Morning Motivator – Dealing With Disappointment

"We can get your out on the 7pm flight… tomorrow."
- Continental Airlines

The worlds SHORTEST ski trip happened yesterday.  It lasted about 1 hour and 43 minutes in 80-degree weather… when it was called short by Continental Airlines in Lafayette, LA.  Delayed plane + missed connection + failure to get you out the next day = no ski trip!

DISAPPOINTMENT is a part of life.  Yes, it is CRAPPY; nevertheless, it is a part of the whole experience.

Understanding and being able to OVERCOME disappointment is a key to becoming a very successful person.  Being able to turn a negative vibe into POSITIVE success is a most special skill.  Turning energies that challenge you to STEP your game and FOCUSING them into success that you would not have found otherwise, is a hallmark of the BEST of the BEST!

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
Learn to accept and CRUSH disappointment!  It is inevitable that you WILL miss out of opportunities, experiences and even finances.

Your ability to REFOCUS yourself and take advantage of the new opportunity and/or situation will ELEVATE you above your competition.  The STORY you share about overcoming disappointment with others will shed new light on you as a professional and as a leader. 

In disappointment, you will have the opportunity to INSPIRE others… through your new successes!!  Turn it into something EPIC and go make your own success!!

Happy Mardi Gras everyone!!

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator – Build a “Community” with Ownership

"If you want to get the most out of people, help them become invested."
- Zachary Barker,  Social Marketing Ninja

If you were building a business today, what would be the FOUNDATION of your marketing strategy?  A big AD campaign?  Free samples?  Tshirts, koozies and other such SWAG?

What if you just went out, talked to people about your business, then "opened the doors" and waited to see who walked in?  Sounds scary huh?

In every business, you have your BEST clients.  They typically "get it" faster than any others do.  Moreover, they become outspoken ambassadors for you and your business.  They are the PERFECT client with a touch of promotional superstar in them! 

Now, what if your marketing plans FOUNDATION was based around investing these people IN your business?!

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
Earlier this week, I wrote about EMPOWERING your people, and while this floats along the same lines, the challenge is to find ways to create OWNERSHIP for your best people. 

That may be from allowing them certain exclusive accesses, rights to negotiate on your behalf with a "benefit" on the back side or even allowing them to become your "sales force" with a compensation package that THEY define – yes, let them define it!

Often, you will find the people that LOVE your business really just want it to be successful, so they don't have to go without in its absence.  Additionally, the things they want – even if large - will be much more IMPACTFUL and EFFECTIVE than a big ad campaign or 'invested" monies into a marketing scheme.

When it is all said and done… if you find a REAL SUPERSTAR that loves, promotes and supports your business… give them a REAL ownership.  Yes, cut them in… by that time they will have proven they DESERVE it anyhow!

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator – I Couldn’t Say It Better

Who will say go? By Seth Godin (http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2011/03/who-will-say-go.html)

Here's a little-spoken truth learned via crowdsourcing:  Most people don't believe they are capable of initiative.

Initiating a project, a blog, a wikipedia article, a family journey. Initiating something even when you're not putatively in charge.

At the same time, almost all people believe they are capable of editing, giving feedback or merely criticizing.

So finding people to fix your typos is easy.

A few people are vandals, happy to anonymously attack or add graffiti or useless noise.
If your project depends on individuals to step up and say, "This is what I believe, here is my plan, here is my original thought, here is my tribe," then you need to expect that most people will see that offer and decline to take it.

Most of the edits on Wikipedia are tiny. Most of the tweets among the billions that go by are reactions or possibly responses, not initiatives. Q&A sites flourish because everyone knows how to ask a question, and many feel empowered to answer it, if it's specific enough. Little tiny steps, not intellectual leaps or risks.

I have a controversial belief about this: I don't think the problem has much to do with the innate ability to initiate. I think it has to do with believing that it's possible and acceptable for you to do it. We've only had these doors open wide for a decade or so, and most people have been brainwashed into believing that their job is to copyedit the world, not to design it.

