Prior knowledge required: Filters – what do you see, hear and feel?

NLP uses the word ‘state’ to describe your way of being at any given moment. This is not just your mood or present emotion, as it also includes your energy level, the way you hold and use your body and the way you think. It is an amalgam of many things and we use a wide range of adjectives to describe it:

• Alert
• Tired
• Happy
• Curious
• Relaxed
• Fascinated
• Loving
• Sad
• Energised and so on.

You are always in some kind of state, though you might not be aware of it unless it is very different from your everyday, baseline state.

Becoming aware of your different states, and learning how to improve the way you manage them are crucial success skills. This forms the basis of Emotional Intelligence, which is now recognised as the foundation of good leadership and a better indicator of overall success than IQ.

Your state is always changing

States are not measurable in any absolute sense. We may notice that a state is increasing or decreasing, or that we have a state to a greater or lesser degree. So we all know that our states change and many people simply accept their changing states just as they accept the weather. But it’s a mistake to imagine that you have no control over your state; it simply isn’t true and not only that, it’s also a limiting and very unhelpful belief.

In reality, everybody already manages their state to some extent. For example, ‘I will take a long bath; that will make me feel better’, ‘I will go out with my mates and have a laugh’, ‘I will eat a tub of ice-cream’, ‘I will go out for a run’ or ‘I will go out and get drunk’. We already have strategies to change our state, though some of these can be quite harmful in the longer term.

As we pass from state to state, either suddenly or gradually, we can think of them as good or bad, desirable or not, positive or negative. We know the states that we enjoy and the ones that we don’t; in fact, the whole world changes when we change state (or at least, it seems to). So we have a basis for deciding whether to maintain a state, increase it or change it to something quite different.

In order to influence our state, we need to have some understanding of what affects it.

What affects your state?

The following diagram, together with an explanation of it, is in the page Filters – what do you see, hear and feel?

Looking at the diagram, you can see that your state is part of a system, and will react to changes in other parts of the system.

External event

We usually think that a state happens as the result of an external event. ‘He brought me flowers and that made me feel really loved’, ‘She yelled at me and that made me scared’, ‘I was so proud driving my new car,’ ‘He made me so angry’ and so on. Looking at the diagram, however, you can see that a state is not directly linked to the external event; it only occurs after some other processing takes place, and this processing is unique to each of us, so the state that results from an event will be different for each of us.

Imagine two young boys playing in the waves on the beach. A much bigger wave than usual catches them both by surprise and pushes them hard into the sand. On recovering, one boy runs up the beach to his mother, crying and scared. The other turns to face the ocean and yells ‘That was FUN!’ waiting eagerly for the next big wave.

Identical event, yet different states generated. Events, in and of themselves, are neutral. They are neither good nor bad. Only after we have processed them through our filters do we label them as good or bad. Just because an event is considered bad by the majority, this does not make it so. It simply means that the majority have filtered the event in a similar way and come to the same conclusion. The event itself is still neutral, and always will be so, no matter how much we might like to think otherwise.

Why, then, ’tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison. Act 2, Scene 2 of Shakespeare’s Hamlet

Stop and think about that for a minute, as it has far reaching implications. Each of us causes our own emotions, regardless of the event.

Just because we now think an event is ‘bad’, this does not mean it cannot change for us as we change our filters. A person with a phobia of spiders thinks an event that involves a spider is horrific and responds with a state of extreme fear. However, we all know that phobias can be cured. We have even seen it done on TV with hypnosis and other tools. The cure actually involves changing the filters so the same spider event is processed differently, resulting in a different state, perhaps one of indifference. The spider event itself was always neutral.

Internal movie

Another way that states arise is when we imagine something or replay a memory. This can be completely unrelated to what is going on around us, yet it can still generate a powerful state. If we really get into the process, an internal movie can generate just as powerful a state as an external event.

	Exercise
As you remember an old argument, how does that feel? As you remember a fantastic holiday, how does that feel? Think of some project you are currently working on, and then imagine how it will feel to finish the project and be recognised for its success? Each time, notice what changes in how you feel, and what changes in your posture and breathing.

