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perspective Tagged Articles
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The Power of CHOICE
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| We are ALWAYS at CHOICE. Sounds simple. For many things, this is an easy and empowering concept to embrace. Someone asks you out to dinner. Do you really want to go? You decide "yes" or "no". You're at choice. Someone asks you to do something you DON'T want to do. Again, you're at choice..."yes" or "no". |
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Developing Leadership Skills – Communication is Key
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| Developing leadership skills can help you advance rapidly in your career as well as change your perspective and ideas about what you want to achieve in life. Many people mistakenly believe that to be successful, these skills must be developed early in their careers and are attained only through formal training. This is not true. These skills can be learned at any time, especially if you decide to take the initiative and learn to develop them yourself. It is often hard to critique our own management style and skills, so you may decide to ask someone you trust for their feedback. |
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Stress and Perspective
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| Then something seemed to whisper in my ear. This lady was having a stressful day. From her perspective, with what she had planned to do today, this was an interuption. It was unnecessary and stress-producing. From her perspective this was huge. I decided rather than think bad thoughts of her that I would pray for God to comfort her and turn her day for good. |
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Emotional Resilience – A Recession Buster
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| Emotional Resilience" and how to handle the enormous pressure related to economy melt-down. |
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Money for starting a business
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| Getting the money for starting a business is a stumbling block that many budding entrepreneurs face at the out set.
The first question to answer is should I buy a business or set up a business from scratch with each route having its own complications from a fund raising perspective. If you are starting out from scratch you have the added problem that you have no track-record in business and the business itself will have not trading history.
However, if you are looking to buy a business or perhaps set up a franchise then this is a slightly different proposition in that and existing business will have a trading history and franchise are liked by banks because they are a know quantity. You do still have the slight problem that you have no business track record, but this can be overcome with a sound business proposal. |
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Haiti, Optimism and Success
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| Successful people are self confident. Optimism is the key to self confidence. The Hope for Haiti Now telethon showed the resilience and optimism of the Haitian people. When I see the optimism of the Haitian people in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake, I'm reminded that my troubles and problems are small in comparison. That's why I keep a copy of The Optimist Creed hanging right above my desk. I read it and think about it when I begin to feel overwhelmed. Choose optimism. Believe that today will be better than yesterday and that tomorrow will be better than today. Then do whatever it takes to create the successful life and career you want and deserve and to "make your optimism come true." |
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How Fear Tricks You into Seeing the Tree Branch as a Python
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| We all experience fear, and right now fear is escalating around financial security. When anxiety heats up, so do we. Where does this fear come from? A little journey down memory lane will help you get perspective on the source of your fears around money. It’s time to be vigilant, and not let the old stories drive your fear; write some new, creative stories. Follow the OUT technique to look fear in the eye and move forward with courage and dignity. |
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Taxes in Perspective
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| Who likes to pay taxes? He asks rhetorically…
I have never been a whiner or complainer but I have always been the first one to vocalize my displeasure about the amount of tax we have to pay every day, every week, month and year.
The more money we make, the more we have to pay. But where does our hard earned tax money go?
I met an interesting fellow the other day that helped me put our tax system into perspective.
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Power of Positivity Online
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| The tough economic times can effect companies not only from a profit perspective, but the negativity in the air can also make business owners lose their sense of focus. The idea is to follow some of the simple steps to maintain a positive mindset because it will give your business the boost to succeed.
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What do your reality shows reveal about you?
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| Anytime of the year is a good time to assess where you have been, acknowledge where you are right now, and dream your most beautiful life into existence. Are you ready to learn a unique perspective for accelerating this process? |
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Eight Steps to Goal Setting
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| If the CEO of an organization were to ask you how to set goals, what would you say? |
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Empowering the Business Mind
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| What does it take to have an empowered mind? What can one do with negative self-talk which has no place in the competitive and demanding world of commerce and business? The answer lies in the changing or shifting of perspectives. |
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Aligning – Doing Business from the Customer’s Perspective
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| Customer-centric organizations and individuals have always been more successful in starting and growing a business. Almost every company has some reference to “our customers” in their mission or vision statement. But few actually follow through on those promises because they try to be interesting to the customers rather than INTERESTED IN their customers.
Here is a quick little guide to help you align with your potential customer’s various points of view. |
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Conducting Insightful Interviews
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| Considering how important the interview process is for scrutinizing potential employees, it is surprising that most organizations do not have a formal set of interview questions. Don’t misread another hire because you didn’t take the time to plan for the interview accordingly. Use Demand Metric’s Interview Questions Tool to create a list of standardized interview questions from your perspective. |
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Heroines
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| We love our moms. Especially as adults, and especially as parents ourselves. It wasn’t until I became a parent that I ‘got’ what my mom must have gone through with me. We’re so narcissistic as children and young adults it’s difficult to get perspective, or to understand the courage it takes to raise children.
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Assuming You Know THE Answer Can Limit You
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| At one time or another, either consciously or unconsciously, each of us has explored questions such as: Who am I? What is possible for me? How do I fit in? And gathered information until we had what we perceived to be THE Answer and then lived our lives from that perspective, seldom checking to see if other answers are possible and discounting any information to the contrary. |
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ARE THEY CONSEQUENCES OR RESULTS?
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| Perhaps it’s just my perspective, but it seems that these days, every newsmagazine and newspaper is featuring articles on subjects that point to an inadvertent but vital lesson for us in life and business. |
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Lesson #2: Never Stop Putting Up A Fight
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| “I was very committed to the people that had signed on with me and if we were going to go down, we were going to go down with a fight,” says Smith. “It wasn't going to be because I checked out and didn't finish it out.” |
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Steve Case Quotes
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| Steve Case Quotes |
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The Top Ten Lies of Corporate Partners
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| In a manner of speaking, I’m running out of lies to tell. So far I’ve taken care of entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, engineers, and marketers. The target of this posting is “corporate partners.” (You might find a previous posting, "The Art of Partnering" interesting.) |
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Do Your Investors Use Your Product?
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| Brad Spirrison has a nice article in the Chicago Sun-Times titled Feedburner’s investors have its technology at their fingertips. Among other things, he highlights that three of the FeedBurner investors – me, Fred Wilson at Union Square Ventures, and Matt McCall at Portage Ventures are active bloggers that use FeedBurner’s services regularly. |
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The Entrepreneur As Systems Thinker: Getting Down to Basics
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| In my last article, I discussed the unique quality that makes world class entrepreneurs different than simply owners of businesses. I said that true entrepreneurs are Systems Thinkers. I then went on to define that peculiar quality of systems thinking that true entrepreneurs are blessed with. (If you have not read that article, please do so. It will provide you with a platform of understanding to better relate to this article: Getting Down to Basics of Systems Thinking.) |
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Building the Perfect Board Package
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| Some companies do a great job of putting together package for board meetings -- it's empirical, concise, and focused on measures that matter and that can be influenced -- while other companies leave their boards more confused after the meeting than before. |
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Sales Call Objective
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| It is important for you to know what you want to happen as a result of meeting with your prospect because everything you say will lead toward that goal and you control the conversation and steer it in the right direction. You need to decide what your sales call objective is before you call the prospect. Prospects are busy, and you will be more successful if you know your objective. Do everything you can to make it easier for the prospect to say yes. |
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The Most Valuable Question You May Ever Ask
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| As you begin to take action toward the fulfillment of your goals and dreams, you must realize that not every action will be perfect. |
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Grow Bigger Than Your Problems!
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| One of the secrets to wealth is to THINK BIG! The fact is that very few people “think” big and even fewer “play” big. So why don't people want to “play big”? Usually, it’s because they believe they can't handle “big” or they don't want to handle it. Why? Because “big” often equals big responsibilities, big hassles and big problems.
One of the biggest differences between rich people and poor people is that highly successful people are bigger than their problems while unsuccessful people are smaller than their problems.
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Good Things Come to Those Who Ask
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| Asking for what you need is probably the most underutilized tool for people. And yet, amazing requests have been granted to people simply because they've asked for it! |
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Perspective
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| Quit your griping - use what you've got! In 1993 the U.S. Junior Chamber of Commerce recognized John Foppe as one of Ten Outstanding Young Americans. John worked as a speaker while in college and graduated cum laude in just three and a half years. He's also a gifted artist and an inspiration to all who know him.
