Personal Branding Authenticity Scares Me

Personal Branding Authenticity is at the cutting edge of network marketing and online marketing these days.  But I think there are some misconceptions about being authentic, and we should straighten them out.  I know that a lot of people worry that they have to share personal information to be authentic.  If you’re like me, the very idea of exposing any dirty laundry is a frightening thought!  Heck, even my wife sometimes doesn’t always see the REAL ME!  How on earth am I going to put it out on Social Media, in blog posts, and everywhere for the world to see?  Do you feel this way too?  Let’s explore what it means to be authentic when we brand ourselves.  Let’s decide whether or not our fears are warranted.

I checked in with Wikipedia on the subject of authenticity and here’s what they said it is:  “Authenticity refers to the truthfulness of origins, attributions, commitments, sincerity, devotion, and intentions.”  Well, that doesn’t sound so embarrassing.  You don’t have to tell people the color of your underwear or whether your belly button is an “innie” or an “outie”.  It doesn’t sound like you have to embarrass yourself at all.  Maybe being authentic isn’t so bad, let’s dig in a little deeper.

Truthfulness of Origins and Attributions. To me this means that I should be honest about the origins of what I’m providing, writing, or promoting.  Also if I’m using someone else’s work, I need to attribute it to them.  So far this is common sense.  I like the word “truthfulness” anyway.  I recommend it in all aspects of your life, not just branding…I’m just saying.  So, be forthright in where I’m coming from with something and where that something came from if I didn’t create it myself.  Okay.

Commitments. Over the years I’ve learned not to make a commitment I don’t intend to keep.  In fact I hold this pretty close to heart.  Clearly it is good that your brand is known as reliable.  But there is another way of interpreting the term commitment here.  If you’ve made a commitment you must keep, then you need to be forthright with anyone you deal with when you know that commitment could change how you are working with them or how they would interpret you.  In this case, being true to your word extends beyond your initial commitment.  Another word for this second interpretation is “transparency”.

Sincerity. To me sincerity is a way we convey that we’re being genuine.  It’s an openness to risk allowing people to see how you feel.  According to Webster’s Dictionary sincerity is an honest way of behaving.  So sincerity is honesty in action.  Okay, I’m down with this sincerity thing, it makes sense for your brand to be seen as honest, genuine, and sincere.

Devotion and Intentions. You’ve got to be open about your devotions.  It’s kind of like being transparent about your commitments.  If you’re devoted to a course of action, a goal, or a way of thinking or seeing the world, you should let people know if you feel it would change their decisions about you or your offer.  The same holds if you have an intention behind your dealings with people that would affect their decisions.  Be forthcoming, not misleading.

To be sure, there is an element of personal branding that encourages you to allow your personality and preferences to be seen.  This also goes with the concept of Attraction Marketing.  But from our exploration today, I believe that Personal Branding Authenticity is not so much about revealing embarrassing insights into your personal life as it is about being honest, forthright and transparent in your dealings with other people.  I can do that, and I’ll bet you can too.  And just in case you’d like a more concrete explanation, I’ll give it a try – when marketing, we should lay off the “spammy” hype and be the real deal.  What do you think?

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admin, February 9th 2010 | Tags:
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Time Management Help for Network Marketers: Regaining Your Focus

As I’ve written before, the fact is, you cannot manage time, but you can manage yourself in time.  Time management techniques are intended to help you gain focus so you can provide your attention where it is most needed in order to meet your goals.  It is the dilution of your attention away from these priority activities that ruins your personal productivity and spoils your success.  Before you can apply time management techniques to strengthen your focus, you must first understand the problems which weaken your focus.

Problem of “Overwhelm”. Multi-tasking is probably one of the biggest myths ever in personal productivity.  It was popularized as a way of dealing with numerous stimuli simultaneously, particularly today’s rich multi-media, such as email, Tweeting, blogs, texting, phone interruptions plus others.    If you feel overwhelmed by the volume of communication you are called upon to manage and respond to, if you feel like you are unable to focus on your priorities because you are constantly diverted by multi-media messages, then you need to take decisive action.

So to overcome “overwhelm” you must learn a new skill.  You’ve got to get comfortable with a new situation.  A sense of being overwhelmed precedes growth.  Mike Koenig, the video marketing guru and co-creator of Traffic Geyser, and video marketing coach to Anthony Robbins said that the sense of being overwhelmed is a sign that the neurons in your brain are forming new connections to manage the new stimuli and problems your are encountering.  In other words, the sense of being overwhelmed can be seen as a sign that help is on the way.

