Recent Updates
267: Find a Strategic Virtual Assistant and Hire the Right Team with The Entrepreneur’s Secret Weapon Tracey Osborne
Tracey Osborne says that you should know what you want, be open to learning, and find that perfect virtual assistant to leverage your time and scale your business.
She tells us how to hire slow and fire fast, and makes us aware of the possibilities that come from hiring a "VA"... for example, her team of virtual assistants can organize entire telesummits for you, run podcasts, publish newsletters, create your funnels, and more.
Quotes:
“There are two types of virtual assistants: those that just do the tasks you assign to them, and those that actually think, strategize, and understand the big picture.” – Tracey Osborne
“If I was going to be a success and make it in this business, I had better get my act together and get organized.” – Tracey Osborne
“Hire slow, fire fast. If after 2–3–4 weeks you can tell it's just not a good fit, cut them loose.” – Tracey Osborne
Takeaways:
01:01 Not all virtual assistants are created equal - some offer strategic thinking beyond basic task completion.
06:30 When hiring a virtual assistant, create a detailed "virtual assistant avatar" with specific qualifications and expectations.
16:03 Paying a higher hourly rate for an experienced VA can save money in the long run by reducing mistakes and increasing efficiency.
20:50 Proper project management and organization are critical for successful virtual assistant work.
23:50 Virtual assistants can provide comprehensive business support, from technical tasks to strategic planning.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 29:11 — 26.7MB) | Embed
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266: Affiliate Mastery: How to Generate High, Targeted, and Fast Commissions with Myke Metzger
Myke Metzger from MykeMetzger.com (email him directly at mindset@mykemetzger.com) has had a lot of online success in a short amount of time, and not only has an amazing lifestyle, he also generates income getting traffic for top performers.
Myke explains his affiliate marketing strategy. Instead of the outdated MLM model of recruiting friends and family, Myke says that it makes more sense to position yourself in front of people who are already looking for a particular solution. (For example, software, luxury automobiles, and high-end water filters). He also believes in focusing on higher conversions and testing your results. Don't be like most people who simply "get ready to get ready"... take small actions today that pay off in the near future.
Quotes:
“If you can get the skills and you understand how it's done with one product, then you can branch out and use it in so many different ways.” – Myke Metzger
“Nobody really knows why some things work better than others. The only thing that's ever going to determine that is by testing it.” – Myke Metzger
“The further you go in life, you take on all these responsibilities, and sometimes it can be hard to find a way around them when you're already committed.” – Myke Metzger
Takeaways:
07:55 Finding online audiences already searching for solutions is smarter than trying to create new markets from scratch.
11:30 Focus on high-ticket affiliate products with bigger commissions instead of selling many low-value items.
16:30 Master one skill or product thoroughly before expanding into multiple areas.
26:58 Always test and gather real audience feedback instead of relying on personal opinions about marketing strategies.
31:46 Stop getting "ready to get ready" and take uncomfortable actions that push your business forward.
Resources
- Myke Metzger (Website)
- Freebie Hacks (Site)
- Travel Hacks (Site)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 33:03 — 30.3MB) | Embed
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265: Visibility, Credibility, and Leadership: Repurpose and Curate Your Evergreen Content with Dawn Jensen
Dawn Jensen from DawnShowMeHow.com is all about reusing your content.
If you're ready to live the laptop lifestyle and enjoy a huge social media reach with your content marketing, without working too hard, then you're in for a treat. Dawn discusses:
- how to repurpose videos and audios (for example, turn a 90 second video into an audio and a podcast episode)
- how to curate your own evergreen content into shareable facts, figuers, statistics, quotables, and checklists
- curate from other sources including Hewes, Forbes, Entrepreneur Magazine and Inc Magazine
- why you should look back at your last few years of blog posts to find new ideas to update that speak to what your audience is doing now
- the feedback loop
- prep, presence, plan, and pivot
Quotes:
“People sometimes don't understand who they are for the people they serve, and they're not sure what to share or how to share it.” – Dawn Jensen
“You are a strategic partner for your clients, whether you think about it that way or not. The more you can educate and inform through your information, the better educated your buyers will be.” – Dawn Jensen
“Typically, when businesses seek help, they usually need assistance in one of three areas: visibility, credibility, and digital leadership.” – Dawn Jensen
Takeaways:
04:06 Old content can be a goldmine for fresh social media posts and marketing materials.
05:36 Repurposing content allows you to meet different audience preferences and expand reach.
12:16 Businesses should focus on creating consistent, branded content across multiple platforms.
22:06 Understanding your clients' needs and perspectives is more important than demographic data.
28:37 Visual marketing through infographics, checklists, and quote graphics is crucial for engaging audiences.
