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The 17 Rules of Bootstrap Marketing

by Paul Joseph July 28, 2011 Featured

Too many people in the small business world believe in the saying, “It takes money to make money.”  While it would be nice to have a huge ad budget, the truth is that most of us don’t start out with a big startup fund – and in some cases nothing at all. Going without any marketing though, is out of the question. The good news is that marketing can be done effectively on a very low budget. There have always been “guerilla marketing” techniques that any business owner could use, and thanks to the Internet, there are more ways to market for free or almost free than ever. But marketing must, above all, be effective, no matter how much or how little it costs. Below are seventeen characteristics of bootstrap marketing that will help you to grow a successful business without having to spend a fortune. Effective Bootstrap Marketing is marketing that’s… 1. Cost Effective. This is of course the first rule of bootstrap marketing! And as mentioned above, with the internet at our fingertips, there are more low-cost marketing options available to business owners today than there have ever been. It has become easier and easier to grow a successful small business on a very small budget. Think Social Media, comment marketing, blogging, guest blogging, forum posts, email marketing, and the list goes on. 2. Unwavering. If you want your marketing to be truly successful, you will need to be dedicated to seeing it through. Giving up in the early stages of your business is simply not an option when success is the goal. Have patience, because most marketing methods take time to produce results. Stick with it, and you’ll reap the benefits. 3. Branded. Providing your customers with a clear understanding of who you are and how your product or service can assist them is a must. Make sure your brand message is carried through in all your marketing. A post or profile on one site should be recognizable as being tied to your other posts and profiles. 4. Consistent. Your marketing campaign will be the life of your business, and needs to become part of your daily business routine. This is part of sticking with it, but it also means making a commitment to working your marketing every day, and for the long haul. 5. Focused on Customers. Your job will be to recognize any problems that your prospective customers have and offer them clear-cut solutions to these problems. Appealing to potential buyers by solving a problem or easing pain is the best way to make your marketing pay off. 6. Directed at Your Target Market. It’s imperative that you know precisely who is in need of your product or service. There was once a place for mass marketing, but that time has passed. Not only is mass marketing expensive, but it’s also a “shotgun” approach that doesn’t target potential customers in a focused way. Make sure you’re speaking to your niche. 7. Trust- and Confidence-Building. Increase the level of trust and confidence that your customers have in you and your business by creating experiences that will cause them to naturally feel more confident and trust in you. Consumers are much more likely to buy from people they trust and like. So make sure your marketing isn’t salesy or cheesy. Let go of gimmicks and be more direct and upfront. 8. A Boost to Your Visibility. Your prospective customers are bombarded by ads every single day. Utilize as many different marketing tools as possible. The more your prospective customers come across you, the more likely they will be to use your product or service. 9. Repetitious. Statistics prove that an average person will need to encounter a business in some capacity from seven to twelve times before they’ll be willing to purchase from it. With that being said, putting yourself out there as much as possible – in as many venues as possible – will result in real results. 10. Simple. You will easily confuse your prospective customers if any part of your business or marketing seems too complicated. If a person is confused, they won’t take the time to try and figure it out, and they won’t spend their money with you. Keep things as simple and straight forward as possible. 11. All About the Wow Factor. Are you doing everything in your power to get noticed? How do your tactics differ from those of your competitors? The fastest way to fail with your business is to blend in too well with the rest. Build marketing programs that are unique and communicate your brand’s personality in an interesting way. 12. Reassuring. The quality of your products and services is obviously of prime importance. And communicating that quality in your marketing is just as important. Reassure your potential buyers by providing warrantees, guarantees, and testimonials. Let people know it’s safe to go with your company. 13. Educational. Present yourself as an expert and take the time to educate your prospective customers so that they will understand why your business can offer them a solution to their problem. This is especially effective when using comments, forums, and social media for your bootstrap marketing efforts. 14. Personal. Create genuine relationships with your prospective customers. Answer any questions they may have, offer solutions to their problems, and help them if they find themselves in a bind. Showing your prospective customers that there is a real person behind your business will help you to build on your business relationships. And it doesn’t typically cost you anything! 15. Customer Nurturing. Attracting new buyers is important, but marketing to those who have used your company already is essential. Statistically speaking, over twenty percent of your current customers will purchase from you again, because they already know you. This makes the cost of acquisition of an existing customer far less than that of a new customer. Create new and different ways to bring your customers back and keep them happy. 16. Trackable. Knowing what works well and what doesn’t with your marketing campaign is crucial. How else will you know if your time is paying off? It can be difficult to track some forms of bootstrap marketing, but in many cases, link tracking software can be very helpful; especially if you’re sure to include a link in your social media posts. 17. Flexible. You never know when things will change, so you’ve got to be ready to adapt to those changes. Stay on top of the newest marketing methods, and when a new marketing platform pops up give it a try. Don’t jump all over the place, but add and alter marketing methods as soon as it makes sense. The more flexible you are with your marketing, the further ahead you will stay from your competitors. Following the rules above when implementing your bootstrap marketing plan will ensure that whatever you’re doing to get the word out, it’s as effective as possible. What other suggestions do you have for rules of marketing? Share with us in the comments!

