So, I had this crazy idea on Wednesday: why not spend this weekend doing a Blog Building Marathon?  After all, I love blogging, I love the setup process, I know people who want to start blogging but don’t know how, and, best of all, it beats doing yard-work.  Never one to think small, I immediately set a BHAG I could be proud of: I set the intention to create 20 new blogs between Friday evening and Monday morning.  I know, crazy, right?

I told a few friends what I was planning and asked them to spread the word to anyone they knew who wanted to start blogging but needed a little help to get going.  There were questions, of course.  I also posted my plans on Facebook, which generated a few more questions.  I got my first two new bloggers lined up, and they had even more questions.  So I thought, why not write a blog post to let everyone know why I’m doing this and to answer some of those questions publicly.  Here goes:

Why are you doing this? First and foremost, I’m doing this because I love blogging. I think blogging is a great way to connect with other people who share your passions.  I believe that blogging is a fantastic tool for attracting new clients to your business (or new fans for your music, or new readers for your books…you get the point).  I’m also doing this because I’m getting tired of hearing stories from people who’ve paid big money to blogging “experts”, waited for months to see their sites, and still been disappointed with the results.  I figured that if I could knock out 20 blogs in a weekend for a minimal cost, maybe more people would realize that it’s not as complicated as the “experts” make it sound.

What are you offering? Basically, what you’re going to get is a WordPress blog configured with what I consider to be the essential plugins (if you don’t know what plugins are, don’t worry…I’ll send instructions for using them), including a domain name of your choice and hosting for 12 months.  The blog will be built on one of the thousands of available free WordPress themes, with a little bit of customization to make it uniquely your own.  Nothing fancy, unless you really want it, in which case we’ll need to work out some details.  The blog will also be integrated with your accounts on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn so that when you write a new post, your followers on those sites will know about it automatically.

Is there a cost?  If so, how much? Yes, there is a cost.  Basically, I’m looking to cover the cost of hosting, domain name, and my caffeine and food for the weekend, plus a little something for my time and effort.  Oh, and to hire someone to do the yard-work I’m neglecting.  I’m asking $149, but honestly (and I really do mean this), if that’s not in your budget right now, tell me what is, tell me a good story, and I’ll probably do it anyways.  At the very least, I can give you some pointers on doing it yourself.  Which brings us to the next question…

Can’t I just do this myself?  Or hire the kid down the street to do it? Absolutely you can!  Here’s a little secret the “experts” are going to be mad at me for telling you: WordPress has made it super-easy for people with a limited knowledge of computers to set up a blog and/or website that perfectly suits their needs.  I’m just here to help those who don’t want to do it themselves and would like to just show up on Monday morning and start blogging without worrying about all the set up.  If you want some pointers on doing it yourself, send me an email (jerry@jerrykennedy.com) and I’ll be glad to help.

Why not use a free service like Blogger or WordPress.com? Excellent question!  For the definitive answer, have a look at this article from Hubspot.  It basically boils down to this: if you ever plan to use your blog for business or to attract traffic to your own website, you’re better off having your own site with your own domain name.  It’s much more flexible and better suited for helping you stand out from the crowd.  That said, if you really want to use one of the free services, there is ABSOLUTELY nothing wrong with doing so.  I have a friend with a very popular blog that’s hosted on the free Blogger platform, and he used it to make $100,000 last year.  No shame in that!

What about SEO?  Do you do anything for SEO?  Because all the “experts” say that SEO is SO important! Glad you asked.  I do recommend you use the “All In One SEO Pack” plugin, which is included in your installation, and I’ll send you some instructions on how to use it.  Here’s the thing about SEO, though: it matters, but not as much as everyone pretends it does.  What really counts with the search engines is whether or not your content is relevant to the person who is searching for answers! Write good content, stuff that your target audience would enjoy reading, and the search engines will love you for it.  Sure, there are ways that you can game the system so that you can “drive traffic” to your pointless, irrelevant website.  Trust me, though; you won’t like what happens when Google catches on to your game, I promise.  Write for people, not for search engines, and the people who align with your values will find you.

Won’t this project just add more crap to the blogosphere? Possibly, but I’m one of those radicals who thinks that everyone should have a voice, if they want one.  After all, one man’s crap is another man’s I Can Haz Cheezburger.

Here’s the bottom line for this project: blogging is one of the most democratic things to come along in decades.  It provides an opportunity for people to share their thoughts, beliefs, feelings, pictures, videos, music, drawings, artwork…whatever…with the world.  It’s my personal belief that there should be no barriers to entry; everyone (even the ones I don’t agree with or who I think are morons) should be able to participate.

