Article 60

Web Surfers Revolt Against "Pushy" Advertising

As the Internet continues to populate with websites trying to turn a buck, two drastically different schools of thought have developed on how to advertise online - "Push" and "Pull."

"Push" advertising involves the use of "in-your-face" advertising tactics such as pop-up windows and direct email. "Pull" advertising entails using search engines and posting articles that literally "pull" interested consumers to a website on their own terms.

As web surfers revolt against pushy advertising, site owners who understand how to pull consumers to their sites will come out the long-term winners.

"Push" advertising tactics worked in the past because they had not reached a saturation point. Since not everyone used pop-up windows, a site owner could use them without fear of backlash. Now it seems pop-up windows hit consumers from every angle and even multiple times from the same sites.

The cycle of events with online advertising always unfolds the same way. Someone finds something new that works and people immediately jump on the bandwagon. As a technique saturates the 'Net and loses effectiveness, instead of finding an alternative, site owners just do it more!

Result: instead of pop-up windows going away, many site owners just run more pop-up's - more often!

Well, if recent developments indicate anything, they show that consumers have said "enough" to pushy advertising.

AOL, infamous for their pop-up ads, has agreed to cut down on the intrusions even though their earnings could use a boost right now.

Major ISP (Internet Service Provider) Earthlink even offers a "pop-up killer" feature on their new service.

Almost all email programs come with filters to fight unsolicited email and many email add-on services have sprung up to help consumers eliminate the unsolicited offers for pornography, business opportunities, and promises of instant riches.

This "anti-spam" sentiment has also caused an unintended consequence for legitimate marketers. Many major newsletters have found their emails blocked by spam filters intended to stop unsolicited email. Through no fault of their own, legitimate email marketers have found themselves casualties of the war on spam.

The future of the Internet lies in "Pull" advertising driven by consumer wants and needs.

The successful Internet companies of the future will invest in search engine promotion and in providing valuable, on-demand information consumers receive only when they ask for it and want it. When a web surfer goes to their favorite search engine and enters the keyword phrase "MP3 Player" or "tax advice" that means they are receptive to information on those subjects.

If they read an article about using vitamins to improve health and click a link for more information, only then they will they be truly receptive to a marketing message about vitamins.

Consumers have taken back control of Internet!

Not with laws or more regulations, but simply by flexing the muscles of their wallets. By pulling money away from advertisers who annoy them and putting it with those who meet their needs, the average web surfer has brought the Internet powers to their knees and will continue to reshape the Internet into an effective, consumer-driven communications vehicle.

Any site owner who wants to have a thriving online business and survive the next year had better take this fact to heart!
About the Author

Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how to use fr^e articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted visitors to your website or affiliate links...

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Article 59

What is Advertising - and What Does it Mean on the Internet&

“Advertising is salesmanship. The only purpose of advertising is to make sales. It is profitable or unprofitable according to its
actual sales.”

- Claude Hopkins, one of the early masters of advertising and author of My Life in Advertising and Scientific Advertising.

This #1 issue of Copywriting Classics Quick Tips focuses on the late, great Claude Hopkins and how you can apply his decades old marketing wisdom to your online efforts today.

Jay Abraham, renowned as 'America’s Number One Marketing
Wizard' said this about Hopkins. “Claude Hopkins is the master
of them all. His influence has easily added over $6 million to my personal Income…and still counting.”

So, what else did Claude have to say about advertising in addition to the quote above? Hopkins said “Advertising is not for general effect. It is not to keep your name before the people. It is not primarily to aid your other salesmen. Treat it as a salesman. Force it to justify itself.

Compare it with other salesmen. Figure its cost and result. Accept no excuses which good salesmen do not make. Then you will not go far wrong.”

So how many of us do a good job of this in the online world?

Obviously the only way you can know if your advertising is profitable is to be able to accurately track its results.

How many of us have thrown money at the concept of branding - of keeping our name before the people? Just hoping we'd get some results. I know I’ve been guilty of it in the past.

So when you’re getting ready to place that banner ad, or pay for some online or offline directory listing, or bid on that keyword at Overture.com, how are you going to track the cost and result?

And don’t delude yourself into thinking that any advertising is
“free.” The most valuable resource any of us have in our marketing arsenal is probably our own time.

What do you value yours at? $25 - $50 - $100 - $1000 per hour? Or more? So be sure and include the cost of your time or whoever you’re paying to perform that advertising task into calculating the true cost of your advertising.

This is truer then ever in the Internet world. So, know your costs
and measure your results. There are online tools available to help you do this, so don’t get careless or lazy. The effectiveness of your online advertising can only be measured by its actual sales.

Your task: Analyze all your advertising to determine its true
effectiveness. If you're not tracking your results you have to figure out a way to do it now. Why? Because Claude told you so.

Next week – you’ll get some more thoughts from Claude Hopkins. This time about how long you should make your ad copy in order to make the sales. Until then, my best wishes for success in all your marketing endeavors.

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Article 58

Where is online advertising going?

Discusses t he brief history of online advertising through specific ad strageis and discusses where online advertising is headed.
Is there such a thing as “traditional” online advertising? If there is, it started with banners, moved to FFAs, took a step backwards with SPAM, a hard right with classified advertising and then shot forward with pay per click search engine. So how do you know where to spend your advertising budget in the current market? If you’ve been responsible for your company’s web advertising efforts over the years you might agree that the traditional means of advertising worked; as least for a little while. So as new types of advertising penetrate the market with increasing frequency, what do you do with those proven stand-by methods of generating links and traffic? Throw them out? Keep them around for posterity? Maybe give them a facelift? Let’s review those traditional ad models then look at some experimental models. TRADITIONAL ONLINE ADVERTISING MODELS