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Staying Up, Up, Up in a Down, Down World (Part II of II)
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| Cheerful, Upbeat People Reproduce Cheerful, Upbeat People
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Mistakes Were Made, Now Recover
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| William F. Buckley Jr. passed away this week. I was lucky to know him and he taught me some important life lessons. |
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Planes, Trains, and AutomobilesShare
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| By the time you read this I'll be in New York (right now I'm on a plane.) If you follow me (or any of my partners) on twitter, you will quickly understand why a Boulder entrepreneur recently referred to twitter as the "Foundry Group location / travel finder." |
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Let's Make Software Patents "Defensive Only"
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| In my quest to abolish software patents, I've been pondering "short term approaches" since I doubt the Supreme Court is going to wave a magic wand and make my fantasies come true anytime soon. |
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No One Is a Lost Cause
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| As you try to build stronger, more intimate relationships in your professional and personal life, you may come across some people who have a hard time trusting others. You may start to think they're "lost causes" - guarded, shut down, and not worthy of your efforts. |
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The Soul of Wit
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| According to a series of psychological studies discussed on Psychology Today, research participants are able to successfully communicate sarcasm and humor in a mere 56 percent of emails—and most of the senders had no idea their attemps were so ineffective. |
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Who Tells You the Things You Don’t Want to Hear?
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| Today's tip is a crash course on one of the key ideas in the new book - lifeline relationships. |
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The Most Valuable Question You Can Ask
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| As you begin to take action toward the fulfillment of your goals and dreams, you must realize that not every action will be perfect. |
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The New Year
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| Since we have a New Year to challenge us, it’s a good thing to keep our resolution to be bigger than our problems. Problems come with the territory called life, and we are fortunate in more ways than we realize. We need to move forward with optimism. |
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Behind Every ‘Problem’ is a Bigger You in Waiting (But Only If You Believe It)
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| If you think having more money means you’ll have fewer problems, then think twice about wanting to be a millionaire. Problems and obstacles don’t stop, you just get a new set of them. |
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We’re Both On the Same Side
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| One of my favorite stories concerns a young lad who was confronted by three bullies with violence in mind. Quickly, the little guy drew a line on the ground, stepped back several feet, looked the biggest bully in the eye and said, "Now, you just step over that line." Confidently, the big bully stepped over the line, preparing to commit mayhem on the little guy. Quickly the little fellow grinned and said, "Now we're both on the same side." |
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Defining Value from the Customers Perspective
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| Some 'best practices' are too important to assume they are understood...and 'practiced.' This article talks about one of my personal favorites. It involves two radio stations and a buggy whip manufacturer. Oh yes, and a website developer that struggled for 6 years before she got the memo on this best practice. The concept is simple, execution tough. Every business must understand why their customer's buy from them, something few bother to do. And consultants are the worst. Stop talking about 'What You Sell/Do' and start explaining 'What's In It For ME (the customer!). |
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The Magic of Measuring
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| When you hear the word magic, what's the 1st thing you think of? Peter Pan? Harry Potter? For me, magic immediately evokes something so powerful that even I can't screw it up. And that's exactly how magic numbers and measuring work. My goal with this article is to help you get a perspective quite different and apart from what your accountant or financial adviser may suggest. And it's probably the best thing you could ever do for your business - making it fool-proof. Even better, it's MAGIC! |
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Searching the Road
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| How do we maintain our progression when the future is unclear? How do we continue to evolve, to grow, to challenge what comes our way? Staying "FORWARD." |
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The Importance of Teamwork for a Business
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| A good team working on a business project is the result of having a guarantee that work well, with issues and objectives from the perspective of almost every conceivable test with be dealt with being seen are included. |
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Why Apple is the "Apple" of Tech
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| Why does Apple continue to dominate the market despite growing competition daily? Because they are "Apple" and no one else is. |
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Taking the Mystery Out of Self-Improvement?
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| I had no idea what I was getting myself into when I started doing personal development work in 2001 after leaving my corporate position. I wasn't even aware how important it was to ask myself the question "Am I happy?" I have come a long way since then and want to clear up some of the mysteries around personal development and self-improvement.
In this two article series I will summarize what personal development is and the perspective from which we can best undertake this work. In the second article I will examine the benefits of personal development in the work place.
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Three Tips for Peak Performance
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| We all have the capacity to operate at peak performance – but we don’t! The following tips should help you shift your perspective on how you spend your most valuable commodity – your time – so that you are effective and efficient. |
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LIFT VS. DRAG - A Business Leader's Perspective
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| LIFT VS. DRAG - A Business Leader's Perspective - If you reach new heights in business and want in life, so make sure you lift it to whatever your maximum and minimum drag takes. Not only will you avoid the missiles, but you will hit your target as well!
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Is Your Ego A Spoiled Child!
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| Have you been looking to or trying to understand better who or what the ego is as a way to understand it so that you can get past it? I have and I've been given some interesting answers from my Angel Guides. The ego has for far too long gone unchecked and has caused much havoc and it is now time to change that. The biggest reason why this has happened, I believe, is due to lack of awareness in regards to the ego. It is difficult to change the direction of something if we are not aware of which direction it is going. I trust this article will give you one more perspective and will increase your awareness of the things your ego is doing that, just maybe, you are not fully aware of yet. |
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The Neighbor 2.0
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| Multiple paradigms shifts are occurring within business. Not the least of which is a renewed emphasis on TRUST. Not just between the consumer and the provider, but between everyone interconnected within our global framework. |
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Indra Nooyi’s Perspective on India
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| PepsiCo Inc Chairman and Chief Executive Indra Nooyi has a clear message for her homeland of India -- improve your infrastructure, work force and sanitation, attract more foreign investment, and develop faster. |
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It's Personal
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| Off to dinner the night before I was the keynote speaker at a regional conference, I wanted something good, but casual; calming but moderately swift. So, my husband and I selected an interesting looking place within walking distant of our hotel. |
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Was It Really 'Mean To Be'?
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| When something happens in your life, do you chalk it up to it was meant to happen so therefore nothing I could have done would have made a difference? Well, what if that isn't always the case. What if something you could have done would've made a difference? Would you want the opportunity to change that perspective? If so, read on. |
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MIND TRAP: Perspective
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| There are traps we can fall into that can kill smart decisions. In this article Steve Major focuses on the third mind trap that we can fall into - perspective. It's where we ignore the whole picture. We automatically assume that what we have done in the past that seemed to be effective will continue to be effective into the future. |
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The Gravity of Doing
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| Taking stock, reflecting on our business, its opportunities and issues - being in the reality of our business versus doing and doing and more doing - that's the way to Defy Gravity thinking and see with a fresh perspective. We simply cannot be in our reality, see our truth - when we are so busy doing. |
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How to Feature the Ultimate Benefits for your Customers
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| Once you know what you want your promotional copy to do, who you want to talk to and how you need to say what you want to say to get results, it’s time to explore features and benefits. |
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Is $100,000 a Lot of Money to You?
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| Your salespeople must be able to understand the value proposition of their offering from every possible angle in order to make it fit their prospects' and customers' different worlds. Do they? |
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Product Training is Not Enough!
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| Many small business owners invest time and energy to ensure that their sales people are well versed in fully understanding the products the sell. Some even take the time to train their teams on how to differentiate their offerings to gain a competitive advantage. This is all good. |
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Game 7 - There is No Tomorrow with This Sales Opportunity
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| Don't turn opportunities where there IS a tomorrow into a desperate, "How much of a price concession do we have to make?", last ditch effort to close it today scenario, but do turn a customer/prospect-initiated deadline into a Game 7 scenario where you do whatever it takes to earn that business! |
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Game 7 - There is No Tomorrow with These Sales Opportunities
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| don't turn opportunities where there IS a tomorrow into a desperate, "How much of a price concession do we have to make?", last ditch effort to close it today scenario, but do turn a customer/prospect-initiated deadline into a Game 7 scenario where you do whatever it takes to earn that business! |
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How to Manage Change - Tell Your People Why the Need For Change
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| How to manage change - and at the speed of change? How to deal with the turbulence? This is challenging and of all the current strategies for managing change it's a perspective that is increasingly relevant in the current climate. |
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Is Your E-Rep Any Good?
