fun fact, the life design project was almost called “no shift key” because i didn’t like using capitals

whether you’re thinking of selling a product or service, or have an idea for a business, i have a trick for testing if it’s profitable that i’ve been using in my business.

the idea can be anything at first to open your mind to this, it could be selling baked goods, doing technical support, telling people how to rack up frequent flyer miles, it’s not important to start.

the biggest hurdle when in this space is usually a mental one…

you’re head messes with you when you have ideas…

• might be scared and so you think “i could never make money from this”
• might be practical and worry about graphics, and the website, and marketing, and how you’re going to charge people equaling overload
• could be adding features by the minute to your great idea, increasing development time, and people involved
• get lost on where to start
• complain you’re already too busy but have big dreams

most businesses don’t fail for lack of trying, they fail because the idea wasn’t very good to start with and no one bothered to figure that out.

so how can you figure all this out quickly and get the real question answered…is this idea going to work?

your first move is to ask that question, which not everyone does before they throw all their money into a pizza place or quit their job

…then boil everything down to basics and set one really specific goal…that will get you started, everything after that I’m still learning.

start small, test, and tweak

IT Arsenal didn’t grow until I got really specific about what was offered and measurable goals like, 10 sales this month.

i tricked myself into action by telling myself i would offer one of my product ideas for a couple months and then change to another one of my ideas instead of trying to get my head around how to offer everything and get everything done.

this “cycle idea” tricked me into getting really really specific instead of trying to pitch “how awesome everything I do is” (pour on the sarcasm)….or think of all the problems or reasons i can’t do it. i was able to just start, really start.

after you make the mental shift, it’s much easier to make progress. it’s something bite sized you can take on.

i ended up not actually moving to another idea in a few months, sometimes it was longer, sometimes shorter, but it forced me to get obsessed about a specific product idea in cycles and find what worked, in other words, iterate more and quicker. i’m still doing this now.

examples of getting really specific for my ideas looked like this…Monthly WordPress Backup and Customized Advice, Website Setup for Online Entrepreneurs, Website Setup Training with Video’s for the Non-Technical.

instead of worrying about delivery, i asked people if they wanted this, got feedback and if yes, just sent them a PayPal link and the more feedback I got validated putting more effort into setting up a system for people to buy it, or a better graphic, or a graphic at all.

bad execution is also why business ideas fail, but without a profitable idea, execution doesn’t matter.

you could post your idea on craigslist first to boil things down to their basics. look to only make 3 sales or some very specific measure.

i was surprised…just getting a little specific in the offer and the goals made all the difference and had immediate results (IE questions, interest, and sales). i now have several products selling, with several landing pages, while i slowly keep testing.

the fact that I’m too busy with users to make changes means I’m making money, which was the point. my original ideas have changed, but what’s important is i know what is wanted, what people will pay for, and can act on it.

when you have something to grow, instead of looking quizically at an empty pot you can test just how profitable your idea can be or change it and keep testing.

how to start

• boil your idea down to a specific small offering
• ask people if they would buy it, ask them to do so. use friends or craigslist to find people. use launch rock to gather e-mails (http://launchrock.com/)
• do it for them, gather feedback
• test and tweak

…after you do this, you have something, which was the point. this is encouragement to take a step on a project you’ve been thinking about.

“Some people succeed because they are destined to, some because they are determined to…”

the time is since long overdue for me to report on progress made at IT Arsenal, an online business built to slowly create financial freedom and enable more and more freedoms in life, be it learning new things, following passions, or simply taking much longer vacations and living the life i want to live. the status at this point is: generating excess income and creating openings for an easier life yet still tied to a busy work schedule. life’s good, and so is business.

i’ll go over major points of interest in the last 4 months or so, what’s working, what isn’t, and what you can take away and use for yourself.

Major Developments

new offerings (continuity programs are where it’s at)

wordpress maintenance, disaster recovery, and ongoing “everything” technical help are three new fully functional programs listed now on IT Arsenal. besides getting more and more familiar with building landing pages rapidly for these services, the continuity of an ongoing service is working out very well. using a paypal subscription, i’ve offered an “all you can eat” solution with some boundaries for technical help. those who have an established online business, meaning, it’s bringing in money, are finding it very valuable to offload their technical needs. it’s not a full on membership site where i add content, rather an all access pass for a monthly cost. more on how it’s implemented below.

although i like landing pages services like Unbounce, i’ve used my WordPress theme, Pagelines Platform Pro and stripped out everything but the top navigation and bottom logo, and used the regular WordPress page editor to create sales type pages.

service based offerings but streamlined with gravity forms

although the new offerings lean heavily toward a service orientation, meaning a person is required to deliver, with the help of gravity forms, and actually having a landing page for many more needs on my business website, a majority of interaction is now streamlined or automated.