Problem of Distractions. Distractions are real vampires.  They siphon off your energy and distract you from your tasks.  It is estimated that after a distraction it takes 15 minutes to get your mind completely refocused onto a task.  That’s a serious dilution of focus.  Most distractions are made by other people.  Someone knocks on your door wanting to talk about the game last night.  If you work at home it might be a spouse or a child or a neighbor.

So how will you deal with it?  Well, first you’ve got to assess it and ask yourself whether it is aligned with your purpose or goals.  If it isn’t, then maybe this interruption has no place in your space and it should be stopped or eliminated.  That can be difficult and touchy, but sometimes necessary.  Depending upon the circumstances, maybe you can simply manage the disruption.  For instance it might be fine for the kids to come into your home office in the afternoon when you’re just responding to calls and emails.  But not when you are writing advertising copy or articles in the morning.  The point is that you should never let distractions disrupt you from your high yield activities.

Problem of Environment. The environment in which you work is perhaps more important than most of my points in this article.  The bottom line on environment is this.  You cannot have a Million Dollar Thought in the middle of the kids screaming, the dog barking, and the TV rattling at the kitchen table.

Achievers actually utilize their time differently in different environments.  For all but just a very few, you can’t do all of your high priority revenue producing tasks in the same environment.  Maybe you can’t write copy or ads or build advertising campaigns in your home office.  Because in your home office there are phone interruptions, email and Social Media distractions, kids and inboxes…just about everything but intense 100 percent peak mental and physical energy performance.  Maybe you need to do your high intensity work at the dining room table early in the morning before the family gets up.  Or perhaps you’d like to take your work to a nice table in an isolated corner of the local library.

For me I like to clear my desk and focus on the high intensity things first in the morning.  When I’m making videos I like to get out of the office and into a room away from the phone and computer.  I like to use the office for more administrative tasks like uploading blog posts and articles, making calls and managing Social Media.  And I like to get away when I read for self-improvement.  So I use three separate environments.  You can experiment with this yourself.  The point is that if you try to squeeze all these various levels of activities into one environment, it will dilute your effort and your success.

Time Management Solutions – Getting Your Focus Back. Okay, now it’s time for some practical solutions to improving your productivity.  Here they are:

  • Journaling. Just like a personal trainer logs your daily exercise results for later evaluation of strengths and weaknesses, you should log your activities throughout a week and evaluate them on Friday to see what you’ve really been doing with your time, particularly whether how often and how much time you’ve spent on multi-media and how much on priority tasks.
  • Blocking Time. Set specific blocks of time aside on your schedule to deal with specific issues.  For instance if you are most productive in the mornings, set up one-hour blocks in your morning schedule strictly for your creative and goal-driven tasks.  Schedule blocks during the less productive times of the day for managing multi-media, accepting walk-in questions/disruptions, and handling mundane administrative or operations tasks.
  • Setting Appointments. Just like you set appointments to meet with people to exchange information, set an appointment for you to handle your email, Social Media, texts, and phone messages.
  • Batching. Batching is when you move multiple tasks to a time slot.  Follow the above recommendation to set an appointment to manage your multiple media, but consider carving out two days that you handle only priority tasks.  Trust me, the world isn’t going to end if you don’t respond to multi-media on Tuesdays and Thursdays, rather you batch the inquiries and handle them only on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.  Then on Tuesdays and Thursdays you are free of multi-media altogether.
  • Goal and Cycle. At the start of each task do two things.  First decide what you intend to do before you move to a different task.  Then set a finish time.  So now you have a goal (what you will accomplish) and a cycle (the start time and finish time).  This is very powerful.
  • Drilling. The fact is, if you’re going to use goal and cycle technique above, you may as well drill yourself to work faster and faster.  Studies have shown that people who work fast are sharper thinkers.  And if you’re an entrepreneur, that’s exactly what you need.
  • 50 – 10 Technique. I’ve written about a breakthrough technique called the 50 – 10 Technique, where you schedule one-hour blocks of time, use the goal and cycle technique above to determine what you’re going to accomplish, and use a timer to work 50 minutes, then take 10 minutes to walk, rehydrate, get your mind refreshed before returning.  This technique keeps you fresh and more productive all day long, preventing exhaustion by the end of the day.  If you do nothing else, adopt the 50 – Ten Technique.

