Spring’s another fabulous occasion for a change in energy and focus.

Just like New Year’s, and September’s “back to school” days, spring’s got a built-in energy boost that can help supercharge your productivity, if you know how to use it.

Clean House

Unplug.

Have you lost your mojo?

Don’t know where it could be hiding?

Can’t even remember when you last had any?

Fret not, buttercup. It’s happened to the best of us. Which is to say, it’s happened to all of us, at one point or another.

Today’s post — in fact, all the posts in today’s Word Carnival! — will not only help you find your mojo, but also finesse it, fluff it back up, and wear it proudly.

 A Confessional Aside

I lost my mojo last year, sometime around September — about the time I found out I was going to have to move. Keen observers can probably even find evidence thereof in the posts I wrote during the fall. Each one required approximately as much pure force of will as pulling your own teeth out with pliers.

I also lost it again when I sat down to write this post. Ha!

So this month’s Word Carnival is like therapy for me.

What Drove Your Mojo Into Hiding

Life, snowflake.

Life drove your mojo into hiding.

It’s all so much, sometimes. It’s the big stuff and the metric crap-tons of little stuff. It’s the not-knowing and the don’t-caring and the procrastinating and the fear. It’s the biz stuff and the life stuff and the personal stuff.

It’s stuff soup.

It’s natural. It’s inevitable. It doesn’t mean you made a mistake, launching this dream of yours. It means you’re human. (Well, most of you. Some of you, I dunno …. jury’s still out.)

It means you’re doing things right, mostly, but you need to reconnect with a few simple truths.

How to Find Your Mojo — The Mindset Stuff

As with all things productivity related (and how can you get your shit done if you can’t even work up the tiniest sliver of enthusiasm, so it’s ALL productivity-related), recovery starts with the business tool you keep lodged between your ears: your brain.

More specifically, your mindset. 

When you’ve lost your mojo, you’ve lost connection to your Dream.

Not your dreams, mind you – little “d” stuff you think about idly when you’re waiting in line at the bank and the post office.

No, your Big-D Dream.

The Vision.

The Thing that drives you forward towards its warm embrace.

The Thing that, if you hold it in your mind for any length of time, produces a sensory tsunami of awesomeness — The Thing you can see, smell, touch, taste, hear in your mind with your eyes closed.

What was that Thing again?

Bring it back into your consciousness. Review your journal, if  you wrote it down back then. Write it down now, if you didn’t.

What you’re after is a reconnection to the feelings that Thing produced inside you.

What if – gasp! – you discover, to your horror, that it isn’t your Dream anymore? That your Dream changed on you?

That’s cool. It’s totally cool. Say goodbye to the old one, and get to know the new. Explore the contours of the New Thing.

Do this a couple of times a day, every day, for a week or so, always always always focusing on the feelings — the emotional response.

How to Find Your Mojo — The Little Things

And this is the part where I give you a gazillion little adjustments you can make to help you reconnect with your Dream (or connect for the first time with your New Dream, whatevs). Pay attention now. Ready?

• Change your locale. If you work inside, find a sidewalk cafe with wifi. 
• Take walks. Lots and lots of walks. No music, nothing to distract you. Just walk, and engage your senses. 
  
• Wash the dishes. Warm soapy water, the repetitive motions – these things will actually help you get out of your head and start reconnecting with your heart – which is where your mojo lives, after all.
• Try a new recipe.
• Play the internet version of connect-the-dots. Start with something you’re mildly curious about. Find a site about that something. Look for another thing that it references. Find a site about that thing. Keep going, hopscotching from one thing to another, using only your level of interest and curiosity as a guide.
• Throw a dance party for one. Gangnam style or belly dance are my two go-to’s. Your mileage may vary.
• Spend time with a kid, preferably one between three and five years old.
• Sleep more.
• Sleep less.
• Take a new path to some location you travel to frequently — grocery store, office, whatever.
• Speaking of grocery stores, find one new food there and eat it.
• Go buy a coloring book and crayons. Get creative.
• Even better, buy a cheap watercolor set and some thick blank paper and go to town. No editing or critiquing. Just have fun.
• Go play on the swings at the local park.
• Play with a medium- to large-sized dog. (The little ones tend to make folks anxious.)
• Write a letter to God, pouring out all your frustrations and asking for guidance.
• Write Her response back to you.
• Try yoga.
• Try Zumba.
• Try laughing at yourself trying to do Zumba.
• Take a long hot bath to ease your sore muscles after Zumba.
• Write a poem.
• Drink more water, and much less caffeine.
• Take jumping jack breaks.
• Take naps.
• Forgive yourself for not being perfect and “on” all the time.

What’s a Word Carnival? You’re soaking in it! Check out our Word Carnivals site to read all the participating posts on this month’s topic: Beat the Motivation Blues – How to Reboot, Re-energize and Learn to Love Your Business Again. You’ll also learn  more about the fabulously awesome Carnies bringing you small-business magic on the digital fairgrounds today! Win-win!