i can’t tell you what a joy it is to field a question of interest with a link to a beautiful page, and a form that leads directly to checkout and captures all pertinent details, that not only stores the information in a database and e-mails me, but e-mails the user a custom checkout e-mail, and adds them to my newsletter. gravity forms is able to do that for my particular setup.

it’s always been a hurdle for me to make specific offerings for the multitude of requests and various names that “IT stuff” get’s called and categorized with, but gravity forms has helped me combat that greatly. i can more easily create a capture or salespage and put an already made form/buy button at the bottom of it. although i shouldn’t be stalled by this, and instead sell to the need, i feel more equipped to create the first funnel and just go now. the faster you can try things out the better. i continue learning over and over that to drive your business idea you should use as simple and quick means as possible to test if people will pay for it. go from there.

Gravity Forms

new graphics

the services page now greatly simplifies what’s offered via a snazzy iPad looking graphic with links that move the user down the page. i can actually use the page as a reference now, and i’ve received out the blue comments on how “easy” the site was to understand. user interface = so important. my online business colleague mars dorian helped with the graphic, i put together elements of it with Omnigraffle.

new referrals

likely my main source of business is referrals. i’m not exactly positive how, but i’m pretty sure i was a poster boy at a recent “Martha Beck” (women coaches) conference because i make sure to give nothing less but superb service to all clients. treat all users like your only users, always. make it easy for those you do business with to share who you are and you’ll see a natural outpouring of referrals, then it’s only a matter of turning that into sales.

i’m now a go to technical resource for adam baker and jonathan mead, high profile bloggers and online entrepreneurs.

new partnerships, co-launch or branding opportunities

previous clients that i’ve helped have noticed packages i offer as useful to their audiences and have asked to collaborate on something custom. nothing live yet, but these are open conversations. i’m finding it tricky to collaborate and be the driving force, but i want to be.

• ashley – the middle finger project – customized WordPress Trainer
• stella – crafting a message that makes your cash register sing – custom packages for boosting response or setting up a website
• stephen – my pocket band – “shortcuts for web entrepreneurs” mostly around what to do after you have an initial “ugly” site up

…and if i can figure out this i might be able enlist a lot more via an affiliate system not tied to a payment checkout system. WordPress Affiliate Platform Plugin – Simple Affiliate Program for WordPress Blog/Site

new 2012 business goals

• earn 32k
• $2000 in “passive” or front loaded income
• co-launch a product or service
• go to 6 events
• review 5 business books
• launch 2 services
• launch 2 products
• hit 1000 on my mailing list

…while holding a 9-5

volunteering

a meetup group called “tech volunteers” puts IT workers skills to good use, so far i’ve helped an organization called Depaul USA. i wish i wasn’t so busy when they end up having their live meetups!

Money

taxes

first year doing taxes married and with a sole proprietorship. we used HR block’s deluxe online package, and chose not to itemize everything to save time. i keep my usernames and passwords in a spreadsheet so the frustration was limited to a few hours and i felt confident everything went well.

credit card

legitimate business credit card uses abound, as tax laws on what can be a business expense are lenient. i opened a card to net 50k miles toward a planned trip to italy, and to more easily track business expenses throughout the year. the perks of a business card allow for some fun. the business opened up an aadvantage citicard visa and nabbed 50k miles using this trick (actually 150k with my wife’s cards) for free flights.

month average income right now – $2073

Side Projects

justanswer.com – i just can’t give it up!

buying old computers, cleaning them up and selling them

What’s Not Working

still preparing and not selling

i feel like my good friend regie, who seems to always be studying for a certification every time we talk about business, when i’m saying just go do it! … and yet here i do the same thing in my own way, always preparing an idea to sell, but never actually selling it, much less promoting it. i need to get in my head as soon as i’ve readied something to the point it sale, i need to have avenues to actually tell people about it, but that leads to my next problem.

overload
part of me is worried i’ll get too much business and not be able to handle it, but that’s super lame. i’m glad i’m writing it so i can see how lame that is.

still preparing, not writing (reports/reflection or newsletter)

i’ve come to learn reflection and reporting are so important. they don’t have to be public, but i just have been in survival mode and ignoring this.

too much service, not enough product

i’ve battled back and forth in the past 2 years to build solutions that are more autonomous, meaning self governed and run by themselves. IE. post up a self contained product and no other interaction is needed for purchase and delivery. some online entrepreneurs would argue this is the only way, but i am doing both, and as mentioned making sure if i build something that doesn’t scale, is streamlined as much as possible with systems. despite that, this year needs to show more results in stand alone solutions for a more passive income.

