to systematically turn them into prospects.  You may be asking “what’s the difference.”  Think of a lead as someone who you don’t know who you have no information about who may not even be interested in your product or service.  Think of a prospect as a person who tells you they are interested in your product or service and gives you their information. 

This is the box that has the three rectangles in it and on this sketch it represents a lead capture web page.  On the live event I’ll talk about two other types of lead capture technology that are super simple that you can use immediately.  The important thing is to direct people (step one) to a page that offers them something in exchange for their information.  Now you’ve turned a lead into a prospect so we’ll move on to step three.

CONVERTING PROSPECTS INTO SALES

Everything we’ve done up until now costs us time and money.  Converting prospects into sales is where most entrepreneurs and businesses fail miserably by not spending the proper time or money on this step.  You can do everything right up until now and get them 90% of the way to the sale, but if you don’t make the effort on this step you might as well be giving your customers, clients or patients to your competitors.

Step three is really EVERYTHING you see after step two.  In fact there are 21 things included in step three and all of them lead to making the sale.  Now this does NOT mean you do all 21 things.  In fact most of them time you’ll just have to do 2, 3 or 4 of the things and you’ll make the sale and you’ll stop from there.  The reality though is that “the fortune is in the follow-up” and while it may seem daunting, on the livecast I’ll go into great detail on exactly whats included in each step when you need to send each step AND how to automate it.  Pretty cool!

Yup, you set it up once, and then these 21 steps are like an unpaid sales force, that never call in sick, and work for you 24 hours a day 7 days a week.  Pretty cool.  These include things like your Shock and Awe box with your A.C.E Sale Multiplier, your automated emails that convert like crazy, three follow-up letters that are simple, fun and in one case delicious, monthly mailings that NONE of your competition is doing and more.

So now that you know the process of how to attract leads, how to turn your leads into prospects and how to convert those prospects into customers, clients or patients, I think you’ll agree with me that this little sketch is pretty darn valuable. 

If you want even more value you’ll join me for FREE, on a one-time only livecast where I’m going to spend 4 hours going over each and every step and answer your questions live.  If you haven’t reserved your spot already, click here now.  We’re gonna have fun and you’ll walk away know exactly what and how to create your own “Ultimate Marketing Machine!”  I hope you’ll join me, click here. 

 

 

 

 

Do’s & Don’ts To Make Your Business Hot…And Keep It Hot All Year Round

If you are like a lot of business owners I meet, you have some procedures in place to attract customers. You may or may not have some follow-up in place. And because often things are cyclical—you work on getting leads, then switch to trying to convert them. Then switch back to focusing on getting leads again. A lot of it is manually done. And because you are missing some of the pieces sometimes things fall through the cracks.

This not only leaves you vulnerable to your competition stealing your business, but it’s stressful waking up remembering the things you forgot to do. Plus it leaves your business running hot and cold.

Let’s face it. That’s no way to live. Stressed out all the time. Worrying about what didn’t get done. Wondering if you’ll have enough customers next month. Wanting more out of life and your business.

So here’s a list of “do’s and don’ts” that will not only reduce your stress level, but will make your business run red hot year round, even when you step away from your business.

Don’t do it half-way. If you have a lead generation system in place, but not a follow-up system, you are spinning your wheels. As Dan Kennedy said in Thursday’s blog, “If you go to all the trouble to get leads and then ignore them, you might as well not have gotten them in the first place.”

Don’t limit your media. Dan Kennedy often talks about the dangers of only using one media. In addition to the dangers, leveraging a variety of media from Facebook ads to email to direct mail will make it near impossible for your prospects to ignore. Plus because the majority of your competitors will only be using one media, you will blow away the competition.

Don’t make appointments and sales dependent on you (or your staff.) You need an automatic system—not a manual one—that consistently, reliably follows up with each and every lead in an efficient, predictable way day-in, -out, whether or not you are there. Sure you can give a list of leads to a sales person and tell them to call to follow-up. But what happens if they didn’t reach the prospect? What if they don’t reach them and they are taking a few days off? You might miss your window of opportunity.

Do it quick. There is no virtue in doing things slow. The sooner you get systems in place, the faster you’ll be able to enjoy more freedom and less stress. Dragging out the process means you’re more likely to forget a critical element. It also ends up prolonging the rewards of better customers and bigger profits.