Photo credit: minifig via photopin cc

It’s No Name Calling Week.

Did you know that?

I just found out, while I was devouring every available editorial calendar template I could find (one of them had all kinds of interesting holidays and commemorative days and weeks listed).

And this one hit me hard.

Because one of the most insidious evil trolls working overtime to ruin your productivity?

Is you.

Well, your inner critic.

I will explain.

The Names We Call Ourselves

“I’m horrible at finance.”

“I SUCK at marketing.”

“I’m a terrible writer.”

These and other condemning declarations regularly come out of the mouths and off the fingers of solopreneurs who are struggling to get their shit done.

When I try to help them examine the root of what’s going on in that area of resistance, this is inevitably what comes out.

Basically: “I SUCK.”

This?

Is unhelpful.

It’s actually harmful.

Here’s why. You’re labeling yourself, and by doing so, you’re putting yourself — the myriad, wonderfully complex totality of you — into a tiny, cramped little box that cannot possibly contain your multitudes.

What happens, over time?

Well, what happens to animals who’ve been caged for years, when the door to the cage is suddenly left open one day?

Often, they stay put in that cage.

You and I are also animals, and the cages we’re in have been built over the course of our lifetimes, by parents, teachers, peers, and ourselves.

I can’t do anything about the hurtful names that have been hurled your way — or mine — in the past. (I wish I could.)

But your contribution to your cage? That, we can fix.

By redefining and reframing, by being as absolutely objective as we possibly can be, by leaving behind every kind of thinking other than rational, logical thought, by swearing off catastrophizing and “always/never” thought habits …

We can not only open the door, but actually dismantle those cages.

Claim and Carve Out the Shame

Here’s an example of what I’m talking about.

Take a look at my bio for the PJ Productivity Twitter account:

being somewhat lazy by nature, I’ve learned from necessity how to get more crap done from my couch in a day than most peeps in those swank offices do in a week.

At first glance, some folks balk at that “somewhat lazy” thing. “Why are you calling yourself lazy?” they ask, genuinely perplexed. “Lazy people can’t be entrepreneurs or business owners.”

These people are well-intentioned, but they miss the point.

I’ve reclaimed the word “lazy.” It’s not a shaming label, but a simple objective statement.

See, I am lazy. I cannot stand to do more “work” (defined as “the crap I have to do but don’t passionately enjoy”) than absolutely necessary. That’s why I’m so good at helping other folks get their shit together and do things more efficiently — because I’m always looking for the better method, the more efficient workflow, the most streamlined system.

It’s not a shaming label. It’s a fact, and it’s what makes me good at my business of helping other people become more productive, and to find the time they need to do what compels and fascinates them.

How Labeling Yourself Disables Your Productivity

Why does it matter? Have I suddenly gone all touchy-feely pop-psych-o on you?

Nah, it really does have an impact on all the choices you make about how you spend your time.

Think about it: if you’ve told yourself you suck at something, are you likely going to be willing to do it?

Aren’t you more likely to start procrastinating? Telling yourself “it doesn’t really matter”? Finding a crapload of other things that are soooo much more important — like, cleaning out your clutter drawer in the kitchen?

What Names Are You Calling Yourself?

Are you calling yourself names? Are you willing to stop doing that?

Tell me in the comments!

So, it’s January 21^st. We are now well and truly into the New Year.

But more than that: today is the day Barack Obama is sworn into office as the President of the United States for a second term.

And it’s got me thinking about do-overs.

Nothing political in this statement, trust me.

I’m just mulling over the concept of a fresh start. Bear with me here.

Societally, we’ve agreed on a few of these dates or occasions as regular do-over occurrences. January 1^st, of course, is the big one, where (traditionally) we make resolutions and vow to do better.

September is another – back to school season never really ends even after graduation, as we grown-ups also find ourselves thinking about giving ourselves and our offices (and businesses) makeovers.

What I’m thinking, though, is that we’re not really limited to those state- and store-sanctioned fresh starts.

Every Monday can be a fresh start.

Hell, for that matter, every day can be your new chance for a do-over.

Sure, some things, we don’t get to do over. Once we burn that bridge with the difficult client, it’s done. (Then again, why would you want to do that over in the first place?)

But, as with taxes, we can usually find a way to start again, do it right.

My thinking on this day of do-overs is this:

Find a way to give yourself a do-over. Right now. Today. This minute.

Where are you unhappy with your prior efforts?

Did you blog inconsistently last year? (Ahem.) Give yourself a do-over: create a calendar and stick to it.

Did you adopt a business system that isn’t really meeting your needs? Give yourself a do-over: dive into it and figure out how you can make it better, tighter, more efficient.

Are your accounts receivable outpacing your cash flow needs? Give yourself a do-over: create a better billing and collections system.

Is your work not up to your own high standards? Do you find yourself phoning it in? Give yourself a do-over: decide once and for all which services you’re really stoked to provide, which make you drag your feet, and how you’re going to increase the former and eliminate the latter.