Behaviour

	Exercise
Jump up and down, or go to look out of the window, or bend down and touch your toes, or start any other physical activity. As you do whatever it is you’ve chosen, pay close attention to the physical sensations of movement in the here and now. Notice how you feel. Did your state change?

By behaviour, we mean any activity. This could be something subtle, such as the way you stand or breathe, or something much more obvious, such as a brisk walk or talking. It is anything you do.

Our state is affected by activity, even a subtle activity. How do you stand when you put on that really expensive and sharp-looking suit? You are power dressed and you know it! If you stand that way right now, even without the suit, how do you feel?

Changing state

By now you will be realising that much of what affects our state is actually going on inside us rather than outside us. This is good news, because we can influence our internal processes, and thus influence our state. This understanding puts us back in control. Even just the process of examining our state, and becoming aware of it, will likely change it.

We can change our state in the moment by changing any of the above things which affect state. We can make more profound and permanent changes to the way we generate states by changing our filters. We may need help to make the more radical changes, such as changing our filters to deal with a phobia, but almost anything becomes possible.

NLP offers many ways to help you manage and change your state at will. See the pages on Submodalities, Anchoring,Using a different point of view, Goal setting, Reframing and Beliefs. Also look at the Alchemy topics on Emotional Intelligence, Goal Setting, Personal Energy and Motivation.

What state do you want?

Your state imbues everything you do. If you are clear about the optimal state for doing something and then access that state, you will be making it much easier to achieve your outcome.

Given your planned activity, whether it is to study something, write up a project, play sports or have a romantic evening out, you might start by considering the following:

• What state you want to be in?
• What state do you want other people to be in?

You then need to plan how you can achieve that state and how you could also help other participants to achieve a useful state. It may well be that you can’t do it all in one jump, so what intermediate states would you or others need to go through?

Think of the way a good comedian works an audience. A joke that is hilarious at the end of the show might well have fallen flat at the beginning, as he had not yet had time to move the audience through a sequence of states to where he wanted them.

Think of the sequence of states that you and your partner might go through during a romantic evening…

Baseline state

Your baseline state is your most habitual state. Many states are fleeting or transitional, but each of us usually drops back into a state in which we feel ‘at home’. Your baseline state may be balanced and harmonious or it may be out of balance and uncomfortable. It may be a ‘glass half full’ type of state or a ‘glass half empty’ type. Nevertheless, it has become habitual, even if it is one of continuing anxiety or depression or dullness. The quality of your baseline state contributes hugely to the quality of your life, since you spend so much time in it.

The good news is that you can change your baseline state over time to something that serves you better, improving the quality of your life.

Eliciting states in others

Have you ever tried to cheer somebody up or get them motivated before doing something? We have all, at times, sought to alter someone’s state. We have also affected others without meaning to. How many times have you heard someone say something like ‘What’s the matter with him? All I said was…’

In fact, we are always eliciting states in others whenever we interact with them. We cannot not communicate, even if we say nothing. Another person will always pass what they experience of us through their filters, coming up with a meaning which will affect their state.

The simplest way to elicit a particular state in another person is to ask them to remember a time when they were in that state. The more vividly you can get them to remember the time, re-experiencing it in all its sensory glory so they are really ‘in it’, the more powerful the state that will be accessed. This works best when you are in rapport with the other person, and you are already doing your ‘version’ of the state you want them to access. If you want them to access confidence, be in a confident state yourself, with all the voice and posture signals that exude confidence.

Another way to elicit states is with storytelling. If you want someone in a calm and peaceful state, describe a calm and peaceful holiday so they build this internal movie in response to your story. See the topic on Storytelling for Business for more on this.

	Tip
If you are in a really bad state, perhaps in reaction to an argument, a setback at work or even something that seems big, such as a relationship break-up, ask yourself how you will feel about it in a month, a year, ten years or however long it will take to get over it completely. Imagine yourself looking back from that time; notice how unimportant that event now seems. Perhaps you might ask that future you what they learned from the event. Are there perhaps any aspects of it that the future you now finds amusing? Imagine that things are now going really well for you and access that state of positivity and well being. Walk into the person you will be then; experience all those feelings to the maximum, using all the senses, and then take that state of well being back with you as you return to the present

How Do Colors Affect Purchases?