there’s so much more i could be doing

i’m holding fast to superior customer service and referrals, basically whoever walks “through my door” or my inbox is more like it and doing very little “seeker” work…blog posts, marketing campaigns to announce new things, constant social media posts now. although i should state i do post regularly but infrequently to facebook, twitter, linkedin, and i do make sure those that i work with, i write linkedin recommendations for or e-mail personal suggestions for their advancement.

a note I made to myself at the end of Feb

consistency, quality of work, referrals, and “being there” are working, interacting with media, pushing out content or asking for the sale, having/refreshing items on the shelf (instead of customized everything e-mail drudgery), are not working.

i’m relying on my past and need to dig in, stop taking new clients and focus on product dev, and then publishing about those new things in a way that increases my throughput and scalability.

the “does it work, will it sell” period is over, now iterate to be bigger. stop getting stuck in the cycle of  catching up instead of innovating.

Tactics that are Working (take these)

scheduled relationship/referral enhancers

i have a weekly calendar occasion to promote someone who has bought from me, touch base with someone in my niche, and answer questions on LinkedIn. this works wonders.

always go above and beyond, it’s your strength when you’re small

icon graphics for landing pages and visuals

a problem i’m always hearing about when actually putting together a website landing page, or a home or about page with some visuals is what to use for images without going to a graphic designer to craft something custom. i find it increasingly easy to search specifically for “icons” or “vectors” in a topic that i need to display, and arrange these in some logical order to my topic. designers give away icons packs much more readily than “stock” images. see the below example i use in my disaster recovery package.

landing page for everything, don’t give them 100 solutions per page, give them 1 on 100 pages

okay maybe not literally 100 pages but there are many ways to sell your product or offering. add “for entrepreneurs” or “for stay at home moms” and you are selling to two different crowds even though the offer is exactly the same. create many different “nets” to catch your audiences and explore them. i’ve been building more and more super specific pages with the same checkout options instead of a more general tech support blanket. it just plain sells better.

thinking about choice while making an offer

sheena lyengar does a TED talk about “choice” that will help you immensely if you’re overwhelmed with options or don’t know where to start when offering something to an audience.

Sheena Iyengar on the art of choosing 

Resources/Tools that are Working (use these)

i’ve mentioned several above, here they are listed again with a few others

• Quora – asking questions you can’t seem to get answered anywhere else
• Gravity Forms (with addons) – excellent wordpress forms with addons for newsletter and payment gateway integration. has a learning curve.
• Asana – task management web application
• Hype – html5 drag and drop builder. i’ve used this to create mini web applications for decision tree like visuals. click here to see what i made.
• H&R Block Deluxe taxes

Realizations

• the speed of business when it comes to service is much slower than products, waiting for responses drags everything out
• business i just part my life now, and i get out what i put in
• it’s not just me who struggles with doing work for current project vs. putting something on a website, selling and innovating

“Freedoms”

i’m not “financially free” yet, but excess income and plenty of perks are the result so far in combining lifestyle design and online business, and it get’s better and better if the last few years are indicators, here are recent freedoms.

• services and software paid for by business income
• a trip to italy later this year, paid for by business income
• paying off wife’s law school loans that much faster
• negotiating power in my career
• access to various training programs and groups for free

i end up saving most of the additional income for later, but it’s fun to think i could lease a sports car or get a massage every week or simply go to chipotle everyday if i wanted to. since i’d like the monthly income to eliminate all my expenses eventually, i keep working on that, and i also generally enjoy being cheap.

although, now that i think about it, i might start getting a massage every week, that sounds pretty good.

Reflection

ironically, although immersed with technology to fuel the business, my interactions are more traditional, based off existing relationships, referrals, and those who stumble on me. this is likely because i’m committed to spending limited time slowly building IT Arsenal when i can. this isn’t to say i shouldn’t be efficiently and quickly launching a marketing campaign, or regularly writing updates and posts for search traffic or shareable/sticky funnel content, or paying for advertising…because i should…i’m just not right now.

despite familiarity with the tech; webinars, daily blogging, and the slow drip launch to a limited space/limited time offer haven’t been appealing to me at this point. small series of test and sell, refer and sell, and e-mailing links are just fine, but i don’t think they will continue to be for much longer.

i suspect my aversion has something to do with not wanting to create hype, the multiple time sensitive communication blasts and coordinated actions that need to happen (and my limited time with a job), and the constant sense i need to get over that my core offerings aren’t ready. they are so close, closest they have ever been.

i curse myself for not being able to pick one problem, like “Hosting Migrations” and just do that and only that. painfully, and it serves me right, i’m learning to do that backwards, by creating a business with multiple services (then fighting to display them) and then working backwards until i end up with a big salespage that offers only one thing and marketing material or pitches for only that. as i learned from Jason Cohen http://blog.asmartbear.com/ , one way to get over this hump is to create multiple landing pages until what people actually want or what you should be focusing on is apparent. i seem to be on that path, and that’s working for me.