There is nothing magical about time management techniques, unless of course by using them you come to realize that the biggest impediment to your ability to focus on your high-yield, goal-driven activities is YOU.  Then you can understand the true nature of being overwhelmed and learn to manage it.  You can learn to spot distractions in your life and remove them or control them, and you can learn to use the right environment for the right task.  If any of the concepts and techniques I have presented in this article help you, then I am honored.  Good luck and go focus!

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admin, February 8th 2010 | Tags: , ,
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Time Management Help For Network Marketers – Success Factors

Time management help is often a topic of interest for network marketers and entrepreneurs.  I’d like to dispel a commonly held myth about time management; you cannot manage time.  It is simply impossible.  Time is an artificial dimension based on sequence and interval; nobody can manage a dimension.   Ah, but you CAN manage YOURSELF in the dimension of time!  You see, there is a big difference in mindset between someone who thinks they’re going to manage time and someone who realistically expects to manage themselves.  Clearly the end results are going to be different.  I’d also like to make another quick point.  Instead of just calling it managing yourself in time, let’s call it what it really is, ‘managing your focus’.  Because in reality time management techniques are really designed to help you focus your attention where it is needed most so you can accomplish what you need to accomplish to meet your goals.

Focus is implied in my personal formula for success.  You see, I think of success as a proverbial three-legged stool.  As you know a three-legged stool must have all three of its legs or it fall over.  In my formula for success the three allegorical stool legs are:  1) maintaining peak mental & physical energy and knowledge, 2) Working only on priority activities associated with your goals and purpose, and 3) taking massive action on those activities.  A tremendous amount of focus is going to be required to bring 100 percent in each of these categories.

You must focus on peak energy and on goals and purpose in order to bring massive focus in the form of action.  Achievers are people who can focus.  Achievers are magnetically attractive people; magically other people are attracted to those who have keen focus on a purpose.  In fact we call them by names like “visionary”, “leaders”, “winners”, and “captains of industry”, just to name a few.  The successes of achievers have been almost always supported by their ability to focus physical and mental energy, purpose-driven priorities, and their follow-through with massive action.  This is what achievers do day-in and day-out.  This is why it is important for you to manage your ability to focus, and this is exactly what good time management techniques can help you accomplish.

Now, what about you?  Are you in peak physical condition?  Do you have apex physical energy to call upon in order to endure long-haul and short-term challenge?  Do you have the mental energy and knowledge to call upon during this effort?  And have you identified your purpose or mission in life and  with your business?  Have you established a vision of where you want to go in achieving that purpose, and have you set clear, achievable goals that challenge you and keep you driven toward action and success?  These are the raw materials that need to be in place before you fine-tune your focus into life-changing and business-changing action toward success.

If you are like most people, you answered “no” to most of these questions.  But don’t be discouraged.  This is your starting point, not your finish line.  These are things you can work to improve.  In fact these can become important self-development goals and business planning goals for you in the near future.  I wish you well in your journey to success.  Good luck!

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admin, February 4th 2010 | Tags: , , , ,
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Time Management Help For Network Marketers


We all need time management help, and if you’re a network marketer struggling to be productive, you’re going to love this.  Not long ago my mentor showed me an incredible time management tool that has increased my productivity dramatically and provided me with noticeably more energy to get through the day.  What’s so amazing about this technique is its simplicity. It’s so simple I discounted its value, that is, until I tried it.  I know this sounds like a lot of build up but I want you to read it and try it for yourselves.

My mentor, Scott Brandon Hoffman, put me on to this technique about three months ago.  This technique has allowed me to focus my energy and attention and get my business rolling.  It is only right to point out that Scott got this technique from Eben Pagan, the super star of personal and business development.  It’s called the 50-10 technique.  Here’s how it works.

Most of us sit down at our computer and get engrossed in our work and don’t stop until we are interrupted or we finally get tired.  That can be hours if you’re working at home and it’s late at night and there aren’t any interruptions.  Have you done this?  When I finally stop I’ll often realize that it’s late and I’m tired and I’ve still not finished what I set out to do.  This is exactly what the 50-10 technique prevents.  The 50-10 technique directs you to work on your task for 50 minutes and at the end of that 50 minutes stop working, get up and completely change your focus and environment for 10 minutes.  This physical and mental break is what makes all the difference in your productivity.