Your turn: where do you need to give yourself or your business a do-over? What are you going to do differently this time?

photo credit: elisasizzle via photopin cc

Today, I want to do something a little different.

Instead of giving you advice, or suggesting a how-to workflow to make you more productive, I want to tell you a story about one of the most insidious dangers we solopreneurs face on a daily basis: the danger of grasping the short term and ignoring the long game. 

The Story

So, as you’ll recall, I messed up BIG  years back. And part of the consequences from that huge-assed blunder had to do with housing.

Namely, I lost mine.

As in, I was evicted.

This meant for awhile, at least, that no one would rent to me. (At least, no one with habitable premises who did even the most bare-bones background checks on prospective tenants.)

For a year, I couch-surfed in various friends’ homes.

Then, the tide turned, somewhat: I worked up the nerve to try to rent again a few years back.

I knew my options were going to be highly limited. So, I restricted the search to owner-rented apartments on Craigslist. And I lucked out – seriously, amazingly lucked out – when a very nice lady offered to rent the downstairs of her house to me on a month to month basis.

Now, this place wasn’t exactly a winner. The windows didn’t open, and there was no screen door, so fresh air was just not gonna happen, unless I opened the front door wide and let all the local wildlife come in for a visit. The gas hot water heater was located behind a door that couldn’t or wouldn’t stay shut, in our part of the house, mere feet from our bedroom doors. Carbon monoxide, anyone?

Oh, and it had baseboard heaters. And a tiny window AC unit.

And did I mention the one-foot-across hole in the middle of the wall in the living room where they’d ripped out an old wood-burning stove and nobody had thought to mend it?

Still. It was ours. It wasn’t like couch-surfing, even though we were still, technically, in someone’s house. We were paying for this space, and slowly, the self-esteem came back.

For a long time, things were groovy.

Then, this past fall, on a sunny Friday afternoon, that very nice lady asked to speak with me. She hemmed and hawed for a few minutes, then finally came to the point.

“I’m selling the house. You need to move.”

I felt like I’d been gut-punched.

I mean, it was a bona fide miracle I’d found THIS place.

How on earth was I ever going to find another miracle?

Then it got worse:

“Can you be out in two weeks?”

(Um. NO.)

“OK, well, forty-five days is the most I can do.”

Something like that, yeah.

For three weeks, I panicked. I ran around the house, trying to pack things up and simultaneously brainstorm ways I could get around the big black spot on my renting record. Trying desperately not to let the “ZOMG I am SO SCREWED” thoughts gain any traction in my brain. Trying to keep my spirits up and my mood calm for my daughter, so she wouldn’t feel as terrified as I did.

Then the landlady did something quite unexpected: She offered to let us stay through the end of the year.

Now, all along, for those three weeks, in the back of my brain I’d been thinking “God, if I could just stay ’til the end of the year, it would be SO much easier in January!”

So, you’d think I’d have jumped at that amazing kind offer, right? I mean, landlady didn’t have to offer it. She’d already given me more notice than our month to month lease required. She could have stuck firm to the 45-day deadline. And I’d been saying all along that I just needed to stay through December, right?

So why did I hedge?

Hedge I did.

And then the landlady rescinded the offer. (Yes, it was … odd. To say the least. But the whole experience had turned decidedly odd.)

And so I had no choice.

I stopped the freakouts. I mean, it’s impossible to get shit done when you’re that much crazy-town.

I called a few people I knew locally to ask for leads.

Within three days, I’d found a house.

Within two more days, I’d signed a lease.

The house is small. It’s a cottage, really. And it has its own problems — the heating units aren’t fully functional, so we require additional space heaters, and the water pipes need to be cleaned out or replaced so I can shower under something slightly more than the current trickle of H20.

But the windows open.

There’s a front screen door.

There are no holes in the walls.

The floors are gorgeous hardwood.

It’s slightly larger than the old digs.

Best of all: IT IS ALL OURS.

(In the leased sense, anyway.)

And this is the part of the post where I segue into the moral of the story …

The Moral of the Story

I was so busy grasping on to what I currently had — to “good enough” — that I almost missed out on getting something even better.

Your hands can only hold so much, after all. If you want to grab that king-sized box of Godivas, you better drop the M&Ms.

That’s what happened to me. I had to be willing to lose what I thought I “deserved” — the “best I could expect, given the circumstances” — and take a risk on asking for something better.

And I had to let go of what was in order to be able to grab what could be.

It’s scary, I admit. It’s soul-quaking and terrifying to let go of something you have — say, a not-so-ideal client, or a service line that brings in moderate amounts of cash but which you despise having to perform — so you can have the space in your environment or headspace or business to ask for, or even demand, something better.

But it’s necessary.

And here’s the kicker: every time you do this, it has ripple effects that are far-ranging and cross life-area boundaries.

Here’s what I mean – and you can go try it yourself, if you don’t believe me:

Weed out your wardrobe — go donate all that wearable, serviceable crap that you hate and that makes you look like an aging Queens fishwife.