i’m in a space where i know exactly what i offer, and what i don’t, and where it all belongs or should belong in the shop. now completing and tweaking the items on the shelves will start to come into more focus, and not live in the outskirts of day to day work.

i’m right in the middle of those two places, and it’s fun. i have to balance giving my all to current and new users who are buying from me or being referred to me…and the internal building and testing…which can only happen after i finish with those awesome clients, break free from the 9-5 drudge, make an effort toward my fitness goals, and make sure i’m being an awesome husband!…but that’s life, and so far, those are all still deemed very worthwhile!

keep on keeping on

i made a template and basic instructions based off a free appsumo.com video (wish they would bring those back) and notes on a call i had with stella, a copywriter friend. see below, take and use.

AIDA Enhanced

have something to announce or sell, without that, your message is already bad
don’t overthink this. it could be about a product, an affiliate product, a new post on your blog, a new discovery your audience might find useful

list 10 attributes of the audience
make up a person “bob” who has all these attributes

speak personal, use I’s and you’s and common speak (know your audience)

use simple visual formatting (limit distraction, pictures, colors, etc.)

write within a 540 pixels wide box so you can see how it will look in most viewers

use arial 12 or a basic font – try georgia 12

use this writing structure (AIDA – described below)
Attention
Interest
Desire
Action (1 action, not many)

template

copy paste when writing

<—
possible subject line 1
possible subject line 2
possible subject line 3
possible subject line 4

Attention

Interest

Desire

Action
—>

Attention
headlines and subject lines – how to make good ones?

• trick 1 -  list things that if you overheard it would turn your heard and go WHAT?
• trick 2 – go to digg.com type in your topic, thing your selling or promoting. order the list by most dugg and use those headlines and swap in your topic or change things

Interest (if you sell a cheaper product, use short copy, expensive, longer copy)
educate, give something critical or valuable

• if it’s valuable you can write a lot
• interesting facts
• story about the product or offer
• i’ll tell you a secret…

Desire
“benefits” of what you are promoting

• more sales
• more reliable website
• bigger muscles, more hits

Action

• we’re running a promotion…
• get your’s now by clicking
• check it out now here at this link
• see the deal here.

make this bigger font, bold, different color

PS. make a claim here, like. after i used this bla bla bla or a guarantee…or, one of my users, jane, has this, and here’s her site…

bonus, how do you hire someone to do this?

make sure they understand the customer, test them on it.

…want to add more “flash” and “pizazz”… don’t!… or do only if it appeals to your audience. you are not your audience.

now if you want some help actually figuring how to put your crafted message into a newsletter service like aWeber, Mailchimp, or InfusionSoft, that’s more of a job for a business out to help you understand and use technology.

…this is an introspective look on being my own worst enemy and tactics on how to over come it. something i feel many online business builders, and project creators could easily relate to. it’s probably the most re-occuring “issue” i continue to have as i develop.

*this is all based on not having urgent tasks, bodily needs or requirements present while “at work”.

- – - -

push through, flesh it out, get it out there. just do it. procrastination. it’ll be there tomorrow. i’m hungry.

those are the things i’m thinking right now as i sit here stuck staring, literally staring from screen to screen for something mildly entertaining enough to pull my attention.

what i’d like, what i WANT is to update and build out my business services page. i want to unravel more services that i can provide and create the on-boarding forms and announce them to the world. i want to grow. i want to get inspired and create new products…but instead i stare at my print out of the page i want to rework with some scribbled notes, and i look back at my monitors for distraction. it’s not so poignant as to force me to realize i’m avoiding action, it’s just a numbing vague sense that i don’t have to do what really should get done if i scan around long enough.

it’s infuriating when the realization does sets in.

why is it so hard sometimes to do that which we should be doing?

there’s little else in my way at the moment, which is better than most days. i’m mildly enticed by doing some other less important reading, or writing, checking out what other people are into and posting about. what are my peers, friends, and the world “up to” right now. is it something i can use?

i recognize those things aren’t important though so i don’t do them either, i just sit here, in an in-between state, hoping something lights me up and pushes me forward.

i see the mounds of piled information i have organized to be used or re-purposed for my next awesome idea, still more enticement to write something, or save information for some specific purpose instead of holding tanks for a unknown “could be useful” purpose.

i’m doing a lot of waiting for things to happen instead of making things happen. i’m my own worst enemy, and the worst part is the indifference i have about it. the non-action because, no one else will notice, or care, or depends on this.

what an interesting trap.

is this the loneliness of an solo entrepreneur or someone with too many ideas and self created projects?

i’ve even invented a process to unhook myself and get focused. i look at the powerful steps i’ve scanned in from written note cards, and think, those are great ideas. the words hit a lead wall, and slump away without any impact on actions.