Tagged as: business, competitors, customers, daily, entrepreneur, internet, life, marketing, marketing-strategies, product, small-business, social

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The 17 Rules of Bootstrap Marketing

by Paul Joseph July 28, 2011 Featured

Too many people in the small business world believe in the saying, “It takes money to make money.”  While it would be nice to have a huge ad budget, the truth is that most of us don’t start out with a big startup fund – and in some cases nothing at all. Going without any marketing though, is out of the question. The good news is that marketing can be done effectively on a very low budget. There have always been “guerilla marketing” techniques that any business owner could use, and thanks to the Internet, there are more ways to market for free or almost free than ever. But marketing must, above all, be effective, no matter how much or how little it costs. Below are seventeen characteristics of bootstrap marketing that will help you to grow a successful business without having to spend a fortune. Effective Bootstrap Marketing is marketing that’s… 1. Cost Effective. This is of course the first rule of bootstrap marketing! And as mentioned above, with the internet at our fingertips, there are more low-cost marketing options available to business owners today than there have ever been. It has become easier and easier to grow a successful small business on a very small budget. Think Social Media, comment marketing, blogging, guest blogging, forum posts, email marketing, and the list goes on. 2. Unwavering. If you want your marketing to be truly successful, you will need to be dedicated to seeing it through. Giving up in the early stages of your business is simply not an option when success is the goal. Have patience, because most marketing methods take time to produce results. Stick with it, and you’ll reap the benefits. 3. Branded. Providing your customers with a clear understanding of who you are and how your product or service can assist them is a must. Make sure your brand message is carried through in all your marketing. A post or profile on one site should be recognizable as being tied to your other posts and profiles. 4. Consistent. Your marketing campaign will be the life of your business, and needs to become part of your daily business routine. This is part of sticking with it, but it also means making a commitment to working your marketing every day, and for the long haul. 5. Focused on Customers. Your job will be to recognize any problems that your prospective customers have and offer them clear-cut solutions to these problems. Appealing to potential buyers by solving a problem or easing pain is the best way to make your marketing pay off. 6. Directed at Your Target Market. It’s imperative that you know precisely who is in need of your product or service. There was once a place for mass marketing, but that time has passed. Not only is mass marketing expensive, but it’s also a “shotgun” approach that doesn’t target potential customers in a focused way. Make sure you’re speaking to your niche. 7. Trust- and Confidence-Building. Increase the level of trust and confidence that your customers have in you and your business by creating experiences that will cause them to naturally feel more confident and trust in you. Consumers are much more likely to buy from people they trust and like. So make sure your marketing isn’t salesy or cheesy. Let go of gimmicks and be more direct and upfront. 8. A Boost to Your Visibility. Your prospective customers are bombarded by ads every single day. Utilize as many different marketing tools as possible. The more your prospective customers come across you, the more likely they will be to use your product or service. 9. Repetitious. Statistics prove that an average person will need to encounter a business in some capacity from seven to twelve times before they’ll be willing to purchase from it. With that being said, putting yourself out there as much as possible – in as many venues as possible – will result in real results. 10. Simple. You will easily confuse your prospective customers if any part of your business or marketing seems too complicated. If a person is confused, they won’t take the time to try and figure it out, and they won’t spend their money with you. Keep things as simple and straight forward as possible. 11. All About the Wow Factor. Are you doing everything in your power to get noticed? How do your tactics differ from those of your competitors? The fastest way to fail with your business is to blend in too well with the rest. Build marketing programs that are unique and communicate your brand’s personality in an interesting way. 12. Reassuring. The quality of your products and services is obviously of prime importance. And communicating that quality in your marketing is just as important. Reassure your potential buyers by providing warrantees, guarantees, and testimonials. Let people know it’s safe to go with your company. 13. Educational. Present yourself as an expert and take the time to educate your prospective customers so that they will understand why your business can offer them a solution to their problem. This is especially effective when using comments, forums, and social media for your bootstrap marketing efforts. 14. Personal. Create genuine relationships with your prospective customers. Answer any questions they may have, offer solutions to their problems, and help them if they find themselves in a bind. Showing your prospective customers that there is a real person behind your business will help you to build on your business relationships. And it doesn’t typically cost you anything! 15. Customer Nurturing. Attracting new buyers is important, but marketing to those who have used your company already is essential. Statistically speaking, over twenty percent of your current customers will purchase from you again, because they already know you. This makes the cost of acquisition of an existing customer far less than that of a new customer. Create new and different ways to bring your customers back and keep them happy. 16. Trackable. Knowing what works well and what doesn’t with your marketing campaign is crucial. How else will you know if your time is paying off? It can be difficult to track some forms of bootstrap marketing, but in many cases, link tracking software can be very helpful; especially if you’re sure to include a link in your social media posts. 17. Flexible. You never know when things will change, so you’ve got to be ready to adapt to those changes. Stay on top of the newest marketing methods, and when a new marketing platform pops up give it a try. Don’t jump all over the place, but add and alter marketing methods as soon as it makes sense. The more flexible you are with your marketing, the further ahead you will stay from your competitors. Following the rules above when implementing your bootstrap marketing plan will ensure that whatever you’re doing to get the word out, it’s as effective as possible. What other suggestions do you have for rules of marketing? Share with us in the comments!

Tagged as: business, customers, daily, entrepreneurship, internet marketing, life, marketing, marketing-strategies, money, small-business, time, your-business

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Young Entrepreneur Interview: Costin Tuculescu of AnyMeeting.com

