Have you ever said to yourself, I’ll give back… when I’ve made more money, I’ll give back… when I have more time?

Let me tell you about my recent trip to Thailand where I spent 3 days in Khao Lak, one of the hardest hit areas of the Boxing Day Tsunami back in 2004.

I visited the Briza hotel which sits right on the beach that got devastated by the tsunami (the above video was shot on the beach there) and the most rewarding part of the trip was when I visited and stayed at the Baan Tharn Namchai Orphanage which was setup after the Boxing Day Tsunami as a place for the kids who lost their parents, brothers and sisters on that tragic day.

I think so often we get stuck in our own lives, that we forget just how lucky we all are here in Australia.

Yes we have problems, everybody does. There is no such thing as a perfect life however seeing these kids, learning about their backstories and some of the horrible things that have happened in their lives – yet they are still smiling, laughing and wanting to play – it is an absolute inspiration.

These Kids Are the Inspiration… Why We Must BE MORE… DO MORE… and HAVE MORE to give.

You and I are the Answer…

I believe the world will be changed by those of us in it who choose to change it. I believe we need more businesses to succeed and that we must create more business owners who are not chained to their businesses but have freedom and flexibility.

As Entrepreneurs and Business Owners we are the people who make real impacts on the world, through the creation of jobs, through the creation of wealth that can be shared, as facilitators of dreams and as the creators of change and legacy.

That’s why I’m really excited about my upcoming event “Magnetic Marketing” in Sydney on the 30th of March.

If you haven’t secured your seat yet – GRAB YOUR COMPLIMENTARY TICKET NOW! ($997 Value)

At this event you will be hearing from 4 Leading Marketing experts here in Australia. Alex Coulson, Jesse Forrest, Tyrone Shum and yours truly – It’s our way of helping create more successful business owners who will make an impact on the world. We won’t be holding back, it’s going to be practical step by step ways to get your business more customers.

We Asked… You Answered… You Want More Of The Right Customers!

We’ll be covering the latest cutting edge strategies like

• How you can use Video to reach millions of potential customers for under $1000
• The changes that Google has made that means it’s now a level playing field again when it comes to getting to #1 on Google
• The exact structure you need to make your website actually work and make you money
• How to find and attract the right customers who love spending money with you
• and much much more.

I’d love to see you there, click here for more info or register below.

Time to Get Re-Invigorated

Welcome to 2012 everyone. I trust that you have all taken a well deserved break and enjoyed your holiday period.

I don’t know about you but for me after a break I find getting back into the swing of business takes some time and is a bit of a struggle. Maybe you are a jump starter you feel refreshed and your roaring to go. Either way this exercise is for you.

In this blog post I want to teach you my exact New Years Business Optimiser session that I am doing this week. Im going to share the questions i ask myself and what i look at to ensure this new year is a success.

You know being the start of a new year it’s the perfect time to reflect on what you achieved last year and what you are going to achieve this year.

Your Business Planning Session

What You Need

• Blank Piece of Paper
• 1 or 2 Coloured Pens (Blue and Red are my suggestions)

The Next Steps

1. With your blank piece of paper draw a line down the middle turning it into 2 columns.
2. Now at the top of the page in the left column put the heading “Rear View Mirror”.
3. At the top of the page in the right column put the heading “The Road Ahead”.

In The  Rear View Mirror…

Write down and answet the questions…

• What are you most proud of last year?

• What were your biggest challenges last year?

• What did you start doing but didn’t finish/ why?

• How many leads or enquiries did you get?

• How many new customers did you get?

• How often did these customers buy from you? Did they come once the entire year, did they buy from you 3 times, or 10 times?

• If you sell more than one product or service, What was your most popular product or service?

If you don’t know these numbers then one of your focuses for this next year better include tracking these things so you are ready for next year.

You’ll also notice we didn’t take a look at financials, because you should be doing this at least monthly if not more reguarly. So if you are only looking at your financials once a year, I highly suggest you also add that to your focuses for 2012.

For The Road Ahead…

• What do you personally want out of your business this year?

• What profit do you expect to make this year?

