Archive - September, 2011

What’s my motivation?

September 19, 2011 in Books, Motivation, Purpose with 8 Comments

After lying in bed for 45 minutes WIDE AWAKE, I finally got up and took a shower. I originally thought I was too tired to take my evening shower, but apparently not.

I’m wide awake due to two things. 1) I had caffeine with dinner (it keeps me up at night if I have it after 2PM). and 2) My mind is racing a million miles an hour with ideas for blog posts. So I need to get some of them out.

One of the thoughts that I keep having lately is, “What’s my motivation?” “Why do I want to start A Better Way of Business?” “Is my reason strong enough to carry me through the difficult times that I know lay ahead?”

I don’t have exact answers for all those questions. At least not the short, sweet, one sentence answers that many experts might say you should be able to give. But I have ideas feelings and beliefs.

Allow me to explain part of what I mean and give you an answer to “What’s my motivation.”

Courtesy of Amazon.com

I read the E-Myth by Michael Gerber probably around six years ago. I was fascinated by his story of how he became involved in helping small businesses. I loved his discussions on the “entrepreneurial seizure”, “the technicians”, and why you need to “work on your business vs in it”. I loved the idea of putting systems in place so your process is repeatable by others so you don’t have to be there every minute of every day.

I remember thinking only a few chapters in, “I WISH I could do this!” I wanted to help small businesses transform from the worst job you’ve ever had (and the lowest paying) to the business you dreamed of when you first started. I wanted to help people start a business in the RIGHT way so they could avoid the pain of mistakes and possible failure down the line.

I dreamed of doing this.

And that’s all I did.

Me, being me, I analyzed the CRAP out of the idea and thought of 100, may several hundred, reasons why I could NEVER do it.

So I talked myself out of it. I crushed my inner spirit and desire to try it.

I put the book with all its highlights, pen marks, and written notes in the margins and at tops and bottoms of pages back on my book shelf and forgot about it.

Then came the pivotal time when Skye told me to put up or shut up with regards to starting a business. I decided I WOULD start a business, but didn’t know what.

I thought long and hard. I asked others what they thought (people who knew a lot about me and how I’m wired).

Professor teaching - Courtsey Inmagine

The spark came when Skye pointed out that the only job I’ve ever enjoyed was teaching. I LOVED helping students learn. I got a THRILL from standing in front of the class talking. I got a RUSH from sharing with others what I had in my head. And I can think of few things as satisfying to me as the point in time when you’re looking into someone’s eyes and you see that they FINALLY GET IT!

So I, or should I say we, decided that teaching should be a part of my business. The only issue is I didn’t and don’t want to teach for a school. There’s numerous reasons for this, but that’s for another discussion.

So how can I take the aspects of teaching that made teaching GREAT to me and apply them to a business?

I could take the aspects of teaching that I loved and combine them with what I saw Michael Gerber do in E-Myth!

A Better Way of Business was born.

I could help people take the idea they have and turn it into a business that functions properly from the get go. I could help the business owner who has created the worst job they’ve ever had, with the longest hours and lowest pay, and show that person how to turn their creation into a successful business. I could share knowledge that I have, with others, to benefit them. I could speak to groups of people who are all wanting to start a business, and thereby get the experience of standing in front of others sharing. I could work one on one with people and witness first hand the spark of recognition when they GOT IT!

It is the best of both worlds.

It is what motivates me to take one step after another in the direction I am sure success lies.

It is why A Better Way of Business exists.

~Ivan

004 – Be Remarkable – LCB Woodturning

September 16, 2011 in Be Remarkable, Video Blog with 13 Comments

This is the first episode of a new series titled, Be Remarkable.

In this series I’m going to highlight people and businesses that are doing just that, they are being remarkable.

Whether or not it is in how they are building their product, how they are interacting with their customers, how they pour their heart into what they are doing, I’m going to highlight people doing things in remarkable ways.

My focus is not just small businesses. In this series you will see a variety of people and businesses; however, every episode of Be Remarkable will show case a remarkable action that can be implemented in YOUR business. So whether I’m highlighting my father, a local landscaper, or the breakfast crew at my local Chickfila, there will be something remarkable that you can take away and apply to YOUR business.