During the 10 minutes you should get away from your work environment entirely, get some water and rehydrate.  Then step outside and get some fresh air.  If you can it’s good to take a quick walk around the block.  But you might want to grab a handful of nuts or a healthy snack.  Just make sure not to eat sugar because that can mess with your whole system and ruin the productivity.  Sometimes when I don’t walk I’ll work on chores, take out the trash or something.  The idea here is to change the environmental and metabolic experience so you don’t get stuck in a rut.  It’s when you’re in a rut that your productivity begins to decline, slowly enough that you don’t really notice it, until it’s late and you’re still not done with your task.

But wait, there’s more to it.  Another part of the increased productivity is the introduction of a starting AND a stopping time.  By focusing your energy into a 50 minute block, you get a sense of your time limitations, you start with a completed task in mind, and you can work without worrying about other tasks.  In order to free yourself from watching the clock (a source of interruption every time you look up and check the time) you should get a timer.  Eben Pagan recommends using an electronic timer.  You set it at 50 minutes and an alarm sounds when the 50 minutes has passed.   That way you can free your mind to your task completely with the knowledge that all you have to do is complete the task, or that portion of the task, that you set out to accomplish.

I hope this time management help improves your productivity like it did for me.  Oh, I’ve got to wrap up this piece now because my alarm is about to go off.  I hope you’ll let me know if this technique helps you by commenting.  Good luck with it.

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admin, February 1st 2010 | Tags: , , , ,
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Why Use Blogs In Online Marketing?

Why use blogs in network marketing?  Because a blog can become your home on the web; your living room where prospective leads can meet you and get to know you.  We all know that the likelihood of a purchase is significantly increases as the level of trust increases in your relationship with leads.  One of the limitations of network marketing online has been that, except for your ad content or your landing page and sales page copy, people have little opportunity to read about you, let alone spend time getting to know you.  Therefore it makes sense to offer a place for people to read about you, to read your thoughts on various topics that might interest them and to spend time building a positive opinion about your. That place is your personal blog.

By blogging about topics interesting you and related to your keywords, you will begin to build personal credibility.  Prospects will begin to see your expertise and knowledge on subjects which interest you.  It is important that you allow your personality come out in your blog posts.  You should express yourself, allowing a peak into your personal interests and passions!  As this occurs, they will identify “hooks” upon which to hang opinions of you.  This is a critical step in relationship building.

Another critical step in relationship building is social proof, or social credibility.  Buyers want to know that other thoughtful people think well of you too.  This social credibility makes it easier to trust you.  A blog allows readers to comment and engage you in conversations that other people can read.  A blog allows you to create a visitor’s gallery, like a Google Friends Connect widget, where visitors who like your blog can sign in as a supporter.  Again, social proof that you offer value.

As you express yourself in your blog posts, on your “About” or “My Story” page, in embedded videos, and on other pages you include in your blog site, people will begin accumulating more and more hooks.  As they see others interacting with you in comments, and as they interact with you themselves, relationships will begin to form.  Even if you’ve never met the person, they will assume that a relationship is there.  Photos of you and your life and especially videos of you hasten the relationship building process.  The overall impression and relationship people walk away with after these interactions through your blog attribute to your image, your personal brand.

Why use a blog in online marketing?  Building your brand and building leads through blogging are the best way I know to build a list and build your business.  If you don’t already have a blog, I hope you’ll get started on one now.  I’m a real believer in the power of a blog to bridge the personal gap left open by the sometimes impersonal nature of the Internet.  Besides, I think blogging is fun.  For me it’s a stress relief to peck out my frustrations at the keyboard.  Have fun blogging!

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admin, January 29th 2010 | Posted in Uncategorized

Beginner Internet Marketing Recommendations

I want to recommend a Beginner Internet Marketing action sequence for people just getting started in the industry. Many come into the field without a clear course of action and here is a good one for you to follow. I’m assuming for this article that you have already selected a niche market. If not, that should be a first priority today, and implementing the following recommendations should be next. I’ll post soon on selecting a niche. I’ll preface this recommendation by stating that if you have a coach or a solid marketing plan from a trusted source, try that first. I do not want to interrupt your training.


Anchor Yourself With A Blog. My first recommendation is to anchor yourself on the Internet with a blog. Let your blog be your online living room where you invite people to come and visit you and find out what you’re all about. If you don’t know how to create a blog, I recommend you cruise on over to and check out a free WordPress.com blog. WordPress makes it easy to create a blog and take up immediate residence on the web. Be sure to put pictures of yourself on the blog and write a good “My Story” or “About Me” page. I’ll post more on blogging soon.