This very cool infographic (Originally hosted at blog.kissmetrics.com) details the many unsuspected ways that color can impact emotion and hence buying behavior.   We all know that we tend to have a “connection” with various colors and that brands have connections with colors (John Deere Green,  Coke Red) , but we probably don’t think very often about how marketers use these color affinities to shape our purchase intent.

I use this list to teach classes on social media. We go through some of the pages and evaluate how well they are doing. We also look at the pages that aggregate all their products and brands on multiple tabs on one page versus individual pages for each brand. What is their default landing tab for non-members? We look at engagement, competitions, regularity of updates, if they seem to have a preplanned diary or are winging it etc.  How many have a clean URL how many don’t. We usually pick a few and see how it works as a Hub-and-Spoke (do they have Facebook links/widgets on their website?). There’s always big debate over the list and how well they are doing. Don’t forget – numbers change over time ….

So, 21.5 million Australians. About 11 million to date are on Facebook with over 8 million “active” monthly (March 2010). How many Australian brands have “set up shop” to access Australian Facebookers do you think? Oh, and in the spirit of “I don’t have to get them all right because I have the internetz to help me” please let me know of the one’s I missed.

Page member numbers are current for end of March 2010.

Australian Facebook Fanpages by Member Numbers

1. ACDC 1,950,000
2. Bananas in Pajamas 1,132,000  (others include BiP 643,000)
3. NZ Flight of the Conchords 726,000 and here 93,000
4. Hamish & Andy 648,552
5. Hey Hey It’s Saturday 432,000
6. Australia Tourism Australia 372,000 fans unofficial 169,000
7. Peter Andre 364,000 from Australia’s New Faces, then Britain
8. Ugg Australia 330,000
9. Billabong Girls  290,000
   Billabong 200,000
10. Pringles 261,000
11. Bubble O Bill’s Icecreams from Streets 260,000
12. Kylie Minogue 206,000 (spelt Kyle in URL)
13. Steve Irwin 204,000
14. Mr Squiggle 200,000 ABC TV?
15. Hillsong 198,000
16. Hugh Jackman 191,000
17. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds 182,000
18. Triple J 178,000
19. Bonds clothing 175,000
20. Stephanie Rice swimmer 168,000
21. The ANZACS 150,000
22. Fifa World Cup Bid 138,000
23. Home and Away 138,000
24. State of Origin 138,000
25. Vegemite 133,000 and Vegemite on Toast 105,000 (unofficial)
26. Coca Cola Australia 132,000
27. McGrath Foundation 128,000
28. I Love Melbourne 120,000
29. Don’t Turn a Night out into a Nightmare 110,000 Government Craig Thomler
30. P!nk’s Australian Funhouse 105,000 by Sony
31. KFC Australia 96,000
32. Australia Day 93,000
33. AFL footy official 90,000 dream team fantasy game 29,000 AFL footy show 16,000 & also 13,000
34. So You Think You Can Dance Australia 86,000
35. Big Day Out (unofficial fans) 86,700 BDO Official 54,000
36. Queensland Maroons 77,000
37. Supre 65,000 from MudoMedia
38. The Hangover movie 62,000 from Mab
39. 5 Gum Australia 55,000
40. Master Chef Australia 47,000 fans
41. Essendon 47,000 Footie
42. JayJays 46,500
43. Cricket Australia 45,000
44. Brisbane Broncos 45,000
45. Toyota Australia 42,000
46. Sunny The Egg 40,000 Sunny Queen Farms
47. Soundwave Festival 40,000
48. Dreamworld Australia 38,000
49. Cotton On 36,000
50. Frankie 34,000
51. Smirnoff Australia 32,000
52. Spicks and Specks ABC TV 30,100
53. The Contender Fox8 28,000
54. The Australian Institute of Sport 27,600
55. Holden official 27,000 and unofficial 21,000 and Holden Torana 3,000
56. Perth 26,000
57. Ed Hardy 25,000
58. AussieBum 25,000
59. Future Music Festival 24,000
60. Top Melbourne Restaurants 24,000
61. Pepsi Australia 23,200
62. Sydney Opera House 23,000