Banners
Banner ads in the form of animated gifs are the most common and widely used form of online advertising today. Banner ads reach the widest possible audience because practically 100% of Internet users can view them without any special plugins. Web marketers, advertisers and promoters have quickly realized that banners under 12k in file size puts the ad in front of the visitor as quickly as possible, increasing the chance of click-through even though surfers are growing increasingly immune. New styles and shapes of banners (such as skyscraper ads) have grown in popularity recently, which is addressed in the “Experimental Advertising” section below. SPAM
What does SPAM stand for? It’s not “Stupid Pointless Annoying Message” (which in some cases it could be) but rather “Sending and Posting Advertising Messages.” It’s hard to believe SPAM is effective, but unarguably, it is. While click-through rates continue to fall and legislation begins to rise, it is a savvy advertiser’s best bet to stay away from it, unless of course you’re selling Pasta Pots or Viagra. Rich mail – “Fancy SPAM”
Most likely, the e-mail messages you receive on a daily basis are text only. Rich mail, on the other hand, allows graphics, video and audio to be included in the e-mail message. When you open up a rich e-mail your e-mail client automatically calls up your Internet connection and launches an html page in your browser. E-mail clients that are offline will invite you to click on the link when you have your Internet connection open again. If your e-mail client does not support graphics you will receive the e-mail in text only. While SPAM is still SPAM, rich mail has proven to be much more effective than standard text messages. Pop-Ups/Pop-Unders:
This creative, yet completely obtrusive and annoying means of advertising was once celebrated in some circles as the most innovative ad concept since banners. It only took a short time before many users, sick of being trapped in a never-ending onslaught of such ads, voiced their rejection. One can only wonder when advertisers will recognize the public dissatisfaction and move on to another more effective means to promote their companies. Institutional Advertising:
While institutional or “in-house” advertising has been available since the inception of the Internet, few companies have made an effort to utilize the many different aspects of online advertising in one format as has 7Search.com with its Direct Pay-Per-Text advertising. 7Search, a leader in the pay per click search engine arena, has recently introduced this program which enables its advertisers to advertise outside of its search return lists using the same titles and descriptions seen on its search engine. The pay-per-click model enables interested advertisers to leave behind the CPM impression model and focus on the click conversions. Direct Pay-Per-Text is a patent-pending concept from 7Search which will be released to the general public in the coming months. Pay-Per-Click Search Engines
It’s hard to think of PPC search engines as a “traditional” means to advertise online, but the ratio of those advertisers who do versus those who don’t is staggering; in fact the majority have at least tried their hand at leasing traffic. In a PPC agreement, the advertiser only pays for qualifying clicks to the destination site based on a prearranged per-click rate. The response on ads with well-written titles and descriptions targeted to the users query pull response rates unseen in the ad industry previously. The greatest advantage arguably is the ability to measure precisely the rate of return versus your investment. Some of the most popular PPC search engines are FindWhat.com, 7Search.com, Ah-ha.com and the industry leader Overture. EXPERIMENTAL ONLINE ADVERTISING MODELS Traffic Exchange Advertising:
Hit exchanges, actually a form of banner exchange, are a recent phenomenon on the Internet. You will visit the site of a member of an exchange, and in exchange, another member of the exchange will visit your site. The recent explosion of hit exchanges on the web has diluted the effectiveness of such a method of advertising. There have also been many instances of cheating, in which a script is used to generate visits to a site. However, if you have a product that is of interest to webmasters, and is low cost or has a free version, there is no harm in giving hit exchanges a try. Shockwave ads
Shockwave is best suited for campaigns that want to utilize out-of-banner real estate, such as applets, trading cards, and games. Director and Flash provide the ability to embed interaction, video, and audio within the file, making Shockwave files some of the richest ad units on the Web. Viral marketing and strong brand interaction are two of the key strengths of Shockwave ads. As these ads are typically “bandwidth monsters” the adoption has been slow and will most likely remain that way. Other downsides include development costs and the fact that it just won’t work without the Shockwave plug-in, which (though downloaded by millions of users) is far from being a mainstay. Interstitial ads
Interstitials are ads that play between pages on a website, much like television ads play between sections of a program. There are several variations on the interstitial model: some play in the main browser window, while some play in new, smaller windows; some are pre-cached, while some stream ad content as it plays; some provide the ability to create very rich ads, while some focus on smaller, faster-loading ads. Whatever the format, nearly all interstitial ads perform very well if measured by both click-through rates and brand recall. Floating ads and DHTML
Types of floating ads include DHTML sponsorships, in which advertising objects "fly" across the page on a preset course; cursor sponsorships, in which the cursor turns into an advertising image; and scrolling ads, in which an advertisement moves up and down the edge of a page as the user scrolls up and down. Floating ads give the advertiser and publisher the flexibility to achieve nearly any effect. However, as this is one of the more daring types of online advertising, advertising and content must be balanced on any given page. Floating ads (especially DHTML and cursors) are best run for short periods to create brand awareness—running them for longer periods can bring negative user feedback. It is important to understand that online advertising is only effective if it generates significant response and this applies to both traditional and experimental ads. Unfortunately, the only way to discover the efficiency of your campaign is to test in every format at least once with as many ads as you are able.

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Article 57

Why Hire an Advertising/Marketing Consultant?

As a business owner, you have the option of taking several different approaches to handling your Marketing and Advertising. You may choose to handle the responsibility yourself, with the idea that no one understands your business quite the way you do.. You may also consider hiring a full time marketing manager or even assigning the tasks, as they arise, to someone already working within your organization. Consider this When your business needs plumbing work do you do it yourself? Hire a plumber to be on staff full time? Or ask your accountant to handle it?

Call in the Experts.

Though some advertising and marketing ventures seems simple enough to be handled in house, nothing is as costly as a marketing misfire. Not only may you be sending out the wrong messages, to the wrong markets, but also by the time you catch it, your budget may be in no shape to recover and redirect. The truth is, no one can do the job as effectively and efficiently as someone who lives and breathes the industry everyday. Plus, the added perk of consistent media contacts that will prove to be financially beneficial to your business.

Seeing the forest and the trees.

When you hire a consultant you hire an objective opinion, as well as a fresh point of view. Sometimes a business may lose perspective on itself by being too heavily immersed in the day-to-day operations, and lose itself in the big picture, missing the small details or vice-versa. Sadly, sometimes a businesss marketing will clearly reflect this. The president of a private jet companys focus is on the bells and whistles of his fleet. Its what he sees as important in his view of his business. Inevitably, his marketing may also focus on this portion of his business, ignoring what he is really selling to his potential clients: The feeling and the status of private jets.

If you add another ball, technically it is juggling.

If you, as a business owner, or an employee take on the added tasks of the marketing of the business, attention is being taken from other projects and responsibilities. Inescapably, focus and demands are bound to pull from one and take away from others until something falls to the floor. Consultants are dedicated to one, and only one, portion of your business. Their focus is committed, and they allow you to keep yours where it should be.

The Gumby Factor.

Consultants are very flexible. Immediately ready and available to take on assignments at a moments notice. Accessibility to getting a new project off the ground is just a phone call away. On the other hand, trying to hire a new employee specifically to handle your marketing needs takes valuable time to places ads; conduct interviews and then sort through applicants, hoping to find the right person for the job.

The M Word Money.

When you total up the actual cost of bringing on a new employee, you will most likely find that hiring a consultant is much more cost effective. The hourly rates may seem to favor a full time employee, but when you factor in employee benefits, training time, vacation/sick time, 401(k), the added overhead involved in situating a new employee, and the sheer fact that you may be paying full time wages for something that may not need full time attention, the cost effectiveness will fall in favor of a consultant. Which bring us to....

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Article 56

Why Radio Advertising Could Be The Best Thing You Ever Did F

In the marketing world, radio has earned the reputation of being the odd step-cousin. You know the one. No one knows quite what to do with him. Especially at family gatherings when everyone tries hard to avoid sitting with him. (After all, who knows WHAT he'll start talking about.)