See if something cool and unexpected doesn’t pop into your life within a few weeks thereafter.

It might be another piece of clothing.

It might also be a kick-ass new client.

Or tickets to a concert you couldn’t afford but desperately wanted to see.

Your Turn

What’s that little voice nagging at you to get rid of? It could be something in your environment, your home, your business … it could be a tangible thing or a trait or characteristic … it could be a thing or a person … a friend or a client … a habit or an “obligation” that’s holding you back.

Share in the comments!

What’s a Word Carnival? You’re soaking in it! Check out our Word Carnivals site to read all the participating posts and to learn  more about the fabulously awesome Carnies bringing you small-business magic on the digital fairgrounds today!

Photo Credit:striatic via photopin cc

(This post has been UDATED – see “Option #5″ section below)

Sad news, from the world of Tungle …

As of Monday, December 3rd, 2012 we will shut down the standalone Tungle service. You will continue to be able to use your Tungle.me page until then to schedule meetings and share calendars. We know our dedicated members rely on Tungle every day to manage their calendars and we don’t want to leave you out to dry, so we suggest you check out Doodle to replace Tungle in December.

So, what’s a solo to do, if she’s been using Tungle.Me for scheduling?

Fret not, my brothers and sisters in Couch-Warrior-Land. I have some options for you.

Option #1: Doodle

First up: the site recommended by Tungle.Me — Doodle.

Like most of our contenders, Doodle is available in both free and premium versions. Premium rates start at a very reasonable $39 per year for a solo user, and go up from there for business and enterprise solutions.

Doodle only does scheduling, from what I can see (unlike Satori, one of our other contenders here, which also handles billing & invoicing).

The free version looks solid for one-off events, or for group events that take place infrequently (i.e., once a month or so).

And you can’t beat free, in any event.

But if you’re looking for a more substantial solution or one that provides other benefits, you might want to keep on looking.

Option #2: Satori

Satori also offers a free version, as well as more robust premium levels to boot.

The free level offers up to 15 scheduled sessions and 100 contacts tracked per month. Higher-priced levels include billing and invoicing, as well as CRM functions, all for relatively reasonable prices.

It also provides a free 30-day trial at all levels.

Plus PJP buddy Michelle Nickolaisen of Bombchelle uses it and loves it. So, y’know, that’s high praise indeed.

Right now, this one looks the best for PJP’s own needs, out of the four options I looked at.

Option #3: Book’d

Book’d is still in beta – you can request an invite here. A few friends have played around with it, and I’m trying to get a more in-depth review to share with you. Until then, all I can say is “Nice landing page.”

Option #4: Schedule Once

ScheduleOnce is scheduling only, as the name implies, but it looks like it does the one thing it does very well. 

Pricing is fairly reasonable, and like Satori, there’s a free trial period.

(UPDATED) Option #5: ScheduleThing

A reader also alerted me to another option — ScheduleThing.

Pricing seems to be roughly comparative to other apps, with free and premium options ranging from $19 to $129 monthly. The main distinguishing feature that varies between levels is the number of resources — defined as “a person, place, or thing that can be reserved.”

Most solo service providers will need one resource — i.e, the solo — and may do just fine with the free option. But if you have contractors or teams that rotate service schedules, you’ll need to upgrade to keep it all straight.

Each kind of new account gets the first month free.

Bottom line: it’s definitely a contender and I’ll be checking it out.

Pajama Productivity’s Decision

I think for PJP’s coaching clients, Satori looks like the best solution, so we’ll probably be implementing it very soon.

But with free trials and free versions abounding here, the best bet is to check the pricing and features of each contender against your own budget needs, then try them out for a month or so, to see which one seems more intuitive and user-friendly.

How about you? Are you sad to see Tungle.Me go? What tools, if any, do you use for scheduling? Hit us up in the comments!

Let’s be real for a moment.

The A-List exists.

However you define it, there will always be a group of bloggers and biz owners in any niche that enjoy a far greater reach and larger audience than others do.

But status as an A-lister doesn’t mean you’re a better person – or even a better business person – than your competitors with smaller markets and sites.

I’ll go you one better: A-list status doesn’t necessarily confer any real authority, either.

It means, for whatever reason, that blogger got more famous than other bloggers in his or her niche.

A-listers are like celebrities. Sure, you’ve got your Meryl Streeps and your Robert DeNiros – folks who studied hard, upped their game, mastered their craft, and became famous for being awesome at what they do.

You’ve also, however, got your Paris Hiltons and your Kim Kardashians – folks who became famous for being famous.

And it’s up to you, cupcake, to figure out who’s who, before you go placing your money and, more significantly, your trust in one.

My Moratorium on Webinars

Part of what I do here at PJP could be loosely described as “marketing consulting.” In the course of helping folks refine their marketing systems and make them more efficient, I have to understand digital marketing itself. I also advise Stage Presence clients on their digital marketing plans.