Do create a reliable list-building system. In Dan’s article, Two Mistakes To Avoid When It Comes To Your Most Valuable Business Asset, he says that the most valuable asset a business has is its customer list. You should continuously be working on building this list. To make it easier, put something automatic in place so it’s working for you around-the-clock.

Do use templates and tools. This goes hand in hand with “Do it quick.” This not only makes it much faster to get things in place, but by using tools and templates, you ensure things will work and are repeatable.

When you get your business running efficiently, effectively and automatically, your business will always be humming along attracting your ideal prospects and immediately converting them into buyers

That means you’ll stop struggling and have more time to enjoy life.

Note: When you click here you can reserve a spot for the one-time only, Livecast of “Creating Your Ultimate Marketing Machine” that’s being done by my friend and marketing automation expert, Dave Dee.

On “Creating Your Ultimate Marketing Machine” you’ll discover the secret formula to creating a system that works 24/7/365 to get you new customers, clients or patients, convert them into sales and creates a predictable, reliable cash flow surges in your business…on Auto-Pilot!

You set this system up once, and it runs for you all day every day!

Reserve your spot for this one-time only Livecast now by clicking here and in just a few hours of working “on” your business you’ll eliminate hundreds of hours working “in” your business.

Still The Best “Big Darn Secret” I Use To Make Serious Money

Words matter.

One of the things many people wonder about is what I do that can possibly justify fees of $18,800 to (more commonly) $100,000 to write an ad, sales letter campaign, video script, TV call to action, etc. The answer is simply that “words matter” and I’ve gotten good at picking and combining words that sell.

I have a little, internal alarm bell that goes off when I hear or see “turn off words” (words that will turn off the reader), so I edit myself as I write. Still, I often spend hours upon hours agonizing over the choice of a few words in a given piece.

It is absolutely true that how you say it is at least as important as what you are saying. This accounts for the success of people in every field.

If you have good marketing systems in place and they aren’t making money for you or if you are experiencing shrinking sales, you should check your copy.

Especially if your marketing worked at one time, but has suddenly dropped off and stopped working. It may be that you just need to resuscitate your ad. All great ads eventually peter out, however it is not always necessary to completely re-do them.

By the way, sometimes copy that isn’t working from day one contains great elements worth hanging on to—elements that do their job.  But the reason the copy isn’t working is because key elements are missing such as an opening paragraph that grabs your reader by the throat and won’t let go or a great offer. You need to know how to identify what’s missing or you may waste a lot of time and money.

You can sell just about anything with great copy. While there are a few isolated cases where great copy hasn’t made a difference, it is rare, and even then the copy still sells, just not profitably.

Not only can you use copy and use sales letters to sell, but you can use them to sell your products and services the way you want to—to sell things on YOUR terms. To make your prospects comply with the way YOU want to do business.

This is a very important principle. Because it is one thing to make money, but it is an entirely other matter to make money the way you want to make money.

Everybody believes that their business is different. That this doesn’t apply to you. That no one else is doing this in your business.  That they aren’t using the written word to sell or that their copy must be acceptable because they are making sales. Maybe it’s “acceptable.” But using better sales copy gives you a competitive edge. Especially when you possess this #1 skill and they don’t.

Darin Garmin was making sales in real estate, but he wasn’t happy with the process and was becoming increasingly frustrated by doing a lot of work only to lose the sale to a competitor.

No one was using sales letters to sell apartment buildings until Darin decided to do it. Not only did he succeed at selling apartment buildings with sales letters, he got the people HE pre-determined were good candidates to respond. Plus, when he did some research, he found that he had moved into a position where 70% of all apartment building transactions go through HIS office. That was NOT the case before he started using sales letters.

It does not matter whether your clients are the CEO or the broom pusher…everybody buys the same way. They all go through the same process. They all go through the same emotions. And if you do not accept that, then you are missing out on the single greatest secret I have to offer.

I made my first money from writing sales copy when I was 17 years old. To this day, it is still the greatest secret to making money I’ve ever discovered.

And I can tell you that there is A LOT of money at stake by not taking your copy more seriously.

From the boiler room to the boardroom, across all demographics, words sell. To believe that your customers are above all this…that they won’t read…or that your words are adequate…or that you can simply hire someone to write them for you without fully understanding whether the words are well-chosen or not… is hopelessly naïve.