it’s a cascade, if you want the business adventure and success you’re looking for, you need to finish these pages of text, and groupings of images, and forms, and payment processes, so you can then announce it, promote it, tell your list about it, or finally have a reason to make a list of people to tell about it.

if you don’t get these things presentable, you’re not doing the stuff that really matters, you’re just maintaining status quo.

the status quo isn’t so bad, when it’s not so infuriating i guess.

i love my current projects and clients, but i’m up to date on them at the moment. inbox zero and all that. then why the frustration? maybe because there are ideas left undone, projects half built? that’s part of it. no growth.

there’s a mental barricade that it’s in my way, and i put it there. i can also remove it.

how to stop being my worst enemy?

i can choose to take a break, not physically, (as i’m obviously not making progress right now) but mentally i can stop thinking about these things, take a real break. come back later. immerse myself in something so clarity of mind comes.

i can stop pretending there’s something stopping me and actually start doing that which should be done. this would be letting those words that hit the led wall take effect.

i can simply start anywhere, because it’s leads elsewhere. it’s apparent you (self) don’t want to be “here” thinking about frustration and being your own worst enemy. so choosing anything in the most remote direction of what you want to accomplish, will lead you elsewhere, which has the potential to be forward, or better.

ask for help, start a conversation. start by vulnerably saying i’ve been trying to get this thing done, and i’m failing at it right now, and it’s totally messing me up. see what the conversation does for you.

you can freeze your physical and mental state in your minds eye. now come “out of” youself and look down from above and slightly to the left. identify what things are impacting you. your environment, are you hungry? are you angry at people? are you scared of something? what systems are working against you and can you identify one by one and fix? how can you break apart your problem into tiny pieces and deal with them one at a time? address them, make requests, make promises.

sometimes defeating ourselves, overcoming ourselves as our enemy, leads us to success. it may be a daily battle, a quarterly one, or just a slump.

keep on keeping on.

Readings, quotes, and images I’ve captured to boost your business mind and general operation below…

i believe this

innovative artists adapt

training = trust = ease of action = mastery

see done is better than perfect. good reminder for procrastination creep

I just finished reading Work the System for the second time, it’s in it’s 3rd edition printing and I can’t recommend it enough for grasping a concrete sense of how to elevate yourself out of the chaos in business and life, pinpoint the systems that make things work, and set them up to do your bidding.

The book is freeing, but also down to earth with real applicable methodologies. It’s awesome and has been a powerful book for me the last couple years, both in automating life, and my online business income, and just identifying how things work and then working them to my advantage.

It gives you a confidence in almost predicting how things will happen, a la Robert Downy Jr. version of Sherlock Holmes…seeing what’s there, taking it in from an objective angle, and then executing to push things in your favor.

It’s a good read and gives access to an enlightened viewpoint, and although it isn’t topic focused as in telling you the mechanics of something specific, it does an excellent job of putting actionable methodologies for anything life and business throws at you.

Check it out if you get a chance, and pull some wisdom from my captures of the book below.

Work the System: The Simple Mechanics of Making More and Working Less [WORK THE SYSTEM 3/E] [Hardcover]

I grabbed the excerpt as I found it applicable and similar to Chris Brogans “gate jumping” thoughts. Use this as fuel to forge ahead if you’re stuck.

Find what works, iterate, make it better if the idea proves itself worthy.

Pulled originally from Facebook’s IPO filing, then from my reading of Eric Ries “Startup Lessons Learned” post on it.

http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2012/02/hacker-way.html

Build your online business like this, there’s too much distraction, too much to get caught up in that without this mindset you just won’t get a chance to make your ideas fly, create income, and see if your business can be a freedom giving enjoyable endeavor. It’s something you can hear over and over as you develop. It’s awesome to see this methodology can be used no matter how small or big you are.

The Hacker Way (letter from Zuckerberg)

As part of building a strong company, we work hard at making Facebook the best place for great people to have a big impact on the world and learn from other great people. We have cultivated a unique culture and management approach that we call the Hacker Way.

The word “hacker” has an unfairly negative connotation from being portrayed in the media as people who break into computers. In reality, hacking just means building something quickly or testing the boundaries of what can be done. Like most things, it can be used for good or bad, but the vast majority of hackers I’ve met tend to be idealistic people who want to have a positive impact on the world.

The Hacker Way is an approach to building that involves continuous improvement and iteration. Hackers believe that something can always be better, and that nothing is ever complete. They just have to go fix it — often in the face of people who say it’s impossible or are content with the status quo.

Hackers try to build the best services over the long term by quickly releasing and learning from smaller iterations rather than trying to get everything right all at once. To support this, we have built a testing framework that at any given time can try out thousands of versions of Facebook. We have the words “Done is better than perfect” painted on our walls to remind ourselves to always keep shipping.