Much of that reputation comes from radio being tough to track. On one hand, radio does work. Businesses do notice an increase in sales when they add radio to the mix. However, radio doesn't test well. In surveys and other tracking methods, radio tends to be the one with the dismal scores.

A good friend of mine, who's also a marketing consultant but before that she sold radio for many years, has a theory about that. She says radio works on a subconscious or unconscious level. People remember the ad, but not that they heard it on the radio. So, they tend to credit a different medium for the ad, like the yellow pages. Yellow pages gets a boost while radio drops a few points.

Regardless, radio should not be ignored because it does work. And many marketing consultants will probably tell you radio is an excellent medium to reach a local market.

However, I feel there are possibilities beyond merely reaching local customers.

Internet radio shows are starting to take off in a big way. That means advertising and sponsorship opportunities are also taking off. In addition, "offline" methods have been shown to be pretty effective at driving traffic online. If increasing Web traffic is your goal, using traditional media outlets to increase traffic should be a part of your mix.

If people already know you (which they might in your local market) they're more likely to be loyal. And they're more likely to send other customers to your site. Depending on the costs of radio in your community, radio may be a very affordable way to get a good viral campaign going. (A viral campaign is what happens when other people pass around your business' e-mails to their friends and family, or send them to your Web site.)

Below are some other positive reasons to use radio:

* Affordable -- when you compare spot to spot, radio tends to be one of the least expensive media out there. However, one spot ain't going to do it. To reach your target market, you need to purchase several spots. That's why radio can also turn into one of the more expensive media. However, there are ways to keep your costs in line yet still reap the benefits of radio -- for instance, buying less spots but running them all in one or two weeks, so your customers are more likely to hear your message.

* Psychological, if you voice the commercials yourself -- hearing your voice makes people feel like they "know" you. (Hence the popularity of audio on Web sites. In fact, marketing gurus claim just by adding audio to a site substantially increases how many people buy.)

People tend to buy from people and businesses they know and trust. Hearing your voice helps them feel as if they know you. These psychological aspects may be another reason to consider running a few radio ads in your local market even if you have an Internet business.

* Speed -- you can get your spot up and running in no time.

* Loyalty -- listeners choose stations based on the music or shows they like and they tend to be quite loyal to that station. If you know what your customers enjoy listening to, it's an excellent way to reach them. (I include both music and talk shows in this.)

* Good support medium -- radio works really well when paired with other marketing mediums (like print, direct mail or television).

But for every positive, there's a negative. In the spirit of being objective, here are a few for radio:

* Background medium -- radio tends to be on in the background, which means it tends to be ignored. Generally, your target market needs to be exposed to your ad more times than other marketing media before they'll act upon your message.

* Little staying power -- the lack of visuals again keeps radio from "sticking" with people. At least, that's what some of the marketing gurus say. But, here again my marketing consultant friend differs. She thinks it's that subconscious thing again.

And if you can write a spot that creates pictures in your customers' heads, you can actually work this to your advantage. In fact, according to my friend, if the picture is defined enough, not only will people remember it better, but they'll also think it was a print ad instead of a radio ad. (More on the art of creating pictures using words in later issues.)

* Hard to track – it's impossible to know exactly how many people are tuning in at any given time.

A final note: Because radio is subconscious, keep that in mind when crafting your ad. Repeat your business name a lot and any other branding info, so it gets into your customers' heads. Don't put in phone numbers. Instead, purchase a memorable Web site domain name and repeat that. And remember to create "pictures" whenever possible.

Creativity Exercise -- How can you use radio in your business?

Would radio work for your business? Let's find out.

Take out a sheet of paper and a fun pen. (I'm partial to gel pens.) Draw a line down the center.

On one side, put the header: Why advertising on radio is a good idea for my business. On the other side, put the header: Why advertising is a bad idea for my business.

Now pick a side and start writing down reasons.

You might be more comfortable starting with the side that's easiest for you. Then when you work on the other side, you can simply turn the reasons around.

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Article 55

Why Your Online Advertising Traffic Leaves as Soon as It Arr

Online advertising traffic leaves when advertisers don't make it easy to stick around.

Business website owners who buy online advertising often get frustrated when most of their

expensive traffic leaves as soon as it arrives--i.e, it "bounces."

Why does traffic from online advertising bounce? Think about it: you've done the same thing many

times. You've searched on a search engine, clicked on a result, then left that page less than ten

seconds after you arrived. You did that again and again until you found what you were looking for.

You might easily have left a trail of bounces on the server logs of a dozen websites, for a dozen

website owners to worry over.

Why did you keep leaving? Because you weren't finding what you were looking for on those websites

within the first ten to thirty seconds of arriving. Experience had taught you that you'd find what

you were looking for faster clicking on other search results, one of which was bound to have what you

were looking for, than sifting through the pages of a website that didn't look very promising from

the start.

That's how everyone searches, and how everyone treats online advertising. You have to work with this

behavior rather than against it.

How to Catch Your Online Advertising Traffic before It Bounces

So how do you keep online advertising traffic from bouncing? Think about why you bounced. What made

you doubt that the website had what you were searching for? If you were using a search engine, you

had searched on a keyword--let's say you searched on "small business website content." Without

realizing it, you were scanning each page for the keyword, "small business website content," or

something very close to it.

A website that talked about "small business web copy" might have been what you were looking for, but

if you didn't know that "web copy" is just another term for "website content," you'd have hit the

"back" button. You’d keep hitting the "back" button until you arrived at a page that had that keyword

in the page title, page headings, and in the first few lines of the body, maybe in boldface to make

it easier to find.

Of course, if you arrived at the page via a link from another website, you weren't looking for a

search engine keyword. You were just looking (hoping) for something that had to do with what made you

click on the link in the first place. If the page title and the first page heading resembled the text

of the link you had clicked on, you'd feel like you had found what you were looking for--no worries

about this being one of those pages that changed after the other site started linking to it.

But if the link promised no. 72 monkey wrenches, you'd feel let down if it brought you to the

homepage of a hardware store. Experience tells you the store might have stopped selling no. 72 monkey

wrenches long ago and never bothered updating its inbound links. Experience also tells you that even

if the site does have what you're looking for, it may be more trouble than it's worth to find it. Why

search through a website when search results from the entire world wide web are just a click of the

"back" button away?

Thanks to the "back" button, on the web, no one has to feel let down for long. Except advertisers who

let visitors down.

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Article 54

You can make Great $$$ in a week from free advertising for o

“Promote one Affiliate Program is the Key to your Success!”

There are a lot of affiliate marketing programs out there that claim to make you more money than you could possible spend; when in true reality, you’ve just sign up to be another person that the company can send you emails to buy their products!

