Tag Archives: business

May 16 2012
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Business, Creativity, Discipline, Focus, Imagination, Leadership, Marketing, Real Estate

Gibberish

In the midst of your product, service, or brand transaction careful with your choice of words. Even though, you know the lingo and how it works – the customer may not.

For instance…

Today, the Realtor should have only one song streaming in his car while his clients are riding with him…INTEREST RATES WILL NEVER BE THIS LOW AGAIN. He should play that song over and over and over. And he should not just say they are 3.75% fixed over 30 years – that doesn’t mean much to most people. He should paint the picture of what rates were just a few years ago, and show the difference in monthly payments and interest saved. Like the blog at I’m A Happy Buyer.

The financial advisor should probably stay away from his opinion of the “T-Bill” and simply advise us with historical charts of different fund performance, potential dividend performance, and tax benefits when we hand him our dollar. GDP is not on our radar when we’re talking about retirement and college tuition.

The car salesman, for most people, should abandon words like torque, hemi, and maybe even MPG. Just show us what THIS car will cost compared THAT car to fill up once gas hit $5.00 gallon. We’ll make the call from there.

Or what about beer? At the ball park the only word associated with the brew that the consumer is concerned with is cold. This is not the time to discuss born on dates, filtering, and calories. Not the case at an upper end micro-brewery in Boston. The consumer there is very beechwood and hops conscious, so it’s ok to go there with him.

The higher price of poker becomes in the transaction the more basic the vocabulary should be. The fancier your words, the more we feel we’re being sold not served. Simple wins in sales, so be careful with your gibberish.

Put another way – We’re not impressed when you know a lot…we’re impressed when we walk away knowing a lot more than when we came to you.

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May 15 2012
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Business, Focus, Imagination

Where Are Your Seats?

There a billion games to choose from.

The question is where do you want to sit in the game you choose to career in.

To sit in the nosebleeds is choice.  To sit court side is a choice. Owning the team in the game is the result of many choices. Don’t forget, cheerleaders sit pretty close to the action too – so that’s an option.

Just realize those you are pointing at from up high did not wish to get court side seats  to watch/participate in the game – they “willed” their way there.

2 Questions:

Isn’t it great news that life is a decisive choice and there is no such thing as assigned seating?

Most will career in 1 to 5 games, but who says you can’t hobby in hundreds? There are some games we will prefer skybox over court side seating.

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May 11 2012
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Business, Discipline, Focus

What It Takes To Fly

One of my unmet heroes is Steven Pressfield. In my opinion he wrote the greatest book ever on breakthrough and our inner creative battles called The War of Art. Follow him on Twitter or check out his blog.

No matter if you’re a struggling musician, entrepreneur, mom, actor, doctor, or a chef – this book offers maddening insight to what goes on in our chest and between our ears.

Pressfield addresses the enemy to our creative as the Resistance – “that destructive force inside human nature that rises whenever we consider a tough, long-term course of action that might do for us or others something that’s actually good.”

Giving a name to this enemy of creative has changed my business and my life. Now I can call it out, name it, stare it in the eyes, ignore it, and fight against it.

I’ve seen resistance come in many forms:

  • A failed attempt – followed by giving up.
  • Words from others.
  • Fatigue.
  • Procrastination.
  • Frustration.
  • Lack of funding.
  • Lack of faith.
  • Lack of confidence.
  • The “plan” having to change.

The list goes on for days….

We think it takes jet engines, planes, and pilots to fly. But without resistance – without something to push against – both we and our dreams are grounded and never free in flight.

Expect resistance in your preparation for take off.

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May 08 2012
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Business, Focus, Imagination

Thoughts – The Road to Reality

I just started Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. I’m finding this is one of those “where has this been all my life” books.

Yesterday I read something that I wasn’t able to shake…”Our thoughts have relatives.”

In other words, if we see something as a problem we can turn it into a nightmare. Or, if we see something as a challenge we just might be able to also see the solution.

How we see in things our minds has a lot to do with how we hold them and respond to them in the physical.

Think about it. Change your thoughts – change your life.

 

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May 01 2012
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Business, Leadership

Lost and Found

Let’s take the people who make up your marketplace and divide them into two categories: Lost and Found.
By lost I mean the ones that have never done business with you. We don’t mean lost in the sense that they don’t have “it” all together. They may know you and/or your brand, but they’ve never experienced it. Simply put, they’re not found in your database – therefore, to your business – they’re lost (not present).
And by found I mean those current, referred, and past clients, customers, or users. These guys use your websites, services, products, facilities, brands, etc. They’ve paid you or are going to be paying you.
It can be very tempting to go all in on trying to convert the lost. Proceed with caution. In a loud world that is shrinking in size daily, most of what you tweet and tell them will fall upon deaf ears. They probably aren’t looking for a new/better ____________.
On the flip slide, in a word of mouth economy, your R.O.I. on communicating often and well with the founds will not only be more affordable in the short run, but will disperse dividends a thousand times greater in the long run.
Quick musical/business thought – Dance with the one that brought you.
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