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| As a sales rep, you know better than anybody what your customers and prospects need to know. You’ve done your research. You know their issues, challenges and objectives. You know the value they could accrue by using your stuff. They just won’t take the time to meet with you and listen! Well, maybe it’s you that needs to listen up. I think there’s a question that needs answering… |
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Go E#$% yourself!
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| As a sales rep, you know better than anybody what your customers and prospects need to know. You've done your research. You know their issues, challenges and objectives. You know the value they could accrue by using your stuff. They just won't take the time to meet with you and listen! Well, maybe it's you that needs to listen up. Are they telling you to... |
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Improving Customer Experiences - Is It Still Important Or Is Price The Only Thing That Matters?
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| Many have questioned the importance of the overarching customer experience... Has the economic downturn minimized its importance? |
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It is What it Is - And Why That's OK
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| Accepting that everything and everyone in your life is, simply, exactly what it is, is a powerful perspective. When you do this, you don't have to waste time wishing things were different, complaining about how things are or wondering how you might have stopped it. All you have to do, is see (accept) what is, decide how you want things to be moving forward, and get on with your life. |
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When Everyone Is Right, Who's Wrong? Uncovering the Mystery of Perceptual Styles
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| Each of us perceives the world differently, not only because of differing perceptual styles, but also because of the various circumstances, goals, aspirations, ages and lifestyles we have. These individual experiences create different realities, each of which represents only part of the whole picture. |
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Stuck in the Middle... of Insanity?
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| You've probably heard the modern day definition of insanity, right? It's doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.
Well, let's look at this more deeply by applying the Life On Purpose Perspective with it.
Recently, I've been working with the challenge many people who come to Life On Purpose seem to have -- drifting through life. I sometime think of it as the "Groundhog Day Syndrome" because one day seems pretty much like the repeat of the previous days. I find many of my clients who are adrift in their life are much like a cork drifting around in the water, being buffeted in one direction or another by the "currents of circumstances." |
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The Universe is Calling - Will You Heed the Call?
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| "The soul is like a wild animal -- tough, resilient, savvy, self-sufficient, and yet exceedingly shy." Parker J. Palmer from Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation
In our last issue I made a distinction between one's life purpose and a calling or vocation. As you may recall the Life On Purpose Perspective offers that your life purpose is more about who you are as a spiritual being and what you came here to this life to be and to experience, while a calling or a vocation often has more to do with what you choose or are lead to do as an expression of your purpose.
Of course, on one hand anything that you do in life can be enhanced when it's 'poured' into the context of your life purpose. For example, several years ago with Life On Purpose Institute was just getting of |
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Using Powerful Questions To Be More Positive.
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| Everyone knows that it is beneficial to think more positively. Yet everyone has challenges with this. Tap into powerful questions to set your mind on positive thoughts.
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Automated Marketing Tools-installing automated marketing tools for your small business to work on autopilot
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| Having access to powerful internet marketing tools is elementary if you want to succeed in your online ventures.
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Marketing Strategies: 7 Powerful Tips to More Confidence
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| Do you let your lack of confidence get in the way of creating your success? Learn how to flex that confidence muscle! This article gives you some great tips on how to build your confidence. |
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Vocation, Destiniy and Work
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| In this article we will explore the concepts of vocation, destiny and work. We'll redefine them and talk about how confusion regarding these three very separate ideas can cause stress and confusion on our journey towards a happy fulfilling career. |
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Asking for a Raise
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| Asking for a Raise |
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Innovation minus Support = Zero Creation
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| There is an abundance of creativity in our world. Humanity is replete with inspirational people who have enormous value to contribute in their own ways - yet most are never seen or heard. As a collective society, we seldom encourage others to take a path of innovation because it's untested, risky, and breaks convention and related reputations. |
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Express Your Independence
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| Learn to love and accept yourself and "get" that you have the power to manifest any kind of life you want. This article shows you how. |
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Marketing Strategies: Are You Proactive Enough?
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| Are you reacting to your circumstances or creating them? Learn how to switch that focus! This article gives you some great tips on how to be proactive. |
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5 Ways To Get A Job
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| No more simple career advice. You're smarter than that. You deserve honesty. |
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The "I's" Have It-Insight & Influence
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| Power coaching sessions circle around to these essential ingredients that are part of every success story we love to hear. These two "I's" are in the mix. There are simple ways to develop them on your terms. |
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Sales Coaching – 1 SIMPLE Way to Get More Business
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| How many times have you spoke with a sales person and never really got a grasp of what they were selling? How many times have you visited a website and couldn’t figure out what it was about? How could these businesses be screwing up like that? |
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Online Business Opportunities - Information Products
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| When it comes to online businesses that are profitable I like ones that offer information products. There are numerous reasons why selling information is a great way to develop an online income. |
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3 Fact Finding Questions to Convert Your Sales Prospects into Customers
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| How successful are you in converting your sales prospects into customers? These 3 quick fact finding questions may help you increase sales. |
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Start Managing Using Your Sales Team’s Talents & Stop Focusing on Their Weaknesses
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| From you role in sales management, do you manage from a perspective focusing on existing talents or from a weakness one? If you truthfully answered from a more negative than positive focus, then can you answer this question?: Why do winning teams win because of their strengths or their weaknesses? Now is the team to change your management style especially if you wish to increase sales and have a high performance sales team. |
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10 Tips For Dealing With Employee Attitudes
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| Valuable tips for dealing with employee attitudes. |
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Closing the Sale: Assume the Close, But Never the Reason
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| There are certainly many techniques and approaches involved in completing a sale, but closing is not a stand-alone activity. Even worse, a seller who attempts to "close the sale" too aggressively without properly executing the entire selling process can do more harm than good. This mistake is often due to one dangerous assumption...
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Is New+Improved Better?
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| You’ve probably been taught that the phrase “new and improved” are strong words to place in your marketing copy. People are supposedly always looking for an edge, so getting the newest thing will help them better. From the customer’s perspective however, does newer = better? |
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Testing times when recruiting ‘good’ salespeople
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| When I consider how I spend my time professionally, I find it is often devoted to demystifying two things:
1. What is ‘good' selling?
2. The proper use of psychometric assessments, especially in sales recruitment
Having written on the former on many occasions, I would like to dedicate this space to the latter - the proper use of psychometric assessments in sales recruitment. |
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Motivate Your Salespeople Like Richard Branson
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| Richard Branson, the eccentric founder of Virgin Airlines and multiple other businesses is the epitome of "unconventional" businessman. He does things HIS way, he does things the way he feels are right...and with a billion or so in the bank, he's been more right than wrong. |
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4 Tips to a Happy New You for 2011
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| Ideas and tips to help you prepare for the New Year. |
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Creating a Life, Creating a Successful Home Business
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| Home business expert, Andrea Scott, discusses the power of positive thinking in creating a successful home business. She gives practical tips to maintain positive thoughts. |
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Human Connections
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| In order to lead a healthy, well balanced life, it is important to have some special people in your life. This makes you feel connected, loved, cared for and valued. We all need human connections to thrive and also to be the best we can be in this world. There are many qualities that make up a good friend. Here are three important ones: |
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Leaves in the river.
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| How an autumn walk can cahnge your perspective on life! |
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Thriving And Not Just Surviving Is The Key To Growth In Network Marketing
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| As a society and a culture we are programmed to survive. Not to thrive. For growth in network marketing this applies as much as anything. It’s all in your head. |
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Saving Selling Time
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| How simply set expectations with others can save an enormous amount to time for both. |
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The Power of Language
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| Developing Awareness and Power in how we use Language in the Art of Communication. |
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11 Leadership Resolutions for 2011
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| 11 New Year's Resolutions for 2011 to help Leaders Keep your Main Thing, your Main Thing, discover What is your Joy, take a Ruthless New Year's Personal Inventory, and Get Perspective among other top 11 thought-provoking touchstones to take you from Now to Wow! in the New Year. |
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On Page Optimization: Strategies For Dominating The Search Engines
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| Are you wondering how to improve the search engine ranking of your web site or blog? Any successful SEO program starts with the concept of on page optimization which is essentially what you do on your website to make it appealing to the world's top search engines. Learn the most valuable on page optimization techniques. |
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The Hard Sell
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| I declare right up front that I am not, and never have been a fan of the Hard Sell. You have probably guessed that from all my previous posts.
