Do you know?

Do you know what you want your business to look like 5, 10, 20 years from now?

Focus

There was interesting motivational talk on this topic given by former Dallas Cowboys coach Jimmy Johnson to his football players prior to the 1993 Super Bowl.   

"I told them that if I laid a two-by-four across the room, everybody there would walk across it and not fall, because our focus would be getting across the two-by-four.  But if I put that same two-by-four 10 stories high between twod buildings, only a few of you would make it, because your focus would be on falling.  FOCUS is everything.  The team that is most focused today is the team that will win this game."

Johnson told his team not to be distracted by the crowd, the media, or the possibility of losing, but to focus on each play of the game just as if it were a good pracitce session.  The Cowboys won the game 52 to 17.

There's a point to that story that goes way beyond football.  Most of us tend to lose our focus in business becays we're too worried about so many negative possibilities.  Rather than focusing on the two-by four, we worry about all of the opportunites to fall.  Rather than focusing on our goals, we are distracted by our worries and fears. 

But when you focus on what you want, it will come into your life.  When you focus on being a happy and motivated business owner, that is who you will be.

Quote of the day...

"A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song." ~ Maya Angelou

STOP INTERUPTING!

Interruption marketing is the "olden days" way of getting potential clients' attention, and it just doesn't work like it used to. Some examples of this include tele-marketers and radio ads. It can be annoying because it usually interupts you right in the middle of something (usually those annoying calls come right at dinner time). Regardless, the interruption doesn't make you feel  excited about the product or service from the very beginning.

In small business today the world of interruption marketing is quickly dying and is being replaced with permission-based marketing. As a small business owner, you can make these changes in your business now to see results tomorrow.

Basically up to this point, everything you know or have been doing with interruption marketing is wrong. For one reason above all others - clients are already overwhelmed and feeling attacked with information overload. So instead, you'll need to get them to "raise their hands" and sign up for more information from you.

Using special tools on your website, you get them to "raise their hands" by signing up for your free offer, VIP mailings, or whatever you're using to entice them to ask for more (not just a free consultation). Then you use this to educate your clients about your story, what makes your products and services different, and what you can do to give them the results they want. This converts them to paying clients much more than hoping for luch that your interruption marketing will work!

When "stuff" hits the fan...

How do you cope when everything goes wrong at work??

Click on this link to read the full article:  http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/02/the-fire-this-time/