63. Telstra 1c Text 23,000
64. Melbourne Australia 23,000
65. Rewards Central Australia 22,300
66. Dominos Pizza Australia 22,000
67. Logitech Australia 22,000
68. Artline 21,000
69. Dell Australia 21,000 fans
70. Emu Australia 21,000 Ugg?
71. Warner Bros – Like? Love! 21,000
72. Smiggle 21,000
73. RSPCA Australia 20,563
74. Ministry of Sound Australia 20,300
75. Vodafone AU 19,300
76. Paranormal Activity (film) Australia 19,000
77. Visit Newcastle 19,000
78. Fosters beer 18,790
79. Bushells 18,000 fans
80. Sunshine Coast 17,700
81. Qantas Wallabies 17,500
82. 5 seeds 17,000
83. Girlfriend Magazine Australia 17,000
84. Tooheys Extra Dry 17,000
85. Stereosonic 16,000
86. CreamFields Australia 16,000
87. OneLove 15,900
88. Qantas 15,000
89. X Box Australia 15,000
90. Blackberry Australia NZ 15,000
91. Up Australia Disney 14,000
92. Art vs Science 14,000
93. Socceroos 13,700
94. Queensland 13,400
95. V Australia 13,000 fans
96. Ernst & Young Careers 13,000
97. Paramount Pictures 13,000
98. Warner Like Love 12,800 from Mab
99. In The Mix 12,300
100. Wicked Musical 12,000
101. v8 Supercars 11,900
102. Panasonic 11,300
103. SeeSydney 11,200
104. TyDI music 11,000
105. Rexona 10,900
106. MTV Australia 10,700
107. Contiki Australia 10,700
108. P&O Cruises 10,500
109. See Sydney 10,000 from Mab
110. Mykonos Easter Festival 10,000
111. FHM Australia 10,000
112. Earth Hour Australia 10,000
113. Sportsgirl 9,000
114. Avatar Australia 9,000
115. The Wiggles 8,800
116. Penguin Books 8,800
117. Open Internet 8,800
118. Wallace Bishop 8,500 jewellery
119. Sydney Festival 8,400
120. EmptyJets 7,700
121. StudyInAustralia (Indonesian expo) 7,500
122. Josh Pyke 7,400
123. ABC TV 7,100
124. RoadRunner Records 6,800
125. Volkswagen Australia 6,700
126. Filmmakers Australia 6,700
127. Vice Magazine 6,500
128. Havaianas Thong Challenge 2010 6,500
129. Triple R radio 3RRR 6, 200
130. Supanova pop culture 6,000
131. BreastAngels 6,000
132. Aussie BBQ Legends 6000
133. Mimco 5,500
134. Dance Informa mag 5400
135. Quiksilver Australia 5400
136. Yves Klein Blue 5,200
137. Yellowglen champers 5,000
138. Jagermeister 5,000
139. Country Music Channel 5,000
140. Lasoo.com.au 5,000
141. Brown Brothers wine 4,900
142. ABC network 4,800
143. Breast Cancer Network 4,700
144. Actors Centre Australia 4,700
145. Greenpeace 4,600 from Darren Smith
146. UBank 4,600
147. Rage ABC TV 4,500
148. My Ford AU 4,500
149. Animals Australia 4,500
150. Showbiz Australia 4,400
151. Modular People (?) 4,400
152. Wicked In Oz 4,400
153. Noosa 4,400
154. Oxfam Australia 4,100
155. Mountain Dew Au 4,000
156. Rodeo In Australia 4,000 magazine
157. Reconciliation Australia 3,900
158. TicketMaster 3,900
159. Goa Hippy Tribe 3,500
160. Krispy Kreme 3,300
161. SpringAustralia 3,300
162. Oxford Art Factory 3200
163. Shoes Of Prey 3200 by 22 Michaels
164. RockWiz 3200
165. Cure Our Kids 3200 charity
166. Marie Claire 3,000
167. Vogue Australia 2,500
168. ABC News TV 2,300
169. Wintergarden 2,200
170. Lifeline Australia 2,000
171. SBS Six Billion Stories and Counting… 3,200 plus their programs each have a page
172. Jetstar 3,000 fans
173. CSIRO 2,300
174. ghd hair Australia 2,100
175. LeBlackBook 2,000
176. RedBubble 1800
177. Time Out Sydney 1800
178. PR Australia 1,500 PRIA
179. Women’s Network Australia 1500
180. Mary Poppins the Musical Australia 1500
181. Pharmaceutical Society of Australia 1400
182. Eagle Boys Pizza 1,300
183. Cadbury Australia 1300
184. D’arenberg wines 1,300
185. Two Hands wine 1,200
186. Australian BusinessWomen’s Network 1200
187. Headspace 1,100
188. ABC 3 Kids channel 1,100
189. Brokenwood wine 1000
190. Ansett (defunct airline) 1,000
191. Scraptherapy 1,000
192. Trespass Magazine 800
193. Optus official 713 fans  unofficial 1,700
194. Big Pond 291
195. Four N Twenty meat pie (unofficial) 140 fans (they need sauce )

