Create Urgency...

URGENCY... The best businesses have it, the best sports people have it, great leaders have it. In times of high urgency, stuff gets done... lots of stuff!

Think for a moment... When do you get the most done? When you start a project or when the deadline is close? Most people don’t have a sense of urgency until they are faced with a crisis or a deadline.

Ever planned a weekend away and a few days before you seem to get more done in those few days than the last month? It happens to me everytime and everytime I say "we should go away more often!"

It’s the weirdest thing, but just think what would happen if you operated with that level of urgency and productivity all the time? Ever been in a crowded airport doing your best to get to your boarding gate or to claim your luggage and you get stuck behind someone walking at half speed with no zest for life? Or you're on a narrow country road driving to a sales appointment with minutes to spare and you get stuck behind a large truck ambling along? I want to shout “Hey... get moving or get out of the way!”

Now don’t get me wrong... All my life I have had a habit of waiting until the deadlines were dangerously close before I shifted into top gear, burnt the midnight oil twice over or burnt the candle at all ends... But got the job done on time. The chase to bring the project home on time is sooo exciting when left to the last minute!! It just never feels the same to start a project early and get it done well before time... boring... and isn't that what deadlines are for?

But I do think that the secret to my success and the success of others is that there is a natural sense of urgency to "get it done!" Not everyone has it. How do you create it, condition it in yourself, get it if you don’t have it and better yet, how do you get others to get it if they don’t have it?

You have to control the environment... Set the rules , create accountability, provide support, celebrate wins and have fun! Set the time frames, the deadlines, the requirements. The closer the deadline, the higher the urgency. Set the goals and make sure that everyone, even if it's just you, has a written copy to review daily. If you discipline yourself to operate in this kind of an environment, I guarantee you will thrive on that natural sense of urgency. You will be invigorated, you will need less sleep, you will feel younger, and most of all, you will get what you want faster. You will have purpose like a heat seeking missile...

Those who are truly on a mission, have a natural sense of urgency. They have something they see, feel and are passionate about that they want. They are always pushing, sometimes impatient, but always have urgency. I am a living example of this... Very often I have to diarise when to go to bed! I get so engrossed and excited reading and responding to feedback, or adding content to my sites, that I forget what the time is, and often, very often, work into the wee hours of the morning... it's just so much fun.

What about you? Do you need an emergency to have urgency or is your mission big enough to drive you? I remember years ago when someone asked me if my business at that time was a jalopy or a racing car! What they were asking was if my business was going to help achieve my goals at a fast speed or a slow speed and may not even get there. I was in a jalopy, I wasn't passionate enough about it to work through the night and my earnings would ceiling due to many limiting factors. I made the change to a racing car and now I'm fueled with excitement and passion and working with urgency.

For all of us the clock is ticking, we only have 24 hours in a day! Life is short so create urgency!
Click Here To Discover Some Incredibly Inspirational Success Stories!

Cashflow - Get Over The Anxiety

Cashflow in small business is often a source of unnecessary anxiety and this anxiety will directly affect your performance and desire to charge ahead. The secret is to take control.

After all money is only another tool, another resource that helps you to get what you want. Just like your other resources it has to be managed and you have to take control. In my first business as a self employed Electrician I had no idea about cashflow... Well that's what Accountant's are for, right? Wrong, usually the Accountant's involvement in a small business is to complete the tax return at the end of the financial year. You as the business owner have to manage the day to day cashflow, and looking at your bank statement balance online is not going to work, infact it will add to the problem.

Knowing your cashflow means taking control and enjoying a calm state of mind. A calm state of mind results in performance at your best potential. Take a little time (1 hour once a week) to update your cashflow schedule and I guarantee you will feel calmer and less stressed about money. You will gain clarity about what you need to do. It will show you what money needs to be collected by when, what extra sales you need to make, what jobs you have to get finished and invoiced, so you can pay your suppliers at the end of the month. And then you'll build on that and start forecasting what your cashflow potential should be in 12 months, 24 months, etc. That's when it gets exciting, because your cashflow schedule becomes a valuable tool in designing your future goals... More on that later.