• How much money will you invest in your education, in marketing, in research and product development

• How many new customers do you want and how many do you need?

• What is the average amount they need to spend?

• How often will customers buy from you?

• What strategies are you going to focus on to achieve if not exceed all these targets you just set

Don’t bog yourself down with analysis paralysis just look at the big picture. What are you planning to achieve this year and what strategies are you using to do it?

No matter what you are focusing on, remember to keep educating. The more your learn the more you earn so buy books, attend courses, find free resources online.

Is getting more customers one of your focuses this year?

Then put your name and email in below to ensure that you stay in contact with me and get lots strategies that will make your business be seen more, convert more and ultimately make more money.

At the begginning of this month I ran a promotion, Giving away a Free 16GB Ipad 2 to one lucky winner… all you had to do was fill in a short survey around Marketing and Yourself as an Entrepreneur and Business Owner and tell me in 20 words or less why you wanted an iPad 2 for your business.

After 375 Entries and going through each one to see the amazing responses and reasons… A winner was chosen – Below is the video that announces the winner and answers the most asked question from the respondants to the survey.

Did you win? Watch and Find Out

Why Did I Do This Survey?

I’m launching an exciting new program in 2012, called The Marketing Matrix, and as a part of this I needed to learn more about you and the challenges you face and what you like around business education. This is a something you should be doing in your business when you are starting out, or are launching a new product or service – you must do Market Research and ask your audience what they want, what they like, what they don’t like and their biggest challenges.

The easiest way to do this is send an survey to them via email… here are the top 3 tools I recommend to send a survey

• Survey Gizmo
• Google Docs – Forms
• Survey Monkey

What have I done with these responses?

The responses have helped me shape the structure and format of the Marketing Matrix as well as helping shape what will be covered to ensure that this brand new business education program will (I hope) be a game changer in the industry of business education.

One that guarantees and actually delivers real results and actions in an intimate learning environment with real participant collaboration.

Can You Find Out More About The Marketing Matrix?

If you want to be kept in the loop about this new course that will help you Get More Customers, Who Spend More With You, More Often… just put your name and email below and I’ll be sure to send you some of the free videos that will help you (the first video is about defining and finding your ideal customer) and then invite you to learn more when I’m ready to announce.

The Email Newsletter Is Dead - You Need To Offer Value

With everyone getting too much email, is it time to give up on Email Marketing?

Ten years ago, if you had a form on your website that said “Subscribe to our newsletter” you were leading the way in online marketing for small business. But today if you have this same form it means you are straggling behind all the other small businesses who use direct email marketing as part of their online marketing strategy.

You see, no one ever subscribes to an email newsletter anymore, people get enough emails as it is – I know because hundreds of people have invested in my course Inbox Domination just to combat this exact problem.

Seriously, think about it… when was the last time you put your email address in on a website that said “Subscribe to our newsletter”

Does this mean Email as an Online Marketing Strategy is Dead?

Certainly not, Email is still a great online marketing strategy if you know how to use it. Email marketing has just evolved but too many businesses haven’t caught up with the changes yet. You see people don’t want more emails and special offers they want value, they want content.

I’m sure you’ve noticed the number of websites offering free e-books and special reports about “buying the right guinea pig” and “how to eat your way to a six pack with no exercise” are on the rise, this is because this is the type of enticement that your potential customers need in exchange for their name and email.

Your first sale online really should be in exchange for their Name and their email address – and nothing more.

This is because you want to build your database so you can follow them up and convert them to a sale later. Plus the size and the quality of your customer and prospect database is one of the key elements that make up the value of your business when it comes time to sell.

5 Email Marketing Tips for Small Business – How To Make Email Marketing Work

Step 1. Create your Money Magnet

Also called a Lead Magnet or Free Gift, this is your product of value (note I say value, it can’t be junk that has no substance) that you offer in exchange for an email address.

Many people write e-books, or special reports. Other people develop videos and free courses.

My suggestion is, as with all good marketing strategy, start by finding out what the most common question you are asked by your customers and find out if you can answer that in an interesting and valuable way.

