What do these two things have in common?

Here’s how it all began. I’m in my backyard removing a tree branch

that hasn’t completely broken off and is coming down across my shed

roof. My neighbor behind me helps me get this branch down and lends me a saw

to cut it up.

I finish the job and go to take the saw back. Since there’s a four foot fence between

our yards I decided to use a combination extension/stepladder to get over the

fence. No problem I used to work in construction climbing ladders all the time,

this is a piece of cake. Only problem was I missed the step on the other side and

ended up flat on my back on the ground.

Then I started thinking this is just like being in business. The branch wasn’t

completely broken off so I could have used a band aide solution and only

taken part of it down. Knowing full well the rest of the branch will have to come

down sometime or risk it going through the roof of my shed.

The biggest majority of those of us who have been in business for a while have all

been in this situation at one time or other in our businesses. Well it’s not

completely broken, it still kinda-sorta works so I can make it do for a while

longer. Instead of solving the problem and doing the job properly and in the

majority of cases saving you both time and money. You’re not paying twice for

the same job.

Now comes the ladder over the fence part. In my mind’s eye I could climb this

ladder with no problem, I did it 30+ years ago for a living. As I swung my leg

over to the other side I missed the step I was aiming for and fell to the ground.

The ladder, my climbing and falling is like some of the things we do in narketing

and promoting our businesses. The ideas and techniques that worked 5, 10 and 15

years ago don’t work now. We sometimes tend to forget that the marketplace

keeps on growing and getting smarter and more educated all the time. What

worked then may not work today or if it does not nearly as effectively.

So I ask you to take a serious look at what you are doing in your business to find

the things that are working well and eliminate those that aren’t performing as

they should. Eliminate those that you know worked a few years ago, but today

are only legends in your own mind. To keep you from falling off that proverbial

ladder.

Do you know how many people are so afraid of losing what they have, that they

won’t give it up to get the greater security they crave?

Primarily because they are unwilling to give up part of what they have to get

what they want. They want to achieve the outstanding sales record that brings a

large income along with security, recognition, and acceptance. But they don’t

want to give up anything they have now to get what they want from the

future.

!. The first de-motivator is the fear of losing security. Fear of losing what you

already have. If you refuse to give up anything that you now have, where will

the space, time, money, and energy come from for the new achievements.

2. The second de-motivator is fear of failure. Would you like to learn a method

to guarantee that you’ll never fail to make an appointment, never fail to make

a strong presentation, never fail to close the sale? Here it is: never pick up

the phone, never make a presentation, and never close the sale. You can avoid

never failing by just not trying.

3. The third de-motivator is self-doubt. Selling, owning your own business?

You have been thinking about doing this for a living. Do you know what that

means? Feast or famine. Chicken dinner one night, feathers the next. What are

you, crazy?

4. The fourth de-motivator is the pain of change.Why is change always

seem to involve pain? We resist change because it means that part of our old

self must time, and at unknown one new self will be born.success avoids fights

it cannot win. Instead of fighting an unbeatable force, success adores change.

So don’t fight change make it work for you.

The pain of every change is forgotten when the benefits of that change

are realized.

The first motivator of the great sales/business person is money.

Why is money a motivator? It allows you to get the things you want and need.

Money is good.

Money is good so long as what you earn is in direct proportion to the services

you give. It’s good, but money by itself won’t make you happy. All that money

can do is give you opportunities to explore what will make you happy. You

can help a lot more people when you are in the black and not the red.

The second motivator is security.

Maslow’s Theory of Accomplishments is the foundation of most motivational

courses. This theory teaches that the average person strives daily to supply

physical needs, that is to say, to obtain security. In our society security it is

something bought with money. Money buys a variety of possessions that to

some degree provide us with a feeling of security. Therefore, money is a

tremendous motivator, both as a direct measure of success and as a provider

of some sense of security.

The third motivator is Achievement.

Almost everyone wants to achieve.  Achievers make up only 5% of the world,

and non-achievers account for the other 95%. People who have nothing are

usually achieving what they think they deserve. Nothing.

The will to achieve is not something that can be imposed upon anyone from

outside: that drive must come from within. I hope you have decided that it’s

time to quit messing around being average.

The fourth motivator is Recognition.