So I’ve made it part of my job in the past to sign up for and attend as many free webinars as possible offered by the marketing-niche folks.

But last month, I decided I’d had enough and swore off webinars for the foreseeable future. I declared a webinar moratorium, and it was all because of what I observed in a spate of three or four webinars held within a few weeks of each other and hosted by different sites and bloggers.

The straw that broke this camel’s back – that last webinar – I didn’t even last 20 minutes.

I logged off in disgust somewhere around minute 18.

I felt so icky after listening to what I’d heard in that webinar that I had the urge to go take a shower. Instead, I sat down and hand-wrote a five-page diatribe about the so-called “A-list mentality.”

I’m not going to be sharing that diatribe any time soon—I was angry and emotional, and the purpose of writing it all down was solely to help me process what I was thinking and feeling at the time.

But I did refer back to it when I was preparing this post for this month’s Word Carnival topic.

What got me so riled up? Five things in particular—five observed behaviors that, unfortunately, aren’t uncommon in the marketing niche and (I suspect) other niches as well.

Observed Behavior #1: Lack of Candor

I’ll admit it: this one bugs me the most.

It rankles, probably because it seems so ubiquitous.

But more directly, it speaks volumes on the for-sale “product” itself—usually some kind of “blueprint” or “system” that purports to teach buyers how to achieve the kind of massive success the A-lister has apparently enjoyed.

That “system” might consist of any number of tasks or actions—some of which, or maybe even all of which, are actually—surprise!—solid pieces of advice.

So what’s the problem?

The problem is that “system” isn’t responsible for the A-lister’s success. Sure, he may have done those things he’s now telling you to do—actually, he better have done those things, because savvy buyers can easily sniff out the liars on this score.

But those things did not lead to his explosive, overnight traffic or his huge list or “six-figure income.”

What did lead to that fame and fortune, if it truly exists at all?

Other A-listers.

This is the poorly-kept secret, if there is such a thing, in the digital marketing ‘verse.

A-listers support other A-listers.

And you know what?

There’s nothing wrong with that.

Let me say it again: There is nothing wrong with supporting and promoting your friend’s work.

Absolutely nothing.

It’s totally value-neutral.

The problem isn’t that A-listers promote each other’s launches.

It’s that sometimes – maybe even many times – the stuff that’s launching isn’t wholly forthright about that fact.

The less-than-honest ones will tell you “Follow the teachings I will lay out for you and you can enjoy the same success I did.”

They’ll state “I’m going to tell you exactly how I did it.”

Except they leave out the real reason they enjoyed that sudden swarm of traffic and instant respect: because other A-listers who already had that kind of traffic let the launcher borrow the A-lister’s traffic and list.

Now, I want to make it very, very clear – not everyone does this.

There are some truly awesome, ethical folks out there who are very upfront about this. They will tell you from the get-go that if you want that kind of explosive launch, you’ll need the help of others who’ve already made it.

Part of these folks’ training products, then, is devoted to the subject of how to get the attention and assistance of A-listers.

But a lot of them don’t. They start raving about this method or that strategy, and nowhere in the hour-long webinar will you hear them say “I owe my success to the assistance and borrowed reach of several popular bloggers.”

Again: there’s nothing wrong with getting help from other A-listers.

There is something wrong with trying to sell some system to new folks that doesn’t acknowledge that’s how you got there in the first place.

Observed Behavior #2: Bad Manners & Defensive Overreaction

I generally am prone to giving folks the benefit of the doubt, particularly when it comes to less-than-stellar behavior.

I’m more likely to think something awful must be going on in a bad-actor’s life for them to be acting badly.

So I’ll state this right up front: people have bad days, and they shouldn’t be excoriated forever because of those bad days – because we all have bad days, and at some point, each and every one of us will snap a little.

But over and over again, I see a certain group of folks act and overreact so improperly, so defensively, that I have to conclude at some level, this is who they are.

Watch what happens in an A-lister’s comments, particularly. Something about being challenged on their own digital turf enrages the bad actors.

The vast majority of us, when we’re criticized on our blogs for our opinions or advice, say “Hm, thanks for the input. I disagree because blah blah but thanks for taking the time to share your opinion.”

Not the bad actors.

They start busting out words like “libel” and “slander.”

They overreact to every perceived slight. They crow about their ability to slam not only the honest, fair critique but the person who made the critique. I actually heard one A-lister claim with laughter “You know what I did with that, right? TRASH it!” (Note to that A-lister: The critic was right. Your writing could use some work.)

Instead of proceeding from an assumption of good will and recognizing that reasonable minds can differ on a point, they feel personally attacked and trot out the threat of legal action.

There’s no need for me to name names here. They out themselves.

Observed Behavior #3: Constant Self-Aggrandizement

I get seriously concerned over the first two behaviors. This one, by contrast, makes me laugh.

You’ve seen them, I know.