Resources
- Social Mention (Website)
- Social Searcher (Site)
- KnowEm (Site)
- NameChk (Site)
- Dawn Show Me How (Site)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 29:44 — 27.2MB) | Embed
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264: Accelerate Your Online Branding with Brand Strategist Jena Rodriguez
Jena Rodriguez from BrandWithJena.com wants you to understand the difference between a brand (the inner game of what you stand for) vs. branding (the outer game of how you express those core values).
She has a 12 component system called branderity that involves communicating with those brand fans to understand their problems, their language, and combine that with your unique story. That leads to your website colors, positioning, price, marketing message, and so on. She also tells us how to prevent getting bogged down with your branding and why you should be clear instead of clever.
Quotes:
“Clarity is better than clever. So if you want to create a business that's kind of like the Google of the world, Google means nothing without the concept behind it, without the story.” – Jena Rodriguez
“Your brand is who you are and what you stand for. It's the experience of who you are, and branding is simply the process of expressing it.” – Jena Rodriguez
“Entrepreneurship is not the easy way; it's the brave way, and we as entrepreneurs have to wear many hats.” – Jena Rodriguez
Takeaways:
01:45 Brand is the inner core of who you are, while branding is how you express that identity to the world.
12:25 Successful branding requires understanding your target audience and speaking their specific language.
20:28 Entrepreneurs should prioritize cash flow and basic consistent branding over expensive, complex marketing strategies.
30:54 Clarity comes from taking action and getting real-world feedback from actual clients.
33:49 Branding is an ongoing process that can be refined and updated as your business grows and changes.
Resources
- Brand with Jena (Website)
- Brave Entrepreneur Podcast (Podcast)
- Digital Maestro (Case study)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 36:59 — 33.9MB) | Embed
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263: End Destination Thinking, Enjoy the Process, and Complete Daily Goals with Motivational Speaker Todd Lemense
Todd Lemense (Twitter.com/todd_lemense) becomes the first ever return guest on our program! A motivational speaker, he says that most people fall into the trap of "destination thinking" ... the idea that a single event, such as a product launch, wedding, or birth of a baby will be the "single moment that changes everything" when in reality, it's all about those consistent daily actions.
Instead of being disappointed when "that one event" didn't change much, learn to enjoy the process. Manage your fear, hope, and expectations with daily goals. Don't cop-out by thinking "I don't have that problem." Educate yourself about your own emotional maturity, and spiritual/health/financial status to reach that higher standard. Everyone, including celebrities like Carrie Underwood and Tom Brady, have multiple coaches just to become 1% better (or maintain the same skill level), so you need a similar resource as well.
Quotes:
“We have to concentrate on processes. Life isn't static, it keeps moving.” – Todd Lemense
“Life is short and ends quickly, so do as much as you can while you can; it's never going to get easier than it is right now.” – Todd Lemense
“The quality of our lives is the quality of our relationships. I try to enjoy everyone for who they are right now, and I don't plan on changing them.” – Todd Lemense
Takeaways:
02:14 Success isn't about reaching a single destination, but consistently putting in daily effort across all life areas.
09:16 Appreciate relationships and people as they are right now, instead of expecting them to change.
11:03 Not every day will be perfect, and that's okay - managing expectations is crucial for personal growth.
13:14 Top performers always seek coaching and feedback, regardless of their current skill level.
18:25 Challenging experiences can be valuable learning opportunities that ultimately help you improve.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 21:13 — 19.4MB) | Embed
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262: Self Publishing without Writing: The Lightning Speed Book Creation Method
Quotes from Thought Leaders
- "The secret joy in work is contained in one word: excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it." -- Pearl Buck
- "You get good (and fast) at what you do a lot of." -- Robert Hunt
- "If I had more time, I would have written you a shorter letter." -- Winston Churchill
Productivity tip: set high resolution pictures of nature as your desktop background (and set it to change once per hour if possible)
Self-Publish a Book on Amazon
- Get out more: stop showing off to your peers so much and solve real problems that people are looking for. The danger in copying what's right in front of you is that you only copy "the top layer." Most people have a tendency to make simple things complicated (including your future buyers, your fellow competitors) and blindly copying someone else just leads to something that's hard to follow.
- You need to be a content machine (hint: content can be videos, podcast interviews, not necessarily articles and blog posts)
- 80% of life is just showing up. You should have at the very least, a short book with your best blog posts. Dish some helpful advice anyone can pick up. Be the person that stuck around and kept selling books after everyone else gave up because it was "too hard." Giving up and procrastinating aren't "real" things. It's just a matter of incorrect priorities.
- Amazon books last forever, even if you die and your websites are gone (although you can edit or unpublish at any time) -- use it to silence the haters in your life and show them you have a real business.