Generate Social Media Friends. Next I recommend that you start making friends in Social Media. If that sounds daunting, don’t worry. It’s a lot easier than you might think. Here’s what I’d like for you to do:


• Set Up A Facebook Account. Go to Facebook.com and set up an account, it’s free. Put a smiling and professional looking picture of yourself in your profile. Also put a link to your blog in your profile too. I’ll write more on Facebook soon. I want you to add 35 friends a day. Here’s how to do that. Join Facebook Groups in your niche market. Don’t go in and start pitching your product, just don’t do that. Instead go in and comment on what others are saying. Your first post should simply be to introduce yourself and tell the group that you’re new to the group and anxious to begin interacting. My biggest tip for you is to always ask a question in every post, so people will engage in conversation. Then add them as a friend. As you see posts that are interesting to you, invite those people to be friends. Try to invite 25 to 30 people a day to be friends.

• Set Up A Twitter Account. Go to Twitter.com and get an account and start Tweeting. There is a ton of information on how to Tweet. Be sure to put the same picture on Twitter that you have in Facebook, and put a link to your blog in your profile. Let me give you the most basic ones. Never blatantly pitch your business. Your first goal on Twitter is to add 50 friends a day. I’ll write a post on doing this soon, but basically find leaders in your company or in the industry. Add followers from their follower list. Just add from the most recent 5 pages. Try to add 50 a day at first. When you get to about 200, you can add 75 a day. As you grow add a few more. Once you’re around 1,000 you can add 200 a day. After 2,000 members you can add 400 to 450 a day. Just like on Facebook, try to engage these people. Retweet messages from people who have something constructive to say. As a guideline, tweet at least 10 times a day.

Use this formula. Tweet 2 uplifting quotes. Tweet 3 informational tweets about the business, a technique, or offering a link to an interesting video, blog, or article you’ve read about the business. Tweet 2 or 3 times about daily life or what you’re interested in…just be yourself and NEVER use profanity or sexually suggestive language because a lot of people you can attract as customers will be turned off by it. And finally, be really careful, but you can tweet 1 fun and INDIRECT advertisement for your business per 10 Tweets. That’s the 90:10 Rule of Promotion. Check out my tweets and you’ll see what I mean. Here’s one as an example: “3 Things I couldn’t live without, my Family, Basketball, and this: h ttp://[yourlandingpage].com. You’ll get the hang of it. Just remember to regularly invite people to your blog and to join you in Facebook.

• After Two Weeks Add One More Technique. After you’ve become accustomed to blogging, making friends on Facebook and Twitter, you need to add a technique to your daily practice. You can select from any number of free techniques like article writing, video, Forum marketing. I personally recommend making a video that summarizes each blog post. My favorite two are:


o Video. Post that video on YouTube.com and put it in your blog (just copy the embed code from YouTube and insert into your blog post). In the description of the video on YouTube, put your blog address on the first line, starting with the http//: part. Nothing else on the first line of the description.
o Articles. If you’re uncomfortable with video, you can easily do article posting. Just take your blog and post to some of the leading article directories, like EzineArticles.com, Amazines.com, and GoArticles.com.

Add In Pay Per Click. You should add Pay Per Click when you can afford it. Don’t start until you can spend at least $500 per month in PPC advertising. As soon as your business is generating profit, begin investing that profit into PPC. This is the fastest way to generate leads, but special training and practice is required or it will be ineffective.


If you follow the Beginner Internet Marketing guidelines above, your business will start picking up steam and leads. If you have any problems feel free to contact me and I’ll get you going. Good luck!

2 Comments

admin, January 28th 2010 | Tags: , , ,
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Why Get A Mentor?

Why get a mentor?  Because if you don’t want to be prey to the industry, you’ll need to become king of your jungle, and if you read on you’ll see why you need a mentor to make the transition.  Let me explain; there is a significant likelihood that if you join a Network Marketing company you’re going to fail.   Of course your results may vary, but the average is 95% to 97%.  That goes for online or face-to-face marketing, it doesn’t matter.  This is a bare-boned and frank discussion of the reality of starting any business.  It’s DANGEROUS out there and if you are average you’ll be eaten alive.  Are you willing to be average, just fresh meat for an industry full of predators?  If the answer is an emphatic ‘No’, then you’ll need a mentor to become a “Leadership Lion”, a “Business Tiger”, and a “Marketing Bear”.