And for those who want to use blogs to market their products or attract new clients to their businesses, I say “Good for you!”  I also say you don’t have to invest a ton of money and wait for weeks or months to get started.  I’m a big advocate of “completion over perfection”, and I’d like to help you get started down the road to using a blog as a way to build your business.

So if you or anyone you know would like to have a blog of your very own by Monday morning, send me an email.  The address again is jerry@jerrykennedy.com.  Or just leave a comment with your contact info and I’ll get in touch with you.  And I’m totally serious about the money part.  If $149 isn’t going to work for you, talk to me.

Let’s get you that blog you want!

One of the worst questions a sales manager can ask a salesperson is, “So when is Prospect X going to sign with us?”  I’ve got news for you Mr./Ms. Sales Manager: not only is that question impossible for your salesperson to answer, it clearly demonstrates that your management efforts are misguided.  Instead of managing the sales process, which is squarely under the control of you and your salespeople, you are trying to manage the outcome, something that neither you nor your salesperson is capable of doing.

Understand this: while you and your salespeople are in control of the sales process, your prospects and customers are in control of the buying process.  And the buyer is ultimately the one who controls the outcome of any sales situation.  We’ve all had the experience of executing the sales process flawlessly only to have the prospect we were courting say “No thanks” in the end; it happens, and it’s out of our control.  Getting frustrated or angry about it is silly; it’s like being mad that it rained today.  Recognize that it’s out of your control, let it go, and move on.

Does that mean that sales managers should just forget about the performance of their sales people?  Not at all!  They just need to shift their focus from the things they can’t control (outcomes) to the things they can control (processes).  Are the salespeople in their charge following a good sales process, or are they “making it up as they go”?  Has the process been clearly defined?  Are their rules of engagement and scripted responses for different contingencies?  Those are the things you have control over; manage them.

And if you’re reading this thinking that it doesn’t apply to you because you don’t manage salespeople, think again.  If you’re an entrepreneur or small business owner who is an army of one, you have to apply these same principles to your own sales efforts.  Too many solo business owners are not taking their sales efforts seriously.  Sales is something they do when they feel like it or something they will try to get to “when things aren’t so crazy.”  As a result, they’re in a constant feast/famine cycle that they just can’t break.

See if this sounds familiar: you panic because there’s not enough work, go out and make some sales, shift your focus to doing the work you sold, then panic again when the work runs out.  It’s no way to live, and that kind of panicked sales effort leads to trying to manage outcomes and frustration when deals aren’t happening quickly enough.

There is a way off the hamster wheel: implement and execute a consistent sales process that involves some kind of sales activity every day.  If you’ll commit to managing your sales process, you won’t have to worry about trying to control outcomes; instead, you’ll end up getting more of the outcomes you want by virtue of having a consistent process.

A final word of advice to those who do manage salespeople: if you’re trying to manage outcomes and you think that you can get your way by beating up on the people who work for you, think again.  What you’re actually doing is creating a highly motivated sales force for your competition.

One of the biggest challenges I face as a budding entrepreneur is what to do when I get stuck on a project.  I know I’m not alone; in fact, this post was inspired by a friend on Facebook who is one of those wacky serial entrepreneurs you’ve read about (thanks for the idea, Travis).  It was nice to find out I wasn’t the only one who gets in this mode from time to time.

The question remains, though: what should you do when you get stuck?  Is it better to muscle through in an attempt to get to the other side?  Or are you better off just giving in to the “stuck”-ness and switching gears to a different task?  Or should you, as my friend Joel D Canfield says you sometimes should, just call it a day and head for the beach?

The answer, of course, is that there’s no one right answer.  That said, here’s what I do: I meditate.  Rather than make a decision when I’m feeling frustrated by a lack of progress or productivity, I’ll consciously make an effort to step away from the project for a set period of time, say 15 or 30 minutes.  During that time, I might push my chair back, close my eyes, and let my mind wander; or I might take a brisk walk and take in the scenery (this is especially effective on perfect spring days like the one we had today in Sacramento).

Whatever I do, I purposely let go of any thoughts of the project I was stuck on and just take some time to enjoy being (thanks to Paul Coltharp for reminding us of that one).  You’d be amazed at how powerful this little exercise can be.  Sometimes I return to the project with a fresh outlook and manage to get past the place where I was stuck; other times, I realize I’m not going to get anywhere right then and I pick up something else to work on and leave the current project for later.  Either way, it beats staring at a blank computer screen and waiting for something to happen.