Hacking is also an inherently hands-on and active discipline. Instead of debating for days whether a new idea is possible or what the best way to build something is, hackers would rather just prototype something and see what works. There’s a hacker mantra that you’ll hear a lot around Facebook offices: “Code wins arguments.”

PS. IT Arsenal’s progress has been slow and steady. I’m the bottleneck, not packaging things up as deliverable digital products, and streamlining work delivery often or well enough. Still, revenue is climbing, hourly investment only slightly higher or fluxuating. A real progress report is due next on what’s working, what’s not working, and some reading inspiration. I really love the projects I’m working on it.

I don’t have tons of free time for my online business.

I don’t go to many online webinars from the “Pros” … I don’t host them either. I rarely send out e-mails to my list (once a month), barely do interviews or guest posting. I don’t have the time to dedicate those methods to my online business growth right now, and I think most would say those a pretty important ones.

It’s not that I don’t like those methods, or they don’t work, they can and do, but not for me while I’m being cut throat with my time, and holding to building IT Arsenal in only a few hours a day or less.

I focus mainly on those people who buy what I have on the shelf, or might, or have already. When I do promote something or get approached, I make sure I’m the winner for that person and they have the best experience possible. Service is my strength.

I’m just making something more obvious for myself that wasn’t previously. I don’t do a lot of popular business builders right now, or if I do, I ease very slowly into them, and it’s okay, there’s no right way and as shown below I can still earn an income without them.

That is something that is consistently mind blowing about business, it’s a human interaction when generally referenced. That’s it. You provide something, and someone pays you for it. There is no specific set of right ways or wrong ways. It’s also what makes it so difficult to grasp and pin down.

These revelations are landing for me as I’ve been in this (business) space for almost a year and a half down and continue to make sense of online business and what’s working for me right now. A beautiful meeting in Laguna Beach, CA helped grant perspective on doing more of what works helped too.

WHAT’S WORKING

Partnerships – rebranding a sales page, but putting a partners information in a few paragraphs or customizing the pitch to a partners users is special. Do this for someone  you’re hopeful to partner with, research their audience a little, and offer a cut. They will love to promote what you’re offering, as long as it looks good. Do as much as you can to help people partner with you, when they grow, you grow. I’ve seen this specifically with 3 partners now! Ashley, Laurie, Cath, and soon Stella. I’m going to try and co-brand a product with Ashley from The Middle Finger Project this year. Sweeeet.

Links links links. Sales links, information links, YouTube links, all that I have produced all with the focus to inform or sell. I put together a quick spreadsheet that has links to all my relevant accounts, and buyable services which is now up to 2 services and 2 products, and it’s absolutely great when someone e-mails with their problem and I have to do nothing then a few words and a link.

Having things on the shelf. It doesn’t really need saying, but it still weighs on me. I see so many people out there interested in online business but they aren’t providing anything. They have NOTHING on the shelf. Things exist because you put them into existence. Patton said a good plan ruthlessly executed right now is better than a perfect plan next week. Actions = results. Put your idea on a page, even if you have nothing to back it up, and put that page out there, deal with the rest when someone tells you they want what you have.

Trading services – I trade tech support for graphic design, coaching, and well…food.

Batching my industry reading and sharing all of my responses via bufferapp.com at one time. I’m my own worst enemy, and sometimes not reading, keeping up with my RSS, or magazines, or friends in the “fields” blogs…it bugs me. I use to try and keep up, which was a losing game. I now schedule time, batch all the “catch up” …and then use bufferapp or buffer which schedules out a stack of responses over the course of a few days as to not overwhelm. In general this has caused much more feedback and interaction.

YouTube – There’s no surprise this is a massive traffic potential. Their new interface, and my revelation that screen casts are big hits with users have my engagement and user interaction way up and actually producing clients and buyers. Is it time for you to look at YouTube as a tool?

Re-occurring payment services. I love this model and I’ve found it works exceptionally well with technical support which can be nebulous in naming convention or issue. Instead covering a broad topic, with specific deliverables for a monthly fee. It creates freedom in my schedule, and re-occurring income.

Tools

• Hellobar.com
• WordPress Plugins/Themes – Contact Form 7, Slidedeck, Platform Pro
• ScheduleOnce.com
• PayPal Re-occurring products – Mentioned above
• FollowUpThen – I’ve mentioned this before, and now use it to make sales. After I’ve worked with someone I schedule a follow up e-mail for a week or two later with a custom note to check in and a link to a service I think they could use.
• Affiliate Systems – I’m starting to sign up and become an affiliate for each system/service I use. I copy/paste my affiliate links into a spreadsheet and have them on call, I find I can easily patch them in on e-mails in social media when and ONLY when they come up organically as a need for someone.