Well the KEY to really making an affiliate program work for you is just by sticking with the one program you’ve signed up for. It gets quite easy to keep signing up for program after program in hopes that you will finally hit pay-dirt. What has happened is that now you are spread so thin in your ability to market a single program effectively.

Your goal is to send tons of traffic to that site URL and then in turn change those visitors into paying customers; further, your goal is to turn those customers or visitors into a down-line group that will help you build an extra layer of residual income on top of your regular commissions.

Believe or not when you promote your affiliate's website directly ..Its more effective
than you put the same affiliate's link in your website...

You can make $2000 in a week from free advertising for only one affiliate...

When you collect your efforts in marketing your affiliate site by only some free
advertising with more working,,,I will guarantee you will earn at least $2000
in a week ....

My important free marketing which I will show you when you use it ,,you will
ensure earning $$$..

1- submit to search engins

http://www.easyblaster.com/
http://penneypalace.ws/page6.html
http://getmassivehits.com
http://blaster-boys.com/bbna1.html
http://payperclickuniverse.com/prefunded.php
http://www.payperclickuniverse.com/pay-per-click-search-engines-special-deals.php

2- Post to free marketing discussion lists
http://www.lsoft.com/lists/listref.html
http://www.discussionlists.com/
http://www.tile.net/
http://www.websuccessmaker.com/internet_information/internet_marketing_discussion_forums.htm
http://www.websuccessmaker.com/follow-up_fine-tune/follow-up_fine_tune_resource_index.htm
http://www.wilsonweb.com/cat/cat.cfm?page=1&subcat=me_Newsletter
http://everydaybusinessonline.com/dboards.htm
http://www.supertips.com/forums/list.htm
http://www.howtocorp.com/forum/
http://www.ozemedia.com/cgi-bin/webbbs/webbbs_config.pl
http://www.williecrawford.com/cgi-bin/index.cgi
http://www.network54.com/Forum/184615
http://www.talkbiz.com/cgi-bin/mlm.cgi
http://www.auctionhints.com/message/webbbs_config.pl
http://www.mcpromotions.com/webbbs/config.pl
http://www.mlmwoman.com/wwwboard/
http://www.escribe.com/computing/neatnettricks/bb/
http://www.network54.com/Forum/87014
http://homebusiness-websites.com/cgi-bin/index.cgi
http://www.network54.com/Forum/184615

3- Write a good article and submite it :

http://www.ezinearticles.com/submit/
http://ezinearticles.com
http://www.certificate.net/wwio/
http://www.ideamarketers.com
http://www.marketing-seek.com
http://www.goarticles.com
http://www.netterweb.com
http://www.isyndicate.com
http://www.articlecentral.com
http://homeincome.com/writers-connection
http://www.web-source.net/syndicator_submit.htm
http://www.clickforcontent.com/writersadd.htm
http://www.aracopy.com
http://www.dime-co.com
http://www.zinecast.com
http://www.writebusiness.com
http://www.etext.org
http://www.zinos.com
http://www.addme.com
http://www.makingprofit.com
http://www.vectorcentral.com/ezine-question-answer-form.htm

4- Post your affiliate site to some Press Releases:

http://www.ebookbroadcast.com/submit.html
http://www.pressblast.com/
http://www.press-release-writing.com/
http://www.trashproofnewsreleases.com/

Try it an hour a day and you will be glad you did..........

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Article 53

How To Create Your Vision with a Capital V

How to Create Your Vision with a Capital V

1. Why is it that some business owners persevere after
several disappointments while others, maybe even
the listeners, give up?

A: It is through the power of vision. Your vision can be an
inspiring, energizing idea that you can use to excite others.
You need a vision to be more effective, more desirable and
more attractive to your clients and customers.

2. What is the value of a business vision?

A: Everything you do, the people you speak with, the clients
you attract are all a result of your vision. The right vision
for your business will help you be more satisfied with your
business and generate more abundance and wealth. With
a true business vision, all your decisions are easily made
because all your decisions are in alignment with your vision.

3. How do you know if your current vision is good enough
for your business?

A: It is not so much about your vision being good enough,
it is about having a vision that is clearly visionary. I
recently interviewed several entrepreneurs, independent
professionals and business owners. I concluded that what
they thought was their business vision was actually outcomes
or results they provided for their clients. These outcomes,
while great, were goals, not in any way visionary. To
reinvent your current vision to a Vision with a Capital V,
it needs to be mind-blowing phenomenal. If it can be put
into words and pictures, it can be achieved

4. I already have business goals.
Why do I need a business vision?

A: Goals are specific, measurable realistic outcomes or
results, usually completed by a specific date. Tasks or
assignments support the completion of the goals. Goals,
in turn, support your mission and vision statements. Goals,
mission statements and vision are usually
aligned with your values.

A goal example is as follows: ABC Company will release
two new computer programs in the United States by end
of the year 2005.This supports the Business Vision example
of: US-Based ABC Company is the only software provider
to global nations.

5. How can a business vision increase my income?

A: A Vision with a Capital V will not only increase your
income, you will also get better clients and customers.
Clarity about who you are and what you do is supported
by your vision. The more you focus on what your clients
want and need, the easier it will be for them to see and
understand your contributions. Opportunities abound when
you have a clear vision. The larger your vision, the easier
it is to attract more money.

6. What is the first step we can take to make your vision
a reality?

A: First, eliminate any individual or challenge standing in
your way, real or perceived. Then find a quiet space, have
a tape recorder or journal handy as well as an hour of free
time. Answer the following questions with as much detail
as possible: (there are moreŠI will provide you with four)

1. What does your business look like? Does it provide all
the resources you require?
2. Is your life rewarding? How?
3. Where are you living? Be as specific as possible.
4. Are you living the life of your dreams?
What does it look like?

7. What strategies can I use to help keep my vision alive?

A: It can be easy to lose momentum, to give up part of your
dream. We all need support and tools to inspire us on a daily
basis. In my latest book, I have a chapter entitled Seven
Strategies to Keep your Vision Alive. The list includes:
Values, Meditation, and Inner and Outer Vision Teams. Many
entrepreneurs think they can do it all alone, that no one can
keep up with them. It's possible, but you will use up all your
skills, strength and talent. The Outer Vision Team is where
the real world action takes place. Many results come from
the real world. Your Outer Vision team must first have a
Mentor, someone who will hold the dream for you. Second,
everyone on your team must have values that are in alignment
with your values. Third, keep the team small. You can have as
few as three others to make your vision a reality.

8. What else can I do to keep my Vision with a Capital alive?

A: Continue to see yourself as the best in your field. See
yourself as the best coach, consultant, real estate broker or
publicist. Redefine your website to reflect your new vision.
See yourself surrounded by inspirational geniuses, all
waiting for what you hve to say. Know that dreams never die,
but that dreams require action. You have a responsibility to
create an action plan. If you follow al the instructions in my
book, your vision will become a reality.