The power of this technique lies in its simplicity.  If you really want to get past the place where you’re stuck, sometimes you just have to take a deep breath and let go.  Trust me, the problem will still be there to solve when you get back; you however, might have changed just enough to be able to solve it more effectively.

“I will act now.” - from The Scroll Marked IX, The Greatest Salesman In the World by Og Mandino

I love the way this scroll starts: “My dreams are worthless, my plans are dust, my goals are impossible. All are of no value unless they are followed by action.” There’s a cold shot of reality, eh?

Many in the “law of attraction” crowd would have you believe that dreams, plans and goals (mixed with positive thinking, of course) are all you really need to succeed. I’m reminded of a quote I heard a few years ago: “If all you do is sit on your couch and meditate all day, eventually they’re going to come and take your couch!”

You probably know by now that I’m a firm believer in the power of dreams, plans, goals and a healthy dose of positive thinking; you probably have also discerned that I’m a firm believer in activity. What you have to find is the right mix of inner planning and outward manifestation of that planning. Finding the right mix is essential.

If you’re going to err in favor of one or the other, though, make it in favor of activity. A great plan with no action gets you nowhere; on the other hand, activity without a well-thought out plan will at least get you a result. And results are feedback from the world around you that lets you know whether you took the right course of action or not, feedback that you can use to either take different action to get a different result or more of the same action if you want more of the same result. No plan or goal necessary.

Plans, goals and dreams are meant to help guide your actions. They aren’t an end in and of themselves; they’re a means to the end, the map that you follow to get the result you’re looking for.

Imagine you’re planning a trip to New York. You map out exactly the course you’re going to take. You cut out pictures of your destination and hang them on the wall, staring at them and envisioning yourself there, standing in the shadow of the Empire State building, walking in Central Park, seeing a show on Broadway…whatever. You spend hours every day imagining how it’s going to be and believing that it’s all going to happen.

Question: is all of that planning, goal-setting and positive thinking going to move you one inch closer to New York? Of course not. The only way you’ll ever get there is if you take some kind of action! Get in the car, buy a plane ticket, hop a train, thumb a ride…if you really want to get there, you’ll figure out a way, but planning alone isn’t going to cut it.

“But what if I can’t afford the ticket? What if my car breaks down? What if I get caught jumping the train? What if I get run down by an angry motorist? What if…?” You know the game, right? You probably also know that your “buts” are getting in the way of your success. Where do the “buts” come from, though? From that deep-seated fear of failure, the same fear each of us is cursed with from about age 7 on. How do you conquer the fear? Mandino answers:

“My procrastination which has held me back was born of fear and now I recognize this secret mined from the depths of courageous hearts. Now I know that to conquer fear I must always act without hesitation and the flutters in my heart will vanish. Now I know that action reduces the lion of terror to an ant of equanimity.”

In other words, feel the fear and do it anyway! Easy, right? If that were the case, there wouldn’t be any such thing as procrastination. It’s hard to act in the face of fear, so here’s a little extra help from the scroll:

“I will act now. I will act now. I will act now. Henceforth, I will repeat these words again and again and again, each hour, each day, every day, until the words become as much a habit as my breathing and the actions which follow become as instinctive as the blinking of my eyelids. With these words I can condition my mind to perform every act necessary for my success. With these words I can condition my mind to meet every challenge which the failure avoids.”

Conditioning. That’s what it takes. Procrastination is nothing more than a habit; it can be changed into action by repeated effort. Start today. In fact, start right now. Think of the thing you’ve been avoiding all week: the phone call you need to make, the conversation you need to have that you’ve been putting off…DO IT NOW! You’ll be amazed ath the power that immediate action will unleash in your heart and mind. Activity is the one and only antidote for chronic procrastination.

Whatever you dream of will only become manifest if you take action, any action, toward its achievment.

“This is the time. This is the place. I am the man.”

“Today I will multiply my value a hundredfold.” - from The Scroll Marked VIII, The Greatest Salesman In the World by Og Mandino

What do you do when you’ve accomplished a goal? Hopefully, you take some time to bask in the warm glow of accomplishment…but not for too long. Hopefully, you also set your sights on something higher and start working on it immediately. Resting on your laurels and past acheivments will never get you where you want to go.

Success is like a muscle; stretch it and work it and eventually it rises to the occassion. If your goal is to be able to lift 200 pounds 10 times in a row, you can get there even if you start off lifting less than 100. When you hit your goal though, a funny thing happens: you plateau. The muscle stops growing because it’s no longer challenged. Step your goal up to 300, and you kick the growth cycle off again.