by Paul Joseph July 26, 2011 Featured

How do you make money by giving something away? Just ask the subject of today’s interview, Costin Tuculescu. Costin, a software engineer by education, is a serial entrepreneur whose passion lies in creating new technologies, finding solutions to technology problems, and producing new, exciting products and services. His latest venture is a full-featured web conferencing application, called AnyMeeting.com , which costs users nothing. Through bootstrapping, and eventually angel funding, Costin has grown the ad-supported business from an idea to a leading provider of online conferencing solutions, with nearly 40,000 users worldwide. With that kind of experience, you’ll want to read what this young entrepreneur has to say! Enjoy the interview! AnyMeeting.com is a great tool that offers a lot of functionality at no cost. For those of our readers who aren’t familiar with the company, can you tell us a little about your business model? Our goal is to make web conferencing as accessible as email for small businesses.  In order for this to happen, it needs to be free and easy to use.  AnyMeeting is ad supported, which allows us to offer such a great service completely for free.  AnyMeeting allows small business users to easily meet with anyone in the world at anytime for free, saving them time and money. You’re competing with some well-established webinar/meeting companies. How did you know your model would be able to stand up to the competition? As a whole, the web conferencing and webinar industry is growing at about 20% a year.  The current economic conditions have accelerated the growth as companies have been cutting travel expenses.  There is also a significant portion of the small business market that has never used web conferencing due to the high cost of service.  A significant portion of our current users represent this segment. AnyMeeting offers for free what other service providers charge thousands of dollars per year for.  For example, if you wanted to host webinars for 200 people, it would cost approximately $4,000 per year with a provider such as GoToMeeting or WebEx.  You can do the same webinars with AnyMeeting, completely for free. A free service is an excellent choice for anyone, from new users and small business who want to start giving webinars and having online meetings, to the advanced user looking to cut expenses.  While the price of web conferencing services is going down, nothing as feature rich as our service is being offered for free so, we know there is a market for our service.  Another differentiator between us and the big service providers is that our platform doesn’t need any downloads, installs or setups for your audience.  It’s completely browser based. You’ve added close to 40,000 users since launching in 2010. How did you do that? Which advertising methods have worked well for you? We’ve been very successful in our attracting new users through search engine marketing and social media. Referrals have also been a great source of growth for us.  Our users are so pleased with AnyMeeting that they tell lots of their friends and colleagues about us.  In a survey to our users, over 65% responded they have recommended us at least once, with 49% stating they have recommended us more than once. We’re big fans of SEO. Once you’re properly optimized and come up organically in search results, you’re gold, so that’s why we’re constantly working on it. SEM as well — Google AdWords and Microsoft Bing offer good ROI for our type of service. We’re also looking to create relationships with associations that reach our target market — small businesses that are just starting out. They don’t really know if it’s worth paying for a webinar service, so, they are open to trying us out first.  Reaching out to those specific verticals and online marketing have been our two main business tools that we use to grow our user base. What has been the biggest business challenge you’ve had to face, and how did you overcome it? One of the biggest challenges for any start-up is building the team.  So far, I’ve been very fortunate to grow the company with the right people on board.  However, finding the talented people that have the mentality of, “okay, we have to do whatever it takes to grow the company” and who share your vision, is one of the most challenging things because you’re not going to just put out an ad and find those people. It’s an ongoing process of networking and reaching out to your network, going to mixers and kind of putting the word out there. It’s an ongoing process to build, and continue to motivate the right team. What three pieces of advice do you have for young entrepreneurs interested in starting their first business? #1 – Plan out what you want to get out of this business?  Is it going to be a lifestyle business where you make a good living to support yourself and your family, or are you going to be the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs?  Deciding on what you’re looking to get out of it, and in what time frame, will help you set up the right goals, milestones, etc. #2 – Surround yourself with smart people that are good at what they do and you enjoy being around.  Since you’re going to be putting in 10-12 hour days, you need to make sure that you’re spending that time with the right people, all working together for one common goal – to be successful. #3 — Work your butt off.  For YoungEntrepreneur readers, starting your own company is your chance to get ahead of everyone else, and it takes hard work to become successful.  Realize that this venture is going to take the next X years of your life, and that you’re committed to its success.  The only way to make that happen is to work your butt off. How do you personally define success? Very simply, to me, success means exceeding expectations.

Tagged as: business-ideas, entrepreneur interview, family, Featured, life, microsoft, startup, user

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My Top 10 List Of TED Talks On Creativity