For the most part, we MUST use words on paper to do our marketing which means you have to keep this is mind as you choose your words. And if you are hiring someone to choose your words for you, then you better know if it is good, if not great copy you are looking at. Because in today’s market, you simply cannot afford to be adequate.

As a side note, I often hear from business owners that they want to grow their business to millions, but they don’t like to write.

This is like being a pro football player, but never wanting to get hit or a pro basketball player, but never wanting to try the game-winning shot.

Sorry, but the serious money comes from result-getting performances, not just acceptable writing.

Fortunately there is literature about the art and science of selling through writing, so you can learn it, change your attitudes about it, and translate it to ‘selling by media’ and copywriting. I talk more about how to do this, click here to read on.

 

Three Uncomfortable Truths About Why Most Businesses NEVER Crack Through To Top Income

It doesn’t much matter where you are in your business at the moment. You can be a well-established pro who knows his income ought to be higher. Or you can be a beginner coming out of the gate and trying to make your way…as long as you have your thinking straight and are serious about your business, you can hit the 7-figure income mark.

However, there are three “uncomfortable truths” about why most small business owners never will.

Truth #1: The highest income people tend to get paid more for who they are than what they do.

You are not entitled to a high income. Just because you have your law degree…your doctor degree…your certification in whatever… and 25 years of experience…etc. This does not mean you will automatically get paid more.

Think about athletes. NBA player Derrick Rose who plays for the Chicago Bulls is one of the highest paid athletes—even though he has been riddled with injuries most of his career. Tim Tebow, whose NFL career never put him in the same category of the best athletes in the game, made millions in endorsements. Why? Simply for being “Tim Tebow.”

So building up who you are is vastly more important than what you do or your competency level.

Truth #2: The path to more, more easily obtained and better customers/clients/patients, and consequently better fees, higher income, and more opportunity is NOT in working to become a better “doer of your thing.” It’s in working on your BUSINESS.

In other words if you are focused on becoming better and better and better at being an auto mechanic, a speaker, a dentist, a you-name-it…thinking that this will lead you to better clients, better income and a better life, well you are self-sabotaging yourself from joining the ranks of millionaire status.

There is no such automatic link, warranty or entitlement. It’s just not how business works. Nor is there a threshold that can be met and crossed before you are entitled to good money.

So the first quantum breakthrough in status and income is making the mental, emotional and actual shift from “doer of thing” to “marketer of self.”

The second quantum shift is moving from “doing work for money” to designing, developing and building a business. By business I mean, a process for monetizing your skill-sets, managing your customer/client/patient relationships, expanding your range and diversity of income sources, and developing assets.

But the most important point to grasp here is that technical excellence does not automatically bring excellent income.

Power is what brings it. That is having customers/clients/patients seeking you out, paying your fees without resistance, status, top income, and wealth.

Power is rarely give in recognition of skill. It is taken by application of business principles. Business owners who refuse to learn these principles, who turn their back on them in favor of working on becoming a better “doer of their thing,” who will not control and use them, are doomed forever to always be seeking (“work”) and rightly worrying that the big payday may never come.

Truth #3: An old one: The definition of INSANITY is: doing the same things the same way over and over again while hoping for different results.

You need to be willing to look for and accept a different approach—even a different concept of yourself and your business. That different approach may include a fundamental change in the way you think of yourself, your role, your business, and the way you present yourself to clients.

Some of it might feel uncomfortable. It certainly will be different from what you see others in your same profession/business/category doing.

At the risk of being obvious, one way you fundamentally increase your income is by increasing your value to those who pay you money. But most business owners invest all their energy in only one means of increasing their value: “doing their thing” better.

This is akin to trying to lose weight, keep it off, and be healthier only by reducing the quantity of calories, carbs and fat you eat—with no changes in physical movement, exercise, food choices, nutrition, nutritional supplementation and mental attitude management.  Yes, you can lose some weight by doing just one thing to further and further extremes, but as any dieter will attest, you hit a wall when no more pounds can be lost even if you eat nothing but a leaf of lettuce with a squirt of lemon for dinner every night.

Sorry, but getting better and better and better at your “thing” will slam you into an income barrier and will NEVER lift you over that wall.

You need to increase your value to your clients/customers/patients in multiple ways in order to multiply your income and demand for your products or services.

If you want to leap-frog to a much higher income, then you must master marketing of yourself, use a more sophisticated approach to your business and your work with customers and focus on learning the strategies that are proven to catapult wealth.