People will do more for recognition, than for anything thing else. Everyone

needs recognition, husbands, wives, and children – and even your boss. We all

do. In our search for recognition it can be the cars we drive, the clothes we

wear, the restaurants we dine in, etc. We all crave and desire recognition.

That’s why this motivator ha such awesome power when used at full throttle.

Recognition must be real, it must be prompt. It must be given with sincerity

and without favoritism. It’s quality or value must be in line with what was

achieved.

The fifth motivator is Self-Acceptance.

This is a dangerous one. Do you know how many people strive every day to

be accepted by everyone else? For many people, including those in sales and

business that’s their greatest motivation – and their greatest weakness.

However, we all want to be liked. Surround yourself with the people you most

want to become. Are you trying to get everyone to like you? Why? You can’t

afford to be popular with losers.

The sixth motivator is Self-Acceptance.

We all hunger for it. self-acceptance is the calcium for the bones of our

personalities. Many of us keep those bones weak by making our self-acceptance

dependent on the approval of others.

Positive input depends on others, negative input we provide ourselves. Watch

carefully where you seek approval.

Those are the 6 basic motivators – powerful, gut level emotions that drive us all.

Untamed, they drown us, harnessed, they supply unlimited energy. Study them.

As a starting point, look at your past. Your past has determined where you are

at this moment: your immediate future will soon be the past that will determine

your more distant future.

From Tom Hopkins – Master the Art of Selling

“Why don’t I do what I know I should do?” Ask yourself this question seriously

because the answer controls your future. Until you start doing what you know you

should do, you’re living under a law against success that you imposed on yourself.

Behind the question stands this problem. How can I cause myself to do what I

know I should do? How can I cause myself to do what I know I should do.

When you began your new business career (selling whatever you sell), what did

you have a big supply of?

Enthusiasm!!!

Do you remember? Burning desire. Excitement. The feeling of “Watch out world

here I come. Now that I have this terrific opportunity in business, there is no

limit to what I can do.”

Then what happened?

Some months passed. You learned your product, your way around the territory,

how accounts are found, what the problems are. But, while you gathered knowledge

what happened to your enthusiasm?

It dwindled a bit didn’t it? But your product is still as fresh to new customers as it

was to you when you started – it’s just not fresh to you anymore.  Your gain of

knowledge merely matched your loss of enthusiasm, and balanced your

performance out to about average – far below your potential.

Motivating yourself to do what you already know you should do is the main problem.

Why is this true?

Because what you should do is not what you want to do. If it was you’d be doing

it.

Why don’t you want to do what you know you should do?

The reason you don’t do this, is that you are in conflict with yourself. This conflict

comes about because the push forward of your wants and needs can’t overcome

the push backwards of your fears and anxieties.

Wants and needs are motivators and everyone feels them. we’re also going to take

a close look at the de-motivators that everyone also feels. When you feel the

de-motvator, you feel fear or anxiety – which is why the de-motivators are so

powerful. they can dry your mouth, make your knees bang together and light a fire

in your stomach – or they can work in soft and subtle ways to kill your action.

Almost every success-seeking person has been torn by this conflict at some point

in their careers and most of us live with it all our active lives. Perhaps we can’t

eliminate this ongoing battle. But we can decide whether we’ll lose everyday,

loose usually,, win usually or win every time. We can’t of course win every sale.

But we don’t need to constantly lose out to our same old unresolved fears and

anxieties.

This is what we need to concentrate on.

North America’s abundance was not created by public sacrifice to “the common

good” but by the productive genius of free men who pursued their own personal

interests and the making of their own private fortunes. By Ayn Rand

It’s time for us to get back to our roots, to doing the things that made our countries

the dream place to live.

To be, to do, to have the things that once made us the greatest nations in the world.

A place where we can all be proud to live in either of our great counties.

By Mark Coloasi

 Don’t Let That Happen. to You” 

When we go to the grocery store and there is nothing to

differentiate one onion from another onion, the ONLY thing

that we can differentiate it with is PRICE.

Why? 

Because it’s a commodity.

Price then becomes the only deciding factor.

Competitors who are less astute will try to sell only on

price, so they will try to beat you down and beat your

competitors down by simply pooh-poohing anything they do

that is different because they are trying to compete on

price. 

That’s also true for the marketplace if you are NOT giving

the criteria for what makes you different, what makes you?

special, what makes you premium?  Then the only thing they

can come back to is price, turning you back into a

commodity. 