by Paul Joseph July 25, 2011 Featured

Hello again. I’m off on a new tangent this week, it’s been inspired by Yaro’s last post . Actually, I’ve had this niggling feeling I needed to take his advice since receiving the email in my inbox several weeks ago with tips on writing great articles – I just have so much spinning in my head that it often takes a while to action everything that’s fighting for my attention. The Master Plan Yaro’s great idea is to make top 10 lists of things related to my topic. He suggested a top 10 list of my favorite books on creativity. Whilst that’s a brilliant idea, there’s one small problem … for some terrible reason, most likely due to my own scattered brain, I’ve stopped reading books to completion. I get part way through them and charge off on other tangents. This is a considerable problem when it comes to making top 10 lists of my favorite books on creativity. So I did what all good creatives do when faced with an impasse and I improvised . Whilst I spend the next few weeks finishing reading all the books on my top 10 list, I decided to make a top 10 list of something else. The “something else” is largely responsible for why I don’t finish books anymore! Details Of My Ongoing Love Affair I have an ongoing love affair with TED . At the end of the day, when I’m sick of dealing with black text on a white computer screen, I crawl into bed with TED and let the world’s most inspiring, informative, ingenious and innovative people take me on adventures into their worlds. I don’t watch TV these days. I watch TED. Somehow, because I’m learning new things and being inspired by what I see, I can sneak past that feeling of guilt I get from watching mind numbing entertainment because it’s not productive. So my first ever “top 10 list” is my top 10 TED talks on creativity . The Master Plan Explained This is how it’s going to look. I’m going to show in order of 1 to 10, the talks I have found to be most inspiring and also practically useful in regards to creativity. I want to explain to you how each clip made the cut and why it’s ranked as it is. So each week, I’ll cover two or three clips, and try to explain why they’re important and a give summary of the magnificence within them. Some of the talks are directly related to creativity. Others are great examples of someone being creative. And others are expressions of crucial elements of creativity, like Isabel Allende’s talk on passion. There’s one talk in here that isn’t so much about creativity. But I realized it’s possibly the most useful way to overcome one of the biggest stumbling blocks to realizing your potential, and take the risks needed to explore and express your creativity. Even though it’s not necessarily pitched as being about creativity, it could be the most important clip of them all if it moves you to action. Drum Roll… Here’s The Top 10 List Sir Ken Robinson “ Schools Kill Creativity ” Sir Ken Robinson “ Bring On The Revolution ” Tim Brown “ Creativity and Play ” Isabel Allende “ Passion ” Ross Lovegrove “ Organic Designs ” Tim Harford “ Trial, Error and the God Complex ” Matt Cutts “ Try Something New For 30 Days ” Joshua Walters “ Being Just Crazy Enough ” Larry Lessig “ The Law Is Strangling Creativity ” Elizabeth Gilbert “ About Genius ” As you can see, I’ve got a bit of a thing for Sir Ken , I have an ongoing love affair with his work to rival the one I have for TED talks. Sir Ken even tops my TOP 10 book list and hogs the first few places : / I think this is for a number of reasons. Details Of My Other Love Affair Ken’s talks are educational, insightful, beautifully articulated and they make me laugh. This combination is a bit like holding the ace of spades as far as I’m concerned, especially that last element. Another reason they top the list is because Sir Ken’s talks set a great foundation for the rest. Sir Ken deals with the starting point of the problem of dislocated creativity, our schooling. We waste a good twelve years of our lives learning how to do things that don’t energize and inspire us… learning how to stuff our dreams away and stamp out our creativity so we can endure those years of schooling. Really, it’s just like twelve years in training for what to expect for the rest of our lives… Unless we’re blessed to have held onto enough hope and determination to do what we love anyway… or unless by some stroke of luck, the schooling system actually did steer us in the direction of living the life that speaks to our deepest truth . Sadly, Sir Ken says during his second talk, of the many people he meets, very few have been able to find this place within themselves to live from. If you have the time and inclination to watch these first two talks in my top 10, I assure you it will be a great foundation for us to launch into the ones that follow in the list next week. Once again, I’d love to hear any comments you have at the end, and I’m going to leave you with a fabulous Sir Ken quote about creativity. “If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” Cheers, Neroli. Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: advice, attention, books, life, mindset, online

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5 Effective Reading Strategies For The Busy Entrepreneur

by Paul Joseph July 13, 2011 Featured

Entrepreneurs are often curious, passionate workaholics. Yes, that’s a generalization – but often true. We want to learn more about things – our business, our world, our customers, our industry, our marketplace, our technology and other stuff. And we each have our preferred ways of staying up to date. Watching TV. Listening to the radio. Reading books. Subscribing to magazines. Surfing the Web. Even getting an assistant or professional service to summarize the most relevant information for you. One thing you cannot afford to do is fall behind. Information is indeed power , especially in today’s “knowledge economy”. And that’s why the staggering fact that the average American reads ONE book per year is so shocking. (I don’t know how different this figure is for other countries, but it’s probably representative). I average between 2 and 5 books every week , and my bookshelf is loaded with reading material, both professional and entertainment. Indeed, my taste in books ranges widely, with spiritual guides and business reviews rubbing covers with medical texts, the latest pulp fiction or copywriting tutorials in my bookshelf. And this isn’t all that I read. Online, I browse forums, blogs, news sources, article collections and social networks to stay on top of things. Studying so much material has given me a serious competitive edge over others in my market. And many entrepreneurs would agree that “ applied information ” is one of the secrets of their success too. Why Does Reading Matter? There are many benefits to studying new material regularly: Course correction – Learning something new helps you measure your progress against benchmarks and allows you to make changes that will power you ahead more surely and steadily. Keeping up with trends – Shifts and changes have devastated some industries. The unwary and uninformed were those crushed in those turbulent times. Being aware of trends helps your business adapt and stay competitive. In-depth knowledge – Expertise takes time to acquire. Study any subject for 10,000 hours and you’ll become one of the world’s leading experts. And there are some areas where detailed knowledge sets you apart from competition. 