Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

It seems like yesterday we were hunkering down for the apocalyptic Y2K to happen but another year and another decade have passed us by.

Now we have the good feeling of knowing that a brand new year and a brand new decade is directly ahead of us and we look forward with great anticipation to big things that are awaiting us!

The new year is always a great time to do a quick reflection and review of your goals.

This time of year typically is when we reflect back on the new year’s resolutions made a year ago and compare to how we finished the year out.  With a decade already passed us, this becomes an even bigger task but one that is definitely worth doing.

There is much that we can bring into the new year from the past 10 years as experience is often times the best teacher.

What lessons did you learn from the past 10 years?  If you could do it over again, what would you do differently?  These are all questions designed to help you prepare to change your results for the next 10 years.   After all, sometimes we get ourselves into a ‘rut’ in life and we can’t seem to find our way out.

Albert Einstein once said the definition of insanity was “doing the same things over and over but expecting a different result.”  We don’t want to be that person!  What we really need to do is change our course of action.  This is where knowing what hasn’t worked in the past can help lead us to finding the right path for success into the future.

So there is great wealth stored in up in some of the answers to these questions so be sure to write them down as you can use them to begin your game plan and strategy for 2010 and beyond.

NOW it’s time to cash in on that experience!

Here are seven ways that you create your best year ever in 2010!

1. Do a serious evaluation and review of your life’s goals and results over the past 1-10 years.   Look closely at the issues that you struggled with the most and what actions you took to resolve them.  Are you still struggling with these same issues?  It’s time to change the actions!
2. Write down with specific detail your goals with 30, 60, 90 day, 1-year, 5-year, and 10-year outlooks.  These goals should reflect every aspect of your life:  personal, financial, business, social, health, etc.  Know exactly how you want your life to look as you reach each milestone.  Be very specific to time, dollar amounts, locations, sizes, brands, colors, people involved, levels of achievement, etc.  YOU HAVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU WANT!!!
3. Use visualization to run the movie reel of your life ‘over and over’ again so much that you can actually see in your minds eye yourself living at the level you desire!  You will be creating an emotional tie and positive feeling with this experience that will be ‘programmed’ into your sub-conscious level of thought which will be your magnetic field for attracting everything you will need to bring it to fruition.
4. Do daily affirmations.  Affirmations are statements of your belief of what you expect to happen written down and read aloud each day, preferably in the morning as you start your day.  Affirmations are key to off setting any negative feelings, discouragement, fear, doubt, worry, anxieties that surely will try to impose their way occasionally into your realm of conscious thinking.
5. Gather needed resources.   There may be things or people that you need in your life to break free from the ‘ruts’ we talked about earlier.  You may need various tools, systems, coaches, training, etc. to empower you to onward and upward to a new level of success in your life.  Some of the resources you may need may have been discovered after you did step 1 with you personal evaluation.
6. Commit to a daily method of operation (DMO).   You will need to set up your DMO as your daily checklist and guide to DOING the things that you need to do to get the results you are looking to get.  Knowing what to do and ACTUALLY DOING what needs to be done are entirely different things!  I recommend making your checklist before bed, and executing your plan by day as the basis for your DMO.  You fill in the blanks.  Remember, MASSIVE ACTION = MASSIVE RESULTS!!!
7. Build strategic partnerships.   I recommend that you don’t try to take your success journey alone, find some other people around you who have similar goals and aspirations as you do and lock arms together and become accountability partners together!  This will help you from ‘falling off the wagon’ to sorta speak and keep you focused and disciplined to reach each step of the way.

My final thought for you is this.

Today is the first day of a new week, a new month, a new year, and a new decade.  It may be intimidating sometimes to tackle all of these thought provoking activities at once but trust me, you will be glad your doing it.

They say that the journey of a thousand miles starts with the very first step.

Take that step now and create a year in 2010 that will become your best year ever!

Much success to you this year!

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Who Is The Leader Here?

Have you ever been involved in something and wondered who was in charge?  Especially when things were not going well or were in a state of chaos?  Or have you ever thought that maybe things could be happening faster if you were in charge?

Those are moments when you can see the power vacuum that exists in that particular group or organization.  The lack of leadership can be devastating to the forward motion of any team or organization.

Great leaders never wait for things to happen for them, they MAKE things happen!  They immediately seize the opportunity to step up and take charge because they are results driven.

You probably have heard the saying, “If it’s going to be, it’s up to me!” before?  It is really true.   Too many people are waiting all the time for someone to make life happen for them and that’s not how it works.  If you want something to happen in your life or business, decide to make it happen and do it for yourself.

Leaders don’t make excuses, they take action!  Leaders always gain momentum faster than followers do and they typically will earn more too!  That’s a good reason right there why you should step up and be one.

Sometimes we hope that someone else will take the responsibilities of leading the charge and doing all the planning, organizing, communicating with the members of the group so that we can relax and enjoy the fruit of another person’s labor.  If everyone thought like that we would never get anything accomplished or move ahead in our endeavors!

