LESSON #16: How to Stay Motivated

July 25, 2008 – 1:33 am

In the previous lessons, we’ve talked about getting a vision for your business, setting goals, and creating a business plan.

However, all the effort you’ve put into building the foundation of your business will be for nothing unless you follow through and take action.

So today we’re going to talk about staying motivated…

(Watch this video…)

Main points:

  • One of the most commonly asked questions… “How do I stay motivated and take action?”

  • What motivates you? And how do you get motivated?

  • We’re all motivated by different things.

  • Short term motivation vs. Long term motivation

    Examples: Losing 5 pounds or getting a new car by a certain date = short term

    Feeling good about yourself or living a certain lifestyle = long term

  • Goals = short term

  • Vision = long term

  • Your primary motivation should to be tied to your vision.

  • Your vision needs to inspire you for the long term.

  • This business requires self motivation.

  • External factors vs. Internal motivation

  • Externally influenced motivation is not a bad thing. It’s a natural part of life… But it’s not enough.

  • You need internal (intrinsic) motivation to keep you going when the going gets tough.

  • Some of my internal motivators include:

    -My faith
    -Family (external factor, but there is also internal side to it)
    -A sense of fulfilling my purpose

  • Figure out what your internal motivators are, and then make sure that they are a part of your vision.

  • Tips and tricks are NOT the solution for why so many people are not motivated. However, they can be helpful for short term daily motivation. Here are a couple of lists for you to check out if you’re interested in those kind of tips…
    http://www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/thirteen-tricks-to-motivate-yourself.html
    http://zenhabits.net/2007/02/top-20-motivation-hacks-overview/

    Action steps:

    1) Figure out what really motivates you internally

    2) Make sure those things are a part of your vision

    3) Think about whether your vision will motivate you for the long term, and if not, tweak your vision.

    Even if you follow all of my advice from this lesson, there will still be times when you don’t feel motivated. There will be times when you don’t want to complete the steps. It involves a choice, and the choice is yours. I’ll be talking about it in the next lesson.

    As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below. (Feel free to share something that motivates you)

    Have a great day!

  • LESSON #15: Creating a Business Plan

    July 20, 2008 – 10:55 am

    Two lessons ago we talked about the importance of having a vision, which is basically the big picture of where you want to go. And in the previous lesson we talked about goals, which are the specific milestones along the way toward your vision.

    So today we’re going to talk about plans, because you need to have a plan of action to hit your goals…

    (Watch this video…)

    Main points:

  • “People don’t plan to fail; they fail to plan.”

  • Failure is not a bad thing, but you should try to succeed!

  • (Elements of a traditional business plan)

    For examples of how to make a typical business plan, you can see:
    - Small Business Association business plan info
    - Traditional business plan sample

  • If you want to take a textbook approach to your business plan, that’s great. But since the business model I’m teaching is relatively simple, it’s possible to streamline it.

  • I’ve put together a 1-page outline template for you which asks for the following information:

    - Name of business
    - Vision for the business
    - Who is the target market?
    - What will we sell? (be specific)
    - What makes us different from the competition?
    - Marketing strategies
    - Goals for building and growing the business
    - Plan of action to achieve goals

  • I’ve provided a link to the template below, and you can download it for free.

    Action steps:

    1) Make a business plan.

    If you wish to use my template, you may download it here for free:

    Click here to download the PDF file (do a right-click “save target as” to download it to your computer)

    So now that you’ve got a plan, you’ll need to commit to it, and figure out how to stay motivated. I’ll be talking about those things in the next lesson.

    As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below.

    Have a great day!

  • LESSON #14: Setting Goals for Your Business

    July 18, 2008 – 9:38 pm

    In the previous lesson, we talked about getting a vision for your business.

    A vision is the big picture of where you want to go. You need to have a vision, otherwise you won’t be motivated, and you won’t have a clear direction for your business.

    However, a vision needs goals and plans to go along with it…

    (Watch this video…)

    Main points:

  • Vision vs. Goals. A vision is the big picture of where you want to go; a goal is a specific milestone that helps you get closer to your vision.

  • Important requirements for goals:

    1) they should be specific (measurable)
    2) they should be serious, but attainable
    3) they should have a deadline

  • For example: a goal may be to earn $10,000 of net profit before December 31st.

  • VERY IMPORTANT: Write your goals down, and keep them in sight.

  • (Story about the Harvard MBA graduates…) Those with written goals made 10X the income of everyone else combined.

  • I use a whiteboard… but a piece of paper is fine too.

  • You can have short term goals, long term goals, and everything in between.

  • Re-evaluate your goals periodically.

  • When you reach a goal, be sure to celebrate for a few minutes before setting the next goal.

    Action steps:

    1) Write down one goal, and put it somewhere near your computer.

    (Also please post it in the comments below)

    It should be specific, attainable, and it should have a deadline.

    Keep in mind that you will need to keep setting new goals for yourself as you build your business. As you continue with these lessons, it will become more apparent what your goals should be, so write them down frequently as you go through the process.

    Now you will need to develop a plan for reaching your goals, and I’ll be talking about that in the next lesson.

    As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below.

    Have a great day!

  • LESSON #13: Getting a Vision for Your Business

    July 16, 2008 – 2:43 am

    Up until this point, we’ve essentially been covering the requirements and prerequisite knowledge necessary to increase your chances of building a successful online business.

    Today marks a turning point.

    It’s time to begin focusing on your personal situation, and to turn our attention to your future business…

    (Watch this video…)

    Main points:

  • Without vision, your business probably won’t succeed.

  • I describe vision as being able to “see” a clear picture of your fulfilled goals in your mind.