1. Read Longer I recently polled my contacts on social networks to ask how much time they spend reading every week. Not surprisingly, the answers were all over the place. The most frequent response was 2 hours a day . Maybe you’re surprised at that. Maybe you think there’s no way you can find two hours every day to read. Well, if you are serious about keeping up with your business world and remaining competitive, it’s time you started trying. Despite a hectic schedule, I manage to squeeze in 3 to 4 hours of reading every day , often early in the morning or late at night. It may not always be ‘easy’ and you might have to make small sacrifices – but the pay-off is rich and well worth the struggle. Here are some ideas to find reading time: Give up (or cut down) watching TV Wake up a half hour earlier Go to bed a half hour later Carry around a book and make use of ‘down time’ (waiting for a meeting, flight or client) 2. Read Faster I’ve been an avid and voracious reader since childhood. And a key factor in reading so much has been my reading speed. As I wrote this, I tested my reading speed using an online test and it says my speed is “504 words per minute” . For material that I enjoy reading, my actual speed could be double. When you consider that the average full-length book is between 50,000 and 300,000 words, I can zoom through it in 1.6 to 10 hours of reading time. And by reading faster, I’ll save 10 hours in comparison to another reader who can only read half as fast! When it comes to speed reading, practice indeed makes perfect. Concentration impacts your reading speed, as does the absence of external distractions. If you’re serious about improving your reading speed, you can try: Attending a speed reading seminar or course Buying a speed reading book and studying the techniques Using speed reading software to train yourself to go faster No matter which learning method you follow, the improvement in your reading speed will benefit you massively – for the rest of your life. 3. Read Smart What type of books (or other material) you read impacts your overall benefit from reading in a very significant way. A powerful mental image that I use frequently to highlight similar concepts is one that I first read in a book by Stephen Covey called “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” . It was about a man who scrambled quickly up a very tall tree, reached the top, and looked around… only to discover that he was in the wrong jungle! Doing things fast is not always more effective. Doing them right matters more . And that applies to reading as well. When you focus on the right kind of things to read, you get greater advantage from every minute invested into the activity than if the greater part of your reading time is spent weeding through junk. That’s what makes ‘Top 10′ lists and ‘expert recommendations’ so powerful and valuable. Some tips that may help you read smart: Look at ‘best-seller’ or ‘recommended’ lists (if many others thought it was good, it probably is) Seek peer group suggestions about the best sources of reading material Keep a critical watch on what you read, and be quick to abandon wasteful drivel (How often have you plugged on with a book just because you started reading it? Stop doing that – it’s not worthwhile!) Skim the highlights and dig deeper only where you feel you need more detail Make it convenient to access quality material (buy or borrow books to keep by you for whenever you are free to read, bookmark favorite online resources, subscribe to great blogs in your RSS feed). If you click here you’ll see one of my 4 bookshelves – with titles I’ve bought so that I’ll be able to refer to them quickly whenever needed! 4. Read More Everything else being equal, the entrepreneur who reads more (and applies the information effectively) will steal a march over another who doesn’t. As the reading habit grows on you, keep exercising it like a muscle . You’ll be amazed at how much more information you’re able to consume, process and apply in a relatively short time. In biographies of business icons like Donald Trump , Bill Gates , Richard Branson and many others, one common theme is the prodigious volume of information they have access to, and stay updated about, on a regular basis. At his busiest, Gates is said to have personally overseen the progress of almost 900 different projects – on a weekly basis! (And you thought it was EASY being the world’s richest man, huh?!) That sounds impossible – until you start pushing yourself as you gain facility at consuming and applying new information in your business and life. When you find a helpful resource, you’ll often come across references in it to other related information and material that will enhance your understanding about the topic that it covers. Following these links to explore new content sources will broaden and deepen your level of expertise. Before you know it, you’ll be a widely regarded subject specialist – and it all comes from reading more. 5. Read With Purpose Simply reading more books without doing anything purposeful with the knowledge you have acquired is as wasteful as not reading at all! Knowing what you hope to get from reading is the best way to maximize your time. In very broad terms, you may be reading for: Information – This comes from studying how-to guides, news updates, technical manuals, polls, surveys, research reports and similar content. Inspiration – When you study success stories, case reports, biographies and histories of famous companies, you feel energized and excited about replicating their models and successes. Insight – Editorial commentary, opinion pieces, guest columns and special reports or whitepapers can sometimes spark a breakthrough idea, fuel innovation or provide a flash of illumination that creates revolutionary impact. No matter what you’re reading for, be sure that you get value from your time and effort – by having a plan . Record the big (or small) lessons you gained from what you read Jot down ideas you intend trying out in your business or life Highlight passages that you liked very much – and scrapbook them for later Share relevant books and magazines with others in your team or mastermind group for discussion and debate Set deadlines and targets for any actionable steps you plan to implement based on whatever you read All of this will enhance the value you get from reading – and act as a positive feedback loop to encourage you to read even more. Then apply that learning towards further growth. So get passionate about reading more. Start today. Find some time to read. Learn and practice reading faster. Read as much as you can. Do it the smart way. And have a purpose to your reading. Oh, and let me know if you read any great books that I should look at too! Dr. Mani Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: business, countries, life, people, process, radio, time, young