There's a huge shortage... a shortage of people who will say go.

Today we're shipping my new book Poke the Box. Writing a book isn't that difficult for me (I've done it before), and it would have been easy to keep publishing books the traditional way, the way it's supposed to be done. Instead, I took the opportunity to start a new publishing company, to reinvent a lot of what we expect when we think of when we consider publishing a book. I took my own advice.

I hope you'll check it out.  Go!

Thanks Seth… even though you have no idea how I am… yet!  ;)

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator – Who is Selling You?!

"In sales, a referral is the key to the door of resistance."
- Bo Bennett

This past weekend I was in San Diego, Calif. for a Sports and Social Industry Conference to LEARN more and better ways to CAPTURE new clients via social networking, media and event planning.  VERY COOL!

The most interesting CONCEPT was the "Empowered Ambassador" concept.  This is the idea of giving your "best of the best" clients the ABILITY to make a referral at anytime, to anyone they see fit and the company will provide a unique, exclusive offering for the referred person.

Most people are saying, "Well duh Zach, we all do that!"  Do you really?  Would you give your best client that ability to write THEIR own discount based on what they felt was needed?  Would you allow them to give away a sale at NO CHARGE/NO COMMISSION to someone they FELT would be a lifelong client?

Whoa, that is giving a lot of POWER to someone.

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
Do not get me wrong… I am NOT suggesting you empower your clients to give away your business. 

The idea is that by EMPOWERING the BEST clients with some special offering that only they have exclusive access to, you are giving them the ability to build your business with ideal clients at THEIR discretion.  If, in fact, they are your BEST clients, they will never give the farm away, nor will they want to give you people that will not pay or do not understand the value of your business.  Rather, they will RECRUIT only the people they expect will be in the same category as them.

What if you could REPLICATE your top client five-fold?  How would that affect your business?  Now, what can you do to give the power to those people to do that?  (No, this is not meant to be an easy answer).

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.

Morning Motivator - When Will I Get Lucky?

"Ill never give up for I may have a streak of luck before I die."
- Thomas Edison, July 26, 1869

This is a republication from a few years back, but in reading it… I felt it was GREAT for today!!

Ok ok...First of all, get your minds out of the gutter! Today's MM is all about the combination of PERSISTENCE and PATIENCE.

Many people, myself most notably, do not have a great deal of PATIENCE. I am an ACTION guy. I would rather DO than research. I would rather PARTICIPATE than wait my turn on the sidelines. Additionally, I am a CONTROL FREAK. I want to be able to control my next 5 minutes, 5 days and most of all, the next 5 years! Maybe this is a good thing...

I believe that most of us, as LEADERS, would tend to see more ACTION and less talk. I do know that PERSISTENCE in action is what often lends to what people term as their "lucky break." You hear stories of musicians that spent years playing dive bars until 3am to crowds of 25 people, then one Tuesday night, a recording rep stumbles in after a party and finds the NEXT BIG THING. It would seem that had that musician "taken a day off" or allowed themselves to become DEFEATED by the lack of progress, they would have missed their BIG BREAK. When is your big break coming? You don't know. How do you make sure you get it? That, I believe, you do know...

2 DEGREE SUCCESS STEP:
A common misconception is that you must be available all the time in every situation to catch your break. Hogwash! (yes, I said hogwash)

Your GOAL is to place yourself in situations that provide you with the greatest OPPORTUNITY and EXPOSURE to the end results you are seeking. If you want to know many people, become the President of a group. If you want to gain RESPECT for your ideas around finance, start a blog for other financiers to participate in. If you want to be a musician - see above.

Your "lucky break" is nothing more than your efforts, strategic placement and opportunity colliding like two run away trains... now just imagine the FORCE you will carry when you get there.

Cheers,
Zach

*To enjoy past editions of the Morning Motivator go to – http://grow-learn-lead.blogspot.com

The Morning Motivator is a copyrighted publication. The use of this article is open for print or publication with proper citations.