By Celia Johnson on 12 October 20100

Australia’s online general advertising market will increase to $877m over the next five years, spurred by greater investment in online video ads and mobile phone advertising.
At present, the general online advertising market is valued at $568m, a growth of 11% in 2010, according to research company Frost & Sullivan. This figure however does not include online search, directories or classifieds.

The company’s Australian Online General and Mobile Advertising Market 2010 report estimates advertising spend will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 9.1% to be worth $877m in 2015.
Growth is said to be led by online video advertising over the next five years with the segment said to outperform all other major categories.

While the report noted that online video advertising was boosted this year in line with increased consumer demand for online video content, there remain a number of factors holding back growth in the sector. A lack of quantity and variety of long-form content such as a wide range of TV shows available on broadcast television, and a lack of access to broadband speeds suitable for real-time viewing of long-form content were cited as the major drawbacks for the sector’s ongoing growth.

Over half of participants surveyed (52%) indicated they plan to increase their online general advertising budgets next year, while 38% intend to increase search advertising budgets.
Phil Harpur, senior research manager, ICT Practice, at Frost & Sullivan, said: “2010 was a strong year for online advertising with the market returning to form. In the next few years, online video advertising is going to be an important force but some of its heat will dissipate as more inventory comes onto the market. In the traditional areas of online display, EDM [electronic direct marketing] and e-newsletters, and integrated site content, growth should remain strong in the short term. However, market maturity will eventually see revenues gradually declining.”

Mobile advertising is also set to boom in the next five years, albeit off a low base, with Frost & Sullivan estimating the sector to be worth $76m by 2015, up from $9.1m this year. The report noted that inhibitors to mobile growth include the need to reach a critical mass of smartphones, a lack of rich media functionality, a lack of locally available mobile optimized sites and immaturity in mobile targeting ad serving functionality.

Traditional brands
Traditional brands differentiate based on objective, quantifiable things like price, performance, and features. Their tactics are familiar: price promotions, ads boasting that they’re “new and improved,” and so forth. It’s important to note that there’s nothing inherently wrong with being a traditional brand. For example, Tide is a multi-billion dollar juggernaut of a brand that’s been going strong for half a century. It differentiates primarily on performance, and and the results speak for themselves. A particular area of interest for me is traditional brands that become lifestyle brands, so expect to see lots of thinking around the intersection of the two worlds.

Lifestyle brands
Lifestyle brands, on the other hand, differentiate based on subjective, hard to quantify things like design. Lifestyle brands are fundamentally vehicles for self-expression. They don’t play by the rules of old-school marketing. They don’t try to be all things to all people. They simply are what they are, and in a world in which we’re increasingly defined by the products we buy, they can be an important part of our lives. We buy them because it’s a way to tell the world something about ourselves, not simply for a functional benefit. Perhaps the ultimate example of a lifestyle brand is Nike. Thanks to decades of brilliant marketing, they’ve made athletic shoes into the premier platform for self-expression in youth culture.