As you can see, it takes the power of Vision
With a Capital V to help create the business of your dreams.
If you want to expand your business and expand your life,
follow these eight steps to experience the life of your dreams.

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Article 52

How Your Intuition Can Make You As Rich As Conrad Hilton

By

Conrad Hilton relied on his hunches to make his fortune. His intuition was so finely-honed that it was uncanny. Although he denied any psychic talent, he was often baffled by the accuracy of his intuitions.

“Most of the time I can reconstruct the circumstances of these hunches,” he confessed, “and I can figure out in a general way where it came from. I mean I can explain it—not completely but enough to make it less strange. There have been times, though, when I couldn’t come up with a good explanation.”

Once his remarkable intuition helped him buy a prestigious old hotel in Chicago. The sale was based on sealed bids. All the bids were to be opened on a select day and the hotel would go to the highest bidder.

Some days prior to the deadline, Hilton offered a bid of $165,000, but that night he went to bed feeling restless and did not sleep well. The next morning he changed his mind. “It just didn’t feel right,” he said afterward. He increased his bid to $180,000. This was just right—he outbid his close rival by a mere $200.

The Success Principle

Conrad Hilton had a strong desire to win the bid. Although he made a calculated guess at what to bid, it did not feel right and he tossed and turned all night long. In the morning, he upped his bid. His new figure was arbitrary, but it was perfect.

His hunch arose from the wealth of knowledge stored in his subconscious. He had been in the hotel business ever since his purchase of a hotel in Texas as a young man. He had spent many years learning about the field and must have gathered a staggering number of facts.

In bidding for the Chicago hotel, he was consciously aware of the value of the real estate, the owner’s estimate of its value, and his competitor’s ideas about how much to stake. Based on this understanding, he placed his first bid. However, while he slept, his brain probably ruminated over numerous subtle pieces of information—perhaps the personalities of the owner and the other bidders, perhaps a remark heard, perhaps the memory of a offer on another similar property, and so on. This nonspecific and unconscious information forced him to raise his bid by an additional $15,000 when he woke up the next day.

Thus while he made a rational decision based on his conscious knowledge, his subconscious went through its own files during the night, and, upon awakening, prompted him to increase his offer.

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Article 51

A Real Estate Formula

It was a simple real estate formula. The ads ran in our small-town newspaper for years before I realized exactly what was going on. They were always the same: A house for sale with 5% down and payments of 1% of the purchase price. Maybe a three bedroom home for $90,000, for example, with $4,500 down and $900 per month payments.

When a friend started doing the same thing he explained the process to me. It was a way to get a great return on capital, and it was the opposite of buying with no money down. There is no down payment at all when you buy, because you buy for cash.

The Simple Real Estate Formula

You probably know that when you buy for cash, you can often get a much better price. With no financing contingencies in the offer, and the promise of a faster closing, sellers are willing to sell for less. You can offer $95,000, for example, on a house that might be worth $108,000. If you can't get it for less than, say, $99,000, you walk away - there are always other opportunities.

Once you buy the house, you put few thousand into high-return repairs and improvements. These might include paint, carpet, and maybe asphalt for a dirt driveway. For our example, we'll say you spend $5,000. Let's suppose the house is worth $116,000 now. You're ready for the next important step in this real estate formula.

You put it up for sale, targeting buyers who can't get financing easily. You provide the financing. Because you are making it easy for the buyer, you can get more than the $116,000 value for the home - and do it without paying a realtor's commission. Let's say you sell it for 123,000. The buyer needs a down payment of just 5%, or $6,150, and makes monthly payments of $1230 per month. You charge higher interest than the going rates at the banks, of course.

This is a win-win situation. Your buyer is able to buy a home instead of renting, and you get a capital gain of perhaps $16,000 after expenses, plus good interest. Your total rate of return will often be over 20%!

In our town, the first to do this consistently were a father and son team of lawyers. They saved money by doing their own foreclosures when necessary. Once they foreclosed, they raised the price and sold the home all over again.

They made millions. Did you know that if you can get an average return of 18% on your money, you'll turn $75,000 into more than one million dollars in about fifteen years? That's the power of a good real estate formula.

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Article 50

Infomercials and Direct Response -

Infomercials changed the way advertisers sell things on television. Previously, product manufacturers merely presented their wares on TV in the most attractive manner they could come up with. They planted ideas, sought to change habits or to create them where none existed. They expanded market share subtly with one common unifying factor – you watched the commercial and if you liked what you saw you went to the store or the showroom and bought it. From now on television would be different. Infomercials and direct response marketing was born. Now if you liked what you saw, thought it was just the right product, idea or concept for you, you picked up the phone, called the number on your screen and ordered what you wanted direct from the manufacturer.

It’s hard to imagine in today’s internet world with overnight deliveries and instantly downloads, but for the very first time you could order something off your TV set without even getting up from your favorite chair. It was unbelievable, magical, and very successful. Almost overnight phone banks sprang up all over the country as the call volume, once numbering in the thousands, surged into the millions. Like Internet domain names today, 800 numbers became a vanity item – the most popular ones disappearing as fast as they became available. Previously only used in magazine advertisements or mail order brochures, the phone business became a very big business with the success of infomercials.

To begin with, infomercials and direct response TV selling give a manufacturer an immediate tool to measure whether or not his product, his pricing and even his approach is working. Previously, manufacturers had to create their product, get it into stores where it would be available for purchase on a nationwide basis and then and only then, launch a costly nationwide advertising campaign on popular TV shows. After that, they would wait a minimum of 90 days, sending out squads of sales personnel or making hundreds of phone calls to find out if their product was selling. If it wasn’t it was back to the drawing board to try to figure out what went wrong and then perhaps try it again maybe next year.

With infomercials and direct response, there was now a way to measure the success or failure of any project in a matter of hours and at a fraction of the cost. If a manufacturer had his own phone bank, he could conceivably sit there after his infomercials were airing around the country and literally count the orders coming in. And almost immediately, he would have an idea if his project was working. This leveled the playing field for new product launches and led to the creation of hundreds of new products each and every year launched and tested as infomercials before ever hitting a retail outlet.

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Article 49

Investing the Profits from Your Home Based Business

Having made the bold and glorious decision to sack the boss and go it alone you are one of the few who have what it takes to succeed. You have an entrepreneurial spirit and a strong will and these are rare and valuable attributes that will guide you throughout your professional and personal life.

Now that your business is up and running and you’re profiting from your efforts, it’s time to turn your attentions to investing the profits from your home based business wisely and for maximum gain.

One of the most consistently returning asset classes over the long term and the one that the majority of us can profit from is real estate.