And if you ask most people about what they think about the profession of selling they will often describe something akin to the ‘Hard Sell'. Of late I have also noticed a rise in ‘hard sell' stories where people are being unnecessarily pressured to buy or sales people being pressured to sell at almost any cost.
The hard times may be pushing some people to do things they wouldn't normally do like the "Hard Sell". |
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Seeing the world from your client’s perspective can make for easier sales
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| Each week we meet and speak with a variety of prospective and/or existing clients who have problems they need solving in our area of expertise. It is more than likely we will deal with a mix of clients: some with little or no understanding about what we really do and those with previous experience, knowledge and opinions in our area of expertise. And then there are those clients who are in between. Whatever their level of sophistication, how well we understand and identify our clients' key priorities and problems, and what they value about working with a credible business partner is crucial to developing, attracting and retaining healthy client relationships and growing sales.
However, most businesses tend to view the world from their own perspective and not from their clients'. This means: |
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Introvert Myth - Introvert and Extrovert Are Only Nouns
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| The introvert myth continues to perpetuate possibly because of the use of the word almost exclusively as a noun, not a verb. Let's first look at how we commonly use the word as a noun to label people and then on to why it is a myth. |
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I Know How to Do This!
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| I thought I had pre-paved a happy-go-lucky attitude towards being a mother. I had intended to let my son, Lucky, follow his own path and my job was to get out of the way. Ahem! Well, my little controller side came out in full force in ways I had not expected.
I started out by trusting that Lucky would find his own sleeping pattern. That didn't work. So, when he was four months old I swung to the opposite side of the issue. My child would forever more be on a sleeping schedule. This potentially could've worked if I were more relaxed about it. But I wasn't. I was in huge conflict with my mate, Steve, about my schedule and method of putting Lucky to bed. |
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Seven Steps To Success.
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| Success is a product of our habits, our habits determine what we do with our lives. Habits are made up from three things skill, knowledge and desire. Skill makes us aware of what we must do, knowledge let us know what to do and desire is the drive and motivation behind it. To be successful first you must master your habits. Here are seven steps in helping you to change your habits. |
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Another spin on Value Propositions
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| Quite often the inspiration for a great sales idea comes from a source way outside our industry or normal frame of reference. What follows is a story about a really creative value proposition. How can you use its message for your own business? |
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Four facts all sales reps should always keep in mind
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| We are all conditioned to always remembering that the customer is always right. That's a good thing in general, but do we take it too far? |
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Taking Stock of What's Happening
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| There's a lot going on these days. People are stressed, no two ways about it. I'm observing a 'tired' group of executives whose staff are looking to them to 'fix' things. Well, no one has a magic wand, or... does everyone have a magic wand? |
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TAKE, SHAKE OR BREAK
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| Business is simple, all you have to do is TAKE, SHAKE OR BREAK. But, good Take, Shake and Break decisions and practices are essential to the continuing success of any enterprise. |
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Making the most of Up Selling & Cross Selling
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| Do you sell one thing and one thing only? Probably not. I suspect your business has a range of things it can offer. And I suspect that many of these things can be integrated together to make an end-to-end solution or various combinations that lead to much larger sales.
If this is the case, then how well are you selling in the size and scope of your business offerings?
Too many times sales people get fixated on the immediate sale in front of them not really seeing the potential of that sale now or into the future. If they would only ask the right questions and get a bigger perspective to work from they might get more and bigger sales for less effort. |
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Personal Branding - How To Do It In 5 Easy Steps
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| If you think of yourself as not being very different from other salespeople, please read this to learn 5 easy steps you can use to develop your personal brand.
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The Steps to Follow for Successful Conflict Resolution
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| The higher up the ladder of success that you climb the greater your problem solving and conflict management skills must become. Here is some very sound advice to follow in order to work towards more positive outcomes when faced with managing conflict. To learn more read on... |
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The Very Necessary Needs Assessment
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| For anyone in a professional sales role that requires any degree of sophistication the skills of uncovering opportunites, identifying needs, revealing shortcomings and exposing gaps is critical. Learn what the needs assessment is and why it is necessary to your success. Read on... |
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Top 10 Questions to Ask Your Prospects Before You Ask for the Business
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| When I was in high school, my girlfriends and I often envied the boys' prerogative of asking for phone numbers, dances, and dates, since the only time it was proper for girls to call boys was to invite them to the Sadie Hawkins dance. It wasn't fair, we fumed, that the guys got to do all the asking, and the girls had to wait to be asked. |
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Staying Naïve
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| There something to be said for remaining naive. Why is it that rookies who are green and don't know any better can often outsell seasoned veterans? In many ways, mentally staying naive has it's benefits. |
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The Power of Excellence
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| The one ingredient that turns the ordinary to extraordinary is merely a commitment to excellence |
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Sales and emotional intelligence
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| The "gender" discussion highlighted by my Sell like a Woman project, articles and other research leads people to believe that women are doing things men cannot because of gender. And this is causing sighing and forelock tugging in some male circles. "Not another feminist on her soap box" or "all men are useless" I hear some say. |
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Getting prospects to talk to you
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| Do you take time to really think about why you are calling a prospect or a client? Do you reflect on how effective you have been post the call?
Making prospecting calls to new prospects and existing clients is still one of the most important sales and business development activities you can do on a daily basis. Even with all the electronic communication and marketing options at hand most businesses still need to have someone prospecting for them to build and forge real business relationships. Top performing sales people make sure prospecting is part of their daily repertoire.
Like many things prospecting is a process and as a business development person, you will need to do over and over again approximately 500-1,000 times in a year at least!
However most people do not prospect effectively and many find it a daunting experience. |
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Financials for Business Owners: More Than A Look In The Rear View Mirror
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| Financial reports are the least understood piece of business information for most business owners. Yet everyone expects a business owner to understand his financial reports. Banks want them and they're needed to prepare tax returns. If you're not an accountant, you probably don't know how to use them to manage your business.
Accounting is the language of business. The reports tell the story of how well your business is performing. Once you know what your financial reports can tell you, your accountant can provide the information in a format that makes sense and is quick and easy to read, even for a non-accountant!
This is the first in a series of articles that will put business owners back in control of their company and reduce the stress that comes from not being certain how well your business is performing. |
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5 Tips to Improve Your Follow-Up Sales Skills While Building Customer Loyalty
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| Are your following sales skills building customer loyalty or inadvertently turning off customers and reducing sales? These 5 tips may help you increase sales, improve customer relationships and demonstrate why you are the Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray Suits. |
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Stress Defence Number 1 - Find a Mentor
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| Having spoken to over a quarter of a million peopls and consulted thousands of companies david Oliver draws from his life experience to share the biggest stress defence of al. Find a mentor. DISCOVER WHY |
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Job Interview Tips: How to Ace the Job Interview and Get Hired - Even in a Recession
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| Get hired faster even in a recession! Once You Get the Job Interview, Here Are Your Next Steps... |
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Are we All on the Same Page?
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| To tell great positioning stories, we need to give everyone the same frame of reference. Before we even get into the story - right up front. We need to place that paradigm shift right there in the middle of the table for all to see, and understand. We have to set the stage for everyone in a very, simple way. |
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Successful Appointment Setting in Today's Economy
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| Many marketers have gradually come to realize that the key to getting your prospective clients to listen to you and hear you out isn't just getting an appointment. If you are in a business that requires you to set appointments first you may hear questions/comments like this:
'Give me the Readers Digest version right now or I'm not making an appointment.' OR
'I need to hear a little more detail BEFORE I meet with you' OR
'If this is going to cost me anything, I'm not interested'
OR
Gone are the days when the prospective customer just waited for your call or visit so YOU could inform him or her how things worked. How can you get your foot in the door to gain trust and image credibility? |
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Addicted to Disaster
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| A person can become addicted to most anything. Besides drugs and alcohol, addictions can be toward different foods, television, people, work, spending, internet (especially email), fear, and one of the most addictive things for the majority of people--disaster! That's right. Most people are addicted to disaster, their own or other people's. |
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How to recreate yourself by identifying, packaging, and marketing transferable skills to a different industry and guarantee steady employment.