There’s nothing revolutionary, but the difference is being on the court, not in the stands with what I’m building. Critical mass continues to build, and I’m excited for my next stand alone product and more slow growth. It seems to be my mode of operation and with how many hours I have (or don’t have) to put forward, I’m fine with that. I’m having more fun than I recently have.

INCOME/BUSINESS REPORT

• 2011 Income – $19,170
• 2011 Business Expenses $1913 (I have to verify this, there might have been other purchases that I use for business and personal use)
• Jan 2012 – $2140 (Great start, I want to double this monthly as my overall online business goal, but still, great start)
• Jan Website Traffic 1427/1258 Unique
• Jan Product Sales – 3
• Jan Service Sales – 4
• Jan Service Sales Re-occuring – 5
• Jan Affiliate Sales – 8

This year’s goal is 32k from IT Arsenal and I’m very hopeful

I love what I’m doing and I actually feel like I’m making a real difference for people, how touchy feely and awesome.

2012 Dreamlines (still developing)

I’ve simplified this to a spreadsheet with being, having, doing, with status, comment, monthly cost. I review it weekly, those who want to accomplish big things, review their goals often. I’m not so concerned about my other living costs currently as I want to pay for and sustain my dreams and goals with my business and the income is on top of a full time job income. When that changes, I’ll incorporate living needs.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Avg9sbYSEUyFdFZOOXZ3d0c5bmVjWGRudUE1Mi1yOEE

i’ve been consuming information on productive living for a few years now. i’m by no means an expert, but from experience alone can comment on a few tactics for getting more done in less time, and the optimal actions for achieving results.

i have some challenging information for you today in growing your business based on experience and observation. i hope it benefits you.

i constantly see books, magazines, articles, and highly successful people toting the advantages of getting up early to start your day. i often feel bad about it because i have such a hard time doing it.

you’ve seen the articles, there’s typically an overwhelming outcry usually in the comments section about people who are “night owls” and do their best work or whatever at night.

but the argument has a hinge point that i think get’s overlooked…what type of work are you doing?

people don’t create as effectively during their night sessions as those who get up early…for specific reasons, mostly out of our control.

mind you this is different than just saying you simply have to get up at 5am every morning. if you get up at 5am and spend 4 hours responding to e-mail, well then, you’re missing the point.

this has rung true based on my own experience in continually pushing up against friction as i build new offers, test products, and mini projects amidst what’s required to just maintain a business presence and other idea’s you’ve launched or are testing (and that job thing i’m holding on to). reminder: still in the business building phase to hit 5k a month in revenue.

i’ll simply state, getting up early to work, is better than staying up to work when it comes to anything requiring pro-action, not re-action, like launching a product, or completing a project. a lot of initial phase idea testing, business building stuff falls right into this category.

in the productivity world this might be bold, but let me explain why before you click away or jump to the comments to holler at me.

some clear reasons why

• there’s much less distraction. less calls, less news from the day, less “already on, hard to shut off” input. distraction is the leading killer of productivity. and coming back to a task after being distracted, can at times, take up to 45 minutes to get back in sync with your intended actions.

• you’re energy. no matter how “charged” you get at different times in the day, is at full in the morning. you may not find it natural to access it then, but it’s there. you’ve just slept and your body is rested.

• you’re looking forward, not backward. unless your schedule is literally backwards, and i’m sure there are cases of those whose are, the world is fundamentally wired to function within a morning to night span of time. at the end of the day, you are inherently and naturally reflecting or recalling events from the day. there’s less mental “space” to move around and create. you are in reaction mode and have to fight uphill not to be. save e-mails for night time.

• pro-active vs. re-active. you can’t call people at 6am, and they won’t bother you. you are free to generate and simply by virtue of everyone else not choosing to get up early, you are left with longer block of uninterrupted time than usual, even if that is 30 minutes. for me, it often is.

•  it’s quiet, and you are in control of your environment. less people, less un-purposefull noise, less distraction. received phone calls is one example of this.

• less rush, more preparation. many have said being prepared is half the battle. i think in most cases it’s more than half the battle. when you don’t start your day perfectly timing how long your shower has to be before you need to be somewhere, there’s a broader calm, and readiness for the day. enhance this by reviewing some goals on an index card, sticky, or whatever mechanism you use. progress will be made.

these are just a few arguments, and i felt compelled to share them. i’m not knocking you if you stay up late to get work done, but i’m going to be a jerk and tell you getting up early is better and more intellilgent than staying up late when it comes to business building (vs maintaining). it’s my opinion, and hopefully it comes as information to benefit you than to challenge how you already work.

it’s valuable to get up earlier than other people, and even more valuable to do pro-active work first than re-active.