P.S. Find out why what got you to 5-6 Figures will sabotage you in getting to 7-Figures and how you can join the “7-Figure Fraternity” including:

The steps I’ve used (and coached many others on) to achieve a seven-figure income from zero.
What you need to do to transform a 6-figure business into a million dollar (or more) business.
Income multipliers that will help you reach the 7-figure mark.
How to identify and erase the income barriers blocking you from the elusive million dollar income.

Find out more by clicking here now…

 

 

7 Steps To 7 Figures

“It is my observation that few bother to learn the history relevant to their business pursuits, let alone borrow from it and build on it and use it.”  – Dan Kennedy

The following is an excerpt from a letter I wrote to 200 entrepreneurs who attended my sold-out event “7 Figure Academy” followed by a brief outline of the 7 Steps.  While the letter is a few years old, the principals are truer today than ever before. There has been no time in history when it’s been easier to duplicate and act upon the 7 Steps To 7 Figures that I outline below.

Welcome to the Academy.

The more I realized that 7-figure earners do certain things different and do entirely different things that 6-figure earners, the more interested in doing this seminar I became.  It had a fairly long gestation period, nearly 5 years, leading up to the serious preparation work that lands us here.

The 7-figure earner is a very rare bird.  There are actually a lot less of these folks than there are wealthy – because it is possible to arrive at modest wealth or even, in some cases, enormous wealth through many other means than outright earning it through income…such as inheritance, pedantic accumulation over time, lucky single event.

Then when you set aside 7-figure earners in categories outside the realm of us ordinary men and women, such as champion professional athletes or rock starts or former Presidents or Governors (with scandal as an added asset) getting book deals and lecture tours, the rank thin even more.

If you narrow it to what most of us are – entrepreneurs – the club gets even smaller and much more exclusive.

Making my career about helping people create much larger incomes and, in many cases, wealth, has been my path.  Anyway, this Academy is drawn from the very-up-close observations of those I’ve worked with and work with, who earn 7-figures, who got up to 7-figures during their time with me, as well as the greater number professing intent but not getting there.

For roughly 20 working years I earned a 6-figure income.  I have earned a 7-figure personal, sadly taxable income for about 10 years.  During that decade I have learned a lot about about not just getting here but also staying here.

I think it’s significant that by traditional standards, I have no business whatsoever making this kind of money.  As most of you know, I have a high school education, began with no family or other financial backing, no apprenticeship or mentorship, and I suspect, no significant talent.

I might have some talent for writing – it’s debatable.  Professional editors vote no.  Unanimously!

But what I did do, largely on my own, was develop the assets necessary to support 7-figures, develop the skills and work habits required by 7-figures, and work intensely on the ‘inner game’ specific to 7-figures, and those three things are the gist of this academy.

Truth is, being one of these rarest of birds, a 7-figure earner of your own making, is not, to use the cliche, ‘rocket science’ not is it all that mysterious.  It is much less about knowing what to do and what is required of you than it is about the will to do it. 

Finally, let me make one idea clear.  When He sent Moses downt he hill, or of arguably less consequence in eternal terms, when Hill penned his 17 ‘laws’, they did not mean their lists as cafeteria menus or as matters of occasion, situation and convenience.  They constructed a collection of things intended to be used in concert, in combination, with consistency. 

I’m afraid what I have to present to you here is in the same vein.  You may pick and choose and use a few things that appeal to you and do not make you uncomfortable or offend you or require great change, and you can incrementally improve a 6-figure income by doing so, and by all means, be my guest as long as you are honest with yourself about what you are up to.  And not up for. 

But if you actually want to get to and sustain another 7-figures, then this is not a cafeteria menu.  No one thing is more or less important than another – what I have to say about ‘personal philosophy’, for example, is just as important as any pragmatic tactic suggested.

And so we begin…

7 Steps to Seven Figures

Believe you deserve 7 figures
Actually deserve 7 figures – based on value
Develop a plan for achieving 7 figure
Let enough of the right people know about you
Actually deserve 7 figures – based on work
Stop those who would interfere with you getting 7 figures
Achieve ‘7 figures congruency’ and stop yourself from interfering with you getting 7 figures

7 Requirements of 7 Figures

Extreme STATUS
Extreme VALUE
Extreme VISIBILITY
Extreme LEVERAGE
Extreme PRODUCTIVITY
Overcoming Resistance
Personal Philosophy

NOTE: If you want to get the entire “7 Figure Academy” check your email this weekend for a 72 hour special on this program. 