For example, if you run a Personal Training Studio and you are commonly being asked “Do I have to change my diet as well or do we just exercise?”

You could create a 6 Part Free Video Series on “How to Lose Weight while Eating More” and you could cover specifically why you recommend eating more to activate the metabolism and recommend some great recipes and give some exercises your prospects can do at home.

This 6 Part Video Series would be an email sent to them every day or maybe every second day with the next video and the final video would include a call to action, so in this example it would probably be best to offer a free session in the gym.

You see what you’ve done here is shown that you are the expert, you know what you are talking about and have given then value that when you ask them to consider buying they feel they owe you something.

Step 2. Get a System to Send Emails On a Sequence

To be able to do this properly you need to automate it, and this mean you need whats known as an Autoresponder. I recommend SendPepper as the best system but there are others like the popular Aweber.

Both of these start from around $25 a month, its very affordable and they will let you set up a form on your website that your visitors can leave their name and email and it will then in exchange send them an email or a sequence of emails in an order and on a schedule.

I recommend a schedule along the lines of 4 emails of value for every one call to action or request to buy.

Follow a Sequence of Value Before Offer like…

Email #1: Your Money Magnet Delivery

Email #2: Link to a recent Interview you did

Email #3: Case Study or Success Story

Email #4: Powerful tip that really helps them

Email #5: Get a Free Consultation

Step 3. Put the Opt In Form On Your Website

Once you have your money magnet and your email delivery system in place, you need to make it easy for people to join your email list to “opt-in” as its called. The email systems like SendPepper and Aweber have Smart Form builders as part of the software that you can use and it will give you some code to put on your website, however there are some other cool tools that can dramatically increase the amount of people who actually subscribe to your email list.

Pop Up Domination is a tool I personally use to allow you to make a popup appear on the screen after a set period of time.

If you use wordpress for your website you can also get the free addin Opt In Domination to create a cool looking side bar opt in box.

Or if you want to create a dedicated website just for capturing names and email addresses, you can’t go past OptimizePress which lets you easily create what are known as Squeeze Pages that the designs look professional and have been tested for high conversions of visitors to opt ins.

Step 4. Promotion

Now you need to promote. If you have already got an email list, don’t just import them all into your new automated sequence. It will just annoy them, especially if they haven’t heard from you in a while. Instead send them an email suggesting they might like your Money Magnet (just don’t call it that) and send them to a page where they can put their name and email to get it.

Make your business card actually work for you and state on your business card that you have free stuff when you go to your website to get it.

Put updates on social media sites like Facebook, Linked In, Twitter, Google +. Send direct messages to some of your closest friends and ask if they can also promote it for you as well.

Step 5. Follow Up

Good email marketing needs to have good follow up. Meaning you need to stay in contact but don’t drown your customers and prospects with emails as they, just like I teach in my email management course Inbox Domination, will just unsubscribe and you’ll struggle to get them to join your database ever again.

Slow down the frequency of emails, aim to stay in contact about once a month and ensure you stick to the rule of 4 emails of value before you ask for something in return.

Has Email Marketing Worked For You?

Share your experiences below. If you have a cool tool you recommend or a success story around Email Marketing I’d love to hear about it.

Your business card, it’s probably the first thing you created when you started your business.
And if you are like most Entrepreneurs and Business Owners, your business card looks just like this one, right?

And what’s worse, you might even be wasting the valuable space that is your business card by only using one side of it, right?

Or even worse again, you used a free business card printing company that has their logo on the back of your business card!! I can’t tell you how many business cards like this I see and throw out right away. I’m sorry but your business card is an extension of your company and if it looks crap and unprofessional, if it comes across as cheap then I instantly assume your entire business is cheap and unprofessional.

If you can honestly say those don’t’ apply to you and your business card then congratulations, you are doing better than 80% of business owners who have a business card. However your business card is probably still boring as most business cards are.

Think about this for a moment, how many cards do you have at home or your office that you have no clue about who the person was that gave you the card?

You see the problem is that very few entrepreneurs and business owners stop to think about the purpose of their business card, and actually consider what is it’s role in your marketing funnel.