Understanding market cycles

Now, you’re most likely aware that property markets are cyclical – this is because there is a direct correlation between the underlying price of real estate in relation to individual buying power. Simply explained: when property prices rise above what first time buyers can afford to pay the market slows down, stagnates and sometimes readjusts – but as soon as purchasing power increases again, either with a drop in interest rates or an increase in GDP, so property prices begin rising again.

And there are even ways to make money from real estate during a market downturn!

Investing in real estate for income

Depending on the nature of your home based business your monthly income may be slightly erratic – some months being better than others! If you invest in property assets in a buy-to-let or even jet-to-let capacity you can secure yourself a consistent monthly income which may afford you an added degree of financial security.

Buy-to-let is when you purchase property for rental purposes – this make be an apartment you corporate let, it could be a house you student let or even a family home you rent out long term.

Jet-to-let is similar but it involves purchasing overseas property for short term weekly or fortnightly rental to tourists. This type of letting is usually very lucrative indeed during peak holiday periods but may mean you have a property that is empty for a few months out of season.

Both types of property investment return you a regular income and at the same time the physical real estate asset will grow in value over the long term and if ever you wish to release the profits from your investment you can sell on the property and take the gains you have accrued.

Investing in real estate for profit

The alternative to building up a property portfolio for income generation purposes is purchasing property and selling it on relatively quickly to realize the gains the asset has accrued.

You can do this in a number of ways…firstly you can purchase run down property in need of renovation, tidy up the property and turn it into a home before selling it on at a higher price and reaping the profits gained.

Alternatively you could seek to beat the curve by buying into up and coming areas, waiting for prices to boom and then selling on for profit. This is quite a risky strategy for a first time investor as timing the market is hard!

An alternative to this is looking overseas for the latest emerging property markets worldwide and buying properties to renovate or properties off plan and then flipping them on for maximum gains in the short term.

Financing your investment

As a self-employed individual it can be tricky to get a mortgage unless you have audited accounts, bank references etc., etc. If you don’t have all of these requisite documents there are other options available to you.

The main options are re-mortgaging your primary residence and releasing the equity that you have accrued already for reinvestment in another property project or taking out a self-certification mortgage where you make a large down payment and basically tell the lender how much you can afford to borrow!

A winning attitude

You’ve already proved you have what it takes to succeed against the odds by establishing a profitable home based business, now apply the same steely determination to your real estate investments and you will succeed in making the maximum gains. Start small, begin gently, test the market and your understanding of it and slowly build up a profitable real estate portfolio from the profits of your home based business for maximum financial gain.

Good luck in achieving your goals.

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Article 48

Is it Just Me, or are People Getting Ruder?

I’ve been wondering this for a while and have been dying to ask my business colleagues and friends. But whenever I’m get ready to pop the question, I manage to convince myself that it’s silly, reveals my cynical nature (or advance years!) and is probably just a figment of my jaded imagination… certainly not worthy of intelligent discussion.

The question, however, continued to reside nervously on the tip of my tongue, eager to fly out (particularly just after leaving my apparently mute colleague a fourth voice mail message). But it wasn’t until I read Keith Ferrazzi’s masterful book, “Never Eat Alone” that I summoned the courage to thunderously and openly inquire, “Are people, particularly those in business, much ruder than they use to be?”

And… “Have we become so numb to it that we actually expect - and worst yet, accept it as normal and okay?”

I think yes. I hope I’m wrong.

Let me, however, step back a bit… Why did Ferrazzi’s book serve as my catalyst?

The short answer is that it’s just plain good. It is a brilliantly written book – simple without being simplistic – in the same league as Dale Carnegie’s classic “How to Win Friends and Influence People.” And in an age when everyone seems to be a marketing, internet or personal motivation coach it’s refreshing to read something so balanced and genuinely inspired. Most importantly, however, Ferrazzi reminds us that we’re not in this alone - people make business happen!

He reiterates what some of us already know. We’re all better off – emotionally, financially, and physically – when we take the time to build thoughtful, intimate (not in the “biblical” sense :>) and sincere relationships with others. Ferrazzi says that while our personal styles and levels of openness should be adjusted as appropriate, making strong human connections is essential to our well being. I couldn’t agree more! This is, after all, what it’s all about – and long overdue advice. Thanks, Keith!

But then it occurred to me. How can you develop relationships with people when they don’t call, email, or show up – even when they’ve promised to do so?!

And I’m not referring about those little, unintentional slip-ups that happen to all of us occasionally - like when you’ve forgotten your Aunt Hilda’s birthday; or waited until the last minute to send in your wedding RSVP; or failed to send a thank-you note.

No, what I’m talking about is far more baffling and egregious. I’m referring to the friends who call you one day before your big dinner party and reiterate how much they’re looking forward to seeing you - and then don’t show up – no explanation, no call, no nothing.

Or how about that real estate agent who promises to get back to you with a price no later than 2 pm, and you never hear from them again?

And what about that old friend or colleague who can’t wait to have lunch with you next Thursday and then doesn’t return your confirmation calls or emails?

Then there’s my favorite… you’ve killed yourself to help someone get something “urgent” done (usually a boss or co-worker) and even managed to save the day… You email “the document” before the deadline, sure that the recipient will be relieved and grateful. But you never find out. No “thank you”. No “way to go”. No nothing.

Or is it just me? Maybe so…

I was raised in a home where we were taught to treat everyone with the same amount of respect and kindness. Period. Behavior that didn’t measure up to this standard was not tolerated. We learned that the true measure of someone’s character rested in their commitment to do the right thing - even when they didn’t have to.

For example, whenever I leave a hotel room, I wipe off the counters; gather my towels together in one convenient spot; turn off the television, lights and air conditioning; return the iron to the closet; and make sure that all my scraps of paper are where they belong – in the trash can.

Why? Because it’s just the right thing to do (and my mother would probably rise up out of her grave and kick my butt if I didn’t :>). Yes, hotels employ a cleaning staff who “are paid” to clean up after me, but why should they? It’s my mess. I was responsible for making it, so I am responsible for cleaning it up – even if I don’t have to.

I have adopted my parents’ code and although I sometimes fail, I continually strive to measure up to those standards.

But what does this look like in the “real world”? It means you… 1. Return calls… even if it’s only to say “no”

2. Honor your commitments… if you tell someone you’re going to do something, you do it. If you absolutely cannot, you let them know beforehand.

3. When you’re asked to RSVP, you do so

4. Say “thank you” and “please”… to strangers, friends, family members, waiters and waitresses, taxi drivers, colleagues, children, teenagers… everyone.

