We are being bombarded by other people’s (and the powers that be) perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes all day, every day. We are being pulled in several different directions, all at the same time. There is a tug of war going on and we are the rope!

• Text messages and phone calls
• Email, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter
• Snail mail and the occasional fax
• Magazines, TV ads, product placement in shows
• The list goes on and on…

There are ways we can protect ourselves from the onslaught. Ways we can learn to work more efficiently and effectively, despite the growing number of distractions surfacing around us.

I have discovered several, five of which stand-out as critical skills. I call them critical skills because I believe that without them, you’re putting yourself at a serious disadvantage.

The 5 Critical Skills

1. CORE VALUES. I have a strong set of core values. I live by them. I move away from activities and people that don’t align with them and move close to those that do.

2. CLEAR GOALS. My core values have the strongest influence on my direction. My goals are secondary to them. I create my goals and then figure out the best way to achieve them. Technology is merely a tool for me to achieve my goals, it does not create them!

3. PASSWORD MANAGER. I use LastPass to manage my usernames and passwords. I also use two-factor authentication via a YubiKey to make my account more secure. I get massive productivity gains by using LastPass because I can one-click login to any site from any device.

4. KNOWLEDGE BASE. I use Evernote as my personal and business knowledge base. For example, I have a: What to pack for a trip list, How to do my end of month reporting, Blog posts publishing and promotion checklist, et cetera. It’s all in Evernote, I can input and access it from anywhere.

5. TASK MANAGER. I use Asana to keep a list of my tasks separated by project. At the end of each day, I review all the tasks in Asana, cutting ones that are not important, so I can spend more time on the tasks that count. I take a less is more approach to completing tasks, focusing on the 20% of the effort that gets 80% of the result, always!

Webcam

To get started you can use your computer’s built-in webcam, if it has one.

The next step up is an external USB webcam. In my tests, Logitech’s produced superior picture and sound quality. Windows users grab the C920. Mac users grab the C910. Both webcams respectively cost around $80.

For recording when you are out-and-about, the camera on most smartphones is more than adequate for video email. You can have a colleague hold the phone. If you will be filming by yourself, contact us and we will discuss the options with you.
Upgrades

Background

If you have a window behind your computer it will cause you to look like a dark silhouette in your videos, or if the background is not suitable for whatever reason, pick up a 5 x 7 Impact Collapsible Background ($60) and Lastolite 3355 stand ($70).

Lighting

The Logitech’s webcams come with right-light technology which works magic even in poorly lit rooms. If you still need a boost which is exponentially rare, you have three options:

Less than $80: Switch out your bulbs for natural daylight full spectrum bulbs. Make sure to get 100 watt or greater equivalent bulbs. Chromalux and similar brands work well. You can also grab a couple of Sunlight Desk Lamps and tape sheet(s) of wax paper over the bulb to soften the light. Soft light is kind to the face

The two options below are for videos that will be filmed on a camcorder or DSLR camera and edited prior to publishing. I am listing them here for advanced users who are producing videos for sites like YouTube and landing pages, as well as video email.

$500 total: Pick up a couple of Impact Octacool-9 Fluorescent Light with Octabox. These are high-powered and cast a lot of soft light. I have an older version of similar set of softboxes.

$1200 total: Purchase a couple of Icelight’s and some stands for them. Only buy these if you need portable lighting or have limited storage space. These are on my wishlist.

You can usually get the best prices from Amazon and B&H Photo.

So I gave her my trolley and got myself another one, a benign act that jest aside I would expect anyone else to have done. To my surprise, [with a big warm smile] she said “Nobody has ever done that for me before. Thank you!”

After the initial jolt of sadness passed over me, what the lady said got my wheels turning.

As a business person, I am continually investing time and money to learn new marketing strategies and customer support best practices. However, aside from what my parents and grandparents instilled in me and reading a few books about chivalry, I have not dedicated time to improving my soft skills.

In a world where less and less people:

• hold doors open for people
• look you in the eye when they shake your hand or toast
• stand-up to give women, children, and the elderly a seat

Is it plausible that many businesses are socially inept? Could it be that now, when we are connected more than ever before, in the era of social media, that we are actually becoming dangerously disconnected?

Below are two tutorials that I have created to explain how Jing works:

Screenshots w/ Professional Looking Mark-Up

Screen Recording

Become a better communicator today, add Jing into your workflows. Jing is free, so no excuses!

P.S. I reveal the most powerful workflows I have designed, in my course 5 Workflows.

Infusionsoft isn’t right for everyone. It might not be right for you.

In this article, I present both sides of the case, so you can weigh what is best for “your business”.

Doing Business Without Infusionsoft

A typical business is going to need an email marketing account and a way to process orders. MailChimp is a popular email marketing system. PayPal is the simplest way to process orders on and offline.

MailChimp is free for up to 2000 contacts. PayPal has a free plan also.

For a business with a low sales volume, MailChimp and PayPal will work adequately. As with many systems that work on a small scale, the challenges mount up as the business starts to grow.

5001 contacts through MailChimp will set you back $75 per month. 10,001 will ding your bank account for $150 per month. All the other email marketing systems have a similar pricing structure.