It’s the same with your personal growth. Once you reach a goal, you run the risk of stagnation if you stop there. Human beings have an amazing potential for growth that sometimes gets hampered because we’re unwilling to push ourselves to grow. Why? Growth is painful. It’s uncomfortable and scary. We set up all kinds of elaborate, unconscious schemes to avoid the pain of growth, and we seriously limit the results we can acheive in the process.

What if instead we were willing to shake off the self-imposed limitations of our pre-conceived ideas and hand-me-down beliefs? What if we were able to get beyond the fear and set impossible goals, continually stretching beyond our prior capacity? What then? Michaelangelo advised that “the greater danger is not that our goals are too lofty and we fail to achieve them, but that they are too small and we do.” Do you really want to look back on your life and wish you’d only tried a little harder? Neither do I.

The Scroll Marked VIII says that we’re like a grain of wheat; a single grain of wheat has the potential, when properly cared for, to grow into a stalk of wheat with a head full of grains. Each of those grains, in turn, has the potential to be planted and produce many more. Given the proper conditions, a single grain of wheat can produce millions of tons of wheat. And you are like that grain of wheat: you contain unlimited potential.

The Scroll points out one difference between you and the grain of wheat, though: whereas the wheat has no say in whether it’s planted and propogated, you get to decide whether your potential is realized or wasted. It’s a sobering thought, isn’t it? It means you get to take full responsibility for your success or failure in life. You don’t get to point to your circumstances or your parents or your government…only you have the power to decide your fate.

And how will you do it? How will “multiply your value a hundredfold”? The Scroll advises:

“First I will set goals for the day, the week, the month, the year, and my life. Just as the rain must fall before the wheat will crack its shield and sprout, so must I have objectives before my life will crystallize. In setting my goals I will consider my best performance of the past and multiply it a hundredfold. This will be the standard by which I will live in the future. Never will I be of concern that my goals are too high for is it not better to aim my spear at the moon and strike only an eagle than to aim my spear at the eagle and strike only a rock?”

The message is clear: continue to aim high, to stretch yourself, to strive to exceed your past performance. If you do, you’ll never stop growing, your value will increase every day, and you’ll be considered by those who know you to be the greatest salesperson in the world!

“And when it is done I will do it again, and again, and there will be astonishment and wonder at my greatness as the words of these scrolls are fulfilled in me.”

“I will persist until I succeed.” - from The Scroll Marked III, The Greatest Salesman In the World by Og Mandino

This principle has become my personal mantra over the course of the last few years. I remember a former employer whose favorite phrase was “Persistence overcomes resistance”, and that phrase has stuck with me through some pretty challenging times.

It’s a fact: the last few years haven’t been easy on anyone. The reason I created Motivation 101 and started this blog was that I kept hearing people around me talking like they were ready to just give up and run for cover; I knew that was the wrong response, and I felt compelled to jump in and do something about it. So I recorded an audio program in a friend’s garage. He produced it, and I started making CDs in my home office and handing them out to anyone who was willing to listen.

The feedback was encouraging: most of the people I talked to were discouraged, but not quite ready to roll over just yet. We would talk about their challenges and how the principles of positive thinking and persistence were the only things getting them by. Some of them had lost jobs, homes, credit scores and personal dignity. It had all taken a toll on their self-image, but they hadn’t given up. They wanted to keep going, and we were able to offer each other mutual encouragement.

The one thing I learned from these folks is expressed nicely in the words of the Scroll Marked III: “Always will I take another step. If that is of no avail I will take another, and yet another. In truth, one step at a time is not too difficult.”

No, one step at a time is not too difficult. When crossing a great desert, it’s best to focus on only one thing: your next step. So long as you can put one foot in front of the other, even if it’s a weak and wobbly step, you survive. It’s only when you give up and stop moving forward that you doom yourself.

Success comes down to one thing: how many times you’re willing to hear “No,” or “Sorry, not today,” or “You’re not what we’re looking for,” or “You’re just not good enough,” and still come back to ask again. My friends at Go For No! call it your No Quotient, and I agree when they say that your NQ is far more important than your IQ; after all, we all know a few broke geniuses, people with high IQs and low net worths. The reverse is true as well, and we do well to pay attention to that lesson.

We talk a lot about “raising your tolerance for rejection” and “failing your way to success”, but there’s more involved than just blindly, relentlessly pushing forward. Sometimes life gives you feedback you need to pay attention to. In addition to persisting, you should also be willing to adapt and learn as you go. The ability to grow as well as persist is an unstoppable combination.