- It's a must-have credibility tool that ALL successful people have (celebrities, politicians, thought leaders)
- It's free. Amazon only takes a cut. You can publish unlimited books, with unlimited pen names, so why not do it?
- It's easier to edit crap than air. Get that first draft completed so you have something to edit. Your message is more important than one or two typos in a book.
- Don't quit. Take action now. The time will never be just right. A year ago, you'll wish you had started today.
Write a Book with Lightning Speed
- Speak out the book YOURSELF and get it transcribed. That way you don't take forever on it, and you're saying it in your voice the way you "would have said it." It's done while you're still within the three day window of excitement.
- You need a guide from someone who has done it before. And a proven system so that you can easily follow in their footsteps, and then repeat the process yourself over and over again.
- Have a real deadline, know why you're doing what you're doing and know exactly how much progress you've made. There's no such thing as being 80% or 90% done with a book. Are you in the outline stage, speaking stage, editing stage, cover stage?
- Use 10-7-4 to pile in "too many ideas" and reduce down to just the important ones, and then WWHW to ensure those short chapters are packed with value.
- Use the step by step process to overcome uncertainty, scope creep, and negative associations to "that damn book I can't seem to finish.
Quotes:
“The secret joy in work is contained in one word: excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it.” – Robert Plank
“The time will never be just right, and a year from now, you'll wish you had started today.” – Robert Plank
“Giving up and procrastinating are not real things. Those sorts of things just mean that your priorities are out of whack.” – Robert Plank
Takeaways:
03:39 Self-publishing a book doesn't have to be expensive, time-consuming, or complicated.
13:30 Creating content that solves real problems is more important than trying to impress peers.
20:20 A published book serves as a powerful credibility tool that can impress potential clients and silence critics.
26:20 Taking action and publishing quickly is more important than achieving perfection.
29:52 Short, focused books with clear value are more effective than lengthy, meandering publications.
Resources
- Make a Product (Book Publishing Course)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 36:04 — 33.0MB) | Embed
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261: The Entprepreneurial Mindset: Find Your Passion, Narrow Down Your Niche, and Diversify Your Income with Jason Hartman
Jason Hartman (JasonHartman.com) is all about having that healthy entrepreneurial mindset and wants to talk to you not only about his own up's and down's, but the common mistakes and solutions that we all face.
First, Jason realized early on that he loves to work and that his business actions represent his own creative expression. He also discovered that to narrow down that perfect niche, find your passion (that also results in income) and diversify so that it remains evergreen. To tackle frustrations and roadblocks, he treated himself as his own first client when it came to solving a problem and "building a better mousetrap."
Finally, Jason explains what drew him into the world of podcasting, as well as his number one secret about podcasting: that it's all about the listener, and not the guest.
Quotes:
“Every business starts out of somebody's frustration with something. If it frustrates you, it probably frustrates a lot of other people too.” – Jason Hartman
“People want someone who's real, so I share my failures and problems on my show because I learn from them, and I want my audience to learn from me so they don't have to make the same mistakes I did.” – Jason Hartman
“A higher level of thinking would be to look around at what other businesses are doing and think about how you can bring that idea to your industry.” – Jason Hartman
Takeaways:
01:48 Real estate remains a reliable investment because land is a fundamental asset that doesn't disappear.
06:23 Every great business starts from solving a personal frustration in the market.
14:15 Stop following competitors and instead look at successful strategies in other industries.
22:25 A podcast or content show should always prioritize listener value over guest comfort.
23:49 Consistent content creation doesn't mean you'll become overexposed if the content remains high quality.
Resources
- Jason Hartman (Official Website)
- Hartman Media (Website)
- Jason Hartman Economist (Website)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:55 — 25.6MB) | Embed
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260: Multi-Channel Marketing: Website Retargeting, Email Analytics, Social Media Traffic, and Postcard Marketing with Neil Berman
Neil Berman has a lot to say about multi-channel marketing (site, blog, social, SMS, postcard) and his service Delivra.com can help you stand out from the blizzard of emails with some smart marketing.
He dives into many different scenarios and case studies showing how you can use analytics to draw conclusions about your visitors, send alerts to your staff to directly contact your visitors, and segment your list into three groups (those that don't respond, those that are always active, and your true fans). Neil also shares the best advice he ever received about starting a business: creating a solution that is faster, better, AND cheaper than what's out there.
Quotes:
“Multichannel marketing, all connected through a single database, is really the next phase of making it on the internet.” – Neil Berman
“The challenge in sales and marketing is the timing or urgency of the sales opportunity.” – Neil Berman
“You can't just set it and forget it. You have to go back in, see what's working, see what's not working, and adjust accordingly.” – Neil Berman
Takeaways:
01:57 Multi-channel marketing connects different communication platforms to boost customer engagement and sales opportunities.
