Marketing Starts Internally!

If you have been following my work, you know that consistently pointed out that marketing is about bringing value to others. For you to get what you want, you must helpthers get what they want.

All the way along I have made one major assumption. Do you know what you want? Many people have no idea what they want and assume one day by some guidance it will happen. It’s the same as arriving in a new city and hoping you can reach an address without a roadmap.

Clearly establishing and setting goals is the subject of this report. What is your purpose? What do you want in life?

If you don’t have a dream, how will you ever make it come true?

I am passionate about teaching marketing because I know in my heart how powerful it can be, and how it can improve the quality of life, and make your dreams come true.

A real dream is being able to answer the question, “What would you do if nothing could stop you?” Very few people would dare to ask themselves this question, since they think it is a waste of time.

By taking this attitude they are not taking advantage of the full resources available within themselves. We all have the same number of hours in a day and we all have the same resources available to us. The only difference is how we use the resources: time, money, and mind! Successful people have dreams and work exceptionally hard each day to make their dreams come true.

Goals are written plans.

I have a lot of respect for Dr. David Burns, who wrote a great book called Feeling Good. Psychiatrists often recommend it for the treatment of depression. One day I had lunch with Dr. Burns, and told him how impressed I was by the way he handled people contemplating suicide. I asked how he knew if the patient was serious. He said it was simple: He asked if they had a plan. Then he would review the plan! But he said in 99 percent of the cases, there was no plan.

You see, we can’t achieve anything without a plan. Directly or indirectly, everything you do from the time you wake up to the time you come home is based on a plan.

If you are good with money, it’s probably because you have a financial plan. A short term financial plan is called a budget.

A formal plan is called a goal! Many of us make New Year’s resolutions, but these are not plans, they are simply wishes. What’s the difference? A plan has a timeline, milestone and action plan associated with it.

In large corporations, hundreds of projects may be going on. How they all are managed? Goals and milestones are set in formal project plans for each. People cannot be paid to generate activity without that activity generating a specific result. In the same way, you cannot afford to go through life without having formal goals that make the best use of your time, money and resources. The secret to a successful life is when both time and money are working for you.

How to turn a dream into reality – A written goal.

All self help books have one thing in common: goals, goals, goals. Living life without goals is like a ship or plane without any navigation system. Goals are your internal navigation system, locking in your mind to work at its true potential.

Every self development seminar teaches some form of goal setting. When you write goals and look at them twice a day, you will achieve 85% one year from now. Anthony Robbins, the famous motivational speaker, says he wrote his five year goal plan on a train ride through Russia. Within two years he had achieved 85% of them!

Earl Nightingale, a founder of one of the world’s largest distributors of self-help information, Nightingale Conant, personally studied successful people for fifteen years, and concluded that written goals were the secret to their success.

Many people will use a religious basis to explain goals. “Ask and you shall receive.”

“Knock and the door shall be opened.” “Seek and ye shall find.”

Why goals work

There may be religious and spiritual reason why goals work, but the real reason I think goal setting works is that they keep us focused on what we truly believe to be important. Goals ensure we major in major things and not minor things! In a single day, it is estimated that we see about 35,000 different advertisements. All these folks are trying to distract you, so now you see why it is so easy to get distracted from your true destiny! Another reason goals work is that they work in the way your brain was designed.

We know the mind is capable of allowing us to do all sorts of amazing things, but all it wants to know is what do you want to do? The brain is said to be the most powerful computer in the world, but as with any computer, it works on clear and logical commands.

The mind loves clarity. This is the basis of the saying “a confused mind always says no.” The mind hates illogical and confused messages.

Have you ever had the feeling of total certainty that you knew you were right? You were on a roll. You knew it was going to happen for you. Why? You gave your mind an absolute and clear message. The mind now becomes very resourceful!

If the mind is given a goal, and it is repeated several times, it takes it as a command where “failure is not an option.” It activates a part of the brain called the RAS or Reticular Activity System. This is part of the brain that has been studied for a long time and is known to be like a homing device, finding things with laser-like precision.

Your RAS goes into action when you buy a new car, and you automatically start to notice all similar cars. Is this pure luck? No! These cars were on the market before, but you’ve turned on your capability to recognize them.

In the same way, if you have written goals and you study them twice a day, you automatically switch on the RAS to look with laser-like precision for things related to these goals. It may be a magazine article, a person, a headline, something you see on TV. So now you can see the power of knowing what you want!

If you take some follow up action, soon you will be well on your way to achieving your goals, and you will be unstoppable. You will soon find yourself surrounded by a network of people prepared to help you! It is truly an amazing experience.

But it all starts with you taking the first step and writing down your goals, and remembering the following five rules:

1. Never, ever share your goals with anyone else. There are people in this world that I call “dream stealers.” If they know about your goals, they will steal your dream by telling you it’s not possible. Less than five percent of the population succeeds and only five percent have written goals. Goals are your roadmap, your navigation system. You don’t need to tell people where you’re going. Just send a postcard when you arrive!

2. Goals must be specific, measurable and have a specific timeframe. It is not enough to say, “I would like to pay off my credit card bills.” You need to say, “I will pay $5,000 off my Wells Fargo Visa credit card by October 2005.” Now what happens? Well the brain is on the lookout for all opportunities for you to make this. It will tell you that you need to stop eating out and spending on unnecessary things. It will search for a job that pays more money. Either way, it will come up and recommend solutions for you. New opportunities begin to emerge from unknown places.

3. Study your goals two times per day, morning and night. If your goals are things you absolutely want, then you will certainly make the effort to study. Remember, each time you study your goal, you are commanding your mind and activating the RAS.

4. It’s okay to change a goal. After a month, you may decide it’s not a high paying job you want, but you’d like to join a local dance club. That’s fine. Success is doing what you want, when you want and as much as you want. It does not always have to be about money.

5. Be disciplined to follow through! We all know we should not smoke, we should exercise, we should eat five servings of fruit and vegetables a day. But how many people actually do it? The purpose of goals is to keep you focused and on track for your true purpose in life. If you fail to take action towards them daily, you will have defeated the purpose. Remember, action always creates opportunity! Wealth is always a result of the follow through on positive ideas!

Once you begin to set and guide your life by goals, your life will change. You will be in the driver’s seat. Nothing can be achieved without a solid plan. When you apply your talents and skills to worthwhile goals, you cannot help but succeed.

When training sales people, I tell them the next day begins the night before with a list of preplanned calls. Before they go home, they need to list their goals for the next day!

Summary

To help with your goal setting, I have designed a goal setting worksheet below. Please use it and enjoy your newfound purpose driven life! I promise you the rewards will be immense.

“A goal properly set is halfway reached.”
– Abraham Lincoln

• All successful people have written goals
• What gets written down gets done!
• Goals = focus
• Without a goal your life has no direction
• Goals should be
• Specific
• Measurable
• Have a time frame
• YOU MUST REVIEW YOUR GOALS TWICE A DAY!
• Sign and date after you complete this exercise
• You will find that one year from today, you will have reached
• 85% of your goals
• Do you dare to dream?

Short Term Goals 3-6 months Finish by

Mid Term Goals 6-9months Finish by

Long Term Goals 9months + Finish by

Signature Date