Mandino compares persistence to the series of single, weak axe-blows that fell the mighty oak, the tiny rain drops that wash away the mountain. No single blow or rain drop could do the job on its own; only their repetitive persistence will get it done.

Are you willing to take the persistence challenge?  If so, remember that there’s only one rule in this game: “So long as there is breath in me, that long will I persist. For now I know one of the greatest principles of success; if I persist long enough I will win.”

After reading an insightful article about social media by my friend Jim Keenan, I started thinking about the way a lot of businesses and individuals are using social media.  Is it just me, or do the majority of users seem to think that social media sites are just free advertising space?  I see it every day, and I’m sure you do, too: the thinly veiled ads, the blatant pitches, the sales copy in “Free Report” clothing.  It’s got to the point where my Twitter stream is so clogged up by spammers, I’m having trouble staying one step ahead of them.  I wonder how the folks with 20,000+ followers do it!

So here’s the thing:  I want to challenge everyone involved in using social media in their business to remember the key word (and no, it’s not media…guess again).  This is supposed to be social. In other words, it should be about conversations.  Instead of worrying about how many Facebook friends or Twitter followers you have, you should be thinking about how many of them you’re interacting with.  This was brought to light recently at one of the companies I work with.

The company has two teams of of people in charge of using social media sites to connect with potential customers.  Team #1 took a “scorched earth” approach and started slamming their pre-packaged message out to as many people as they could and directing them back to the company’s website, relying on the site to make the sale.  Team #2 took a more deliberate approach of engaging prospects in conversations and walking them through the buying process.

Can you guess what the results were?  I probably don’t need to tell you that, after on week, Team #1 had contacted 500 prospects with zero conversions and Team #2 made far fewer contacts (about 60) with a 10% conversion, and the results are still trickling in from Team #2′s activity as they follow-up on their initial contacts.

I know we all want to chant the mantra that “sales is a numbers game”, and to some extent that’s true; it’s just that we’re usually focusing on the wrong numbers.  Instead of obsessing about how many cold calls you can make in a week, why not focus instead on how many new conversations you can start with prospects in a week.

A friend of mine said it best when he said, “You can’t sit at your desk and answer calls and make a lot of money until you’ve knocked on at least a thousand doors.  And if you’ve knocked on a thousand doors but nobody ever answered, those doors don’t count.”  In other words, it makes no difference how many calls you make a day unless at least some of those calls turn into meaningful conversations with your prospects.  It also means that, no matter how many people follow you on Twitter, if you never say anything meaningful to them, they don’t count either.

Well, I admit it.  In spite of all my rants about taking responsibility for your own motivation and doing the activity that leads to success, I still have days when I’d rather just give up and curl up on the couch.  Even though I tell everyone how important it is to control your own thoughts and choose an optimistic outlook,  I sometimes allow the negativity to creep in and seize my brain.  And there are days when all I want to do is whine about how I wish things were different.  Days like today.

So what does the guy whose constant theme  is motivation and optimism do on a day like this?  Well, here’s the plan.  First, I’m going to take some of my own advice and spend some time in quiet contemplation, visualizing a successful outcome for the day.  Then, when my head is a little straighter, I’m going to leave the office and go make a call on a local real estate agency to share the message of “Motivation 101” with them.  I’m also going to make a couple of phone calls to follow up on some great contacts I’ve made over the past several days. 

Then, I’m going to come back and let you know how it turned out.  I’m going to do all this bcause I know one thing: the only antidote to having a crappy day is to get up and do something about it.  Change your thoughts, and you change your life.

I’m curious: what do you do to break the momentum of a bad day?  What do you do to help you keep going when you really feel like giving up?  Please share your suggestions and advice in the comments section and, until next time, make it a better day!

Jerry

With the beginning of a new month on the horizon, I want to chat for a bit about information overload and its effect on the unwary salesperson. I’m sure you would agree that it’s very easy to get bogged down with too much information: from the daily news to talk radio to the endless stream of e-mail alerts, RSS feeds and Tweets, we receive far more information in a day than we can hope to process. This often leads to that old disease, the paralysis of analysis.