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| In the business world we have a short list of traditional sources of interdepartmental friction. One of these "hot zones" is the intersection of HR and managers, who can easily find themselves at odds. |
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Slow Down To Speed Up! How The Right Action Can Make You Go Faster
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| As a leader in the sales world, you are always in motion, but sometimes it feels like you are spinning your wheels instead of moving forward. |
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Pitch the Story, Not Your Book
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| Pitch your book and you have a certain number of stories and media hooks. Pitch yourself, your life experiences, your anecdotal stories and your book and you’ve suddenly broadened the bulls eye… |
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Three is Marketing's Magic Number
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| When you overload your audience with too many messages, you risk not communicating at all. |
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How to REALLY Connect With Your Customers on Their Terms to Build Relationships and Generate More Sales
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| Knowing how to engage your readers with attention grabbing headlines is important and at the same time, it's not enough to really create a relationship, build trust and eventually win a customer or client. |
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A "Weak" Consumer With Confidence!
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| When the strong Consumer Confidence numbers came out today, it begged the question: Do we really want consumers too confident?
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Nothing and Everything
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| As a bit of time has passed, hopefully we are able to put the death and destruction from the
Oklahoma tornadoes in some type of perspective. Although a tragedy of that nature can never be
fully understood, there are lessons to be learned.
My most lasting memory is of a young father being interviewed on the radio. As he stood with
his wife and two children on the spot of barren dirt that hours before had been his home and
everything he owned, he spoke the words I will keep with me always.
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Love Marketing
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| What makes the biggest difference in attracting money into our lives and our businesses? |
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10 Ways to Be Happier Now
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| Despite any negativity you encounter, you can choose what you want to pay attention to and direct your energy toward things that make you happy now. |
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Differentiating Pricing Strategy From Selling Strategy
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| Let's differentiate between this very sound pricing strategy yet unsound selling strategy. From a pricing perspective, this strategy allows you to effectively position your company, brand, products and services wherever you need them to be, based on markets, competition, reputation, quality and business strategy.
However, from a selling perspective, never provide your prospect with even two, let alone three options. It's difficult enough to close business in a timely manner today and you certainly don't want to be the cause of a decision making delay. |
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STRESS & How to become Stress-Free Quickly !
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| This article is a first aid kit against stress. It provides fast solutions to handle and get rid of stress. |
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Perspective is Everything
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| Reality can be best defined as one's perception based upon their own perspective.
Recently, I was enjoying an old, rather antiquated spy novel in which four opposing secret agents are sitting around a table, engaged in a card game. One of the agents was to receive a secret coded symbol that he was to write on the tablecloth. The secret coded symbol was to be picked up by a hidden camera in the ceiling of the card room. The other three secret agents were to observe the secret symbol as soon as it was written on the tablecloth and then report back to their respective spymasters.
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A Whole New Outlook In An Instant
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| Ever meet someone who is always chipper, always has a kind word to say, can be sick in bed but still wears a smile. Why? What makes two people look at the same situation and observe two completely different things? Is it perception or something deeper? |
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Sales Coach: High Level of Empathy In Selling Important?
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| Empathy is defined by Wikipedia as: “the capacity to recognize or understand another’s state of mind or emotion. It is often characterized as the ability to “put oneself into another’s shoes” or in some way experience the outlook or emotions of another being within oneself. Empathy does not necessarily imply compassion, or empathic concern because this capacity can be present in context of compassionate or cruel behavior.”
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Earn From Home With A Legitimate Online Business
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| There are great expectations from legitimate online businesses because they are the ones that customers trust and transact with more than once. Building a legitimate online business will ensure profits as well as guaranteed entrepreneurial growth. |
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Problem Solving the Coaching Way
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| One of the challenges of being a leader is dealing with the many issues that face us on a daily basis. Most of these issues are those that come with people. How many times a day do you spend trying to solve other people’s issues? Want to free up more time during the day to get to the things that you want rather than the things other people want? |
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Successful Networking Strategies
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| Ever go to a networking event and don't know how to "break the ice"? Here's practical tips for becoming more confident and comfortable. |
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The secret to determining if your advertising is profitable
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| As a marketing consultant and owner of a marketing firm, a big mistake I see businesses make is they do not take into consideration the value of repeat sales when they review if their advertising is profitable. Here is how to determining if your advertising is profitable... |
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Fighting for Superstars
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| It's superstars who make the critical difference in your company's performance. Everyone wants the superstars, and you have to fight for them - both the ones you have and the ones you want. Winning takes a multi-faceted approach that includes building a healthy culture and involves everyone in the organization. |
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What to Expect when Selling a Business for the First Time
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| Many business owners who are selling a company for the first time do not know what to expect. Of course, every transaction is different and no one can truly predict what you will face. However, here are nine “surprises” that any first-time business seller may encounter: |
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Business Success Strategies -- Are You On a High or a Low?
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| At Alex Mandossian's Teleseminar Secrets Reunion, we did a "timeline" exercise. Alex started it by charting his highlights and lowlights from the past 20 years. It was fascinating to see this laid out for us and to know even someone like Alex was in the abyss at a couple of points. Even more importantly, I learned 2 important takeaways I wanted to share with you. |
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May I Quote You?
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| As an author, the question, “May I quote you?” is a humbling request and a great compliment. For anyone who is in search of excellence a good quote is fuel for our journey.
It’s amazing how a short, simple quotation can quickly provide perspective, inspiration, comfort, motivation or insight. What a wonderful return for our invested time - take 10 seconds each morning to read a new quote and our day, maybe even our world, is changed.
I wanted to share a few of my favorites which can also be found in the new coffee table gift book, The Nature of Excellence…
“It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.” - Babe Ruth
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What Is That? Great Executive Coaches Add Perspective
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| Successful entrepreneurs understand that executive coaches can add an important dimension to their growth in business and as people. Great executive coaches add perspective. |
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A Secret to Closing More Sales
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| Do you know who your most ideal client is? Do you know how to find out that information? Read about three easy and effective ways to do market research. |
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Sales Tip – Top 3 Selling Crimes: Bring in the Sales Crime Stoppers!
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| Salespeople need an edge in a down economy. You can get some edge from being a sales crime stopper and here are some sales crime stopping tips. |
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The 7 Ways to Save Your Retirement
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| Veteran Financial Planner gives you the steps to re-building you retirement portfolio and retirement dreams. |
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What Sergio Garcia Can Teach You About Selling
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| Sergio Garcia could have made one minor adjustment to his golf game last year and earned an additional $2.5 million dollars. Salespeople can earn more too, with 1 minor adjustment.
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What is your product really worth?
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| The secret of selling is the art of value visualization. A natural sales person will lead the buyer through a series of structured questions, whereby the buyer will actually “see” what the product will enable them to do. The Sales person then will encourage the prospect to put their own value on that capability. |
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Dont Take it Personally
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| Do you sometimes feel like there is a conspiracy and the whole world is picking on you? Your friends, family, colleagues, even strangers? You know they are really talking about you even though they are making general statements. Who do they think they're kidding? Strangers even seem to be going out of their way to make your day difficult. You've been bumped with shopping carts AND cut off on the road by inconsiderate people. Sound a little familiar? Here is the question - is everyone REALLY out to get you, or is it your own baggage that makes you perceive that everyone has an agenda with your name on it?
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Buying An Existing Business Part III of IX
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| This section of Buying An Existing Business deals with goal setting. It suggest several critical questions you should ask yourself before sitting out on your journey to being your own boss.