Hybrids
While it’s usually obvious whether something is a traditional or lifestyle brand, there are areas in which the boundaries are blurry. For example, cars have characteristics of both traditional and lifestyle brands: performance is a big deal, but brand character and heritage also matter a lot. Shoppers spend a great deal of time comparing power, mileage, price, and other elements that are important to traditional brands, but they can also be passionate evangelists for a brand (see the Ford/Chevy rivalry).A

• Develop clear goals and write them down.
  Because higher productivity begins with clear goals, goal setting is a key component of our coaching program. As you know, a goal must be specific and measurable to be effective in guiding your behavior. It must reflect your beliefs and be within your power to achieve.
• Write a clear action plan.
  Next, if you want to turbo-charge your productivity, make sure you have a clear, written plan of action. Every minute you spend in careful planning will save you as many as ten minutes in execution.
• Set your priorities.
  The third step is to prioritize your list. Analyze your list before you take action. Identify and start with the high-value tasks on your list.
• Concentrate and eliminate distractions.
• In this step, choose a high-value activity or task, start on it immediately, and stay with it until it is done. Focusing single-minded attention on one task allows you to complete it far more quickly than starting and stopping. [PB: Not sure this is always best in this day and age or multi-tasking]
• Lengthen your workday but increase your time off.
  By starting your workday a little earlier, working through lunchtime, and staying a little later, you can become one of the most productive people in your field.

• Work harder at what you do.
  When you are at work, concentrate on work all the time you are there. Don’t squander your time or fall into the habit of treating the workplace as a community where socializing is acceptable.
• Pick up the pace. At work, develop a sense of urgency and maintain a quicker tempo in all your activities. Get on with the job. Dedicate yourself to moving quickly from task to task.
• Work smarter.
  Focus on the value of the tasks you complete. While the number of hours you put in is important, what matters most is the quality and quantity of results you achieve.
• Align your work with your skills.
  Skill and experience count. You achieve more in less time when you work on tasks at which you are especially skilled or experienced.
• Bunch your tasks.
  Group similar activities and do them all at the same time. Making all your calls, completing all your estimates, or preparing all your presentation slides at the same time allows you to develop speed and skill at each activity.
• Cut out steps.
  Pull several parts of the job together into a single task and eliminate several steps. Where you can, cut lower-value activities completely.

Action Exercise
What are your ten most important goals? Carefully review your ten most important goals. Select one that, if achieved immediately, would have the strongest positive impact on your life.

These range from mistakes to avoid, to
making strategic decisions, of how to get
cash flow to come in the fastest, etc.

They are in no particular order…

1. ALWAYS DO MORE THAN IS EXPECTED OF YOU

I learned this at an early age from my Dad.
He had a very successful career as a business
executive and engineer, and this the core
principle that created his success.

You can apply this to your business in many
ways… over-delivering to your customers,
giving unexpected bonuses to your employees
or outsourced workers, and more.

Most people do just the bare minimum. Do
more than is expected of you and it will do
amazing things for your business.

2. STOP DREAMING AND START DOING

Too many entrepreneurs get caught up in the
big dreams of how they will one day be rich
and how their life will be amazing…

…but they never end up doing anything.

They buy courses, read all they can, jot
down little notes and ideas in a notebook,
but nothing ever actually gets created.

A web site doesn’t get made. Advertising
isn’t run. Markets aren’t tested. Nothing.

If you want to make a lot of money the only
way that happens is getting stuff done. Period.

3. DON’T LET LEARNING DELAY ACTIVITY

Most people that have studied Internet Marketing
much already have the basic skills that are
needed to build a million-dollar business.

That’s worth REPEATING…

Most people that have studied IM much ALREADY
HAVE the basic skills that are needed to build
a million-dollar business.

You can get stuck learning new stuff FOREVER.
There will always be new methods and techniques
that get discovered. The Internet changes on
a DAILY BASIS. This is a given.

Don’t get caught in the trap of “I’m going to start
building my business right after I go through this
next course…”

You can start building your business TODAY while
you are studying and learning new things that you
can easily apply TOMORROW.

Things will NEVER perfectly align for you and
your business. There’s no such thing. So don’t
wait. Get started NOW and take action. Get some
stuff going and go from there.

4. MULTIPLE IDEAS CAN BE THE KISS OF DEATH

It’s okay to work on multiple projects and ideas.
It’s almost impossible to stop entrepreneurs
from having tons of new ideas at the same time.

BUT…

No new money comes in the door until you get
ONE project launched and making money.

Something has to be launched FIRST.

5. MAKE JUST ONE DOLLAR FIRST

No one has ever made a million dollars in sales
without generating $1 first.