A mentor can help you get through two very steep learning curves.  One is marketing and sales, and the other is Business and Leadership.  A mentor knows the path, has been through this jungle before.  A mentor will help you become what you’ll need to be to succeed.

Become a Marketing Tiger.  Many people jump into a business opportunity thinking that they’ll invite a few friends to a meeting or put up a website and a sales funnel and the money will just come rollin in.  Not so…they’re already in the ‘Exit Lane’ from the industry and haven’t been involved 5 minutes.  Marketing and sales are at the heart of Network Marketing.  Don’t believe anyone who says “you don’t have to sell, you just share”, Horse Apples (Col. Potter, MASH).

Marketing is figuring out what to sell, whom to sell it to, how to find them, and what to tell them so they are attracted into communication with you so you can sell something to them.  And Sales is what you do with them once they show up at your door so they end up buying just exactly what they need and want, going away happy that they ran into you and telling their friends to go see you too.  This is a bit of a Swiss Cheese (full of holes) interpretation, but I think you get the point.  Marketing and sales are at the CORE of running a business.  Here are a couple of gold-letter definitions from the American Marketing Association for those of you who are sticklers for precision:

  • Marketing.  Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.
  • Sales.  Any of a number of activities designed to promote customer purchase of a product or service. Sales can be done in person or over the phone, through e-mail or other communication media. The process generally includes stages such as assessing customer needs, presenting product features and benefits to address those needs and negotiation on price, delivery and other elements.

Folks this takes time to learn marketing and sales, are you willing to spend time?  Don’t expect money to come rolling in up-front without these skills.  To get up this learning curve fast, you’re going to need help.  You’re going to need a solid and tested training process, and you’re going to need a mentor who can guide you through.

Become a Business Bear and a Leadership Lion.  The second learning curve is the Business Owner Mindset.  This is my favorite because it doesn’t sound very hard.  When I first started in this business I thought it would be a cinch, after all I figured that I had an MBA, 20 years in Corporate world, and I was leaving my role as VP of Marketing.  WRONG; I was not prepared to instantly succeed as a business owner and it took a lot of energy to get there.  I didn’t realize how ingrained the employer-employee mentality was in my personality.  Bottom line, even if you have the marketing and sales skills, financial management skills, if you don’t have the mindset of a Business Owner, you’re going to bounce all over the profits board, and you’ll end up a casualty of the industry.

The reason is simple enough.  Employees know that if they go to work, they’ll receive money in exchange.  Business Owners know that they don’t make money unless they make it happen.  Successful business owners don’t quit because they have stalwart self-determination.  Successful business owners are driven from within, from desire and a dream and from passion.  They love what they’re doing, or at lease something core to what they’re doing.

This is the mindset that’s going to get you past the tough times.  It’s the mindset that’s going to see zero sales and just keep pushing forward.  It’s the mindset that asks “how am I going to make this happen” when you get Google-Slapped (lose your AdWords account).   It’s the mindset that gets you up in the morning with a smile on your face when you’re losing money, knowing that you’re ultimately going to make money because of what you do each and every day to improve your business.  And it’s the mindset that forces you to change your entire personality and become an ‘Alpha’ leader so you can literally attract people into your business like a magnet.

Take it from me, you’re going to need a mentor who can help you make this transition into a business owner’s mindset.  It’s a steep learning curve, and I didn’t make it to the top until I had a mentor.

Get a Mentor.  Three percent to five percent make it in the industry, that’s all.  Eighty percent of those work with a mentor.  In fact over time they have a series of mentors as the ramp up their success year-after-year.  Are you going to be a statistic of this industry, or are you going to become a Business Lion, a Leadership Lion, a Marketing Tiger, and a Business Bear?  Get a mentor.  You’ll thank me for it.

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admin, January 27th 2010 | Tags: , , ,
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How We Started A Syndicated Marketing Tribe

Recently Patrick McIntosh and I started a Syndicated Marketing Tribe that has begun to see great success in just its first eight weeks of operation.  Already we’ve had members reporting a doubling of traffic to their sites.  This is just astounding.  Here’s how we did it.