mind you…i’m also telling myself this, very very loudly. i go through cycles of being able to get myself up early and then falling off the horse and making this a less purposeful practice. it’s time to pick it back up and “bake in” an hour in the morning for 2012 results by way of pro-active actions, not at night re-actions.

if you agree, but find it hard to get up early, like myself, review zen habits tactics for how to become an early riser, you’ll find some great tactics to roll into your routine. it’s interestingly enough a learn-able skill.

get to the important stuff first, and early in the day in 2012!

some phenomenally famous early risers

• Tim Cook – Apple CEO
• Robert Iger – Disney CEO
• Thomas Edison – lightbulb
• Jeff Jordan – Former PayPal and OpenTable head
• Benjamin Franklin – “Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.” He planned his routine around waking up at 5 a.m. and asking himself“What good shall I do this day?”
• Sounds like Tim Ferriss’s….if I could only do two things today, what would they be? Now get to work on them and don’t check your e-mail.
• John Grisham – famous writer
• Charles Darwin – natural selection

http://dailyroutines.typepad.com/daily_routines/early_risers/

http://www.businessinsider.com/successful-early-risers-2012-1#

Photo by jimbrickett

how do you get over the administration and organizational hump of implementing faster when you want to test an idea and launch something? this is what it looks like for me in my own circumstance right now, how can you re-produce for your business situation?

this is an introspective look

unless you have no idea if your idea can sell, the first real problem for services and products is putting up a sales page to gauge REAL interest, regardless of what is built or isn’t. challenge your assumptions and test with a sales or pitch page as soon as possible, some sort of capture page. people so often miss this with their ideas. your thoughts on your idea are not important, others thoughts on your idea are important.

note: you should have a tingly feeling that you know existing users/clients already want this thing, and could pay for it. for the sake of jump starting action, if you haven’t done some preliminary google searching, and have ZERO current contacts/tribe to test with, that’s OK, you’ll just have to pay for some initial traffic after you have a sales page, or do some hunting with friends and colleagues for feedback.

what’s “in the way” of getting this sales page up?

• the fake cloud of, there’s too much to do
• the applications i think i need to have to get it done
• the knowledge i don’t have
• the procrastination
• the coffee (don’t you always feel like, oh i’ll start this after i get another cup?)

what to do to get over it

have a short long conversation with yourself about how much you’re making excuses and get over the fact you haven’t done whatever else it is you think you need to do to validate your idea. it doesn’t matter, you don’t need those things, press on.

then…

1. create wordpress page or use www.unbounce.com to create a page, the one that is going to be the sales page, then make it a bookmark. put bookmark on desktop or somewhere prominent.
2. put big bold headers on page, some text, some images, make it a folder in your dropbox folder structure or similar to collect resources in.
3. create a signup form for it, or if possible, a direct buy now button. use a wordpress plugin, or panda forms, or a newsletter sign up box. make it time sensitive, space limited, and offer an incentive because, after all, you’re just seeing if this thing is worth getting off the ground.
4. shop it around, send it to your list, go on some forums, blast it out on Facebook, GET FEEDBACK, quantify interest and determine if it’s worth pursuing or re-working the salespage.

based on how easy it is to actually create, or deliver on the product, THEN start doing so, start implementing, building your blog posts around it, your supplemental content, you already have your first sales waiting in the basket, OR you know you can throw that idea in the trash and you still have a sense of accomplishment. both are wins.

from experience

i’ve done this with my now current business focus, wordpress backup and maintenance which has gone from idea, to over 15 sales in the last 2 weeks. it was a hidden landing page, up in a weeks time at the bet of $100 if i didn’t finish it with a friend (as posted on twitter). i put it out on forums, to current clients, and followers. now that it’s proved itself, i’m cleaning up the subscription process, marketing, talking more about it and so on. it has legs now, and that’s the point.

now it’s alive to play with, improve, automate, “become my one thing”, overwhelm me, line my pockets, talk about at parties, go stale, turn into something more….it doesn’t matter what it does right now, the point is it was tested quickly and can be learned from. experiences like these are so building, they carry forward. they open up the world of products built to improve your business for actual application instead of distraction, for random example, creating product art, with something like this … Box Shot King (affiliate link)

A tip after bantering back and forth with @claycollins this week. Once you do find an idea that works, and you master that product idea…commit to it, and focus on it to increase sales, and better business. Do the same with a conversion method and with a traffic source. You are not a Target super store, don’t appeal to everyone.

If it’s one thing I learn over and over in 2011, it’s to have one product (at least at a time), one audience (a particular one) convert them using one method, and get them from one traffic source. Start as focused as possible, and stay there until it’s unquestionable that changing will achieve your goals faster (must be measurable).

Merry Christmas! Keep hustling, always here to help and share!