Archive - August, 2011

Can you accomplish everything that needs to be done?

August 31, 2011 in Action, Community, Direction, Getting Started, Priorities with 1 Comment

NO!

At least I can’t.

In getting A Better Way of Business off the ground I have found that there are AT LEAST 100 things that should have already been done but I have not gotten to. Of those 100 items, 50 needed to be done yesterday. The other 50 needed to be done 2 weeks ago!

And it seems like every day there are 10 more things that need to get done, for which I don’t have the time.

It can and does get overwhelming at times.

So the question is, how do you decide what to actually devote your time to?

You could simply accomplish each task as you encounter it. Although you won’t be able to accomplish every task you come across each day, you can work on the each item until it’s complete and then start the next, but realize you’ll never be able to get it all done.

I’ve found this to be ineffective. If you’re like me, you have a tendency to think of new things that need to be done that are inspired by what you’re currently working on. And if you’re like me, you’ll be prone to forget what you’re currently working on and chase after that new shiny object you just saw.

This will lead to an infinite of half complete, started and never finished projects. And if you don’t complete some of these projects your business WILL suffer.

So what do you do?

Here’s how I’m approaching it. I am prioritizing tasks based on whether or not they fall into one of three major categories I’m currently focusing on.

For instance, right now I’m focusing on: 1) Generating quality content. 2) Connecting with people. 3) A special project I’ll be writing about soon.

So each day as I come across the various tasks that needed to be completed at some point in the past I make a quick note or type a quick email to myself as a reminder of what I need to do. Then when I get home I analyze all that needs to be done and see which of the items fit into one of the three categories. If the new task doesn’t fit into one of the three categories I save it in my inbox for another day. If it does fit into one of the three categories then it gets my attention, but again, it gets my attention based on which category it fits into.

So generating quality content comes first, connecting second, and items for the special project third.

Trust me, I’m right there with you when it comes to having too much to do and not enough time. But hopefully you’ll be able to maximize your effectiveness with YOUR business if you prioritize.

~Ivan

What do you do when life knocks you down?

August 30, 2011 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

This is how I've felt lately!

So lately I’ve had a series of rough days. It just seems like most the areas of my life are conspiring to kick my butt.

My car basically died so we got rid of it b/c it’d cost more to fix it than it’s worth, so now Skye and I have only one car. I just received a $479 power bill, and my house is 80+ degrees for that. It’s official our air conditioner is on it’s last leg, barely working, not repairable, needs to be replaced. My day job is challenging lately (this is a gross understatement). I’ve got a sinus infection that just won’t go away, even after two rounds of antibiotics. Alexander is cutting his two year molars, which apparently are kicking his butt. And Skye’s suffering from some recurring ENT issues.

And this isn’t an exhaustive list, but you get the picture. I’ve recently experienced a string of what I’d consider rough luck.

And I’ll be honest. All this CRAP has made me mad. I’ll go so far as to say I’ve been REALLY PISSED OFF lately. Frequently.

And I think it’s ok to get mad for a time when life knocks you down. And then keeps kicking you in the ribs while you’re down.

It’s just no fun.

But I started thinking today.

This is “normal”.

Not that bad crap has to happen ALL THE TIME.

Not that EVERYDAY has to suck b/c of life throwing its uglier side at you.

But that we ALL experience bad days. We all have things happen to us that we’d prefer didn’t. We all have a string of bad days.

And I’d say this is especially true when you’re just starting out on the path to owning your own business.

If you’re anything like me, you’re coming from the world of employee-dom and now your marching down the path of self employed-dom. This is a SIGNIFICANT change. Not only are you making a huge career change, from being bossed to being the boss, but you’re also going against what is considered “normal” by most folks. Which is the secure job, with the large employer, a 401k plan, and some health insurance.

Now, you’re saying you’ve recognized you have something of greater value to give to the world and you’re marching to your own tune.

And when you start down that path, you’re going to have some bad days. You’re going to worry about cash flow. You’re going to be concerned about where you’re going to find your next client. You’re going to have to DEAL with the upset customer, instead of handing them off to someone else.

You’re going to have some bad days.

But what hit me today is that how you handle yourself while experiencing these bad days is going to have a SIGNIFICANT impact on whether or not you succeed in business, or simply become another statistic adding to the number of small businesses that have closed their doors too soon.