As a first criterion, we wanted to invite online marketers whom we knew to be active in the Social Media and who were posting high quality content to their sites.  At first we brainstormed a list of about 20 people and agreed to each visit their sites and engage them in Social Media for 2 weeks.  At the conclusion we had built some good relationships and were able to narrow our list to approximately 12 people, knowing that ultimately we wanted an active tribe of 5 to 8, with no more than 12.

Next we sent out invitations to each of them inviting them to a kick-off webinar and explaining about the tribe and its goals.  The introduction said, “You are invited to join a new and exciting tribe of online marketers with the express purpose of syndicating each other’s content to dramatically increase traffic to the members’ sites.  The idea is to leverage our share of free traffic and minimize the need for paid advertising for our businesses, and have fun and make some valued friends in the process!”

Next we laid out the big picture.  “We envision this tribe as a small group of 12 or so at first.  We’re specifically inviting people we know to be active in social media and to offer positive, uplifting or educational content in their blogs and videos.  Later each will be encouraged to establish a second tribe of their own, resulting in over 12 tribes linked for power promotions”.

And we gave them an idea of the time commitment.  “Certainly there will be time commitments.  It’s an everyday task to promote other tribe members, at least 6 days a week.  Probably it will take 20 minutes a day.  Plus there is a mastermind call built in to support the tribe, 1 hour a week”.

And finally we listed our expectations of members.  “To give you a preliminary idea of what is required, here is a list of key accountabilities:

  • Daily “Tweets”.  Getting the word out about the developments of each-other’s content with Social Media.
  • The holding high of the “Content Bar” to ensure we are consistent, accountable to our goals and delivering valuable content to move others forward.
  • Following the 90:10 Rule of ’90 percent helpful content and only 10 percent pitching.’
  • Weekly participation in a Power Hour of masterminding.
  • Being authentic, real and having fun with the process.

In addition to sharing the sign-up details for the webinar, we called each of the invitees and discussed the opportunity with them.

This is how we set up our Syndicated Marketing Tribe. Can you think of 20 people you’d like to work with on a weekly basis?  People destined to become great friends, supporters and advocates?  I encourage you to get involved in a Marketing Syndication Tribe.  My tribes and I are starting more tribes, so you’re welcome to contact me and I’ll get you connected.  Please let me know what you thought of today’s content by leaving comments.  If you liked it, please share it with others via Twitter, Facebook, and by bookmarking it.

Thanks,

Phil

614-570-5293

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4 Comments

admin, January 26th 2010 | Posted in Uncategorized

Advantages of Marketing Syndication Tribes

Certainly the key advantage to joining a Syndicated Marketing Tribe is building traffic to your site and, hopefully, increasing sales.  That’s the goal.  My friend Patrick McIntosh and I started a tribe called the ‘DailyCrushers’ and about six weeks ago and already some tribe members are reporting increased traffic volume, up to double the pre-Tribe levels.  That’s simply astounding.  But traffic volume is not the only reason you should participate; in fact there are quite a few.

What we’ve noticed in our tribe is that a number of benefits are beginning to appear in addition to increased traffic.  Once a week our tribe joins together on a SKYPE call and we promote each other’s latest blog posts, articles, videos, etc. We call these calls our “Power Hour”.  It’s just a amazing how much interaction and exchange of ideas can occur between our members during these calls.  Here are a few benefits I’ve started noticing from our Tribe and its “Power Hours”:

  • Accountability. You’ve heard the expression, “your word is your bond”, and nothing is more true than with Social Media.  If you recommend a blog post then you are staking your reputation on it, that is, you are staking the reputation of your brand on it.  That’s serious stuff, and our tribe holds each other accountable for posting high quality material.  If it doesn’t meet the standard, it doesn’t get promoted.  This is a nice incentive to continually work to produce excellent content.
  • Mutual Support. The tribe members are also great about letting each other know if there are any problems with their blog, like a widget failing, strange things going on with the sidebar, or failure to properly set up TweetMeMe.  This helps you keep your blog looking its best for everyone else. Also, if any of us has a problem or needs advice, we’ve got access to a collection of online marketing and Internet experts that can get it solved.  Finally, members have each other’s backs.  If you’re sponsoring an event or a webinar, the Tribe is great to get in behind and promote it for you.  Our friends in network marketing have an expression, “you’re in business for yourself, but not by yourself”.  This is a major benefit of the Tribe, whether you’re in network marketing, affiliate sales, business coaching or sell your own products.
  • Mastermind Effect. I know from my marketing research background that groups of people create a synergy, where the sum of the parts working together is greater than the sum of the individuals working separately (ex. 2 + 2 =6).  That’s exactly how a smooth-operating tribe works too.  Recently one of our members was experiencing “writer’s block” coming up with a blog post topic.  The tribe discussed it and a great topic surfaced.  This kind of higher group function can really help you leverage your business.
  • Leadership. The tribe is also a great place to hone your leadership skills.  When setting up our tribe we went to great lengths to establish that the tribe was strictly a team of equals.  At any specific time any member can step in and provide leadership to a group of peers.  This happens every week in our tribe, and as far as I can recall, every single member has provided leadership; it’s just a natural outgrowth of participating in a creative group session.
  • Stretching Personal Growth. We’re pushing our tribe members to begin creating unique expert training.  Each tribe member is developing a 10-minute presentation which will be delivered at a Power Hour.  For most, this pushes them past their normal comfort zone.  That’s exactly where they need to be operating if they want to grow as a person, as a leader, and as a business owner.  The tribe can serve as a stimulus to push its members to raise their standards and to improve themselves.
  • Joint Venture Potential. In addition to stimulating personal growth, the presentations during our Power Hour will begin to accumulate into an information bank of training that we can refine, package and sell as joint venture products.  We’re ultimately going to be able to monetize our efforts to help each other, and to me, that’s just amazing!
  • Best Practice Identification. Over the six weeks since we started our tribe, various members have shared special expertise with the tribe.  For instance, one tribe member is Matthew Neer, who is a WordPress and HTML guru.  His practices and advice have improved each of our blog sites.  Another member, Glenn Arcaro, is a professional television editor, who has provided us with expert tips on making videos for our businesses.

One of the benefits I didn’t mention is that this is actually a lot of fun!  I don’t know about you, but for me fun is a real motivator and a great reward for all the work I do operating my online business.  I hope you’ll consider joining a Syndicated Marketing Tribe and sharing some of the benefits I’ve found with mine.  I’d love to hear from you.  Please comment on this post and let me know what you’re thinking.  And if you like what you’re reading, please Tweet about it and bookmark the post.

Thanks,

Phil Jackson

614-570-5293

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On Tribe Building And Social Media

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9 Comments

admin, January 25th 2010 | Tags:
Posted in Uncategorized

Coming of Age in Online Marketing: Marketing Syndication Tribes

Marketing Syndication Tribes are the newest way to succeed in Online Marketing.  People naturally join tribes; we all know that.  We all know that we love the companionship and supportive comfort of our tribes.  Seth Godin points out in Tribes that people have been part of tribes for millions of years.  It’s who we are.  In fact we’re all in multiple tribes right now.  Your family is a tribe, so is the PTA Fund-Raising Committee, your Sunday school class at church, and your workgroup at the office.  We all enjoy the benefits of tribes in almost every aspect of our lives.  But in Online Marketing the concept of tribes has evaded us…until now.

Marketing Syndication Tribes bring the power of synergy to your online marketing.  They also bring the power of knowledge sharing among tribe members, who are also online marketers.  These tribes bring you the power of accountability and they also give you the self-assurance that someone “has your back”.  That’s pretty powerful.  But the biggest benefit of Marketing Syndication Tribes is that they can leverage your business into a better sales position…you know, you’ll make more money!

So what is this Marketing Syndication Tribe thing all about?  First of all, it’s about amplifying your marketing.  It’s about bringing the lively enthusiasm of true fans to bat for you in the Social Media.  What do you do when you post to your blog, publish an article, load a video on YouTube, or write an entry into Facebook or even Tweet?  If you’re like most of us, you hope that others will pick up on it and re-tweet you and put the word out.  Your post is like tossing a pebble into a mirror-still pond; the ripples spread and grow.  With a tribe syndicating your post, it’s like a bucket of pebbles being tossed individually into the pond…even like a truck load of them.  Just imagine the ripples!  Marketing Syndication Tribes get the word out fast, and potentially viral if your content justifies it.

This is the first of a series of articles on Marketing Tribe Syndication.  Future articles will cover topics like where to learn more, how to start your own tribe, what to do to syndicate marketing, and what kind of monetization can you and your tribe members achieve.

Thanks,

Phil

614-570-5293

Watch Recorded Webinar

On Tribe Building and Social Media

CLICK  TO WATCH

5 Comments

admin, January 20th 2010 | Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized
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