Recently I was at Startup 2012…

Startup 2012 is NYC’s premier business plan competition and entrepreneurship conference. It covers all the crucial topics in entrepreneurship, and one winner goes home with $75,000 worth of cash, goods, and services at day’s end.

I was there with Jay Abraham, he’s been working with some of the biggest start-ups in the world.

My interest, other than hanging out with my good buddy and mentor, was that I’ve been studying this space for a little over a year now.

I’ve been watching the top venture capitalists, reading dozens of books about tech start ups, and analyzing the marketing behind rapidly successful start-ups.

What I found will change Internet marketing forever

…continue reading Our Biggest Announcement in 2012 & The Contest Winners

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Today Jay Abraham and I are in NYC at StartUp 2012… I’m running a contest today on my facebook fan page – all you need to do is guess why we are here… whoever is closest gets free 1/2 hour call with me to focus on their business.

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Live Webcast Today Only With Dan Kennedy Listen-In LIVE Now

During a recent trip to participate in a high- level “mastermind” meeting hosted by Dan Kennedy…

Dan and I sat down and did a short, casual video interview together…

…where we talked about how I got started in business…

My life as an Internet marketer…

And how I positioned myself as a “Category of One“… by doing the OPPOSITE of what everyone else was doing online.

How I Got Started In Business Interview With Dan Kennedy

Here’s the raw, unedited interview right now. You’ll find it very interesting:

…continue reading How I Got Started In Business Interview With Dan Kennedy

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Throughout this blog series, we’ve been looking at both the wrong ways and the right ways to create free content.

Now it’s time to show you how to create your own incredible free content that will convert free blog readers, E-Letter readers, and YouTube watchers into paying clients.

…continue reading Part 4: 8 Effective Ways to Create Your Own Free Content

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Over the last few posts, we’ve been talking about why so many Internet marketers have problems creating free content that makes sales.

If you already watched part 1 and 2 of this series, then you already know the wrong way to create free content.

Now it’s time to take a look at the right way…

…continue reading Part 3: The Secret to Powerful and Profitable Free Content

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In my last post, I gave you some background on why marketers have such a problem creating free content that makes the sales.

I also told you a story of one of my clients who I helped dramatically increase his sales with just a few suggestions on how to change his free content.

If you didn’t watch this first video, I recommend you go back and watch it now.

Today, we’re going to pick up where we left off in this free content series. In the video below, you’ll hear the biggest mistakes that Internet marketers make with free content.

…continue reading Part 2: Major Mistakes that Marketers Make with Free Content

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Over the next few posts, I want to talk about an area of marketing that so crucial to succeeding online, yet so many people get it wrong – free content. Specifically, free content that actually makes the sale.

To start off this series, today’s video will introduce you to why so many Internet marketers have problems creating free content that turns prospects into clients.

…continue reading Part 1: Why Most Free Content Doesn’t Sell

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We spent the last few posts talking about a very important concept to your business – getting clarity. I mention that because it provides a nice segue into what I want to talk about for the next couple of posts.

It’s an area you definitely need clarity on in your business. One where you need to be as clear as you possibly can about what your objective is; what you’re trying to do; what success will look like, etc.

The area I’m talking about is getting clear about your communication with your prospects and your customers or clients.

And when I say communication, it could be anything. It could be emails. It could be a report. It could be videos. It could be blog posts. I mean, you name it. It doesn’t matter. I’m talking about communication in any format.

The Most Important Reason For Being Clear About Your Communication

So first let’s ask, why do you communicate with your prospective market? Well there’s the obvious answer – to make more sales. You want them to buy your stuff.

But that’s not really clarity. There needs to be a deeper reason. And you need clarity on that.

I don’t know how many of you will remember, but in the past I’ve talked about my retail clothing store. And how our goal when a customer came in was not to just sell them clothes, but to sell them on the store as well.

Doing that gave us the opportunity to sell them again and again and again. Had we just focused on selling them the thing they came in for, we would have probably sold it to them anyway, but we wouldn’t have created a new, frequent customer. We would have only created a sale.

So if your answer to why you communicate with your prospects, clients and customers is to make sales, then what you’re doing is narrowing down the potential of what you can get. You’re losing all ability to leverage each and every sale.

What are some of those other clarity goals you might have as you communicate with your prospects, your marketplace, your clients and your customers?

…continue reading Communication Clarity 101

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So I’m going to tie up my discussion of clarity today. We’ve spent the last couple issues on it and hopefully it has made some impact on your life and your business.

If you’re a Founders Club or BGS member reading this, you already know that. I’ve stressed the need repeatedly in a number or Founders Club reports I’ve written for you.

We touched on it in the Blueprint Report which helps you get clear about who your prospects are, what they want, who you are, what you want and then helps you build a business to bridge the two.

The Core Concept Report is all about getting clarity on that one message that helps you get what you want and helps get your prospects to become clients, to get what they want. The one message, the one sentence, that boils it all down.

The Core Myth is about getting clarity on the best way to transmit that core concept.

All these things fit together and it’s all about developing clarity so you can be more effective.

The Most Important Level Of Clarity

So clarity is one of the most important aspects or insights any person can have. And it doesn’t have to be about your business. Whether you’re a business owner, or you work 9 to 5… Whether you’re a student or a professional in the workforce… Whether you’re an artist, a bus driver, a plumber, a college professor…

The most important clarity you can get is about you.

So what about you?

What about clarity of who you are?… What you’re all about?… What it is you want?… And how you’re going to get it?

