10 Principles to Laser Focus Your Business

Living in Japan for 10yrs placed me in situations where I met various individuals that I probably would have never met growing up in the inner city of New York. A good 50% of those individuals were self made millionaires; many of which never even graduated high school, (but that’s a whole different story for another day).

Creating a traditional business; meaning, one not on the Internet; from scratch with very little conventional education is a task that commanded a lot of respect, from me. I mean, its hard enough to start & maintain a business with a college degree — being able to do it successfully with not even a full high school diploma means I want to listen to what you have to say…

Take the word ‘Easy’ out of your business vocabulary.
Yeah, see this one applies to our online business lives very well; as you’ll more than likely receive all kinds of eMail promotions telling you how easy some method or system is.

Because the word ‘easy’ is so prevalent in our vocabularies; and a lot of marketers know and exploit this; that eMail very easily distracts us from what we need to be doing to build our business(es).

Many a guru; (under the guise of trying to help you); will tell you to just ignore your eMail inbox while you’re working… but how impractical is that? Very! Because in today’s world we need to be working in “real time”, not “delayed time”.

If you ignore your eMail inbox totally, (and get back to it later), ultimately what you’ll find yourself doing a lot of is catching up. Information and chances to act on said information will pass you by and you’ll fall farther and farther behind the pack. Instead just FILTER certain words out of your mind.. or put them in your mind’s “junk filter”, so when you see words like “easy” you automatically know “OK, this is something I can ignore for now and possibly get back to later. Let me review the info I need to review now so I can get back to work.”

“Overnight Success” DOES NOT Exist
This one falls under the same idea as the above. We can not allow our dreams to cloud our reality. (read that again)

Overnight success stories don’t even happen overnight!

Everything worth anything is going to take time. Just accept it — deal with it — prepare for it. If you can’t.. well, it might be best you find something else to do with your time because running a business just isn’t for you.

80% Selling + 20% Useful = Delete
Yet, another distraction. If someone is trying to sell you 80% of the time and only supplying you with about 20% of useful information.. get rid of ‘em! Simple.

You, your business, your time and your time with your Family is worth far more than that. Nuff said.

If/When You Say ‘No’ — Stick to it!
One of the things I’ve learned is that usually our initial gut reaction is the most accurate. Problem is, most people will not just listen to their guts and start rationalizing that initial gut reaction. Some will even tell you that initial gut reactions are compulsive and irrational. POPIKOK!

Think about this… say you’re an athlete; a running back. You workout everyday honing your skills. You spend hours upon hours building up the muscles needed to make the cuts, spins, stops.. build up your speed..

All this work puts you in a zone when you’re out on the field. The playing field becomes your battle ground. You’re in the huddle and hear a play to bang the Right Guard slot.. this means the Quarterback hands you the ball after its hiked and its then your job to find “the hole and explode through it”. Ask yourself, (even if you don’t know much about football), do you think that running back will gain many yards, (have any success), if that initial hole closes and he tries to run through it anyway?

No. His initial gut reaction would be to cut back left as that initial hole closed. Cutting back left has a higher rate of success because the initial play was to go right; this means the entire defenses’ movement was to the right. Think about that; I’ll leave it there ‘cause this isn’t a football coaching post.

‘Free’ DOES NOT Mean ‘Solution’
Do I even need to explain this one any further? Seriously.

Free is good, but good for information; not solutions. This works on both sides of the equation, really. For both the Client & the Vendor.

The Client (or consumer) should be using that free thing for information; not a solution to their situation.

The Vendor (or distributor) should be giving away that free thing for educational/informational purposes; not trying to solve the prospects problem.

The Customer is NOT Always Right; They’re Gods
This is a Japanese concept regarding their Customer Service practices; which I think are some of the best in the world.

Now, do not make the mistake in thinking that by me saying “They’re Gods”, that I’m speaking of the Alpha/Omega.. I’m not. “Gods” is used more in the Greek God sense; whom, (if you study your Greek mythology), were very petty, jealous, selfish and childish.

Many business owners make the mistake of falling into the western philosophy of “The Customer is Always Right”; which is a literal frustration magnet. Why? Because you put yourself “mentally” in a position of defeat; which by human nature is an uncomfortable position. This means you’re automatically in a defensive stance with your Customer.

Shifting that idea towards “The Customer is a God” allows us to approach any encounter with an empathetic mind set. Where you can take the stance of, “You might not be right, but my goal here is to please you even IF you’re being petty, selfish, jealous and/or childish.” This is a position of control and a far more comfortable position to be in, naturally.

Over Delivering = Under Delivering
One of my favorite movies is “Drumline”; its a movie about the life and times of a southern African American college band member. In that movie, there is a line that goes..

“If you’re on time, you’re 5min. late; if you’re 5min. early then you’re on time.”

I think that is one of the best explanations of this Principle I’ve ever heard. Adopting this mind set with your entire business will put you miles ahead of your competition and make your Customers literally love you.

Watch the Big Boys & Emulate
And we’re not talking about any of the so called self proclaimed “gurus”, either. Them making a couple million dollars is impressive, yes. It does warrant recognition, yes. But it does not qualify them as “Big Boys”.

Apple, Microsoft, Adobe, IBM, Coca-Cola… those are the “Big Boys”; make no mistake, here.

One of the most beautiful things about the Big Boys is the fact that there are publications literally dedicated to following their every move. Analyzing it, reporting on it, breaking it down, predicting next moves, breaking inside stories… a literal plethora of business strategy information.

Without breaking a sweat, you can know what works — how well it works — what doesn’t work — how bad it didn’t work — where the market is shifting — consumer behavior — consumer thinking — shifting trends — emerging technologies — PLETHORA

All of this information can help you deftly navigate your business thorough the labyrinth of doing business online OR off-line.

Never Employ an Accountant if You Don’t Know how to Add
Took me a minute to accept this one. Especially when you start feeling overwhelmed with how much it takes to build a business up from scratch. You wanna just hire somebody to do this and that for you; especially when you have the capital available.

Yet, how can you tell if an Accountant is ripping you off if you can’t add? How can you tell if an eBook is a piece of crap if you can’t read? How can you tell if a program is going to work if you don’t test it? How can you SELL something effectively you’ve never used yourself?

The CEO of the business is supposed to be the most qualified person in the entire business. Just telling people what to do isn’t enough to command the respect you need to get those you’re telling what to do to do it to their best abilities and beyond. Ask yourself when was the last time you felt a need to impress that a**hole boss that didn’t know what the Hades he was talking about? hmm

Listen to Everything Someone has to Say, but NOT Everything They’re Saying
This last one I thought I’d throw in because its one of those golden nuggets from my Great Great Grandmother; whom I had the privilege of getting to know before she passed at 105yrs. under her belt.

Took me a while to fully understand what she was saying, but essentially it means that everyone has something to teach you as long as you don’t listen to everything that comes out of their mouth.

Even the homeless drunk on the corner could tell you, “Its real empty of me to be so filled up with this bottle”; and it have profound meaning to you. Yet, when he says, “Mary smacked my toe and made Jeffery steal my liquor!”.. it might be best to just walk away.

I sincerely hope these Principles find their way into your psyche. They’ve helped me tremendously. I’ll share more, later.

Peace, Love & Prosperity (PLP)
tecHead

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