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How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie - Book Review
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| You are probably reading this article because you have heard about Dale Carnegie's book or someone recommended it and you are not sure you should read it?
You may be thinking, what the hype is about and if reading this book will change your life and your perspective about people? You may be wondering what differentiates this book from other books in its genre. |
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How to Win More Sales Must Include the Answer to this Simple Question
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| If you are in business can you answer who is your client? Sure, you may be thinking it is everyone I have invoiced and possibly what a dumb question. Yet, are you sure that your clients are only relegated to those you have received payment for your goods and services?
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Ride For the Brand
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| I've never seen anyone make it to the top who wasn't completely loyal to the products, services, organization, idea, philosophy or cause she represented. Why would you waste your time and energy on something you don't or can't believe in? |
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Simply Speaking Increase Sales Using These 7 Words
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| Imagine just by changing 7 words that you currently use now as a sales professional you could quickly increase sales. Would that be of interest to you? If you are so inclined to improve your sales skills and therefore your sales results, then read on. |
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Marketing – my three start up priorities
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| Are you considering establishing your own small business, or perhaps you are currently operating a business that you bought or started yourself? If you are, then we have found common ground. My name is Jo Macdermott and I am writing this article about my own marketing journey in creating a business that does just that: Marketing. |
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Advertising's Most Important Word
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| If you had to guess the single most important word in advertising what would it be: free, special, discount, sale, new, improved, bigger, better? So many words have lost their meaning or been corrupted by misuse or abuse that it is not an obvious choice. The words luxury, exclusive, and world class have been rendered meaningless after being applied to everything from eight hundred square foot condos to restaurants that serve microwave frozen dinners. We can't even rely on light, diet, or low carb to actually describe what's inside a package. |
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Don't Select the Route before You Know the Destination
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| Goal-setting is a critically important skill that's necessary for success. However, it's not the most important one. |
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Let's Talk Perspective
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| Whether you can or whether you can't depends on how you choose to see your challenge. |
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In Business to Sell Shoplifted Items
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| Shoplifting along with employee theft has become big business. In a number of cases, storefronts have been set up for the sole purpose of reselling shoplifted items for huge profits. In other cases shoplifters as well as grocery store employees have made arrangements with unscrupulous restaurants to supply them with stolen merchandise, primarily meat products for a cut rate price. Meanwhile other shoplifters have gone into business for themselves selling a variety of shoplifted items on one of the many online auction sites. |
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Why an Outstanding Resume is Not Enough to Get an Interview: Reason 3
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| Many people think that a powerful, well written résumé is sufficient to give them the edge needed to secure a job interview. While an outstanding résumé is absolutely necessary, it may not always be sufficient. This is the third in a series of short articles which outlines the factors, other than your resume, which could determine whether you will be amongst the chosen few from the multitude. |
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How your Resume can Optimise Interview Time
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| The primary function of a resume is to secure an invitation to an interview. But that's not all it can do. It can also provide you with a competitive edge at the interview.
Because your worst enemy in an interview is time, optimising that limited time is critical. Many interviews devote 50% of more of the precious, never to be repeated time to clarifying your experience and achievements rather than being an discussion about your ability to contribute to the organisation. |
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How to Find Your Own Unique Selling Proposition
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| One of the biggest mistakes a small business can make – especially a young small business – is trying to be all things to all people. This article will show you what it takes to create your own unique selling proposition (USP) in order to become successful.
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10 Tips to Gain Credibility Online
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| Below, are some key points that may give you a fresh perspective on how to enhance your credibility online. |
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Listen, Listen, Listen
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Perspective.
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| When things are getting tough a little perspective may be what is needed to refocus, re-energize and get going. Your biggest disadvantage may just be your biggest advantage. |
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Is the student ready?
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| Benefits of a mentoring relationship |
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CARVE YOUR SUCCESS KEY
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| I had just finished commenting to my husband how much I liked the use of copper in the Parade of Homes' kitchen we were touring, when I overheard another woman telling her husband how much she disliked the look. It made me laugh. It's funny how we see things differently.
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What Great Questions Can You Ask?
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| Ingenuity and thinking are driven by questions. The better the questions you ask the more insight and ideas you get. Here are just a few of the over 150 questions I like to ask. |
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When Was The Last Time You Took The Time To Reflect On Your Past?
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| Life lessons I have learned as I have journeyed through life. Why not take the time to learn from my experience and then take the time to think about yours. |
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How Customers’ Needs Increase Sales
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| One would think that any sales professionals know that the customers’ needs increase sales. However, actual sales experiences do not support that belief. |
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Work Hard Get Less
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| Are we really working harder for less? Before you shake your heads.... |
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Network Your Way to Powerhouse Results!
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| Most people would probably agree that building and effectively utilizing a strong professional network to create success is simply not an option. Yet when it comes right down to it, many people avoid networking like the plague. |
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In the Drivers Seat
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| Envision yourself in the driver's seat of your car. Where are you headed? What path are you taking? How long will it take you to get there? How do you get around traffic and road blocks? These are some questions that can be applied to life as well. How does one find the answer to these questions? By learning about, understanding, and applying the various powerful laws of the universe. These are the laws which govern our very existence. |
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Practice Landing Your Next Client
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| In an exclusive interview with web copy expert, Nick Usborne, Rebecca Matter, Vice President of Marketing for AWAI, shows you step-by-step how to pitch your services, negotiate your fees and land clients. |
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Affirm Your Financial Destiny for 2009
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| It is often at the end of the year that we consider what our ‘New Year’s Resolution’ will be. But in these times of economic uncertainty, the trend is to re-examine one’s financial situation. |
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Your CUSTOMER Satisfaction Is Tied To Your EMPLOYEE Satisfaction
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| WHAT DO YOUR CUSTOMERS REALLY THINK ABOUT YOU?
We constantly endeavor to achieve 100% CUSTOMER SATISFACTION. We invest our time and money developing surveys and devising ways to improve our rate of return on those surveys. We empower the information gathered to correct individual problems and micromanage our way to solutions. In fact, much of the comments we act upon don’t really reflect upon the way our business is actually being conducted. These knee jerk reactions create more problems than they solve. The most important feedback never makes its way to our “gatherers”. Our BEST customers don’t respond to surveys and the truly DISSATISFIED customers will never give us a second chance. |
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The Art of Asking the Right Questions
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| The truth is, most of us don’t know how to ask good questions, or when we do ask a really great question, it is by accident. There are several ways to ask questions. Some people seem really good at it, while others use a random, what-ever-pops-into-head approach.
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Accepting and Embracing All of Yourself
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| Close your eyes and become aware of your breath as you inhale and exhale. Allow your breath to take you to a silent place in the core of your being where you feel centered and present-focused. When you’re ready, say out loud: “I am okay accepting and embracing all of myself unconditionally”.
Notice. Does it feel that every part of you - every cell - knows that this is true about you? If your answer is no, continue to read. This is a signal that there is room for you to step further into your own power and light.
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Taking Down Walls
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| Our walls or protective shields are the focus of this month’s article. The use of the word “protection” here is different than what would show up in an insurance policy, house alarm company, or in an article about practical ways to prevent physical harm. What is being explored here is the use of ‘protection’ in the feeling sense. |
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Performance Appraisals: Critical Conversations
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| No one likes performance appraisals. Managers hate giving them. Employees hate receiving them and HR professionals hate policing the process. As one manager explained to me, doing a performance appraisal is similar to getting a root canal: both are painful; neither will kill you; but with a root canal, the trauma is over the next day. And yet, we continue to insist on doing appraisals hoping for different results. |
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Balancing Basics for Busy Women
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| As women, we often attempt to do everything on our own. It seems quicker and less hassle to just do it ourselves. In this way, we are sometimes our own worst enemy. We need help. We need support. It is OK to give up control and ask for it. Balance is basic when we know where to start.
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Gambling – Or Risk-Taking?