It’s ok to get knocked down when life throws an uppercut your way. It’s ok to admit that last punch in the stomach REALLY HURT.

But what’s going to set YOU apart is whether or not you GET BACK UP or whether you stay down.

For me, I’ve realized that God hasn’t given me this desire to serve small businesses for only a week or month, but for the long haul. So that means that no matter how many times I get knocked down right now, I’m going to get back up. It may not be pretty, I may not want to, but for ME I have to stay in the fight.

What are YOU going to do when like knocks you down?

What are you doing to draw attention?

August 29, 2011 in Action with 0 Comments

Imagine this roaring through your neighborhood.

So I just got back from a walk around the “neighborhood”. I say it that way b/c I really walk out of the neighborhood and down this other road to a dirt road and turn around. It’s VERY nice. There’s a rather large cow pasture on one side (with only a few cows) and the rest of the way has woods lining the road. It’s overcast today, about to rain, with a nice breeze rustling through the tree tops. It made me smile thinking, “God sent this breeze just to cool me off and say, ‘I see you, my son. Keep walking this way.” It was VERY nice and relaxing.

Then I hear him.

He’s down the road a mile or two, but you can always hear him coming. It’s my neighbor from 3 doors down. I’ve never personally met him, but we hear him EVERY DAY. He’s the guy on the Harley. You know, the one where he removed the mufflers to make it EXTRA LOUD. Oh, and he does around 60 through the neighborhood. You know… where the speed limit is 15 and there’s ALWAYS kids playing in the street, but he likes to hear his Harley revved to the moon so he FLIES through the neighborhood regardless. Yeah, that’s who I hear coming.

I instantly start thinking bad thoughts when I hear the guy b/c he’s already disturbed my peaceful, rejuvenating walk with the obnoxious noise of his motorcycle.

And I ask God, “God, why did you have to let THIS GUY come by RIGHT now and RUIN this? Couldn’t you have made him come by some other time? Why can’t you just make him go away?”

I took another 20 steps or so as the guy comes ROARING past me and I’m just stewing. This guy and his stupid motorcycle REALLY get on my nerves.

And I ask myself, “What could God POSSIBLY expect me to learn from this guy? What?”

And I just felt this feeling of, “It [the noise] got your attention didn’t it?” And it did, it really did. And I realized, even before I could SEE the guy, I knew who it was.

And it made me think. What are you doing to draw attention to your business?

Are your out in the market pushing your business so hard that you are being like this Harley guy? Your potential customers are seeing you as loud and obnoxious and really just want you to shut up and go away?

Are you doing NOTHING to draw attention to your business and just hoping and praying that customers will somehow, magically find you and your products and want to buy them?

Have you even THOUGHT about this AT ALL?

Because I have to be honest and give the neighbor of mine some credit. I know a lot about him because of what he does to draw attention to himself. He loves his motorcycle because he’s driving through the neighborhood ALL THE TIME. He likes his bike loud, because you can tell he’s removed his mufflers. Maybe the loudness is even a safety feature because you can hear him coming from miles. And he gives off the air of being a little edgy because he’s always going so fast in a busy area.

So whether or not it’s the image he’s aiming for, my neighbor is DEFINITELY drawing attention to himself. What are you doing?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY…

August 26, 2011 in Uncategorized with 2 Comments

Look at how good looking he is!

… to ALEXANDER!

That’s right. Today is his second birthday! The picture to the right is of him from just a couple weeks ago.

Anyone that knows me well knows there are three driving forces in my life right now.

1) Growing closer to Christ.

2) Being the best husband I can to Skye.

3) Being the best father I can to Alexander.

Today is the day we celebrate having Alexander with us for two years. As anyone who has kids knows, these two years have gone by in a blink of an eye.

It seems like only yesterday that we brought him home from the hospital. I have honestly been SHOCKED at how quickly and how significantly Alexander has been able to get me to shift my priorities. Prior to his arrival I was primarily focused on my career. The day of his arrival my priorities had changed.

Alexander, about 4 months, and his dad.

Not only did I realize I wanted to spend every available moment with this awesome little man, but I also realized just how GREAT Skye is. Having Alexander actually helped me to realize just how deeply I love Skye and how much she means to me.