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How Showing Vulnerability Makes You A Better Blogger

by Paul Joseph July 11, 2011 Featured

I have an ongoing fascination with how technology has changed the way we do business and affects how we connect and communicate, and this fascination was peaked after reading Yaro’s last article . Having only started my adventure into this online world in the last two years, I’m always learning so much from reading the articles posted here. As I spend time on this blog, and the more I see of the connection between Yaro and the readers, I get to see how Yaro models running a successful business in the new economy. Today’s economy is a technology-based economy. It’s constantly evolving through the Internet, nanotechnologies, information and telecommunication technology and bionics. I’d like to share with you my observations of some of the elements I see that make up a successful model. They’re elements that are often unspoken, yet crucial to success in today’s hyper-connected world. These elements are: Blurring the lines between business and the rest of your life Transparency The Gift of Vulnerability and Connection I couldn’t think of a more succinct way to say, “blurring the lines between business and the rest of your life” but I think you get the idea. I’m referring to the ever-present element in business nowadays where your customers want to know more about you, they want to know who you are beyond just the business persona . This isn’t something new. When you think about it, humans once lived in small, local communities and traded with people within these small communities. Everyone did know a lot about the people they did business with. There were no clear lines between business and every other part of life. This served a very handy function, because you were able to gauge the level of integrity and value of a person in business by observing and interacting with them outside of their business persona. (Rural communities are still like this; I grew up in one and I’m currently writing this blog post from a property in rural Australia where I’m looking after my brother’s animals whilst the family are away.) Transparency The blurring of the lines between your business persona and who you are in other areas of life is a crucial element in today’s economy because it’s needed to build trust and create connection . What this does essentially is create more transparency and allows your customers to have a personal experience of you in your personal life, which helps them gauge the level of your integrity and authenticity. Even more importantly, it facilitates our primary need for human interaction and relatedness. Today’s economy is global and runs largely online, so your clients can’t get a good sense of who you are outside of business unless you share it with them. Most of us have a common preconception that people will put on certain “appearances” if they want to be perceived in a particular way. This isn’t an unfounded belief, it’s precisely how we often behave. So we’re wired to be somewhat distrustful and sceptical about other people’s business personas, because we know they’re not necessarily a complete representation of who they are. This is why it’s so important to allow your customers to see more of you than just your business persona, because it’s those aspects of the rest of your life that will create the greatest level of trust and connection between you and your clients . I read Yaro’s recent post , and was amazed and touched at how many people responded to his very open appraisal of what’s been happening in his personal life lately. Yaro’s article gives a great example of how to walk the line between remaining professional yet still communicate with others in an open and candid way that facilitates a greater sense of connectedness and relatedness . And reading peoples comments shows how much this is valued by his audience. Of course, transparency doesn’t mean sharing the most intimate details of your personal life with your clients. Even in the days when humans lived in small local communities, this didn’t happen unless you were married to the town gossip who would broadcast the family secrets daily : /  Transparency simply means sharing some of who you are in your personal life, including and especially the challenging experiences, so that clients can have a greater sense of connection and relatedness to you. The Gift Of Vulnerability I say “ especially the challenging experiences” because it’s those experiences that show others our vulnerability . If you want to know what creates connection more than anything else, it’s showing some vulnerability. Again, I don’t mean becoming a bleeding heart that pours out its troubles endlessly. Simply showing others that you have real struggles and challenges in life and things are not always perfect is one of the greatest gifts of humanity you can give, and it has a powerful impact on others. Social media, like Twitter , Facebook and YouTube and blogging are the most commonly used channels of communication that blur the boundaries of business and life. All of them are highly effective if you know how to balance being professional whilst still sharing openly and authentically from other areas of your life. Living in small local communities has morphed into living online in communities we’ve chosen. The online communities we choose create the space for us to have a variety of interactions and connections; much of it comes down to fulfilling our primary human need for connection and relatedness. It’s a different version of connecting and communicating, but essentially serves the same function. The intricacies of human connection go a lot further than this. There’s a great TED talk by a research professor named Brene Brown if you want to look into it more. The main thing to remember as a blogger, is that you have a gift you can give your audience that will have a far greater impact on their perception of you than anything else you say. This is your ability to share aspects of your life (like personal challenges and difficulties) that facilitate a level of connection that we rarely give ourselves permission to experience. And the rarity of this in life is part of what makes it so appreciated. Cheers, Neroli. Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: book, business, family, internet, life, online, perception