Their Twitter feeds are jam-pack full of keen, erudite observations such as “I am SO blessed to be able to help people achieve their dreams!” and “WHOOT! Awesome rockin’ coaching call with my super client, @{namedrop}!”

Their Facebook updates? Inevitably contain some not-very-veiled reminder that “my blog is #1!”

Look, an occasional statement like this is fine. You’re grateful. We get it. It’s cool.

But these folks take it to a whole new level.

Your first reaction when you see something new from them is to roll your eyes.

Kinda like this …

They must honestly think the rest of us actually are persuaded of the truth of such statements.

I mean – if they knew we all roll our eyes, wouldn’t they stop?

Observed Behavior #4: “Do As I Say—Not As I Do”

Recently, there was an article link being shared by a lot of folks I’m connected to on Facebook.

It was about connecting with A-listers. How to email and connect with these folks. How to break through the barriers they’ve set up because they get so many emails, they just have to protect their busy, busy schedules.

That part, I’m OK with.

But I saw more than a few folks who shared this on Facebook say something like “This is good advice, but don’t try it on {the author of the piece} – it won’t work.”

In a way, I guess this is a corollary of the first observed behavior, because it’s not really honest.

I’ve also seen very popular bloggers write about the benefits of publishing guest-authored posts on your blog – but those bloggers only accept guest posts from folks who’ve bought their expensive membership course, training, or product, or from other A-listers, or not at all.

I’ve seen A-listers write scathing editorials about the lack of civility in the profession – then turn around and publicly excoriate someone on Twitter.

Most of us realize fairly early in life that nobody likes a hypocrite, and that if you’re going to hold some high standard for everyone else, you better abide by that same standard yourself, or else risk a major loss of respect.

Observed Behavior #5: Absurd Pricing

Ugh. Pricing.

This is such a sticky subject. On the one hand, I’m a confirmed capitalist. I have no problem with someone charging what the market will bear for her work.

But it would be idiotic not to acknowledge that sometimes, the prices of these training products are astronomical, especially compared to similarly structured media and resources (i.e., books, DVDs, etc.).

Let’s take the Godfather of the Self-Help Industry as an example: Tony Robbins.

His Personal Power II product, according to his website, contains:

• 25 audio CDs
• Miscellaneous training material (flash cards, etc.)
• A one-hour coaching session with one of Robbins’ licensed coaches
• $100 off any Tony Robbins live event.

Price? $300.

Is that a lot of money? Yeah, for most folks.

But it’s not outside the realm of reasonability. One CD at $10 translates to 25 at $250. Thus, you’re paying $50 for the flashcards and the one-hour coaching session (and the $100 coupon).

Note: I’m not commenting on the utility of the product; for purposes of this discussion, let’s assume both products actually do what the sales copy promises.

Now consider some of the courses and products you’ve seen A-listers push. I’ve seen prices ranging from $997 to much, much more.

Or consider an e-book – basically a PDF document – listed at $47. (I’m working on a book right now which will be available on Kindle and in paper back, and the price range I’m looking at? $8 to $12.)

Whether the product is “worth it” I’ll leave to another discussion.

But there’s a real disconnect here, I think, and it’s a problem.

Do I think any high-priced product is automatically suspect?

No, of course not. One in particular that launched recently cost several hundred dollars, and I’m still miffed I can’t afford it because I absolutely trust the person behind it. (Danny Iny & “Marketing That Works,” in case you’re interested.)

But if it came from someone in whom I’d observed any of the other four behaviors? I don’t know about you, but if someone came to me and asked what I thought, I’d have to be honest and say “I wouldn’t buy it.”

What to Do Instead

All this is well and good, but it leaves a lot of us wondering what, exactly, we’re supposed to do instead of “investing” in these products and people.

Well, instead of modeling yourself and your business marketing on a digital superstar, how about declaring a moratorium on “training investments” and making a renewed commitment to creating real relationships?

Instead of stroking the egos of A-listers, how about spending that time instead hunting for people who have questions you can answer, and answering them?

Forget massive success, blueprints, and six-figure incomes.

Embrace slow marketing.

Have you had enough of the A-lister culture? Want to defend your favorite A-lister? The comments are all yours, my friends – just be respectful.

Did ya like that? It’s part of the Word Carnival – the best little fairway on the ‘net, written for small business owners, by small biz owners! Check out the other Carnies for this month’s topic here.

And while we’re on the subject, you can get Annie’s expert productivity coaching services for as little as $25 — but only until midnight PST on Halloween! Trick or treat, y’all — go here to contribute to the Indiegogo campaign and see all the other goodies you can get!

Photo Credit: Dustin Diaz via photopin cc

Couch warriors, does this sound familiar?

You settle in on your couch or at your desk one fine morning. You’ve got your task list in front of you, your MIST list items identified, your first project of the day open on your laptop screen before you, and you’re feeling fine.

With a determined smile, you dive in, ready to rock the shit out of that project, and within minutes, you’re in it deep, you’re feeling the flow, you are smokin’ that list, baby …

KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK. *Doorbell-doorbell-doorbell*

“You home?” the hopeful, cheerful, loud voice calls from the other side of the front door.