When we ask our minds to process too much information, we have a tendency to lose sight of the fact that information alone is useless. We have to put that information to use, and in a positive direction, before we receive any value from it. For example, consider all the data you’ve seen recently with regard to the economy. From the sub-prime mortgage crisis and the related plummet in real estate prices, to the oft-repeated declaration of “the worst depression since the Depression”, we are bombarded by data that has worked many people into a state of panic. This panic has caused many salespeople to fall into negative thinking patterns (“No one is buying in this economy!”) which prevents them from engaging in the very activities that could bring a swift end to all the bad news. Enough is enough, already!

Consider a different way to look at, process and do something with all that information that comes in the form of “bad news” about the economy. What if, instead of buying into the panic, the salespeople of the world looked at the situation as their cue to step up their efforts and invigorate the economy? What would happen then?

I’ll tell you what would happen: we would get the blood (in other words, the money) flowing again. That is the power that you, the world’s sales force, holds in your mortal hands. We all know that salespeople (and small business owners, entrepreneurs, solo-professionals, etc.) are the backbone to any thriving economy; at the same time, we can also exacerbate a stagnant economy. The only difference is in our attitudes. If we buy into the dismal outlook regarding the future, are we really going to feel motivated to get out and make our daily number of connections with prospects? If, on the other hand, we choose to let all that information motivate us to take responsibility for getting things moving again, we really can make a difference.

I’d like for you to try a little exercise with me: from now on, whenever you sell something I’d like for you to visualize the process by which that product or service arrives at the customer’s door. Think of all the folks who receive a paycheck along the way; try to imagine what they, in turn, buy with the proceeds of that check and all the subsequent paychecks that activity generates. Keep it up until you can see a crowd of at least a thousand people in your mind’s eye, all smiling and waving their checks over their heads. Now, I’d like for you to accept that you are responsible for making sure they continue to get those checks! That certainly changes the way you look at your sales day, doesn’t it?

It really is amazing how shifting your perspective can influence your activities and, therefore, your results. So get out there and get things moving! As we start to see the first signs of improvement, fan the flames! Let’s all work to create the momentum we need to bring the world’s economy back to its feet and take it to even greater heights. This is your call to action. If you’re in, spend the rest of the week doing your best to help people buy. Who knows: the paycheck you save might be yours.

Question: What have you done this week to move yourself closer to your goals? Do you have a clearly defined, written plan to get you where you want to be? If not, what are you waiting for?!

We’ve all heard that what gets written down gets done, yet the majority of us don’t do it. It really amazes me how many salespeople I talk to who have no idea what they need to accomplish on a daily, weekly, monthly and annual basis to help them achieve their goals; in fact, I still encounter many people who have no idea what their goals are! I only have one question: if you don’t know where you’re going, how will you know when you’ve arrived? More importantly, how will you even know if you’re on the right course to get there?

Specific written goals are vital to your success. You know that. If you haven’t written out your goals for this year, stop reading and go do it now. Don’t come back until you’re done, because what I’m going to suggest next will require you to have your written goals in front of you. This is a powerful tool that will help you achieve any goal you set, and it is actually very easy to do. Unfortunately, anything that’s easy to do is also easy not to to do, so I want you to make a commitment, here and now, to try this method out for the next seven days. If it doesn’t work for you, you can stop; but you have to try it for at least seven consecutive days before passing judgment. Ready?

Looking at your list of goals, I want you to think of the six most important things you could do tomorrow to move you closer to their accomplishment. Limit your list to only six things, the six most critical. Now, prioritize the list in order of highest impact; in other words, the most impactful thing you could do becomes number one and so on. Now comes the hard part.

Tomorrow morning, start your day with task number one from your list. Don’t do anything else until you have completely finished task number one and can cross it off the list. Next, move on to task number two, again not moving on until it is completely finished and can be crossed off. Do the same for the rest of the tasks on the list. If you get to the end of the day and haven’t completed all the tasks, those left unfinished move to the top of tomorrow’s list. Do this for seven days, and you’ll be amazed at what you’ve accomplished.

How do I know this works? When I first read about this technique in James Arthur Ray’s new book Harmonic Wealth I decided to give it a try. You wouldn’t believe the impact this habit has had on my effectiveness every day since! Knowing what you need to be doing now and what comes next is truly one of the most powerful methods I’ve ever used to get more done.

It’s like my friend Tibor Shanto of Renbor Sales Solutions said in his blog the other day: taking daily action is the key.  If you’re not in action every day, you’ll find your motivation beginning to wane.  You can have grand plans, but without action you’ll also have massive frustration when those plans don’t materialize.  

So, no excuses now! Get out your day planner and make your “Must Do” list for tomorrow; repeat this practice every day for the next seven, then let me know what you think. I look forward to reading all your comments.