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Of grit and determination, of not giving up

by Paul Joseph June 16, 2011 Featured

Sanjeev Bikchandani narrates the story of naukri.com and his life The June feature event of TiE Chennai at IIT-M Research Park auditorium was a bit special. It featured TiE Chennai champion, founder of InfoEdge that has naukri.com, jeevansathi.com, 99acres.com, naukrigulf.com, Sanjeev Bikchandani, narrate the inside story of how naukri.com came into being. It was not as if this St. Stephen’s… (Visit Yourstory.in for full news, other content, and much more!)

Tagged as: Featured, frontpage, life, research, story

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Kerwin Rae Explains How To Maintain Optimal Flow For Peak Performance

by Paul Joseph June 12, 2011 Featured

Hello once again fellow entrepreneur. Today we have a very interesting article based on an interview I had with Kerwin Rae last week. For all those who have been reading this column from the beginning, you will notice that Kerwin has already appeared twice previously, once in an article on Creativity and Influence and the other on Inspirational Leadership . In one of the articles, I mentioned seeing Kerwin presenting in such a powerful state of flow , that he literally seemed to have the audience in the palm of his hand . I found out later that he made around a million dollars from that 90 minute presentation, which exemplifies how powerful congruency and flow are in relation to our business. When I asked Kerwin about this accomplishment, he told me it has taken about ten years to get to that level of expertise in his presenting skills. This lead us to discuss something I have heard him reiterate numerous times, that success is never an overnight phenomenon , and it’s always the long distance runners who win in the end. Endurance Beats Speed Kerwin went on to say that in many areas of business, you hear people talking about overnight success, but business and wealth creation needs to be committed to for the long term. Kerwin has studied wealth creation for decades. The penny dropped after one of his mentors asked him to read the BRW Rich 200 and start studying billionaires , rather than listening to people who talk about making money. He noticed all these guys were 50+, and only started to really crack money game in the mid 40’s. He also noticed that a lot of them were 60, 70 and 80 years of age. At that point, it really hit Kerwin that if he wanted to figure this out and do it properly, he needed to let go, relax, do the work and realize it was going to take some time. One of the most useful things Kerwin uses to keep his mind in the right place for wealth creation is to keep his expectations in the short term realistic and stay focused on the long-term goal . Staying focused on the game for life, not moment to moment, keeps him in the state of relaxation and flow he needs to keep jumping his business to higher levels. What is particularly fascinating about this is that Kerwin has cracked the game of wealth and business at a level many people only dream of, those who attain this degree of success in business, often do so much later in life. (I can’t be quoted on this, but I think Kerwin is the same age as me, and that’s mid-thirties.)  But he did this by shifting his focus, working smarter not harder, and learning how to maintain a state of coherence and flow within himself, and as we shall see in the next paragraph, without the latter, none of it would have been possible. That is fascinating! I think that equation could be worth noting for all of us. How A Life Threatening Situation Led To Greater Coherence In his early thirties, Kerwin suffered a massive stroke, he told me that the stroke turned out to be one of the most amazing experiences of his life. To explain this, he went on to cite the difference between elite athletes and business people. If you look at most business people, it’s almost a complete reverse model to an athletes model, we spend 80% of our time competing in our business, maybe 5% training, and if we’re lucky, 15% in rest and recuperation. This is actually a burn out model, and Kerwin said he has burned out many occasions. One of the techniques Kerwin had to learn was moderating his energy levels . Like many business people, he used to become quite intense and run on adrenaline in his activities. Much like the sprinter, he was very effective very quickly, but suffered from exhaustion because of maintaining such an obsessive focus. The greatest tool Kerwin found for moderating his energy levels and finding flow was something called “ Heart Math ”. Heart Math is based on the science of neurocardiology, which concentrates on the messaging system between the heart and the brain. Various meditation and spiritual disciplines create an alignment between the brain and the heart. Heart math is a scientific approach to accessing and accomplishing these same results. Heart Math focuses on coherence, helping people find a channel or a link between chaos and coherence as quickly as possible in stressful situations. Ultimately, it trains us to recognize coherence as a state being and access it on demand. Heart Math has played a phenomenal role in Kerwin’s life, especially in his recovery from stroke. For three months after his stroke, Kerwin had no short-term memory, and he would be grappling to remember things constantly. He said it was like torture to live in this state for three months. But one of the things heart math gave him was the ability to access information that was not neurologically based. So when Kerwin became panicked at not remembering things, he found he could use heart math to access the information, it would just come to him without him having to remember it. This happened through the process of aligning his heart and brain, so he could access information without having to use his brain to think about or remember the answer, it was more like using intuitive memory . Heart math has enabled Kerwin to bring focus to his heart in stressful situations, and put his heart back into a coherent state, which then sends messages to his mind, then through the rest of his body to return to a state of relaxation and flow for optimal performance. When we relax, we give ourselves the ability to find flow. This is often the missing link when we are trying to be successful in our work, we’re so intense and focused, we can lose the natural flow that is there for us. The Curious Case Of Our Inner Oracle Kerwin explains that the heart sends 16 times more information to the brain than the brain sends to the heart, our heart is communicating to the brain constantly . Our heart perceives information in the environment well before the brain does, and it communicates that information directly to the brain. Using heart math is one way to get access to information that is available in the environment to everyone, but very few people are tuned in to it . As many of you will have read in my previous articles, I talk a lot about using play to access creativity, and how our creativity gives us the ability to access information that is not present to the senses, in other words, it’s intuitive knowledge . What is particularly interesting about this is until my conversation with Kerwin last week, I’d never heard of Heart Math, but a very weird thread of similarity ran through the things he spoke about and what I wrote about in my book on creativity. My first book was literally written from my intuition, I even say in the introduction: “I would often go in search of this book in the outer world, asking people if they knew of a book like one that was already imprinted in my own heart.” Of course, I researched and cited the work of many leading authorities and scientists on play and creativity in the text, but the information I intuitively knew was only being reinforced by their findings. The reason I’m telling you this is to show you that we all have access to our intuition , and the information is already sitting in our environment waiting for us to pick up on it. The trick is finding whatever works for you to access this and then doing it. Both Kerwin and I are on the same page about the heart being the crucial instrument we need to get connected and coherent with in order to make this happen. The more open our heart is, the more open we are to intuition , then the challenge is to have that information transported to the brain and interpreted in a way that we can receive it clearly. That’s where coherence comes in. How Coherence Gives Us An Edge In Business We need to create coherence within the communication system, and then be able to recognize the information that’s being sent as different from our thoughts or ego. Kerwin teaches Heart Math in his program, Power to Create . During the program, people find out how to read other people’s intentions, so we can pick up on people’s intentions in any scenario. Our heart can receive information, but it can also send information. This may sound a bit unusual, but the truth is, we’re all doing it all the time in our lives anyway. We may not be doing this consciously or effectively, because we have not consciously aligned our heart and brain frequencies for coherence. Kerwin explains that our heart has the most enormous amount of charge compared to any other part of our body. Every time it beats that pulse, it goes through the entire body, the thumping of the heart acts as a regulator, regulating the entire body organism . He goes on to say that we’re constantly giving off heat in the form of photons . Our body is literally producing light, and depending on what we’re doing and thinking, our body is producing different levels of light. Every time our heart beats, it is imprinting information on the photons that are leaving our body. So whatever we hold in our hearts is being communicated to the rest of the environment. Kerwin says that 85% to 95% of the time in his Power to Create program, people can read into situations, events, occurrences in people’s lives just by putting themselves into a state of coherence. The applications for this in our business are phenomenal . Most successful business people I know work from gut feeling and intuition when deciding on potential business partners. Sir Richard Branson says he knows within a few seconds of meeting someone whether or not he will do business with them, this is based on intuitive knowledge. By sensing another person’s intentions and level of coherence, we can decide immediately whether or not the other person’s intentions are coherent with our own. Again, we all do this sometimes; none of us would do business with someone who didn’t “feel right” to us. It isn’t rocket science, it’s just common sense. Unfortunately, we’ve been trained to ignore or discount our intuition when really, if we are tuned into it properly, it’s a far more accurate method of discernment than relying only on material data alone. (There is an entire article in this that I could write on marketing and perception management, but I’ll leave that for another time ) This article has blown out to being much longer than I’d planned, and I haven’t even come to the end of the information I transcribed from Kerwin’s interview! As much as I love this topic, I’ll have to finish up here and continue with this in another article. I hope the information shared by Kerwin has created some new insights and avenues of thought for you, and as I’m sure you can tell, he has a wealth of knowledge and experience to share. Kerwin travels all over the world doing presentations, trainings and workshops, and if you would like to find out more about his work, check out his website for details. Thanks for reading and I’d love to hear your comments at the end. Cheers, Neroli. Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: book, business, environment, game, life, mind, online, person, power, thoughts