Let’s look at 4 Ways to Avoid a Boring Business Card

1. SALES COPY

This means benefit driven… what’s in it for me… converting sales copy.
So few business cards do this and that is why they are boring. So start simple, have a Benefit Driven Headline and some points of benefit for the products and services you provide and remember to finish it off with a call to action offer.

While we are talking offer, let me be clear… you are extremely unlikely to make a sale from your business card, it however is your qualifier and it gives your prospect an opportunity to ask for more information and that is what your offer should be… a chance to get more information.

2. FUNCTIONALITY

Does your business card have a function? Check out the case study below for a really great example. Business Cards all should serve some kind of function, as I mentioned above it should allow someone to request more information, another function might be to get people talking, or laughing or something more than just giving name and contact details.

3. WALLET SHARE

Will it be kept and get some room in someone’s wallet?When I owned my Gift Business, our business cards all had important dates to remember on the back. So you could always know when Mothers Day, Valentines Day and other important dates that year were… this achieved wallet share… it served a purpose that was worth hanging on to.Another example is fridge magnet style cards, these get kept and left on fridges this is still wallet share because they are easily accessible and could result in business further down the track.

4. SHAREABILITY

Will people talk about your business card? Does it offer them a way to share your business with others?For example a coffee shop business card could have a tear off coupon, for a free muffin with every coffee purchased.
 

Here’s one of the coolest business card designs I’ve seen that definitely isn’t boring!

Mod hair salon is a “Rock ‘n Roll” hair salon based in Rome, Italy.

So the first thing you should notice is that it doubles as a comb, that is a fantastic idea for a hair salon. And if I saw something like that from a hair salon I’d already be impressed… but they didn’t leave it at that.

They took it from fantastic to remarkable by designing the teeth of the comb so that they worked like a musicbox.

So what this means is when you rub the teeth of the comb with your fingernail the card plays a song, and not just any song as they are a “Rock ‘n Roll” hair salon it plays “Satisfaction” by the Rolling Stones. Absolute Genius!

So, ok it’s not the best business card ever, and I’d be interested to know how effective it actually is.

If it were mine I would add a clear call to action offer. But do you think anyone throws this “business card” away? How much conversation has this card created for them do you think?

The real question is, How much conversation is your business card creating? What attention are you capturing?

I’m going to leave you now with a few business cards to get your creative juices flowing… see what you can come up with and remember your business card should serve a purpose which is to get an enquiry not just be a gimmick with no clear reason.

Is it a business card or a paper plane?

Give People Something Do do… Like this play a game when there’s nothing else to do

Not sure of the practicallity of putting these in your wallet, but definately stand out

Here’s a practical use business card

Secret Message Business Card

Perfect for Divorce Lawyer… perforated edge down the middle so you can Split the card

Scratch Panel reveals the call to action

Showing your clear benefit

Your Business Is Like A Bus and You're The Driver

Business is a team sport, whether you’re a sole trader or a large corporation you always have a team, and if the team aren’t going in the same direction you have a very big problem.

This means business owners and entrepreneurs like you have to find out who’s getting on the bus with you and who you need to let off before they make everyone else on the bus upset and possibly give the driver some wrong directions.

Every Business Has A Team

I know what you’re thinking, sole traders don’t have a team they are a SOLE trader. Let me ask you this though… does the sole trader have a family? Does the sole trader have an accountant or a bookkeeper? These are all people who are part of the business team and each impact on the business and its success.

The challenge you face with a team is having everyone get on the BUS, take their seat and wait til you get to the destination, because if someone in the team doesn’t want to go where that bus is going or doesn’t even know where the bus is going then it won’t be a very pleasant bus trip.

Now I’m using the analogy of a bus but I’m sure you know I’m talking about business. Everyone from the latest employee who was hired two hours ago to the managerial staff and the CEO all need to know where the bus is going, and be asked at the door to the bus do they want to get on.

There is no point having a team member in your business who doesn’t want to be there and to go where the business is going.

How To Find Out Who’s A Team Player In Your Business

Here are Three Action Steps for you to implement right away.