Alexander also helped me to realize I can’t do this on my own. I’ve been a Christian since November 6, 1997. I’ll be the first to admit I haven’t lived like a Christ follower most of that time. But having Alexander helped me to realize I’d just begun an adventure that I needed divine assistance with.

I thought being a father was going to be good, but what I’ve found out is I had NO IDEA just how GREAT it was going to be.

Thanks, God, for providing us with such a wonderful little boy. Thanks, Skye, for being part of this wonderful journey. And thank you, Alexander, for teaching me what it means to be a father.

~Ivan

Consistency Between Names

August 25, 2011 in Client Questions with 0 Comments

I worked with a client the other day who had several separate sites for their business. Although the business has been around for years, it is still in the early stages of development; that being said, multiple free sites are being used to cut back on costs. There’s a blog site, an online store, and a newer site that incorporates both a blog and an online store. The blog site and the online store both have the same name, however the newer site has a completely different name, so my client asked, “Should all my sites have the same name?”

I immediately responded, “Yes, they should. You want to build consistency and name recognition in your brand and it’s going to be almost impossible to do that if on one site you have one name and another site you have another name and maybe over here on this other blog you’re using a third name.”

For whatever goods or services you are trying to sell you want your name or your company’s name to pop into your customer’s head first! This is called Top Of Mind Awareness. In order to build this Top of Mind Awareness you need to have consistency in the message you’re promoting and thereby the name of your various sites.

Now that we’ve established that we need to have consistency between the names at the various sites, which name do we choose? Again, two of the sites have been around for few years and have the same name in the URL, the second site is much newer and has a different name that is intended to be a little catchier and a little more descriptive as to what the business does. Which to pick?

We decided to stick with the original name, but maybe not for the reason you first thought. In a case like this where one name has been used for years and the other is relatively brand new you might think to stick with the older name because it has been out there for a while. But this is not what drove the decision.

What drove the decision was the years worth of feedback data in the online store. As I said earlier, the business is still in the early stages of development and that’s because the business side of this equation has not been approached intentionally, it was the love of producing the goods that was approached intentionally. So the client has a a 100% positive customer feedback rating and is unwilling to trash all the years of meeting / exceeding customers’ expectations. And I don’t blame them.

The ultimate decision was made to stick with the original name for the business that has been around for several years, but to transition to the new site that has the blog and store in one location.

So remember, consistency in the name you are putting out to your customers and clients brings Top Of Mind Awareness, and TOMA brings more business.

What do you focus on?

August 24, 2011 in Uncategorized with 6 Comments

When it comes to our personal development we can focus on improving our strengths or we can focus on improving our weaknesses.

There have been times of my life I have focused on improving my weaknesses.

There was Spanish while I was in high school. I believe that was the only time in my life I brought home an F on a progress report (your grade at the mid point of a semester). It was one of the more challenging tasks of my high school career to pass that course.

There was baseball in middle school. I wasn’t bad, I was AWFUL! I practiced and practiced and PRACTICED. And I still stunk. Combine to that I was TERRIFIED every single time I got in front of the crowd (more on this with a later post).

I don’t tend to socialize well in a crowd of people I don’t know. So in college there was a time I decided I needed to start going to more parties so I could learn to socialize better. Let’s just say that didn’t work very well.

There are other instances in my life were I tried and take a weakness and turn it into a strength. In all of my efforts I can only think of one case where that weakness was actually turned into a strength. In all other cases I spent  A LOT of effort and went through A LOT of emotional pain to try and turn a weakness into a strength.

I have recently learned a better way to approach self development. And that is to focus our efforts on our strengths. We can devote hours upon hours to improving a weakness and still just bring that weakness up to the mediocre level.  Or maybe we get lucky and bring it up to the average level.

The last time I checked people are not willing to pay very much for mediocre or average. Nor are people likely to be influenced by or remember mediocre or average. If they do, it’s usually only for a short time and then only to complain.

However, if we spend the same number of hours on the areas in which we are naturally gifted by God we can take something that we are good at and turn it into greatness.

People will pay for greatness. People will talk about greatness. People will remember greatness.

Remember, we can spend our effort and energy on our weaknesses and bring them up to a level that is unremarkable. Or we can spend that same effort and energy and turn our strengths into something remarkable, something few people could even dream of achieving. Which way will you choose?

Where are you investing?

August 23, 2011 in Uncategorized with 5 Comments

No, this is not turning into a financial blog and I have NO IDEA how to get rich investing in the stock market (I hear dollar cost averaging and diversity are important, though).