5. Call when you’re going to be late

6. Return emails (unless it’s spam)

7. Welcome people into your home… do your best to make them feel comfortable and important

8. Clean up after yourself

9. Value other people’s privacy

10. Honor your parents

11. Respect elders

12. Chew gum quietly

13. Say “excuse me” when you burp

14. Open doors for others

15. Allow someone with only two items to move ahead of you in the grocery line

16. Respect other cultures, religions, ethnicities and the like.

17. Don’t push in front of someone… even if you’re in a car

18. Share your things

19. Don’t act like a pig… even if it’s at an All-You-Can-Eat buffet

20. Don’t brag

21. Never litter

Are these rules a thing of the past? Passé in today’s fast-paced culture? Old fashioned? Silly? Or am I just imagining things?

But if I’m not… why? Are we overloaded, overbooked and over committed? Has it become too easy to make excuses? Have we been forced into a “every-man-for-himself” mindset? Did our parents and teachers fail us?

Or is it that we just don’t care because they’re not important. What do you think?

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Article 47

Make Money Fast With No Investment-how Andrew Made $100,000 In 6 Months

Andrew Newberry is a distant family friend that knew about my business acumen. He knew how I had been in his position only 24 months previously and had heard about the new life I was leading with the wealth I had generated. I could hear the earnest desperation in his voice, when he asked me "how'd you do it Jack"? His question was open and sincere. In my eye's he was at a point where there was only one direction for his life to go...up.

Andrew needed to make money fast. His family were in danger of losing the roof over their heads and although Andrew worked a fulltime job, there were difficulties that created this current crisis.

He couldn't understand how I had done so much considering my humble beginings, while he had worked at his current job for over 10 years and was saddled with the difficulties he was currently experiencing. He told me he had no money to invest or anything like that, but could I advise him on what if anything was possible.

This was my response to him.

You see, what he was asking me specifically was, "how do I make money with little or no investment" My mind ignored his emotional pain and focused on the reality. That is the reality of what he needed answering.

Talking about Real Estate investment or anything that needed a capital injection was futile for Andrew, he needed to hear something different. This is what I told him to do, step by step. I told him that if he followed these two steps, he would have $100,000 within 12 months. He did it in 6!

Step one, get a little money. Not much needed, a few hundred dollars would do, but he has to find something as a seed capital account. I gave him the URL of a broker that does paid surveys online. These brokers represent companies that pay ordinary people for their opinions. They typically pay between $50-$300 per hour. He got his wife busy doing these through the day and evenings, they had $1000 within 2 weeks.

Step two, Go Shopping I explained to Andrew the mechanism behind my success. Compounding, intrinsic value, leverage, rapid capital gains, pyramiding profits. I then asked him to compound that thousand dollars by 30% 19 times. In other words, I told him to find 19 investment-objects that were for sale that he could buy, that had at least 30% or more spare intrinsic value.

Intrinsic value is everywhere. Whether you are buying New York sky scrapers of marble pool tables or Bertram boats, every market has a percentage of sellers offering their goods at well below market value.

Andrew started with old cars because he was a mechanic and now he had a game plan he was going to compound his money with his existing skill set. He traded up and up until he had $12,000 in six weeks.

Get your calculator out and see how he did it, how he evolved his money without a hitch. Start with 1000 then multiply by "1.3" which is the same as 30% Don't press equals, just hit "1.3" and multiply symbol again. Do that 19 times.

When Andrew sold his last auto deal, he was ready to get involved in Real Estate. With $12,000 it wasn't much but it was enough to start applying the same principles with Real Estate. This is where his compounding really escalated.

It escalated, because now he was using leverage....borrowed money. He called me on the day he was ready to start compounding with Real Estate with another problem. As I advised him "get into Real Estate Andrew as quickly as you can, around the $10,000 mark its time to get into that game"

He had a problem. The houses in his area were dear, he couldnt see how having $12,000 was enough to get involved.

I advised him that he should forget about houses until he had at least $40,000 He should focus on raw land. Raw blocks are cheap, and easily re-zoned into a higher purpose. With just a small investment at the local town planning department he could re-zone a residential into a commercial or the other way around where appropriate. Its called a "soft" or "paper" rennovation. No painting, no work, just a few simple forms and a fee to pay.

Creating a new use is just one way to add value to raw land, there are many others. Andrew researched and discovered them all. He stuck with land after all was said and done. He discovered buying a large block and subdividing it was very profitable. The second deal he did, he bought a block of over an acre, surrounded by established homes for $300,000 (with a bank loan) It was a corner block and he split it into three handsome sized blocks, tailored to the upper market. The first two blocks paid out his loan and put profits in his pocket, the last block he used as collateral for another bank loan where he built his own beautiful mansion on.

He sold it for a final profit of $354,000

That was about 8 months after our little chat on that cold evening.

To your health and rapid success.

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Article 46

Make Money With No Investment -Starting From Scratch

In the begining it's a tentative situation. Your first few deals are small potatoes. To make money with no investment is not entirley accurate. Everyone has access to something. Some small amount that will be allocated for wealth building. I think back to when I was starting from scratch and at the time my cynical attitude made it painful, but looking back I remember the experience fondly.

It's challenging to make money with no investment capital but when you are starting from scratch you have nothing to lose. With your back to the wall, you can go forward confidently in the knowledge that you literally have little to lose.

Curiously, all great wealth once began from scratch. To make money with no investment capital is exactly the situation you need to be in if you want to succeed and get that first million under your belt.

You see, it's not how much you started with that counts. It's not how much you have made that counts. What matters is the system. HOW you do it. If that is based on sound principles then you will never fear poverty again.

I could make money with no investment capital if you dropped me in any free City on the planet. I guarantee you within a few months I'd be living well (providing I spoke the language).

Starting from scratch, the first thing I would do is find a market. No money, but I have my self. I can offer a service. As soon as I make a few hundred dollars saved, I would begin applying the principles of opportunity investment. I would trade up and up until I had borrowing capacity.

I would use the leverage that borrowing allows me to manufacture obscene compounding returns in real estate and large ticket items like used trucks and yachts. I would work until I was comfortable, then start spending on myself.

You are in a better situation than my scenario. You have friends, contacts, and knowledge of your town. You have experiences and intimate perceptions of the existing markets in your home town. All you need is the knowledge to make it happen.

To make money from scratch with no investment capital is easy. Don't be fooled into thinking your situation is hopeless. You need knowledge, tools, and skills. It's time you took a real shot at your first million, believe me the second and third will be easy.

"The pain of discipline is less then the pain of regret" -- Martin Thomas

Copyright2005 Opportunity Investor.com

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Article 45

MLM Success Training - Golden Rule For Prospecting Strangers

Cruising around the MLM playground (Online MLM Forums), the question of “How do you prospect strangers into your MLM Business?” popped up. And I knew if this fellow Network Marketer was struggling with this question, then several others probably are having the same dilemma as well.

So here it is.