You have just become the victim of another drive-by border intrusion.

They mean well. I truly believe that.

But for whatever reason, they just do not grasp the concept that working at home means you’re WORKING at home.

You, my friend, have a border security problem.  If you don’t get it under control quickly, you’ll soon find the invaders are taking over your work time, and making your time & task choices for you.

How to Deal With the Home Office Intruder

If you’ve got one of these folks in your life who just cannot seem to grasp that your work hours are for – y’know, work, then you’re going to have to muster up the guts to have a potentially less-than-pleasant convo with the intruder.

But before you start ranting at the poor sod, take a minute and make sure you’re clear on the following:

• Off-limit work hours
• Time spans that might be OK for previously scheduled outings or home entertainment
• Hours reserved strictly for family, spouse, or personal time

Once you’re clear on this aspect of your schedule, it’s time to have a little heart to heart with the repeat offender. Here’s a script you can adopt for your own use:

Look, I appreciate your friendship, and it’s important to me. That’s why we need to have this chat — because I don’t want there to be any issues between us. Here’s the thing: if I happened to work at some office downtown, you wouldn’t dream of cruising in at any time during the day and expecting me to entertain you, or drop everything to go somewhere with you.

There’s no difference here, really. Working at home has its own challenges, and even a short five-minute interruption really means up to 20 minutes out of my day, because I have to reach a stopping point, transfer my attention, then pick it back up again and figure out where I was when you leave. So I’m going to have to ask you not to drop in between the hours of x and y during the weekdays, at least not without calling me first and checking to see if it’s a good time.

Kicking It Up a Notch For the Intractable Offenders

All well and good for reasonable folks, but what about the intruders who don’t listen, even after repeated reminders?

Now, my friend, you’re gonna have to dig in for some tough love. And the solution might drive you a little batty at first.

Ready? Here it is:

Don’t open the door.

Don’t answer the phone.

Ignore your friend.

We’re thoroughly conditioned to drop everything whenever anyone pings into our consciousness, but the simple fact is we are not obligated to subjugate our livelihoods to the whims — or even the needs — of others, unless we’re legally or morally responsible for them (say, your minor children).

And I’d also add this: Any friend who expects you to ignore your own interests and pay attention to their crises du jour over and over like that is not really your friend.

Dealing With the Tiny Border Crossers

All that’s fine and dandy when you’re dealing with (putative) adults. But what if your boundary-smashers are your kids?

Well, that’s a different story altogether.

First and foremost, you have to grasp and accept a basic fact: you cannot run a business and care for your kids simultaneously.

At least, not when the kids haven’t hit their teens yet. Older kids are more than capable of observing boundaries and entertaining themselves for a few hours at a time.

But the wee ones? You can’t do it all. I know it seems like an awesome idea — you can re-enter the workforce by running your own business after the baby’s born! You won’t even have to get dressed! It’ll be  awesome! – but it just never works. (I know. I tried.)

So, you’ll need child care for your work hours. And that can get truly pricey in a hurry, especially when you’re just launching your creative biz and have much more time than money at your disposal.

One creative solution past clients have come up with is the child care co-op. The premise is simple: look for parents in your neighborhood with kids about the same age, and swap out child-care duties. Maybe the other parent gets her mornings free, while you watch the kids, and then you swap so you can work in the afternoon.

Yes, you have to do your due diligence before handing your kid off to anyone. You also need to be crystal clear with each other on the schedule, the expectations, and the rules. Written agreements here are a very good idea.

But I have seen this set-up work incredibly well before.

Other tips for dealing with the kids at home:

• Be upfront with your kids. Explain what’s going on, why you need private time, and what you’re doing in there. Taking away the mystery reduces a lot of the insatiable curiosity behind many interruptions.
• Establish shorter time spans, punctuated by “parent time.” For instance, tell the kids you will work for 55 minutes, and when the clock says 4:55, you’ll come out and spend 15 minutes exclusively with them. (But treat those 15 minutes as sacred – no phone calls, no diverted attention.)
• Set up a reward system. It’s not a bribe if the good behavior precedes the coveted goodie.

Border Guards, Unite

What’s your worst or funniest home office intrusion story? How do you handle the relatives and neighbors haranguing you for “just a little favor” because you’re “not doing anything”? Share in the comments!

Photo Credit: Medhi via photopin cc

For those of you who think commenting on other people’s blogs is a waste of time and no one really reads them, think again: this whole post was triggered by a comment to a guest post I wrote earlier this week about three common marketing systems every solo needs for Danny Iny’s Firepole Marketing blog.

The comment from Owen McGab Enaohwo of Hire Your Virtual Assistant read:

Annie, I enjoyed your content but thought it’s missing a very important system which is a sales funnel system that actually gets folks to buy the product or service. All the systems you mentioned in my view are need only after a sales funnel has been set up because they will not have as much impact without a sales mechanism in place. Please share your thoughts on this?