I want to know where you are investing in your LIFE!

I’m about to describe to you a way of looking at life that has COMPLETELY revitalized and revolutionized (I hope that’s a word) how Skye and I view life and live it.

On page 55, of the revised edition, of 48 Days to the Work You Love, Dan Miller lays out “The Wheel of My Life”. This diagram consists of a seven piece pie in the center, surrounded by two concentric rings surrounding the pie.

The outside ring has: How will I be remembered? LEGACY: A Life well-lived

The inside ring has: Fulfillment of Purpose, Mission, Destiny, Calling.

The seven pieces of the pie are: Career, Financial, Social, Family, Physical, Personal Development, and Spiritual.

Over the last 2 years Skye and I have faced MAJOR challenges in our careers, with our finances, with our social-ability, in our families, and in our spiritual walk. Personal development is the one area we’ve been pretty consistent in.

And for the majority of that time we have both said, “If I can only get the ‘right’ job for me, everything will be better.” “If we can only save XXX number of dollars, everything will be ok.” “If we can only do ______ at church, everything will be ok.”

We have believed that if we were somehow able to make one area of our life PERFECT, we would then have ALL areas of our life PERFECT.

But this is not how life works.

Dan Miller explains “The Wheel of My Life” in a way that makes so much sense that neither Skye nor I can figure out how we didn’t understand this ourselves.

As I said, the center of “The Wheel of My Life” is a pie with seven pieces: Career, Financial, Social, Family, Physical, Personal Development, and Spiritual. These seven pieces make up the seven key areas that comprise each of our lives.

“The Wheel of My Life” is vital for having a well rounded life that will roll down life’s highway smoothly. But for a wheel to properly roll it needs to be shaped like a wheel. And the shape of “The Wheel of My Life” is determined by the health or deposits that have been made in seven distinct areas.

So as we all know, if a wheel is uneven, it will not roll properly. Our life is the same way. If there are parts of the seven areas of your life that are out of balance compared to the other areas your life won’t roll smoothly.

As an example, if your 5′s in all areas, but a 10 when it comes to your career, you’re life’s going to be out of balanced and you’re going to have issues. Maybe your family feels cheated b/c to reach a 10 in your career you’ve spent more time at work. Maybe your spiritual life is suffering b/c you stopped going to church so you could work more. The imbalance WILL affect your life.

Skye and I sat down and analyzed our lives at the end of 2010 and were shocked to see that we had a bunch of 2′s and 3′s. Some area’s we agreed were closer to a zero. And our thought pattern had been, “If we could only find a perfect job, making our career piece of the pie a 10, then EVERYTHING in our lives would be better.” But that’s just not true. We would have been even more imbalanced.

After coming across 48 Days to the Work You Love we decided to figure out how we could make improvements in ALL areas, to the best of our abilities. Our goal wasn’t to make any one area a 10 over night, but to bring ALL areas up by at least 1 point as soon as possible. So we took Dan’s advice and started making little deposits as frequently as possible to all the areas of our life.

And it’s worked. We still don’t have any 10′s in our lives, but we also don’t have any more 2′s and 3′s (or anything close to zero). We’ve realized that Dan Miller is a genius and if we want our lives to roll smoothly down the future’s highway they need to be balanced and we need to make deposits into all areas of our lives on a regular basis.

So I ask you, what areas of your life are imbalanced? What can you do to bring balance to your life? What small steps can you take TODAY to start putting deposits into the neglected areas of your life so you can live your life to the fullest?

And how can I help you succeed at this?

————-

48 Days to the Work You Love

Dan Miller

How I increased my site traffic 255% in one week!

August 22, 2011 in Uncategorized with 2 Comments

I really hope the title of this post got your attention, b/c it DEFINITELY got mine once I saw the stats. Please check out the screen shot of my page visits for the last several weeks (click picture to enlarge to see detail):

A Better Way of Business Page Views

So the big question I foresee is “How did you do that?” A lot of you already know. Some of you don’t. So I’ll tell you.

It’s simple.

I started posting five days a week.

Prior to last week, I regularly posted twice a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. But if you go back to my first Friday Free Form you’ll see that by posting only two days a week I had more than a month’s worth of blog posts already written and waiting to be posted. Plus, I have 50+ blog topics I had yet to even write on. So in light of that I decided I had enough to say to increase the weekly number of posts from two to five.