When you’re building your MLM Business there is 1 Golden Rule to follow when it comes to prospecting strangers and it’s simply:

Just Don’t Do It!

That’s right! You NEVER want to prospect strangers to build your MLM Business. Now I know some people may not agree with me, so here are 3 “Prime” reasons why you don’t want to prospect strangers as a way to build your MLM Business.

Reason #1 - Strangers Are Not Your Target Market.

Believe it or not, but unfortunately more than half the population isn’t “wired” to be in business for themselves. Your goal is to find people with a “track record” of success. These are the only kinds of people you need to help build your business, not strangers (any ‘ol Joe Schmo you see walking down the street).

If that’s your plan then you might as well whip out the phone book and start dialing. And let’s see how many No’s, not interested’s and don’t call me again’s you get before you finish the page. It’s simply because “strangers” is not the target market you should be going after to build a successful home business.

Reason #2 - It’s Too Ineffective.

Prospecting strangers is a big waste of time, energy and patience. Just think about it, would someone like Donald Trump say “Hey, I have this great business opportunity that’ll help any self motivated and dedicated individual make a handsome residual income each month –let’s kick things off by showing it to people walking on the street!” Of course not! So why should you?

It’s at least 10x more effective to target a group of people who “already” possess positive character traits and good business skills that’ll help you take your business to the next level.

Reason #3 - It’s Just Not Worth It

Prospecting strangers isn’t worth the hassle (time, energy, sweat, blood, tears and not to mention the headaches). Prospecting these types of people for your business WILL take a lot out of you. (Just thinking about it, makes me cringe). Facing rejection from the wrong kinds of people is one of the main “killers” for many new home business owners. Don’t let it happen to you, or anyone in your organization. Don’t prospect strangers.

Remember; don’t try to prospect everyone for your business because unfortunately not everyone is ideally suited to be in business for themselves. It’s sad, but true. So in order to find the right people for your MLM Business simply focus on a target market. Look for people with a track record of success and possess good business skills.

Some great examples of this are real estate agents, store owners, small business owners, franchise owners and even other Network Markets (they almost always keep their options open). Simply put, focus your energy on target markets rather than every ‘ol Joe Schmo who comes within 3 feet of you, it’s proven to work 10x better than prospecting everyday strangers.

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Article 44

Mona Lisa Your Branding

Have you mistakenly trained your branding to fall over and play dead? Do you know how to use psychology to create branding that lights up with the voltage of a thousand neon bulbs? And can you play Scrooge with your budget, yet get huge branding mileage? And if so, how? Read on and find out how you can be a Leonardo Da Vinci with your brand!

It’s Raining 3000+ Messages a Day!
I have a friend. Let’s call him Eugene. Partly because that’s his real name. Eugene positions himself as a pitch manager. Very effectively, he shows CEOs and executives (who make pitches for new and existing business) how they can use simple steps to get a powerful presentation across.

Eugene had a problem that all of us do. His brand (or his company’s brand) was just one of three thousand new messages that bamboozle us every day through various media. To get his name welded in his customer’s brain was like being on a rocking chair. You feel the movement, but you go nowhere. Eugene’s brand was going places, but it was a slow tedious process.

He needed to get some prime real estate in his customer’s brain really quickly and without the benefit of Daddy Warbucks’ deep pockets. All he had to do was get their attention…

13 Boxes. Does That Get Your Attention?
Doesn’t your brain go nuts wanting to ask what is the significance of 13 boxes? That’s the new brand name of Eugene’s company. Can you see that immediately catching your attention? The brain is dying to know the significance of this strange sounding set of words. And it won’t let go till it gets an answer!

In this case the answer is simple. Eugene has a system of 13 boxes in his training process that takes you from the start of your presentation to the final crescendo. The 13 boxes form the structure and the route you must follow to get results.

His company brand could be something like XYZ Training or have his own name (like accountants and law firms do) but why on earth would that excite his customer’s brain?

Another Branding Example called KeyGhost...
Here’s another example of vivid psychological branding called KeyGhost. KeyGhost is a powerful but simplistic device that monitors every keystroke on your keyboard. This spy-like product evades the scrutiny of the unobservant eye. A name like KeyGhost immediately ruffles the brain forcing it to stop what it’s doing. Then it drives all its attention in the direction of this unusual sounding product.

This is exactly what you need. Once you’ve got a spotlight-hogging brand name, you start to own a tiny part of your customer’s brain that is yours to keep forever.

Forever Starts With a Trigger…
A trigger called Curiosity! Curiosity sounds a deafening red alert in every neuron of the brain. The brain is at its curious best when faced with something that seems irregular or uncommon in some way.

If your brand name doesn’t create a curiosity factor, you’re wasting gobs of money to just trying to cut through the communication clutter. The sooner you get psychological exclamation marks into your brand name, the sooner you get the attention you crave for.

But What If You Have a Boring Company Name That You’re Stuck With?
Hey it happens! You inherited the brand name and there’s not much you can do with it without the shareholders going for your jugular. Well don’t fret. First you’ve got to realise that branding is not restricted to just your company name. A process/product that your company has or follows could become bigger than the company itself.

Look For The Power Of Your Processes…
With Eugene, his process was sitting under his nose all along. In the case of 13 Boxes, it’s quite easy to draw up a dramatic scenario of how 13 boxes can get you out of your ‘box’ and give you immense confidence in your presentation skills. In his case, though, the process actually defined the company.

With KeyGhost, it’s a cinch to describe how the hardware works just like a ghost and yet link it back to your keyboard and computer.

You can be an accounting firm with a company name like “Boring, Dead and Co.” and still brand your prize-winning process and call it ‘Goodbye Extra Tax’ or ‘Corporate Loopholes.’

Do you think your clients will see you in a better light? You bet they will! So get going, get out and get working on your brand naming canvas right away!

Nonsensical Names Work Too…
One Red Dog, The Loaded Hog and other such names flout the basic principles of process and logic. Yet they seem to work powerful imagery on the brand name. It’s the story that goes with it that creates a sense of immortality and distinctiveness around the brand.

Even if you choose to have a name that means very little and can drum up a story to match it, you’ve got yourself a winner. Which place would you rather frequent? 'One Red Dog' or 'Joe’s Café?' With a vivid name you’ve got the opportunity to weave a story -- even a story that you made up all by yourself!

Shazaam! It’s Branding With Drama!
Don’t just Mona Lisa your brand. Put some Shakespeare in it as well. Push the limits of your brand name and make it an action tool. For example, 13 boxes could be presented as 13 different boxes placed on a CEO’s desk. Can you visualise the curiosity factor? What if the boxes were different shapes and different colours? Can you see the website name? The t-shirt design? The ad on TV? Can you see how extendable a picturesque brand name can be?

Go ahead; make the effort to Mona Lisa your brand name.

You’ll make Leonardo really proud of you!

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