Recently I was speaking with some members of the Marketers Club program who shared with me the impact a particular idea had on them and their business.
So I thought I’d share a couple of these ideas with you in the hope they may have the same impact on your business.
IDEA #1
You can’t Build a Million Dollar Business with Hundred Thousand Dollar Thinking.
One of the key reasons many entrepreneurs find themselves trapped by a false income ceiling is not because they lack the desire to earn more or the ability to deliver a quality product or service. The issue is with their thinking. If your goal is to build a seven figure income, then the first step is to think like a millionaire. While many entrepreneurs may DREAM BIG, most of them still THINK SMALL.
Small thinking leads to developing the habit of playing small. This can manifest itself in a myriad of ways; most notable the entrepreneur’s lack of confidence to invest in themselves or their business. Instead they are waiting for the client to invest in them to justify any future personal or professional development. Unfortunately this is not the way the world works. Clients are not in the business of taking risks with their suppliers, it’s the supplier who must take the risks in an attempt to attract the client.
Building a million dollar business also requires developing other million dollar habits. This means you let go of trying to do it all. While it may be necessary for an entrepreneur to initially play the role of ‘jack of all trades’, in the long term this strategy will only lead to long hours and limited profits. You must defend your time and outsource the lower value jobs so you can maintain your focus on the major issues. The bottom line is if you are worth $200 per hour, every time you do the $20 an hour work you are going backwards. Now it may not be possible to outsource everything overnight, but you must have a plan to minimise the amount of low value work you need to do if you are serious about building a seven figure income.
IDEA #2
Focus before Freedom
When surveyed about the primary reason they went into business, the most common response given by entrepreneurs is FREEDOM & CONTROL. If these are the things you are looking for too, then the first step is FOCUS.
We encourage all our members to identify and then focus as much of their time as possible on the three most important money making activities that they do really well. Experience shows us that the more time you spend focused on your key money making activities, the faster you will reach your desired freedom point.
It’s important to understand that these are the money making activities YOU DO REALLY WELL. For example while good copywriting is extremely important, there is little value having you spending hours trying to write copy if you are no good at it. You would be much better served to hire a copywriter and keep your focus on what you do well.
In my business we are all very clear about the three areas that I need to maintain focus on.
- Speaking
- Mentoring entrepreneurs about how to improve their sales and marketing
- Doing the marketing for our business
If I am not doing one of these three things, then it’s likely my business is wasting one of its biggest assets. If you haven’t thought about it before, try listing your three most important money making activities. Once you’ve done that, take a guess at how much of your time you currently spend engaged in one of those three things. If you’re like most entrepreneurs, you might get a fright about just how little time you spend on these critical areas.
IDEA #3
The First Sale is made to You
In one of my conversations with a client, I was thrilled to hear the impact this idea had on their business. One of the areas we challenge many members to look at is their pricing. Often we discover that despite offering a superior product or service to their competitors, many entrepreneurs struggle with pricing.
Lorenzo, increased his prices initially by 24% and has since increased them by a further 10%. That’s 34% in one year and his music school has actually grown in student numbers. Lorenzo’s experience is not an isolated one. I have witnessed dozens of our entrepreneurs raise their prices in the last 12 months by as much as 100%, all with little or no impact on their customer numbers.
While many entrepreneurs are initially fearful that if they raise their prices, the loss of clients will mean they lose more than they gain, this is seldom the case. In fact, time and time again we see price rises actually have the reverse effect and higher prices can help attract more clients. The reason is simple; most of us equate price with quality. Psychologically the belief is if it’s cheaper then it must be inferior. While this is not always the case, we cannot deny the profound impact price has on our decision making.
Ultimately when it comes to setting your pricing, the first sale is made to you. You must believe that you are worth the increase. If you don’t buy that you are worth more than you are charging, then it will be difficult to increase the price. One exercise you can do in relation to pricing is draw a vertical line on a piece of paper. At the top write the highest price you are aware of in your industry (assuming it’s not you) then at the bottom write the lowest price and then mark where on that line you are. If you are not at the top, identify all the reasons your competitors who are presently charging more than you are able to do so. You might find there are not many real reasons that justify their higher price.
In Summary
There are few things more powerful than an idea whose time has come
While the three ideas outlined above may appear simple, they are in truth incredibly powerful. Too often we discount the power of what we know because we assume everyone thinks the same way. They don’t – an idea you take for granted can often be a profound insight for someone else.
If you understand the power of an idea, then you know the enormous benefit of belonging to a community like the Marketers Club. It was George Bernard Shaw who wrote “If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples, then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.”
This is one of the fundamentals that underpin the Marketers Club community. We can all significantly accelerate our knowledge and progress our results by sharing insights with each other. The fact is, by applying just one new idea, you can change your life.