Owen’s exactly right in this respect: the sales funnel is the most important system for any solopreneur. Without it, marketing is pointless – unless you’re engaged in this gig strictly for attention. But most solos I know actually would like to get paid, and thus, a sales funnel is a must.

While sales funnel systems are not strictly marketing systems, and thus were outside the scope of the post I wrote for Danny, they do implicate marketing, as well as sales, finance, and workflow systems.

So, rather than just pop off a few comments to Owen in reply to his comment there on Danny’s blog, I figured it was time to take a look at this system in some depth here on the PJP blog.

What’s a Sales Funnel?

At its most basic level, the sales funnel is how you get paid.

Why “funnel”? Because that’s the single best paradigm to describe what happens when prospects become paying clients or customers — or, rather, it‘s been considered to be the best paradigm (more on that in a moment):

1. Let’s say through whatever means (links from other blogs, search engine traffic, etc.), 1,000 people come to your website.
2. Out of those 1,000 visitors, 100 read your article.
3. Out of those 100 readers, 10 sign up for your email list.
4. Out of those 10 subscribers, 1 becomes a client or purchases your product.

Funnels are wider at the top, much narrower at the bottom – and that’s pretty much what happens to your prospects.

If you want a few more paying clients at the bottom, you basically feed a bunch more casually interested prospects in at the top. (Er. So to speak.)

The Funnel Vs. The System

This is an important distinction: your sales funnel is comprised of systems. It is also, in one sense of the word, a system itself – a series of moving parts that feed into a specific purpose.

But don’t mistake the funnel for the system itself. The funnel is just the visual representation of a workflow. In order to activate the funnel and get the most out of it, you need to build the systems to support the funnel.

Here’s an example – going back to our overly simplified “1000/100/10/1” scenario above, you have at least five systems at play:

1. Your traffic system(s): how you get casually interested prospects to actually visit your site
2. Your content system(s): how you plan, draft, schedule, and publish the helpful articles and, also, how you use those articles to convert readers into subscribers to your list
3. Your email list system(s): how you plan, create, and publish content to your list subscribers
4. Your client sign-up system(s): how you internally manage the conversion to paying client (i.e., administrative files, contact information, CRM management, etc.)
5. Your work delivery system(s): how you perform and deliver whatever the client/customer bought to the client/customer

Creating Your Sales Funnel

Ideally, we should have several funnels leading to paying clients.

As an example, a coach can work one-on-one with clients, write and sell a book, lead live workshops and seminars, manage a paid membership site … the options for creating several streams of income are potential funnels in their own right.

Additionally, there are many ways you can move prospects down the funnel and get them to know, like, and trust you—the essential emotional state that comes before the vast majority of purchasing decisions.

Making a visual representation of your sales funnels is crucial if you want to get a clear picture of all the ways people become your clients. It’s also essential to know what state of readiness each element or component of the funnel is in at any given point in time, as this helps you focus and prioritize your tasks.

That’s why I really love Nicole Fende’s sales funnel template, which you can download here (right-click or Cmd-click on Mac to save to your computer).

NB: This is a Word .DOCX  format file. If you’d like another format, let me know – or you can use one of the many freebie file conversion tools on the web. 

Nicole prepared her version of this document to share with the Blog Posse, the small mastermind group to which she and I both belong. It was so impressive that we all immediately began clamoring for a workable version for ourselves. (Seriously, if Nicole ever decides she’s had enough of being the brilliant Numbers Whisperer™ she’s totally got a career in graphics.)

As you’ll see in the template, the various elements are color-coded as to the status (“Major Gap,” “Needs Work,” “Setup Complete”). You can change the color of each element for your own funnel by going to Format/Shape.

The elements are also arranged in an hour-glass shape, instead of the more traditional funnel-shape. This is because Nicole used the principles behind John Jantsch’s Duct Tape Marketing in creating this template.

As John writes here, the familiar paradigm of “know-like-trust” is extended to “know-like-trust-try-buy-repeat-refer” which you’ll see down the right margin of the template.

I like this more than the funnel shape because I think it more accurately reflects the reality of a comprehensive digital marketing plan. So you can rearrange the box elements in the hourglass as you see fit, to most accurately reflect the reality of your business marketing plan.

I’ve left a few elements in the various text boxes just as examples. What you’d do is save the template as a separate file, then select the text in each box and change it to your elements – the things you’re working on, such as your next product, your ebook, your whitepaper, your guest posts, etc.

One final note: this is a big-picture tool. It’s designed to give you the bird’s eye overview of the whole shebang at one glimpse. To actually implement your plan, you need to take the next step of expanding each of these elements into their own systems.

Funnel On, My Friends

I’d like to thank Nicole for the amazing template and for giving me permission to share it here, and also Owen for the insight and motivation for this post!

Any questions? Not sure how this would work for your own business? Hit me up in the comments!

Photo credit: El Bibliomata via photopin cc