Remember, the services you deliver in your business are not

the same as your competitor.

You MUST create the buying criteria for what sets you apart

from anyone else.  It is pretty powerful to develop this

mindset that everyone is trying to make you into an ordinary

commodity and your job is to make sure that you stand out as

extraordinary.

In virtually every business, the number-one factor in losing customers and turning customers into bad news spreaders is actually very simple. It can be summarized as “stated or implicit promises not kept.”

One of this biggest Wealth Attracting Secrets ever invented is simply saying what you will do and doing what you say. When you become known for absolute reliability, customers, clients, opportunity, and money will flow to you in ever-increasing abundance. The word spreads because you are so rare. Price competition becomes irrelevant.

Like everyone else, I occasionally get myself into a situation where I can’t meet a deadline, can’t keep a promise. I am maniacal about every commitment, from simple punctuality to the more complex seriously, so the operable word is “occasionally.” It makes me nuts when this happens because, as a pragmatist, I know how detrimental to my interests it is. When it does occur, I’ve learned not to run and hide or ignore it and hope it goes unnoticed, but to confront it, apologize, and make it right. Again, not out of ethical or moral obligation, but out of pragmatism. I’m choosing the best business strategy.

And here’s something rather “advanced” that very few entrepreneurs ever discover: a less appealing promise kept serves you better than making a more appealing promise you can’t, won’t or don’t keep.

Are YOU committing this common crime to your bottom line?

One of the worst mistakes you can EVER make is automatically assuming everyone buys based solely on price.

That couldn’t be further from the truth.

If that were the case everyone would be driving, KIA’s and no one would be driving Lexus, Audi, Mercedes or even your everyday Ford, GM, or Dodge products.

Why do you see people lining up to buy iPhones and iPads when you can get comparable cellphones and tablets for much less?

The bottom line is only 10% of consumers make their buying decisions based on price. Think about it – if price really controlled buyer behavior, then broad range of prices would exist.

What does this have to do with your business? Plenty! If you are failing to get the maximum price the market will pay for your products or services, then you are leaving money on the table … and OUT of your wallet.

This simple fact is probably ROBBING you of the time and freedom you could be enjoying right now.

Instead, you have to work like a dog to sell more of your products or services and you have become a SLAVE to your business …instead of its master.

You’ll have to work harder endure more stress, uncertainty, lack of control that could rob you of peace of mind.

Another VERY important thing: You should NEVER, EVER, EVER be the low-cost provider in your industry!

You simply can’t keep it. There will always be someone else who will come into your market and compete head to head for your customers a

So How Do You Convert Failure to Success?
By Dan Kennedy – The Ultimate Success Secret

First, just by hanging in. failure often transforms itself to success purely as a result of persistence.

Second, by diligently looking for the concealed opportunity. To quote the proverbs and adages: nothing is either good or bad as it first appears to be…and…whenever one door closes another one opens.

Third, by taking prompt, decisive action. Stopping is the absolute worst thing you can do. I wonder how many shots Michael Jordan MISSED (failures) in his pro basketball career? Even how many CRUCIAL shots he missed? Well, one thing’s for certain, when he did miss one, he didn’t rush over to the bench, get the coach to take him out of the game, sit down on the bench, put a towel over his head, and refuse to take another shot for the rest of the game. What did he do when he missed? As soon as possible, he took another shot. No stopping is not the answer. Instead, as with most problems, action is the only true antidote.

From Dan Kennedy – “The Ultimate Success Secret”

Tell your wife/husband/significant other/kids/grandchildren, you love them more often. And especially tell them today, because they might be gone tomorrow. There is a last time for everything.

Stop and have a friendly conversation with your Mom, Dad, a friend, the guy at the newsstand on the corner. Take just a few minutes for this more often than you do. And, especially today. They might be gone tomorrow. There is a last time for everything.

When you go to your job or place of business today, be thankful you’ve got one and give it the very best you’ve got. Tomorrow, thousands will lose their jobs – and then maybe, wish they’d done things differently. Tomorrow, a thousand entrepreneurs will close business doors – and then, maybe, wonder what might have happened if they’d advertised more creatively, sold more aggressively. There is a last time for everything.

Whatever you’re going to do today, give it your best, and take from it the best you can. There is a last time for everything.