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Use This Little-Known Insight To Harness Your Mind’s Million Dollar Potential, Fight Your Fears And Succeed In Business

by Paul Joseph May 16, 2011 Featured

I’ve written previously about our mind, and it’s role in creating things in our lives that are useful for our business, finances and lifestyle . I’ve recently lined up some interviews with businessmen, Rowan Burn and Kerwin Rae , who have a lot of knowledge and information to share on this subject, and over the course of the next few months as I get the interviews done, I’ll share what they have to say with you. On Friday, I heard a speaker named John Assaraf explaining the insights he has learned about harnessing the power of the mind to propel him to ever greater levels of success in his business and fulfillment in his personal life. John has built four multimillion dollar companies in the last 20 years and appeared on “Larry King Live” and “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” to share his observations and experience of using the power of his mind to help him accomplish his entrepreneurial goals. More Sophisticated Than An F16 Fighter Jet He explains why the mind is such an important component in our success by likening it to an F16. He says, “The brain is the most sophisticated instrument we have at our disposal. It’s more sophisticated than an F16 fighter jet , which costs around 50 million dollars . But most of us don’t really know how it works or how to operate it properly.” This is a really useful analogy for a couple of reasons. We all have a mind, and most of us are blessed with a mind that has pretty much the same creative ability as everyone else on the planet. This means, everyone reading this post probably has at their disposal an instrument worth at LEAST 50 million dollars . Think about that, you have a 50 million dollar instrument available to you every day in your business. Unfortunately, we’re most likely not truly aware of the power and value of this instrument. Instead of using it like the extremely high performance, precision instrument that it is, we often use it like more like a golf buggy. Imagine having an F16 in your garage and only using it to drive – not fly, to the corner store to buy soda, and that’s kind of what we’re talking about. Luckily, this thing can be fired up at any time and we can retrain our minds to be high performance, precision instruments that take us to ever increasing levels of success in business and fulfillment in life. Who Runs This Show Anyway? I’ve mentioned in the last two articles the importance of intention, consistency and congruency in the creative process. John spoke about the importance of neuro-resonance , which relates to those three elements. What does this mean? Approximately 2% of our mind is conscious, and approximately 98% is unconscious. The unconscious is by far the more powerful force that drives our thoughts and actions most of the time, and it’s responsible for a lot of our behavior. John has found that in order to achieve our goals , we must have neuro-resonance, that is, our conscious and unconscious minds need to be lined up and resonant. This is when the power of being coherent and consistent in our creative process really kicks in. One of the big difficulties we face in being coherent and consistent is that our conscious mind will tell us one thing, like “I’d love to be successful in business , I’d love to earn $25,000 in passive income from my blog this quarter.” But our unconscious will be running a completely different story, like, “I’ve got no idea how to do this, I’m freaked out because I’ll have to learn new things and I might mess up and look stupid .” This kind of thinking will sink our chances of creating that money and experiencing that success quicker than smashing into a giant iceberg . But the problem is, a lot of it is unconscious, we don’t even know it’s going on. It’s a bit like a steady hum of background static, 24/7 in our lives. It’s no wonder the unconscious runs our thinking process that in turn feeds into our actions! The reason a lot of our unconscious thoughts are designed to keep us in a “safe” place, rather than stretch ourselves to reach those goals, is because we humans prefer to avoid pain at all costs . I drew the arrow picture last year when I was at the “Mind and Its Potential” conference. I’ve been busting to find somewhere to use it ever since as it’s such a perfect and powerful visual example of why we can struggle with our conscious creations because the unconscious mind can throw a massive spanner in the works. Basically, our unconscious is trying to help us avoid pain , but in doing so, it can seriously impede our ability to bring to fruition the things our conscious mind wants, like a more profitable business . This is a problem if we don’t address it, because our unconscious will run 24/7 telling us to stay “safe” by having fearful or self-sabotaging thoughts so that we then act accordingly in our business and in our lives. Or don’t act as the case may be. Fear and anxiety shut down our ability to act. As we know, action is a big part of being successful, all great entrepreneurs take massive action every day to reach their goals. How To Take Back The Controls And Set Your Own Course John says one of the ways to deal with this is to learn to act in spite of our fears . We need to learn to act to get beyond our doubts and anxieties and past unconscious blocks . Acting in spite of our fears can be accomplished by setting things up so you can’t back out of them. I agreed to write an article every week, so every week, even though I’ve got my own blocks and interference from life, I make sure it’s done. Same thing with booking interviews or creating launches . If you have a launch or an interview or something when people are relying on you to deliver , you will generally deliver results. Another way to act in spite of fears happens when life hands you a reason so big and important that you can’t back down from it. A bit like people who let their health go to a critical point, then faced with impending death , do whatever it takes to bring their bodies back to health. Dr. John Demartini is a big advocate of finding the biggest “ why ” you possibly can for your life. Rather than waiting for life to give you a reason to act in spite of our fears, find the biggest reason we can that inspires us to go way beyond our comfort zones first. He says “when the why is big enough, the hows take care of themselves.” There is more to share about how John Assaraf achieves neuro-resonance and it’s role in the creative process, but we’ll continue with this next week. For now, if you think there is a chance you have some conscious goals for your business and your life where your unconscious is running interference , consider ways to set things up so you can’t back out of delivering results. Alternatively find a reason big enough to override procrastination , which is just fear in disguise Once again, thanks for reading, and I’d love to hear your comments at the end. Cheers, Neroli. Get your bonus copy of my book “How To Start An Internet Business & Make Your First $1,000 Online” Download Here

Tagged as: goals, life, mindset, personal, power, time

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Entrepreneur Narayan of Dexetra – On their latest product offering, Friday, which can make a smart phone actually “smart”!

by Paul Joseph May 12, 2011 Featured

Tell us about Dexetra Dexetra is a product startup that primarily works on the mobility domain. By combining the power of phones and the cloud, we are building an interesting product that gives a personal answering engine to the users. Called Friday, it can talk about you, your patterns and your life. (Visit Yourstory.in for full news, other content, and much more!)

Tagged as: cloud, content, frontpage, life, other-content, power, yourstory-in

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