It’s not always  easy trying to build a team and get all the parts moving in one direction all the time but it is worth doing.

Here are seven reasons why you should step up and be the leader of your team or organization:

1.  Leaders  cast the vision and set the direction for the team.

2.  Leaders  are the pacesetters for growth by their example.

3.  Leaders  will be recognized as the ‘expert’ within the organization.

4.  Leaders  will become more visible and will attract other leaders who wish to model your success.

5.  Leaders have a platform to communicate their messages from.

6.  Leaders opinions always  matter when it comes to problem solving.

7.  Leaders will be remembered with their legacy for  contributions made when serving their organization.

Leaders will always think, “If not me… who? If not now…when? If no solution… how?” Leaders are extremely valuable to any community, business, or organization and their contributions usually are always remembered.

It’s not always easy and sometimes the tasks at hand are difficult.  But leaders are like eagles where they will soar high above the challenges and will always find the way to success!

So the next time your trying to find out who the leader is, try looking in the mirror!

* If you are enjoying articles like this one you might also enjoy my video tips, training, and resources on video at my YouTube Channel!  Please visit http://www.youtube.com/mlmphonepro.  Don’t forget to rate, comment, and subscribe while your there! Thanks! Steve

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Are You Communicating Properly?

Have you ever felt like you had a lot to say about your product, service, or opportunity but it was falling on ‘deaf ears’?

Many people feel that way including me from time to time.  We live in a over populated marketing world where the ‘promotion noise’ is deafening and it can be extremely challenging for you to get your message heard.

It is very important that when you do get the attention of your prospect for that brief moment in time that you are communicating with them at a very high level so that you can have a maximum impact on them!  You only have a few moments of their attention so you better say what needs to be said and in a way that it is memorable to them.

Often time people just want to ‘throw up’ all over their prospects and just waste a good prospecting opportunity.  There needs to be more strategy in marketing your wares than just being a blow hard salesman.

That’s why we need to know the 8 keys to being an effective communicator when creating our copy for our landing pages, websites, social media profiles, articles, blogs, videos, webinars, conference calls, etc. etc.

Here are the 8 keys:

1.   Always look through your prospect’s eyes, not your own.

Don’t assume that your prospects know why your product, service, or opportunity is valuable to them.  Explain the reasons to them.  Most professional advertisers write to a fifth or six-grade reading level, because most people are not really paying attention.

2.   Follow the path of least resistance.

It takes longer to change peoples minds than to just build upon the current perceptions they already have.   Find a way to reinforce something they already believe and tie it in directly to buying your product.  The power in this is accepting people as they are and seeking the smallest possible change in their behavior that is required to  get them to buy from you.

3.  Don’t be logical – be psychological

People are both rational and emotional.  But it is emotion that drives attitude and behavior.  Behavior is the result of fear and desire.  When desire exceeds fear, people will act.  The goal in writing good sales copy is to increase desire and reduce fear.  In short, choose the most powerful words you can get away with to drive people’s  emotions.  For example, ‘bulletproof’ is more emotionally powerful than ’safe’.

4.  Organize information around a single idea or theme.

Organize your content to be based upon a single idea versus overloading your prospects with too much information.   Drive home the main point or theme with precision.  Don’t overstate the obvious with lists of information, they won’t read it.  Your headline, tagline, and opening paragraph are vitally important here.

5.  Be conversational.  Write to express and not impress.

Be conversational with your writing style.  Try not to use big ‘$100′ words that people don’t understand.  Simplicity and being authentic is key.  One way to test your copy is to read it out loud as you write it and listen to how it sounds to you.

6.   Less is more

The average reader gives you about a half second or less to determine if they will pay any attention to your communication so less is definitely more!  Use short words, sentences, and paragraphs to break up the thoughts into easy-to-read bites.  Use bullet points and phrases to summarize your thoughts and make it easy.  Remember, people don’t read anymore, they scan!

7.  Use visual language to paint pictures in people’s minds.

Use words that frame a picture in your prospects mind of your main point.  Don’t be vague and use general vocabulary but be specific and concrete in your descriptions of your offer.

8.  Don’t hype your offer, validate everything!

Documentation beats conversation every single time right?  People are not impressed with your ‘hype’ and overly positive attitude about your offer.  They are impressed and inspired to action when they can see verifiable results through third party validation.  People don’t trust much anymore, why should they trust you?  Get the proof they need.

Marketing in today’s world requires much more than being just a ‘bag full of wind’.  It requires some understanding of knowing your target audience and knowing how to communicate effectively to them using these 8 keys and others.

So, if your wondering why people are not responding to your communications via your marketing, think about changing your approach and using some of the 8 keys of being an effective communicator!

* Excerpts of this article were taken from “Perfect Phrases for Sales and Marketing Copy”  by Barry Callen

** If you are enjoying articles like these, please visit my video channel at www.youtube.com/mlmphonepro and watch, rate, and subscribe to my videos!!!  Thanks! Steve

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