07:41 Personalized, timely follow-ups significantly increase conversion potential.
08:58 Successful marketing requires constant analytics review and customer behavior understanding.
14:19 Small businesses can now access advanced marketing technologies at affordable prices.
18:13 Email remains a critical communication infrastructure, despite claims of its decline.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 22:02 — 20.2MB) | Embed
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Paper Template: Push the Right Button, Don’t Get Bogged Down with Design and Ditch the Copywriter to Create a Website Fast
This might make you angry... I know that it did for me back when I realized that:
I'd spent literally years unsure about how to make a sales page and opt-in page... I was scared that my website would "look stupid" with an ugly design and some of those weird cheesy "headlines" and "sales messages"... copywriting...
But can I tell you what happened next?
This was before I created Paper Template. I hired someone to create a "mini-site" design for me... about 300 bucks... I had to wait a couple of weeks... it came back, and I didn't discover until years later that the plain "white piece of paper" design (Amazon uses a plain white background, Google uses a plain white background, eBay) out-coverted the "pretty" looking website... by a long shot...
The only thing I can figure is that visitors were pulled in MORE by the words on the screen than the "beautiful" design, huge logo and everything...
And then... I paid a copywriter 400 dollars (an inexpensive one, this is a person who writes the persuasive text on the web page) and had to wait two more weeks for that...
Let me tell you what happened with the copywriter. They had me fill in a 12 page questionnaire. It took me a couple of days to complete, actually. And then, the copywriter only made MINOR tweaks to the text I had entered.
It was largely a copy and paste job. To give you an idea, one part of the questionnaire asked me to list the names of all 17 videos contained in my product. The copywriter chose to only list the 9 most exciting videos and then said... plus 12 more videos for a total of 17 videos!
I don't regret paying the copywriter or the graphic designer because I wouldn't have finish the sales page anyway... but as they say... here's what I paid for:
Pushing button: $1
Knowing which button to push: $399
Now, you yourself might have paid thousands of dollars for a website design, and maybe thousands more for a copywriter...
And I don't think copywriters are bad... but...
Can I give you a free copywriter? (in plugin form?)
It's called Paper Template.
And it not only creates your landing pages for you (opt-in pages, sales letters, download pages, webinar replay pages, etc.) but it also:
- allows you to do it independent of your website's theme (let Paper Template run your whole site or create a landing page in addition to your blog)
- has a number of designs (including that tried and tested plain white one that converts) so you can have a website where people focus on the WORDS and not just how beautiful your design is
- has a ton of pre-built pages with the EXACT words and phrases you need to use... just customize to make it your own or delete what you won't use (it's easier to edit crap than air)
- has a bunch of pre-written headlines and bullet points built right into the plugin... just click, click, click your way to a profit-pulling web page
Check out Paper Template and discover how you can get it for 7 dollars (the quick and easy version) or 47 dollars which includes mobile responsiveness, templates, swipe file, and so much more.
259: Reinvent Your Life, Culitvate Your Inner Circle, Absorb Values, and Model the Right People with Damion Lupo
Damion Lupo says that when it comes to choosing the people you want around you, "The way they do SOMETHING is the way they do EVERYTHING." For Damion, money is a side effect of what he does, and he's more focused on circulation and contribution, helping others succeed financially.
Listen in to our conversation as Damion talks about owning our own life, absorbing values, and modeling the right people (paying close attention to what's under the hood as opposed to that external visible lifestyle). He's got lots of life advice about everything from disconnecting digitally, to noticing/observing nature and spending time thinking about those bigger issues.
Quotes:
“The way people do something is the way they do everything.” – Damion Lupo
“Today, when I think about my goals, it's not necessarily to make 10 times as much money this coming year; it's to create 10 times as much impact.” – Damion Lupo
“We have to make sure that we know what's under the hood with people that we're spending time with.” – Damion Lupo
Takeaways:
02:05 Money follows impact, not the other way around. Focus on contributing value and solving problems, and financial success will naturally follow.
05:45 Choose your inner circle carefully, as the people around you significantly shape your values, ethics, and personal growth trajectory.
09:56 Authenticity in business means being transparent about costs, services, and intentions, rather than manipulating client emotions.
15:37 Develop a consistent morning routine that sets a positive tone for the entire day, prioritizing personal development and gratitude.
20:17 Create intentional space in your schedule for stillness, disconnection from devices, and personal reflection to maintain mental clarity and prevent burnout.
Resources
- Total Control Financial (Website)
- Reinvented Life (Book)
- Hal Elrod's The Miracle Morning (Book)
- The One Thing (Book)
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:17 — 25.0MB) | Embed
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