THE MAN, THE MYTH, THE LEGEND… Santa Claus?

Santa Claus is, remarkably, a public domain character. Never has so valuable a piece of intellectual property or celebrity been royalty-free.

Most of the time, most people see things, but most never see them as opportunity. Opportunistic Thinking is not a part of most peoples’ mindset. Starbucks may exist because Howard took his Opportunistic Thinking with him on vacation to Europe. Most people just come home with postcards.

Most marketers see Santa Claus every 9 months, for about 3 out of 12 months every year, but they do not see him as opportunists see him. They do not think of him as that rare gift of a free-use, universally famous celebrity. They do not think of him as a great salesman to be put to work. They do not see him as a surrogate, who can step in and manipulate with guilt, with nostalgia, with other emotions…..

”Dear Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Santa Claus won’t skip your home. Your children will have a wonderful Christmas morning with a sack full of gifts from Santa to open, while you video it all with your shiny new I-phone. But less than 30 miles from you, poor children will wonder why Santa ignored them even though they were good all year. They’ll put on brave faces in the living room but cry upstairs in their bedrooms. They’ll even go hungry or maybe have bologna sandwiches for Christmas dinner. Think about them as you buy your presents. There but for the grace of God go your children….”.  

The greatest Santa-for-selling story I’ve ever heard told was by Glenn W. Turner, a tear-jerker and a rallying cry in one, and it worked year ‘round. It is in the favorite-stories section of my autobiography, Unfinished Business, published by Advantage, available at amazon.

Sure, every marketer and merchant makes some use of Santa. It’s automatic. Routine. And that’s their problem. They take the jolly fat man – and his cast of characters: Mrs. Claus, the elves, Rudolph – for granted. They don’t get excited about having him at their disposal. Few see him the way a really great marketer does.

Disney, by the way, owns more characters than you can name in a month, but they put Santa to work big-time for these few months. He is the star of their televised Christmas A.M. parade show, an infomercial never called that.

How You See & Think About Santa

May Well Reveal Something About

How You See & Think About Everything

Nap’s title THINK AND GROW RICH was great for bookselling, but it gives many a false idea – that you can “think” and by your thinking alone, manifest riches. He was into metaphysics and even mysticism, but he wasn’t in that far. A truer title would have “How To” in front, “To” in place of “And”, and, awkwardly, “And Act On That Thinking” on the back. He was absolutely on target with the importance and significance and power or impotence in the way a person thinks. There is a way to think to grow rich. But he sinned by omission.

The terms “mindset”, “attitude” and “vision” all have bad names and are widely misunderstood and discounted. Many people lugging around big egos, proudly insist they don’t need any of that “mindset stuff.” Many mix it up with “motivation”, and insist they are self-motivated, and only weak people need to be externally motivated. At the opposite side of the room, a lot of people have mystical, fantastical ideas about these terms and co-mingle them with “manifestation” – with just thinking makes it so. At its extreme, this is mental illness. A charitable interpretation of President Obama is that he is afflicted with this illness. All this gives “mindset” a bad name.

But I find, just as Hill found in the 1920’s, that “super achievers” and entrepreneurs who make themselves wealthy and independent do share certain ways of seeing things and thinking about things that are at odds with the way 99% of the people see things and think about things. Redford accused Newman, in that movie, of looking at the world through bifocals, while he saw it through binoculars. Further, the self-made and self-making millionaire and multi-millionaire entrepreneurs do have their own attitude. It has a sharp edge to it, a bite to it, a chip on its shoulder, a bit of the bully with the “get out of my way” snarl. It is opportunistic, often predatory, and aggressive. It is creative and futuristic. It is horribly simplistic to label this as “positive” versus “negative”, but then again, that is a big part of it. Back in the late 70’, I coined the term “positive abnormality” to differentiate from the good Dr. Peale and the taint already on the 1950 construct of positive thinking. It’s always surprising to cynics to discover that people they respect as tough-minded, hard-nosed business leaders not only read “attitude “ books, listen to CD’s, etc., to reinforce their attitudes, but also preach basically the same principles as a Peale, a Nightingale. Trump leaps to mind. Our friend Gene Simmons has a new book out, ME, INC., which, in harsher and edgier tone, is channeling Ralph Waldo Emerson on self-reliance and Peale on thinking.