What's that you mumbled... "not another thing to fit into my busy day... I don't know how to create a cashflow schedule, I have no idea where to start, and anyway I'm using an accounting package!!" Well the accounting package is useless because that's only looking at your history. How much time are you wasting look at that pile of bills in the shoe box, trying to sort them, or looking at your bank statement and thinking where's all the money going and the waste of time worrying and stressing. 1 hour a week will allow you to focus, to take control, to plan.

What's a cashflow schedule? A simple spreadsheet on a bit of paper or on the computer that identifies all of your income, all of your expenses, with a profit result at the bottom. Our cashflow segment of the free mini course at www.profitfitness.com provides a template for this. A cashflow schedule is simple and imperative for small business. Every week you would enter any bills that need to paid, at the date that they need to be paid, and any income expected at the date expected. Very quickly, by looking at the net result (income less expenses) you can identify any weeks in the future that you may have a negative result. So weeks before you already know about a problem and can put something in place to correct it... Make more sales, take out a loan, etc. Also, if you ever need a loan from a bank this tool is brilliant to show them as it'll show expected profits and most importantly demonstrates that you are in full control.

Most small businesses struggle with sporadic income, mainly because they haven't yet learned how to maintain customer loyalty, or don't have a good ongoing customer retention program in place. More of this in our mini course. Sporadic income is very hard to predict on the cashflow schedule and usually ends up being inflated to make the net result look good. A good cashflow schedule should show a consistent income week after week that is steadily rising. Which leads onto a valid reason why you need to identify your target market, make an offer that pulls customers away from your competition and then lock them into an ongoing loyalty program, so you know exactly what your income will be for the next 12 months. Also you have just massively boosted the value of your small business.

Consider this... 2 different, single operator, mobile car detailing businesses for sale. The 1st operator has been operating for 3 years and waits for clients to ring. The 2nd operator has been operating for 1 year, he has 60 clients, they are all on a 12 month loyalty plan, all his clients receive a discounted weekly car detail and the detail is completed at the same time and day once a week. Which one would you buy?

The 2nd operator has guaranteed his income for the next 12 months. If his service is impeccable do you think his customers will renew the program for another 12 months? He has created a win win solution, the customer wins with a better price and knowing exactly when the detailer will arrive so they plan their day around that. The detailer has won because his business is worth at least double what his competitors business is. How easy would it be to loan money from the bank, for another vehicle and detailer, based on this cashflow?

Your cashflow schedule will help you to make informed decisions and give you peace of mind. Make a note in your diary now, block out 1 hour the same time every week to update your cash flow. Make it an important priority. Make it a habit, you will be thankful you did.

Give Your Customers Options.

Give your customers options... What do I mean? Well you are spending either time or money to advertise your business constantly. It might be paid advertising, the advertising on your car or the front of your building, the advertising on your uniform, business card or word of mouth.

Now if a potential customer rings you up or walks through your door, some part of your advertising has worked... But now it is up to you to convert and sell them something. I'll give you an example:

It's now winter in Western Australia and although our winters are pretty mild our houses are generally built to cater for the heat so when the mercury gets low, we need heating. Our house is open plan and we have a wood fire heater which works great. But I work at home, and every now and again during the day I would like to heat the house. Now comes the inconvenience of having to get the wood, start the fire put up with a bit of wood smoke in the house while it starts and all in all it would probably waste about half an hour of my time.

So, I see a glossy advert in the junk mail for a portable gas heater that will heat the entire house, is self igniting and it has a remote! So I could press a button and be warm, seems like a good convenient solution. First like always I do a Google search to make sure there is not a better solution and notice the advertisers on the right are all supplier ads and nobody local is advertising there? Well off I go to the glossy ad shop to have a look. The shop is small, they sell cooling and heating solutions, it is well laid out, with 3 staff when I walk in. I wasn't in there 30 seconds when I get asked "Can I help?" I feel great, the shop is inviting, the staff friendly and I'm ready to spend, credit card in hand.

