Attract Customers and Make Yourself Famous
No, that’s not a typo–I mean REVOLUTIONS!
Although you can and should make changes and improvements at any time, the new year is always a popular time to make changes, acquire new habits and lose bad habits.
Take advantage of the spirit of the season and make the changes you need to make to be successful.
Don’t be timid—take big steps. Start by revolutionizing your thinking. [Read more…]
I read a lot of marketing and business advice from different sources, and I see a lot of, “Always do this,” and, “Never do that,” in the words of the gurus. But should you “always” listen to the gurus? The answer becomes clear when you realize that much of the advice from one expert will directly contradict the advice from another.
Of course, there are a few things that will work for almost anyone, or that should generally be avoided. However, for everything a guru says is a waste of time and money and never works, there is someone, somewhere who is doing it successfully. Whether you are thinking about blogging, advertising, sending press releases, publishing a book, or other promotions, you will want to consider whether it is a good idea for you, not just what the gurus say.
So how to do you know which ideas will work for you and which will not? A bit of analysis and planning can help you decide. When you follow that with testing, you will know if you have a winner or a dud. [Read more…]
When someone criticizes you, how to you react? Do you tell them to, “Take a hike, jerkface,” or do you crawl off to a corner to sob? Neither of those reactions is particularly useful.
Getting defensive when someone criticizes you is a normal reaction, but if you are willing to accept constructive criticism you can improve. The criticism may be of your business, your products or you personally—if you can get past your initial reaction, you may find it helpful.
I have presented seminars for years, including about a year for a major public seminar company. Every day I faced an audience of 50 to 400 people, many of whom were sent by their bosses and did not want to be there. At the end of the day, they got to say whatever they wanted, anonymously, on the evaluation form.
Fortunately for my ego, most of the evaluations were positive. People talked about how I kept their interest and how much they learned. But sometimes they said I talked too fast (Oops. Yes, I do that.) and sometimes they lobbed gratuitous insults rather than offering constructive criticism. One person didn’t like my hair, another criticized the color of my jacket, and someone else said I was too short.
My favorite comment was from someone who said, “She tries to be funny and it makes her even more annoying.” “Even more annoying”? So this person did not like me from the git-go, and when I opened my mouth, things went downhill from there. What can you do when you read something like that but laugh?
The secret to handling criticism is to know when to pay attention to it and when to shrug it off. The people who said I talked too fast—well, they had a point. I do sometimes talk too fast. Seeing comments like that made me more aware of it, and reminded me to slow down and breathe once in a while in future presentations. But to the people who said that my jacket was too bright or I was too short, geez, get a life.
When you are in the public arena, you will be criticized, sometimes fairly, sometimes not. You need to develop a thick skin so that the ridiculous insults do not draw blood, but recognize when someone offers criticism that can make you, your business or your products better. Here are some ways to do that. [Read more…]
This post at Jezebel.com got me thinking about the attitudes we get from mass media when it comes to successful people. It seems that Cosmo ran one of their (in)famous quizzes, this one titled, Are You Destined For Success? If your answers indicate that you possess any shred of human decency, you are labeled an “Undetermined Dawdler” with no chance of succeeding in business or in life. The “correct” choices in this quiz involve being deceitful, sneaky and manipulative, while not displaying raw ambition because that would apparently be unladylike.
Of course, anyone who actually takes advice from Cosmopolitan magazine has deeper problems than can be addressed here. And if this attitude only existed in a quiz written by a bitter freelance writer making less than $20,000 a year, it could easily be ignored. However, it is reflective of what we are taught about successful people in all kinds of media. The boss is always the person who got ahead by stealing the ideas of underlings, lying, and pretending to be nice to people while actually stabbing them in the back. Sometimes literally. How many times have you watched an episode of Law and Order where the murderer is the successful businessman?
Many of us have mixed feelings about successful people. We resent them, all the while wanting desperately to be one of them. And when the depictions of successful people as evil are repeated again and again, we internalize those ideas. We start to believe that people who have reached the heights must have gotten there through nefarious means.
Perhaps those who do not become successful (or are not yet successful) console themselves by thinking that they could have gone further, if only they were ruthless and evil enough. Or they believe that the achiever was just “lucky.” Well, luck is a factor in all of our lives but, as the saying goes, I find that the harder I work the more luck I have.
How do you react to news that someone else has gotten something you want, or achieved your dream? My reaction is typically, “How did she do that? And how can I do that?” I want to know what I can learn from her. That attitude has allowed me to accomplish many things.
Fortunately, many of the successful people I have known have an abundance mentality. They recognize that it is not necessary for someone else to fail for them to succeed. They are willing to share their knowledge and experience to help others achieve what they have.
Do you know of someone who has done what you dream of doing? Learn from them. They may be willing to mentor you or offer consulting or training. If you can not make personal contact with them, find out everything you can about them. Have they written books? Do they have a blog? Are there books and articles written about them? Have they given speeches? There may be clues there that can help you.
Reverse engineering can help you find the path to success. The specific techniques will depend on what you are trying to do, but studying their career path or life journey will show you ways you can replicate their success. I chose the word “replicate” rather than “duplicate,” because no two people are alike and your path will not be exactly the same as someone else’s. However, you can follow similar steps to reaching your dreams.
Being ruthless and manipulative is not a long-term strategy for success. Building relationships, learning from others and sharing what you know will take you much further. Treat others the way you want to be treated. Apparently, that Cosmo writer never heard that you meet the same people on the way down that you did on the way up.
Would you like to have a mentor? Someone from whom you could learn the secrets of success? It is not easy to find someone who will share their secrets and spend the time to teach you what they know. But there is a way.
I have had a number of what I call “double-secret mentors.” These are people from whom I have learned without even making direct contact. Instead, I studied what they did and how they did it so I could apply their knowledge to my business.
Not only did I learn a lot, in many cases I later got to meet these mentors. We have since become friends and colleagues, and I continue to learn from them.
Here is how you can get double-secret mentors of your own: [Read more…]