 How many engineers, manufacturers, and other capable people do you suppose were walked by their dogs before one of them saw a grand opportunity and went to work replacing collar with harness? How many supply salesmen saw the McDonald brothers’ hamburger stand as a hamburger stand for them to sell napkins, paper cups, buns, cleaning supplies to, the same month that the milkshake machine salesman Ray Kroc saw it as something entirely different? My friend, the late Joe Cossman, looked at existent products and saw them in different places, as million dollar opportunities – most famously, The Ant Farm, originally a teaching aid for biology classrooms. Joe saw a toy every young boy would want on his bedroom dresser.   I read the same novels that hundreds of thousands of people read. While they see only entertainment, I regularly spot stories, examples, characters that I can use as a copywriter to sell something for somebody. These things are not random accident. Only fools chalk it all up to that. Most of this happens because certain people see things through a very different visionary and opportunistic mindset, with a very different attitude, than most. This mindset is, more often than not, cultivated. It becomes a conditioned response to just about every stimulus.

Your conditioned response to stimuli – be it Santa Claus or a potential investment or expense or a breaking news story or anything – is your subconscious’ instantaneous action representing its understanding of your mindset and your world view.

I, for example, have zero interest in opening, owning or operating a brick ‘n mortar business ever again, and am more broadly trying not to start anything or take on any new responsibility at this point in my life, and I do my real estate investing by delegation and have zero interest in being a landlord. But when I drive by a commercial property with a for-sale sign, my subconscious mind instantly serves up the specific business its location would be perfect for, and starts spewing forth ideas, information, contacts.  

In my Archives Collection, you’ll find an old, successful sales letter that featured and was built around a USA TODY article about a giant sinkhole. I may be the only person of a million who saw that article and instantly thought: what a great story starter for a sales letter! I don’t work at that. It’s a conditioned response.

You Can Be An Opportunistic Predator, Too

Truth is, most people are stunningly un-curious. When you ask them what they know at 5:00 P.M. that they did not know at 5:00 A.M. about their business, about the field they are in, about important people in their field past or present, about an admirable competitor, etc., etc., they have no answers. This is, by the way, a ‘million dollar question.’   I do have people who act on my mere mentions of books to read, people they should know – take a look at the first letter in this month’s DAN GETZ MAIL & YOU GET LESSONS. But I talk with people who never know anything new or more or historical or deeper about their businesses. They are told of “superstars” but lack the curiosity to then go look them up, find them, study them. Personally, I hate being ignorant, and hate being seen as ignorant even more. Others don’t seem to mind.

One of the late Marty Edelston’s greatest millions-making characteristics was insatiable, aggressive curiosity. Same with Trump; I’ve witnessed it. The un-curious are dullards. Walt called them the “lawn mowers” of the world. In corporate environments, we call them “managers.” They keep trains running on time – but they envision no new routes, no new luxury services to sell the passengers, no breakthrough alliances with cruise lines, no turning of the regular scenic railroad into “The Polar Express” at Christmas or into the Haunted Railroad at Halloween. They have 20/20 sight yet zero vision. And they work for wages, and they have a place; lawns must be mowed. But their minds are not millionaire minds, their attitudes not millionaire attitudes, their curiosity not millionaire curiosity. The term “personal growth” means GROWTH. For most, there’s not much of that going on.

 So, when Santa shows up each year, most businesspeople haven’t really planned his welcome or his use to its fullest opportunity. He brings a sleigh full of gifts. They take one or two small boxes and leave the rest. This is the same way they see most other opportunities – in an ordinary, small-thinking way. Each time an opportunity drops by with a giant sack of ways to exploit it, they grumble about being too busy, they take a couple small things from the sack, they sit it in a corner and neglect it like some forlorn office plant nobody notices or remembers to water. Sometimes, I find the tiny bite someone takes out of a big opportunity demoralizing.

 I won’t wish that Santa is good to you this year, as some people are wont to do. I happen to have a close relationship with him, and know that he’s good to you every year. Up to you to accept and unwrap the gifts, though.

NOTE: Christmas has come early this year at GKIC and for the first time ever they’ve opened up their FAST Implementation Bootcamp to non-members for just $97 (usually $497.)  And for members of course this is still free!  Reserve your spot now…click here.