Next up you have processing fees. PayPal is notorious. 2.9%, plus 30 cents per transaction, to be a little more precise. As opposed to 2.25% and 25 cents per transaction (for Visa and Mastercard), if you setup a merchant account and processing through a company like Authorize.net.

At an administrative level, keeping your MailChimp prospect and buyers list in sync is a daily manual chore, unless you want to hire a programmer.

If you are bootstrapping or your business is a side project that you intend to keep small, MailChimp with PayPal is a frugal and wise approach. Sure it creates some extra manual work and the processing fees are high, but the trade-off is that you will have zero overheads.

The real challenges start to appear when:

• Your list reaches over 5001 contacts;
• You process over $3000 per month in orders;
• You process several orders per day.

Doing Business With Infusionsoft

Is like upgrading to an all-in-one power tool. You incur an overhead because you have to charge the battery… a cost of $300 per month.

So the question can be boiled down to “Is the cost of maintaining the power tool outweighed by the benefit of using it?”

Infusionsoft’s Main Features

• Email Marketing (including opt-in forms)
• Order Processing
• Referral Program (aka an affiliate program)
• CRM (including notes and tasks)
• Automated Marketing
• Lead Scoring
• And More…

Depending on the size and growth stage your business is in, you are going to have to learn how to use Infusionsoft. You’re actually going to have to roll your sleeves up and focus for about 3 hours per day for 2 to 3 weeks.

On the plus side, you will be learning invaluable skills that will help you grow your business more efficiently and effectively. Skills that will give you a serious competitive advantage!

Other Options

Infusionsoft is not your only option. There are other platforms that have similar capabilities. However, Infusionsoft is the most comprehensive and is the pioneering company. It is still the only company breakout in all-in-one marketing and business automation space.

While other companies are grinding the bit to reach their first 5000 or so users, Infusionsoft has over 50,000 of them, and is signing up over 400 new users per month.

When it comes to putting a piece of software at the foundation of my business, they are a company I can depend on now and for years to come! A company that has the people power and cash-flow to constantly innovate new and powerful features that will help you grow your business.

Behind the Curtain

Infusionsoft is extremely powerful, the challenge has been usability of the application. In the past couple of years Infusionsoft has bolstered the team with an array of experts, all with a pedigree for improving the standards of internal operations and the overall user-experience.

One of the many game-changing improvements that has been made, is the deployment of a visual campaign builder. The likes of which I have only seen in a couple of enterprise level systems, that cost upwards of $1500 per month.

Here is a peak at the workflow and capabilities of the visual campaign builder:

Conclusion

For a bootstrap start-up or side project, Infusionsoft is probably not the right solution for you. A free MailChimp and PayPal account will get you in the game with zero overhead.

For everyone else, the case for using Infusionsoft (as opposed to the fledgling companies that have started to pop-up as a result of Infusionsoft’s meteoric rise) is a strong one.

Learn more about Infusionsoft, check out this page (it is the quickest and easiest way to assess their software).

Think of it like this, you are using a regular screwdriver, I hand you a battery operated one (and teach you how to use and maintain it). The result: you can screw in more screws, in less time, with less effort. These workflows are similar to the battery operated screwdriver; once you know what they are… you will get better results, in less time, with less effort.

Here is a sample of one of the tutorial videos (about “Login Management”) from inside the course:

If you found the video useful, check out the course.

I used a Canon T3i, Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II lens, and a Audio-Technica ATR-35S wired lavalier microphone to make this video.

Help me grow. Click the like button below.

I will be creating more video tips like this in the future. This was my first run using my new equipment: Canon T3i, Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II lens, and a Audio-Technica ATR-35S wired lavalier microphone.

The workflow:

1. I select people “thought leaders” who I want to mastermind with, and then start to comment on their blog posts.
2. I read / buy the bulk of their content to get a better feel for who they are and where they are going.
3. I add them on Twitter and start to retweet their posts.
4. I add them on Facebook and start commenting on their posts.
5. After a couple of weeks, I respond to one of their marketing emails (which often goes straight to their inbox) because only a small percentage of people reply to mass emails.
6. I aim to provide value, based on a SWOT Analysis, of their operation: to give them ideas and pose questions that will make them think.

The result:

I add a new member to my mastermind network, someone I can email once in while with a question, and get an answer.

Key points:

• The key is not emailing the person until they know who you are, until they recognize your name that is “and find what you have to say is intelligent and different”.
• Some people are a little more difficult to reach, in which case it takes time, perseverance, and adaptation.
• Another key part of the process is not having an immediate need.

“When You Need A Friend, It’s Too Late to Make One”—Mark Twain

Footnotes:

This post is an updated version of the notes I made in my business notebook on How To Build a Mastermind Network.

The underlying message rings true, but I feel that some of the punches that are thrown are off the mark.

Sources:

• SaltyDroid, Syndicates on The Verge
• TheVerge, Scamworld: ‘Get rich quick’ schemes mutate into an online monster

Responses:

• Frank Kern’s response on Facebook
• TheVerge, “Internet Marketers” vs “Internet Scammers”