Another source of encouragement to begin posting five days a week can be found in two shows over at CoachRadio.tv. Show 077 – Your Story: Greg Ng and Show 079 – Your Story: Gregg Pechmann. Both Greg and Gregg emphasize that part of what has led to their current level of success was blogging five days a week when they started. Both go on to explain that by blogging consistently and by putting out a large volume of content early, they later reaped the benefits of 1) being known due to a large volume of quality content and 2) the volume of early work helped them gain a secure foot hold in their desired niches.

So en-light of having a decent number of posts already written and hearing two men who are already successful both say that blogging five days a week when they started helped lead to their current success, I decided I would attempt to follow in their foot steps.

And even though my numbers may be relatively small, I still find the increase SIGNIFICANT. And I’m looking for even more visitors in the future!

So that’s it. If you want to increase your sites traffic significantly, BLOG MORE OFTEN!

~Ivan

What do I want to help you accomplish?

August 19, 2011 in Friday Free Form, Purpose with 0 Comments

So I’ll be the first to tell you that A Better Way of Business IS and WILL BE a work in progress. I do NOT have everything figured out. I do not believe that ANYTHING about the business is static (unless you want to consider me to be static, b/c I physically intent on being here for the duration).

And I was thinking today, “What is it that I want to accomplish with this?” I thought this while I was replying to my first client. I was checking in on her progress to see how she’s carrying out the action steps we came up with after our first meeting (A TON of great ideas were generated, enough so she said she’d be busy for SIX MONTHS if she did everything we talked about!).

And as I was wrapping up the email I was thinking to myself, “What is it I’m trying to accomplish by sending this email?” “What do I want to get her to do?” “Am I pushing too hard?”

And probably another 20 questions similar to those ran through my head. And so I typed something. I think it subconsciously came out, because I’m not bright enough to come up with such a cool line.  I typed in the email: “I’m super excited about helping you and your business grow into your dreams.”

And that’s it. THAT is what I want to accomplish with A Better Way of Business! I want to do EVERYTHING I CAN to help you and your business grow into your dreams. I want you to see you can OBTAIN your dreams with your own business. And that business doesn’t have to be done “the same old way”, you can do it a better way.

Thinking about it, it makes so much sense to me. “You” because if you’re running your business YOU are EXTREMELY important to it. And you may need to personally grow in order to fulfill your dreams. Maybe you need to learn a new set of skills. Maybe you need to learn to delegate or outsource some other skills. Maybe you need to realize that your BUSINESS is not the only thing in your life and you need balance in all areas of life.

“Your business” because “business” is what I know. Particularly, I know accounting. I’ve got TONS of education and experience in it. And accounting has exposed me to ALL areas of business, from manufacturing to HR to marketing I’ve dealt with it all. I also have management skills, forecasting and budgeting skills, problem solving skills, trend spotting abilities, and others.

I CAN’T and WON’T tell you how to do the task that you so love and are skilled at that you started a business around it, but I CAN tell you how to take that skill and turn it into a viable BUSINESS that makes you money.

We all have dreams. And if you’re in business for yourself I hope it’s because it’s part of the LIFE you’ve been dreaming about.

I’m here to help you and your business grow into your dreams.

So what are you waiting for? Let’s get started. I want to see you accomplish your dreams!

How I’m doing what I’m doing…

August 18, 2011 in Uncategorized with 4 Comments

So I’ll be the first to admit I don’t have a lot of money to invest in starting this business. But I AM going to get A Better Way of Business up and running, regardless.

So how do I plan on starting a business without having much money to invest? I’m getting creative. I’m looking for ways to gain knowledge without having to pay for it.

Please check out this blog about one of the key methods I’m using to learn what I need to in order to get this business off the ground.

Ivan is Getting Free Coaching and You can too

The blog is by Justin Lukasavige, a man whom I greatly respect and look up to. Not only that, but through NUMEROUS online interactions Justin has become more than that, he’s become a friend. Justin runs NUMEROUS websites and businesses, but he blogged about what I’m doing over at CoachRadio.tv. Please take a moment and check out what he has to say. Then be sure to DEVOUR his site b/c it’s PACKED FULL OF HIGH QUALITY INFORMATION!

Thanks.

~Ivan

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