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| There is a difference between gambling and risk-taking. John Scully says, “People who take risks are the people you’ll lose against.” A study of the first graduating class from the Harvard School of Business revealed that, across the board, these men were risk-takers. They would not pass a car on a hill or a curve, nor blindly go into a business venture. They assembled the facts and evaluated carefully from every possible perspective the chances of success and the benefits which went with that success. They understood there were no guarantees and that the possibility existed that they could lose. Nonetheless, they recognized that the possible gain was so much greater than the possible loss that they deemed it appropriate to take the risk. |
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How Does Inertia Suck the Life Out of Your Small Business?
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| Sales are important to every business because revenue is the fuel that drives growth. But in the case of small businesses, there seems to be a greater sense of urgency when it comes to converting every individual sales opportunity. Due to the real or perceived pressure of closing a sale, small businesses sometimes fail to recognize when the grip of inertia has taken hold of a prospect. What is inertia and how does it affect your small business? Are there any strategies to deal with "Prospect Inertia"?
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Courageous Conversations
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| For the purpose of leadership, courage is defined as a reconciliation of the consequences of failure. A courageous conversation is then the interaction between people when the leader has defined the consequences of failure and is alright with those potential risks. |
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How to negotiate with integrity
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| For some the worlds of negotiation and integrity may seem poles apart. How can you ensure you get what you want whilst retaining your integrity? Well, according to sales guru Jack Collis negotiators fall into one of three categories. |
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You Have to Connect to Sell
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| Do you have something lots of people need and want? Great. How will they know about it? How will they know to buy from you? |
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How to Avoid 4 Key Sales Objections
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| As you’re holding a sales conversation with a potential client there are three conversations going on. The outward verbal conversation between the two of you, the inward conversation in the potential clients mind, and the one you’re having in your mind. Currently you monitor two of those three conversations. |
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Telling Aint Selling
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| Telling ain’t selling. If you goal is to increase sales, then maybe you need to redirect your senses. |
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Email With Integrity - Reaching for Inboxes in a World of Spam
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| This paper outlines the following information:
Table of Contents:
* Introduction
* Defining Spam
* How Spam Affects your Earnings
* Double Opt-In Versus Single Opt-In
* Why Double Opt-In Is The Right Choice
* Common Questions About Spam
* Maximizing Email Deliverability
This paper is designed for a quick over view and understanding of the issue as a individual sending email as part of your business process. |
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Trading Concessions
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| A Win-Win negotiation can only be achieved if both parties are prepared to concede some of their ‘would like to have's’ in favour of preserving their ‘must have's’. The way concessions are handled is a vitally important negotiating skill and can have a huge impact on the final result. Below are 10 Top Tactics to help you:
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Hold Up a Quarter
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| Differences in perception often cause conflict between people. If I hold a quarter out in front of me, I will see heads and you will see tails. It is the same object, but we have very different views of it.
Our perceptions lead to logical conclusions about how to react to any issue. If you see a different problem, you are going to suggest a different remedy. This creates conflict because you and I will not always agree on actions to be taken. This article shares several antidotes.
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Closing with Ease
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| Next to objections, closing is one of the most talked-about sales training topics among sales people and sales managers. Everyone wants to know how to close and how to speed up the buying process. Closing is easy when you have thoroughly appreciated each customer’s specific requirements and aligned the presentation of your solution accordingly. |
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Increase Sales with a Fine Tooth Comb
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| What’s the difference between what you do and how you do it and how top producers do the same things? It’s all in the details. The stuff you don’t even notice or think about. The stuff you can’t even see. |
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Managing Luxury Brands in Recession
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| The article focuses on how luxury brands can manage the effects of recession and rather gain from it. |
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REAL Teamwork: A Leadership Lesson from the Dugout
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| How can you avoid exhausting attitudes that drain mental energy and sour workplace successes? What's one simple analogy that can help support collaboration and cooperation? This quick and simple lesson "from the dugout" might help you and your team re-frame the big picture when it comes to accepting the nuances of being a team player. |
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Staying Up, Up, Up, In a Down, Down World
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| Parts I and II |
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Scheduling and Planning - Keeping on Track - Part 2
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| Keeping your day on track can often times be a challenge in today's schedule hectic environment. We have provided 8 tips for you to use to make your day go smoother. |
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Defeat Procrastination and Make More Cash!
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| In order for any business to grow, they have to TAKE ACTION! This can be really difficult for some.
Procrastination is the #1 reason small businesses stall and do not grow as quickly as they would like.
Let's put an end of that today! Here are some great techniques to defeat your procrastination. |
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Don't Freak Out During Follow Up
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| What they say... what you hear... what they mean. This article will help you clarify the sometimes crazy process of follow-up. |
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How To Use Tip Sheets To Promote Your Business
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| Your prospects just want to trust you. Here's how tip sheets can help you gain that trust. |
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Dealing with Sales Objections: General
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| Today I’m going to start a new series of blog posts about handling and overcoming common sales objections. The title for each post will be “Dealing with Sales Objections” followed by the particular objection that will be tackled as part of that post.
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Are You Wedded To Your Marketing?
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| The other day I received a most curious email from someone I’ve never met.... |
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How to Get Over Being Angry
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| One of the things I’ve been hearing in my recent Comfort Zone to Confidence Zone programs is that participants have gotten stuck feeling angry – angry at a frustrating boss, anger at an ‘ex’, frustrated with a difficult family member, etc. |
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Help, I Urgently Need to Increase Sales
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| Whether you’ve been selling for a while, or you’re new to the business you may find yourself in dire need of sales. The more desperate you get to increase sales the worse you do. |
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DOES A LACK OF EQ IMPACT PROFESSIONAL GOALS?
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| Emotions limit our intellectual ability and sabotage our best interests!
It is not a question of education & skill that will make the difference in professional achievement & success; it is a question of access. It is about our ability to access that part of the brain where this learning is stored in times of tension, ambiguity and change.
Scientific research is clear, emotions come before thought. We feel before we think. Why is this important to understand? Our “Emotional Brain” or site of emotional memory has the power to flood our processing center, the “Thinking Brain” or site of IQ and working memory. What happens? It is like our brain’s computer crashes!
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What the Best CEOs Know by Jeffrey Krames
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| Jeffrey Krames gives us a glimpse inside the minds of 7 of the top CEOs. He profiles: Michael Dell, Jack Welch, Gerstner of IBM, Andy Grove, Bill Gates, Herb Kelleher and Sam Walton. These men were all at the helm of very large companies and some faced seemingly insurmountable problems. Others had policies that allowed them to get far ahead of their competitors. Read on to find out what you can learn from each of these CEO's and how their experiences can help your business. |
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What Will Your Transition Cost?
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| Although culturally it may cost men to become introspective and to examine in some depth what's really important to them, the cost of failing to perform this kind of self-examination could be much higher. It cost you everything you hold dear. |
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Why Do You Buy?
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| What makes you buy one thing and not another? Is it because of price, quality, uniqueness, or is it something else? |
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Transforming Power by Hugh Ballou
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| Hugh Ballou, the author of Tranforming Power, has over 40 years of experience as a choir director and now he works as a motivational speaker, coach, and a leadership trainer. It may be difficult to see how those two careers tie together, but this book shows a wide variety of examples of the way that transformational change can help any type of organization or group. The book is chock full of stories from people who have been involved with various transformational changes. They share the positive, the negative and the successful ending to these changes. There is much to learn in this book for any group or organization who is in need of a transformational change by a transforming leader. |
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What To Say When Your Prospect Only Has 10 Minutes
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| Learn the three options for dealing with a prospect who says they have a limited amount of time to learn about your prospects and services. |
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Is Selling Simple or Complicated?
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| Tessa Stowe dispels the notion that selling is complicated and offers advice for finding a simple sales process. |
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IS THERE ANY VALUE IN YOUR VALUE PROPOSITION FIVE TIPS FOR COMMUNICATING THE REAL VALUE OF YOUR SERVICES
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| By John Doerr
Are You Different?
In the course of my work with all manner of professional service firms, I hear a very common lament. “We are becoming a commodity. The prospects just seem to buy on price. We are really good. How can I possibly separate myself from the crowd?”
My usual response is, “What can make you special? Why are you different?”