I explain my situation and get directed to a portable gas solution with remote... Yes! But then the sales person tells me all the features! I want the benefits... In my boredom I flick over the price tag and notice it's $1250 and while he is rambling on about the convection and igniter mechanism I'm thinking, I can't really justify that cost, maybe I'm just being lazy I'll start the fire at 6am so it doesn't disrupt my day... Ohhh, he stopped talking and I didn't hear the part where he said "I'll get you a brochure" and walked off. He returned with a 4 page glossy brochure in hand, price written next to the model he suggested, I said thank-you and walked out? After all I'm being lazy, I'll chop the wood on the weekend... what was I thinking.

That small business relies on local sales and they have made a big effort to get people through the door, but they are leaving a huge bundle of cash on the table by not converting and making sales. When a customer rings you or walks through your door it is imperative that you sell them something or at the very minimum get their name and contact details so you can directly market to them until they buy. The sales person in the heating shop knew my problem but didn't identify my objections? My objection was the price, I couldn't justify the price, he didn't identify that. But if he had explained that these heaters generally last 10 years and therefore it will cost less than $1 per day to run and then asked me if my time was worth more than $1 for half an hour... I would've been sold.

Or offer me a payment plan or a rental plan or even better identified my real problem which was the time it takes to get the wood fire going and offering a solution with compressed paper that ignites immediately and is smokeless or something... Give me options, sell me something. I had walked in expecting to spend money, they had paid with there advertising to get me there, I walked out with nothing... We both lost. They lost money for not converting and I lost because I didn't have a solution.

It is always better to have part of a profit that you otherwise wouldn't have had. It would have been better for them to have sold me a $10 product rather than nothing and offered to email me a free report on "10 ways to efficiently heat your home" if I ticked the box accepting their weekly newsletter. I am then a qualified customer and they have my details for future marketing. It is expensive to get a customer to call or walk through the door don't let them slip through your fingers and go next door.

You and your staff should have a goal to convert 100% of people that call or walk in to your business... And the conversion can be anything from a sale to getting their contact details. Remember those customers pay your salary...

5 tips for automating your business online

In a previous post I spoke about creating an online income stream to compliment your offline business. This maybe like the Beauty Salon creating an ebook on how to care for your skin using natural products... Now they are benefiting from not only the local walk-in clients but also a global online clientele that pays you while you sleep!!

If you're someone who can appreciate the value of a guaranteed return on the time and money you invest -- and you're excited by the prospect of making, say, $300 for every $1 you put into your business...

Then I have an exciting special report for you!

For the first time ever, Internet Marketing guru Derek Gehl is going to lead you step by step through 5 simple business automation strategies that will allow you to work less (save anywhere from 4 to 25 hours per week)...

Plus, he's going to show you how to make MORE MONEY this year (from $12,000.00 to $200,000.00 or more depending on your particular business and situation) than ever before.

He's not only going to reveal how he made over $3.5 Million in online sales in the last 365 days using a series of powerful e-mail marketing techniques and tools, along with case studies of real people who increased their incomes by 242%... $80,000... even $200,000 using these strategies...

... By popular demand, he's also decided to share his FREE MONEY system.

You may be astonished to learn that -- right now -- he has students all around the world quietly using his FREE MONEY system to rake in $1,000s every day, with zero effort.

To read Derek's special report, that explains step by step how this system works -- and how you can apply it to your business immediately, visit:

http://www.marketingtips.com/mailloop/t.x/867389

By the way, as part of a special celebration, on this page Derek's also giving away FIVE SUPER BONUSES (valued at over $827, but yours FREE!), including the secrets of avoiding spam complaints and getting your e-mail delivered to the "BIG 3" -- Hotmail, AOL, and Yahoo!

But only the first 250 people who contact him will get this ENTIRE bonus package, so visit:

http://www.marketingtips.com/mailloop/t.x/867389