ALL successful businesses start with that first
sale and then grow from there.

It doesn’t matter what your income goals are.
The faster you make your first dollar, the faster
you will reach your goals. PERIOD.

6. DO THE IMMEDIATE CASH PROJECT FIRST

What should you work on next? Whatever will
bring in cash the fastest for your business — and
of course, I mean that in a moral/legal/ethical way.

If you analyze all the great ideas you are probably
sitting on, I bet you can realistically prioritize them
in the order of which ones would actually make
money come in the fastest (if it succeeds.)

THAT is the project you need to focus on.

Cash is the lifeblood of your business (and your life.)

Save some of those “big” ideas for the future. Focus
on the ones that stand the best chance of getting
new money to come in right away. Once you have
some stable ongoing cash flow in your business, then
you can take a chance on that project that may take
longer to pay off.

7. EMAIL MARKETING KICKS THE CRAP OUT OF
EVERYTHING ELSE

When it comes to growing a business online, nothing
generates long-term cash flow like an email list of
engaged subscribers & customers.

Email marketing is the best way to generate traffic.
It’s the best way to ‘recycle’ the same visitors again
and again to any of your projects. It’s also the best
way to convert prospects into buyers.

RSS, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, BLAH BLAH BLAH

Yes, those methods can generate leads. Yes, those
methods can generate some sales. But time and time
again little old email marketing kicks their butts — by
a long shot.

So make building a list, and a solid relationship with
it, a top priority in your business.

8. RUN A LEAN OVERHEAD MACHINE

I can’t stress this one enough.

When you start growing a successful business
it’s really easy for your overhead to get out of hand.
It’s easy to start hiring a bunch of people and
committing to a bunch of expenses.

Take it from me, when you have months where
your fixed expenses (doesn’t include advertising, etc.)
are well over $100,000/MONTH (and growing) it can put
you in a tough position to make healthy profits.

I used to have fixed overhead that high but never again.
I realized there were smarter ways to do things.

What you need to realize is that REVENUE doesn’t
mean jack squat. It’s your profit (income) that
matters.

So while running a $10,000,000/year business (sales)
is impressive, I know people running a $1,000,000/year
business that nets MORE than the person that owns
the $10MM/year business.

It all comes down to your expenses.

Sometimes it certainly DOES take heavy expenses
in order to make a lot of money. But that’s not my point…

My point is, your overhead can really get away
from you. If your sales experience some dips,
and it’s almost guaranteed they will at some point,
then you can LOSE YOUR BUTT very quickly.

So add to your overhead as a last resort.

9. MAKE ACCOUNTING A PRIORITY

This is a big mistake that most entrepreneurs
make — and I’ve been guilty of it as well.

Keeping the books and doing accounting work
is the LAST thing that most entrepreneurs want
to mess with. We have more fun by coming up
with new ideas and trying to make them grow –
not spending hours of our time inputting receipts
and figures into QuickBooks.

If you don’t like accounting, immediately pay
someone a few bucks to handle it for you. Just
make sure your accounting is always up to date.
It’s very important.

As an extension of this, make paying your taxes
a priority — even if you pay them in advance.

I have paid a small fortune in tax penalties because
of being lazy and filing late. And it’s too easy to
let one delay turn into another and for the problem
to get worse. So make it a priority.

Don’t “rob Peter to pay Paul.” This is a trap
most entrepreneurs fall into — again,
I’ve been guilty of it in the past myself.

It’s easy to start making a bunch of money
and think “I’ll just use this money to make
more money instead of paying my taxes
on it now and I’ll just pay the taxes later
after I’ve made even more money.”

Or the same thinking is applied towards
delaying payments to a vendor, or some other
expense that needs to get paid.

This is probably the #1 mistake entrepreneurs
make that can create problems and a lot of
wasted money in paying penalties and interest.
So make sure your accounting is taken care
of and your taxes get paid on-time for you.

10. DON’T LEASE OFFICE SPACE

(If possible.)

As tempting as this might become if your
business starts to grow, avoid it at all costs.

If you’re like me, what will happen is that you
will eventually stop going to the office and just
work from home where you always were
more comfortable anyway. And/or you will
end up realizing you really didn’t need it.