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The Path of Least Resistance
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| Have you ever faced a situation where none of the obvious next steps felt good? Or what about a financial crisis and all of the solutions made you cringe? There’s nothing like feeling stuck or out of control that will give you a stomachache or a splitting headache faster. How do you use the laws of attraction deliberately when you don’t know how the heck to get to a better state of mind? |
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Money Is Your Servant
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| Money issues seem to be an ongoing challenge for many of us. We tend to try to control it, as if it were a beast. We put boundaries, rules, limitations, and goals in place to make us feel like we're being "good" and doing it "right."
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Partnering for Profit
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| Doing almost anything, besides meditating, is easier when you have two or more of the right people. So, why do most people invest by themselves or just with their significant other? They
don't know how it easy it can be. |
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Shift your But
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| How to get out of fighting fires and crisis management and reduce your stress levels. |
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Are You Feeling like an Also-Ran when You want to be a Top Producer?
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| You're sales training may not have included the keys to standing out. Standing out enables you to get the attention of the right people, and get known among those right people. |
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Why this Common Sales Mistake is Costing You More Sales than You Realize
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| The exact language you’re taught to use puts pressure on your prospect. This pressure increases your prospect’s anxiety, and reduces their ability to make a decision. |
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Online Social Networks Part 1 Social Networking
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| Authors and other business entrepreneurs have a valuable resource in online social networks--providing they learn how to use thiem. Although this article is geared toward the author or writer, the concepts will work for anyone who has a product or service to promote online. |
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If You Don't Know, Ask...Then Ask Again
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| First impressions...how quickly do you make them, hold onto them and judge everything by them? Making a judgment based on first impressions won't serve you. Paying attention to how and why you make those judgments will. Should you judge a book by its cover? |
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How To Earn Money With Affiliate Programs in 3 Steps
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| Let's say you are new to internet marketing and you want to earn money. How do you start? One way that is popular is to sell other people's products. This is known as affiliate marketing. |
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How to get and leverage attention from the mass media
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| To get mass media attention, you have to broadcast for a reason. That means your message is broadcast to a lot more people than those in your niche. This is where most people get it completely wrong, and here Joel Roberts gave some very good advice. No matter what your niche is, you have to figure out a way to frame it so that the masses will listen. If you can grab their attention for an instant, you can then go into the details. But, if you start with the details and the solution, you won’t get anywhere with the mass media. |
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"Own Your Zone" Marketing
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| Do you get overwhelmed when you think about your marketing?
Do you feel there’s so much to do, or you’re not clearly sure what to do?
Here is one way I have found to cut through all the confusion to complete clarity.
I know that you know about marketing with benefit streams and creating the “What’s in it for me?” marketing perspective for your materials. However, there is more important information about what makes you unique that often gets ignored.
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Take A Vacation To Improve Your Results
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| Do you own a business or does it own you? Sometimes it requires getting away from the business to improve results. |
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Business Literacy Stimulates Entrepreneurial and Personal Mastery—Part 1
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| In this series, I will share the traits, actions and strategies pertaining to entrepreneurs I’ve gathered over two decades. Business Literacy™ adds order to chaos and reason to scattered efforts and information. |
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Reach Your Reader: How to Make Your Letters a Success
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| Letters—and even e-mails—are person-to-person communications; they are usually written by one person and read by one person. They have the power to win you’re your reader like no other marketing material can. However, there is no such thing as a routine letter. As soon as you start to regard external correspondence as just a task that needs to get done, your letters may lose their personal touch and competitive edge. |
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Even Better Than Great
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| What aren't you thinking of that's holding you back or could help you evolve? If you figure out the answer to that, you won't be great. You'll be even better than great! |
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Is Your Franchise Ready to Expand?
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| If you are thinking about expanding your business, you have to look into certain points. First of all, you must know your customers’ profile and the market where they exist. You are also supposed to upgrade your training facilities and support system. |
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Cut yourself some slack
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| How many of you feel that you have so many different responsibilities in your life, that you cannot possibly make it all work. You may be focusing on work obligations while trying to keep your household up and running. All of this running around creates a feeling of hopelessness. I have seen it countless times with clients that try to do it all with enormous to-do lists, and in the end they feel like a failure. Sometimes I just need to remind them of the larger picture. When all is said and done, do you really think anyone is going to care that your home is spotless? Rather, what they will remember is how they felt in your presence, the memories you shared. |
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Glad to Be Sad.
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| A story from STORIES OF SHIFT: How to Deal with Difficult Situations and Change Them to Positive Opportunities |
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Only one way to go from here
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| A story from STORIES OF SHIFT: How to Deal with Difficult Situations and Change Them to Positive Opportunities |
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Do You Put Your Customers First?
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| Customer centricity - being customer centric - seems to be one of the buzz words again in business circles. Being truly customer centric means looking at your business from your customers' perspective. But what does it mean & is it worth it?
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The Call to Leadership
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| As a coach working with small business owners for over a decade I've seen the difference it makes when entrepreneurs consciously choose to function as leader and learn to apply the fundamentals of good business practice. Learn them here. |
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Get Outside
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| It’s springtime, get outside. I mean this literally... |
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Three Steps to Empathetic Listening
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| An article of 1165 words describing three steps on how to master the skill of listening. |
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The Power of Attention
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| An article of 947 words describing how to stay focused when days get hectic. Coaching tips are provided to help you “stay in the present” and focus on the one thing that needs your attention at that time. |
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The Power of Social Bookmarking Improve Your Rankings
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| Social Bookmarking has become a phenomenon in the last couple of years. As more individuals join these social networks, the news, and what is deemed important is now driven by consumers - a fundamental shift on how information was prioritized in the past. |
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BE HERE, NOW - Being present as facilitator
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| Someone unexpectedly decides to leave a group. Not an unusual occurrence, but one which John Gloster-Smith uses to explore the qualities of awareness and presence that are fundamental to his style of group facilitation. |
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Have you had your annual check-up?
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| With the business enviornment changing so quickly it's important to not only do annual check-ups, but quarterly check-ups. |
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Clear Expectations Lead to Great Partnerships
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| Create great relationships by starting with clear expectations. In any partnership the expected outcome must be clear to everyone. Settling disputes arising from unclear expectations help attorneys thrive. Misunderstandings cause arguments, and blame abounds. This can be devasting to your business. So, get the expectations clear up front! |
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Getting Support in Times of Change
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| Understand what "helpful" support looks like, and how to get it. |
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Corporate Manslaughter and Homicide Act 2008
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| Are you aware that the new Corporate Manslaughter and Homicide Act came into force in the UK on 6th April 2008? |
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Can Attitude Change Your Reality?
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| I’ve observed that negative people often adopt a defeatist mindset, taking on the role of a victim, while positive people often adopt a solution-oriented mindset and set about creating their own opportunities. |
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Your Work or Your Life
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| You don't have work-life-balance issues because you have the necessary systems in place....
Right or Wrong? |
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What’s in it for me? How to keep people reading your business letters and e-mail, reports and proposals
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| Most people write about themselves and the features they have to offer. Savvy business writers know they need to write to the reader and share benefits and results. Along the way, all their terrific features will come out--but in a way their readers can relate to. |
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Giving Effective Feedback
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| If there is one area that gives both managers and employees difficulty it is the need to give and accept effective feedback. While giving feedback is not about dishing out criticism, this, however, often proves to be the case when managers find themselves under pressure.
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How does policy either motivate or undermine employee performance?
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| In an excerpt from a November 20th post in the Procurement Insights Blog titled "How Leadership Repeatedly Under-Mines Their Most Valuable Procurement Asset" (see below), I discussed the impact that current procurement policies and environments have on purchasing professionals within their respective organizations.
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Sorry No More
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| Do you find yourself saying “I’m sorry” too often at work? Have you noticed a pattern of prefacing feedback or sharing of your ideas with an “I’m sorry, but?” Clients often come to me noticing their overuse of this phrase and the negative impact it has on their professional stature. What place does saying “I’m sorry” have in the workplace? |
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Change Your Mind and Change Your Life
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| Want a new job? You'll have to pull some time and attention away from what you're doing now to make the time to launch a job search. And if you believe that business development is something that you'll begin "later," you likely won't recognize client development opportunities that may come your way -- because chance favors the prepared mind.
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