  • It’s like the box cover of a difficult puzzle…

  • You must begin with the end in mind.

  • Almost every success in my life has come AFTER having a vision for it. (For example, when I won the state championship, and every time I launch a product)

  • The successful business owners that I’ve known ALL have vision.

  • It’s kind of like looking at the world from 30,000 feet. You see the big picture, and not the problems.

  • If you lose sight of your vision, you lose hope. And if you lose hope, it’s game over.

  • As we progress in the lessons, we’ll keep moving forward step by step, but if you don’t start by getting a vision, further efforts could be somewhat futile.

  • If you set your target too low, you may hit it, but there is almost no chance that you will exceed it. On the other hand, if you set your target too high, you may fail, but you will be further along than the “low” target. Therefore it’s better to set your vision higher.

  • One of the biggest things I see holding people back is a “victim mentality”.

  • “Formulate and stamp indelibly on your mind a mental picture of yourself as succeeding. Hold this picture tenaciously. Never permit it to fade. Your mind will seek to develop this picture. Never think of yourself as failing; never doubt the reality of the mental image. That is most dangerous, for the mind always tries to complete what it pictures. So always picture ’success’ no matter how badly things seem to be going at the moment.” - Norman Vincent Peale

  • Many of us have taken on a “just get by” mentality.

  • The size of your vision will dictate the size of the result.

  • YOU are valuable. Don’t sell yourself short.

  • Here’s my “disclaimer” that I forgot to include in the video…. “The mind of man plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.” (Prov. 16:9)

    Action steps:

    I want you to take a moment to tell me your vision for your business. The vision can involve other areas of your life too, but since we’re working on building your business, it should be focused on your business.

    It’s important to write your vision down, so go ahead and post it in the comments below. This is YOUR vision, and there is NO wrong answer.

    Focus on the big picture. Don’t worry about the details of how you will get there. We’ll worry about that stuff when we learn about goal setting and business plans, and I’ll be talking about those things in the next lesson.

    As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below.

    Have a great day!

  • Traffic Secrets 2.0 from John Reese

    July 13, 2008 – 9:19 pm

    Special Edition

    The Internet Marketing world is currently buzzing about the release of Traffic Secrets 2.0, by John Reese.

    Traffic Secrets 2.0

    It would not be an exaggeration to say that this is one of the most anticipated launches… ever!

    Back in 2004, John launched the original Traffic Secrets home study course, which resulted in his infamous million dollar day (over $1 million of the course was sold in the first 18 hours).

    Many lives were changed as a result of the traffic generation methods John taught in the course.

    As you may know, a lot has changed on the Internet since 2004, and that’s why the Internet Marketing world has been craving an updated version of the course.

    The new course is updated with the latest cutting edge strategies, and John estimates that 85% of the material is brand new (stuff that WASN’T in the original Traffic Secrets course). As far as the content of the course… I feel very little needs to be said. As far as I’m concerned, I’m confident knowing that John Reese is the go-to guy when it comes to web traffic, and he has a long lasting reputation of producing quality material.

    Honestly, I wasn’t planning on promoting this. In fact, I’ve become very cautious about promoting other people’s products directly on Eric’s Tips.

    If you’ve watched my video lessons, you may recall from Lesson #3 I said to “stop buying stuff that you don’t need!” And yes, that rule DOES apply to this product too!

    But there were a few factors that tipped the scale in this instance, which I felt warranted me writing about it.

    First, I expected this to be another BIG ticket home study course. The original Traffic Secrets was $997. Recently we’ve seen successful launches of $1997 products like Product Launch Formula 2, Mass Control, and the List Pros course. So I expected the price to be at least $997, with a likely price point of $1997.

    However, I was surprised to learn that John is taking a different approach. He’s selling Traffic Secrets 2.0 for only $397. So right off the bat, I feel good about the price, knowing that it’s clearly not bloated and overly inflated by hype.

    Next, there are NO upsells… no “one time offers”…. no increasing price countdowns… no fake limits. In other words, he’s decided to try a no-hype approach to the sale itself.

    Whether that’s a smart move from a marketing standpoint remains to be seen, but I certainly appreciate the effort.

    Lastly, I was impressed by the simple format of the learning system he’s created. This is by no means a “thrown together” collection of all of his techniques. It’s really a step-by-step system designed to be followed by Internet marketers of all skill levels.

    So should you buy it?

    I would say a strong maybe.

    If you don’t know why you’re buying it, don’t buy it.

    If you think it’s a magic bullet that’s going to build your business for you, don’t buy it (Keep in mind that this is a TRAFFIC course, not a complete business building course.)

    If you’re at a place in your business where you’re ready for web traffic, and you have $400 to invest, I would say yes– buy it.

    Just to let you know, I will be covering many traffic generation methods in my free lessons. In fact, there will be approximately 15-20 lessons devoted to traffic.

    However, there’s no way I could cover as much ground and teach everything that he teaches in his course, without spending a year creating a separate course devoted to web traffic.

    Can you build a successful online business without John Reese’s course? Absolutely. I certainly did.

    But is it worth a $400 investment if you can afford it? Absolutely. I often spend that much per DAY on paid traffic, so it’s easy to see how a one time price paid for these traffic generation techniques could have a very good return on investment.

    If you would like to get more information and details about the course, feel free to check it out via my affiliate link:

    Click Here to go to Traffic Secrets 2.0

    Just remember my saying, “Don’t buy it if you don’t need it”. In other words, if you don’t need a course about traffic generation, don’t buy it. But if you need web traffic and you don’t know how to get it, I think this is a product worthy of consideration.

    As always, you are welcome to post your questions and comments below.

    Have a great day!