Having an “office” is not required to have
a successful business. We live in a
Digital World now and it’s just not important
anymore.

Even if your business grows and you need
employees, you still don’t necessarily need
an office. There are people out there running
$20MM+/year businesses with no office; the
employees all just work virtually. This is
becoming more and more common.

* There certainly are exceptions to this. My
team in the Philippines works out of an office
I leased. But they are collaborating on software
projects and NEED to work in the same location.
And, of course, it’s also very inexpensive.

Most office leases are thousands of dollars
per month and usually don’t turn out to be
a good use of cash.

11. ALMOST EVERYTHING TAKES LONGER

When creating new projects, or having some software
made for you, or having an ebook ghostwritten, or
anything else, know that things almost always
take more time than originally expected.

This is the #1 reason why you need to act TODAY
to start putting things in motion to grow your
business. The longer you wait, the more into
the future you push your potential of getting
money to come in the door.

12. THE MONEY IS IN THE MARKETING

Don’t get caught up in trying to make Web pages and learn
HTML, or studying how to create javascript, or learning to
master Linux so you can administer your own server, or
how to use Photoshop to create little logos, etc.

You can certainly do that stuff if you want, but know that
it will most likely just be a HOBBY.

It’s no surprise that some of the most successful entrepreneurs
I know are also some of the LEAST TECHNICAL people I know.
The main thing they do right is to simply pay others to do all
the “nuts & bolts” stuff that makes online business work.

It allows them to spend all their time on the marketing — which
is where the money comes from.

*** BONUS LESSON ***

* See how I’m over-delivering as mentioned in the first lesson?

SPENDING TIME ONLINE ISN’T NECESSARILY WORKING
ON YOUR BUSINESS

Just because you spend hours a day online doesn’t mean
you’re working on your business.

You can do ‘research’ forever and never make a cent.

You need to be spending most of your time on:

- Generating Traffic
- Communicating With Your Customers (i.e. blog, list, etc.)
- Creating Content

Don’t fall into the trap of reading blogs & forums, chatting
on Facebook or Twitter, checking stats, reading news,
etc. for hours upon hours.

Just know that almost all of that stuff (with rare exception)
is LOSING YOU MONEY more than making you money.

—

I hope you enjoyed these mini-lessons. Hopefully, you
can apply them to your business and be a lot more
successful!

Yours For Online Profits,

In a recent study by Cornell University, they discovered the following statistics about how many clicks the first 11 results in Google’s search engine that came out for a specific keyword phrase.

Here’s the click breadown (in terms of percentage of all clicks):

Position #1 ——> 56.36% of clicks
Position #2 ——> 13.45% of clicks
Position #3 ——> 9.82% of clicks
Position #4 ——> 4.00% of clicks
Position #5 ——> 4.73% of clicks
Position #6 ——> 3.27% of clicks
Position #7 ——> 0.36% of clicks
Position #8 ——> 2.91% of clicks
Position #9 ——> 1.45% of clicks
Position #10 ——> 2.55% of clicks
Position #11 ——> just under 1% of clicks

And the remaining 0.02% (approximately) of the clicks goes to ALL the remaining results.

Interestingly the increases in Internet usage have not seen a corresponding drop in individuals consumption of other media with time spent watching television actually up 30 minutes amongst Internet users. The report’s authors attributing the increase in media consumption to the 49 percent of internet users who multi-task television and the Internet at the same time.

Matt Bruce, Managing Director of Nielsen’s online business in Australia believes this shift to media multi-tasking behavior is a result of the increasing variety and number of media choices now available.

“Changes to the Australian media landscape in recent years such as the introduction of Freeview TV, digital radio and PVR/DVRs (personal video recorder/digital video recorder) mean consumers have more options and flexibility in their media choices than ever before,”

In other surprising results consumption of radio amongst Internet users rose to 9.3 hours per week from 8.8 in 2008, with newspapers being read for 3.2 hours per week in 2009 up from 2.8 the year before.

Consistent with the belief that the internet and computers are still dominated by males, the study found they spent an average 19.2 hours online vs only 16.1 hours per week for females.

Nielsen’s Internet & Technology Report, was based on 2,371 responses from internet users and non-users via online and telephone interviews.