1. If you haven’ t already write your vision for your business… Where is the business going? Need help check out my previous post Follow The Yellow Brick Road – Creating the Golden Pathway for Your Business
2. Call a Team Meeting to share this Vision to all your staff
3. Make a warm and accepting environment to allow anyone in your team to honestly say they aren’t interested

Once you know who is and isn’t interested in getting on the bus, start mapping the route the bus will take and get all the people who want to be on board on the bus.

If you can do this successfully, your business will be a great place to work, you’ll have excellent teamwork working for you that means you and your business gets where you want to go faster and with less angst.

Your business needs a golden pathway. It needs an Oz.

Where is the business heading, what does it stand for, what will it have achieved in the next 5 years, what about in 100 years?

The business vision is more than just a statement. Text book’s on business will teach you to write a statement about your vision, but look its your vision you decide what and how you will communicate it. Maybe you won’t write it, maybe you’ll shoot a video, do a powerpoint presentation, narrate it, story board it – I don’t know…. You need to decide but let me share a process that can be powerful at working out your business vision.

First off, grab a piece of paper and write “It’s ____ years from now and my business is…”

Now fill in the ____ with a number that is far enough away from right now but close enough that its worth fighting for. There is no point saying 100 years (yet!) if you just started the business 1 year ago and really need to see massive growth in the next 2 years.

Now fill in the rest underneath like you are writing a letter to yourself, It’s 2 years from now and my business is providing the worlds tastiest chocolate cakes that come in a frozen packet etc…

Now I just completely made that up but it is designed to help get you started.

Some of the areas to think about when writing this vision are:

• Team – Who works in your business, how many, how does the team view the business
• Awards – What awards have you won, been nominated for, applied for
• Profit – How much money are you making as Profit
• Time – How much time are you the owner spending in the business vs. on the business
• Customers – How many customers do you have, how often do they come back, do they refer to you often

The yellow brick road will lead to Oz once you decide where Oz is and you and your team start walking on the path to get there.

A Vision for your business is not just something you hide away in a business plan it should remind you every day, and be what you live and breathe to work towards.

And while it is a story I have heard many many times before, it is a great story and an awesome reminder about prioritising what’s important in your life.

So i’m sharing the email with you so that when things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, you will remember the mayonnaise jar and the 2 Beers.

A Professor’s Lesson about a Mayonnaise Jar & Two Beers…

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and the 2 Beers.

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, he wordlessly picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with 20 golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous ‘yes.’

The professor then produced two Beers from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar effectively filling the empty space between the sand.
The students laughed.

‘Now,’ said the professor as the laughter subsided, ‘I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things –your family, your children, your health, your friends and your favorite passions — and if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house and your car.

The sand is everything else — the small stuff.

‘If you put the sand into the jar first,’ he continued, ‘there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls.The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Spend time with your children. Spend time with your parents. Visit with grandparents. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your spouse out to dinner. Play another 18. There will always be time to clean the house and fix the disposal.

Take care of the golf balls first — the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the Beer represented. The professor smiled and said, ‘I’m glad you asked.’

The Beer just shows you that no matter how full your life may seem, there’s always room for a couple of Beers with a friend.

Please share this with someone you care about. I JUST DID!

What does that mean? Watch the video to find out.

Why is this good?

Giving a discount or I would recommend a value addition instead, but having an incentive of some kind to get your customers to check-in to your business gives you an amazing viral effect.

If I see my friend Joe check-in to a particular coffee shop every day, next time i’m in the area which coffee shop do you think i’ll choose?

It’s not just for coffee shop’s, any business could use it, dentists, bookshops, restaurant, etc…

This is awesome news, and I look forward to helping my clients use this strategy to grow their business

For those of you who haven’t been following me on facebook, Red Means Go! made it to #1 New and Noteworthy Business Audiobooks on iTunes in less than 4 weeks of publishing and has remained there for over 5 weeks to date.

Red Means Go! distribution has continued to push forward with new technologies, now available on Amazon’s Kindle readers, and in the process of being released on the Apple iBooksstore.

Thanks again to everyone for your support, I really appreciate it.