How much clarity do you have?

If we were to boil it down into more psychological types of phrases or definitions, we’d talk about how clear are you about your purpose, your mission in life, your spiritual beliefs, etc.

How clear are you about your identity, who you are and what you’re all about. How clear are you about your beliefs and your values, which values are most important to you, which beliefs you hold most sacred.

How clear are you about the skills that you bring to the table in your business and what the benefits are of those skills for others? How clear are you right now about the behaviors that are both helping you and hurting you.

The Most Important Benefit of Having Clarity

You see, the great clarity you have about these elements, the easier it is for you to be authentic.

Because, when you think about it, how can you be authentic if you’re not clear on who you are?

You can’t be authentic unless you’re clear about who you are. And that’s important. Because if you’re going to do video marketing or you’re going to do report writing or any of the type of cerebral type of marketing that ultimately requires you to get your prospects to make some kind of shift, authenticity in yourself helps make that a lot easier.

That’s an area where clarity greatly increases your ability.

And then of course we’ve talked numerous times about clarity about your market; about who your prospects really are and when you’re creating a video or message, any kind of marketing message whatsoever, the clarity about what it is you want them to think, what it is you want them to feel, what is it that you want them ultimately to do.

Do You Have Clarity?

The metaphor that, from my perspective, sums up whether or not you are operating from a position of clarity is – right now, do you feel more like a lion ready to pounce, just waiting cues you know you need to move forward… OR….are you more like a deer caught in the headlights uncertain, unfocused, confused, worried, afraid of what’s going to happen. Struggling without the clarity of exactly what you need and the exact steps that you need to take.

There are so many quotes about how you’re more powerful than you realize. You’re more powerful than you know. And that’s true when you’re operating with a sense of clarity.

So I wanted to share that clarity with you. How to get the clarity of what you want, clarity of where you currently stand, clarity on anything that is integral to your life. Clarity is a performance enhancer.

It is an igniter of more progress. It’s an accelerator of progress. Because ultimately you’ll know what you need and where you need to go next.

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When you finish whatever it is you’re undertaking, what do you hope will be true for you that hasn’t been true yet? What will be different? How would you know that your time was well spent? What would be different for you at the end? What will be true for you at the end?

Asking questions like these clarifies your goals in your mind. And when you do that, you naturally focus more on the things that are truly important for achieving your goal.

I want to backtrack just a little and re-emphasize the importance of clarity in anything you do.

Why We Sacrifice Clarity

Most people that I coach really lack the clarity they need when they walk into any situation. They rarely know what it is they’re trying to achieve and what they need to achieve it. And in the end, they never get what they want.

The reason for this lack of clarity isn’t because it’s hard to understand what it is you want and what it is you need and how to go get it. It’s because you’ve been trained your whole life to not think this way.

You’ve been taught to let an instructor or a guru give you the answer about what you need. And that’s simply not the best approach. Thinking that somehow an instructor or guru – a teacher in high school – a professor in college – even me, is supposed to take more responsibility for your life, your business, your success than you, simply won’t get you the results you want.

And if you walk into a situation without the clarity on what it is you’re expecting to get or why you’re expecting to get it or why you feel you need it to get what you want, then ultimately what you’re doing is putting responsibility for your success in the hands of someone else. You look to them tell you what it is you need and give you the answer that they think you need in order to progress. And I’m telling you that’s not the way a successful entrepreneur operate.

Let Me Share A Personal Story About This

I recently re-created the introductory webinar for my BGS program. It’s now a one-part webinar as opposed to two-parts. It’s been shortened to 2 1/2 hours as opposed to the 3 1/2 or 4 hours of the combined two part version. And so far so good. It seems to be really well received. Like it’s actually even more effective than our previous ones, so it was time well spent. A greater percentage of viewers are staying on longer and everything is going really well with it.

Now along those lines though, I was working with someone when I re-created this version. This time I was working with a gentleman by the name of Michael Cage whose name you may recognize if you’ve been watching some of my videos. I have a great amount of respect for Michael because I believe he is one of the few people that knows more about how to create high content webinars than I do. So I was very excited to get a chance to get his advice and have him work with me on it.

But during the creation process, I noticed I was even feeling some of these same feelings. I had a real desire for him to tell me what it was I needed re-creating this webinar. I was looking for him to be clear about the outcome that I wanted. I was looking for him to take over more and more of the responsibility for the outcome – even knowing everything I’ve just told you.

That’s because it’s the natural human condition to want others to tell us exactly what to do; to have our best interest at heart; and to just point us in a direction. While we can certainly get help as we go down a direction and even get advice on which direction, ultimately we have to realize that the responsibility of getting to our goals falls to us.

Anytime we hand over any of that responsibility someone else, we’re really giving away some of our power.

Getting Clarity Is Everyone’s Job

Now this isn’t the same as delegating or outsourcing. That’s assigning responsibility for an outcome, not responsibility for getting clarity to achieve your goals.

The point I really want to make here is that this is not just a problem of people who are opportunity seekers. It’s really something that everybody struggles with from time to time.

And you have to be aware of it. Because if you’re not, you tend to fall back on your old patterns, sacrificing clarity because you want the illusion of security. You want the illusion that someone else is working on your behalf. If you can believe that, you don’t have to embrace that reality of uncertainty because you think you’re gaining some degree of certainty by placing responsibility in the hands of the expert or the guru or the teach or the instructor or the professor.

And that’s just not the way you need to operate.

We’ll finish up this discussion in the next post…

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