I’m VERY excited to start this series by show casing none other than my Pops, Louis Bickett. Since his retirement 10+ years ago Pops has been a wood worker. He started making furniture and more recently transitioned into wood turning, or as he likes to say, “Making square things round.”

I don’t want to spoil what is so remarkable about LCB Woodturning, so please, enjoy the video:

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So Pops is remarkable because he is SO GOOD at what he does that potential clients COME TO HIM and ASK HIM to make pieces for them. Pops doesn’t turn wood for a business, he does it because he loves it, but when and if he does turn LCB Woodturning into a business he’ll have clients lined up asking to buy his pieces.

I ask you, are you so good at what YOU do that clients come to you, instead of the other way around? Because most of us have to go looking for clients and ask them to do business with us.

~Ivan

You have seen this name FREQUENTLY here at A Better Way of Business, but I want to thank Justin Lukasavige for the inspiration for this series. Check out this post by him over at coachradio.tv to see what I mean.

003 – How do I get so much done? Batch your work.

September 15, 2011 in Video Blog with 14 Comments

This is the second part of a two part series based around the question:

How do I get so much done?

I’ve been getting this question from friends, family members, clients, and people I’ve been interacting with online.

So let’s dive in:

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Batch your work! By batching your work you allow your brain to focus in on a specific series of tasks. Thereby, you allow yourself to be more efficient while knocking out the similar tasks.

A big “Thank you!” goes out to Dan Miller and Justin Lukasavige for introducing me to this GREAT method for approaching work.

~Ivan

Who’s doing the work?

September 14, 2011 in Action, Priorities with 4 Comments

Photo courtesy: dreamstime.com

We’ve all seen it. Typically on the side of the road. They’ll be some sort of construction just off the side of the road and they’ll be one or two men digging a ditch while 6 to 10 men stand around and watch the ditch diggers. A few are “in the trenches”, the rest are just bystanders.

It dawned on me the other day that even when we’re starting our own businesses we sometimes get confused as to who is supposed to do the work. Who’s supposed to take action. Who’s going to initiate a transaction where goods and or services are exchanged for money?

Sometimes we’ll be so busy “in the trenches” in one area of our business, we’ll ignore other, equally as important areas of our business. You might find yourself devoting days and weeks to making your website the best it can be, but you’re ignoring the accounting and the financials of your business. Or you might find that you’re devoting a lot of time to building relationships online, but you’re TOTALLY IGNORING your local community.

Sometimes, we find ourselves “in the trenches” focusing on areas that are not as important as what we should be focusing on. For instance, we may spend considerable time and money to have a logo created that catches attention and yet we are SHUNNING THE SALES PROCESS because we’re afraid we might hear a “no”.

In each of these examples we’re “in the trenches” in one area and being the bystander in the other.

In the past I have been guilty of this in many ways.

The first that came to mind are the various blogs I’ve attempted to start before. I honestly can’t remember the number of blogs I’ve started and let die. Somewhere between 3 and 5. Each case was the same. I would stumble upon an idea that would inspire me to write a couple blog posts. So I’d quickly crank out 2 to 5 posts and sit back and wait for the millions and millions of subscribers I was going to have.

There are NUMEROUS problems with what I just described, but for the sake of this discussion let’s just focus on two. My “trench” in each of these examples was the content that I produced for the blog. So I’d get busy for a few days on writing about whatever the idea was for the blog. And then I would TOTALLY AND COMPLETELY ignore any effort on my part to draw an audience, to build a community.

Another great example happened when I attempted to sell real estate. Here my “trench” was really diving in and trying to get to know the local inventory on hand so when I had clients I could take them to the PERFECT MATCH for their requirements. So I spent days and weeks combing through the inventory of houses in the local market. I made notebooks of all the details.

BUT I COMPLETELY IGNORED GOING AFTER CLIENTS! OK. Not completely, I sent out a bunch of letters. Thousands of them (we could mail 300 letters for free each month for the broker I worked for). So I passively went after clients.

Now tell me, what good does knowing the inventory do if you NEVER HAVE CLIENTS to show the inventory to???

NONE!

I don’t think I fully realized it then, but I occupied myself with being in one “trench”, knowing the inventory, at the expense of missing the most important “trench”, going after clients who could and would make a purchase.

So I ask YOU, what “trenches” are you currently in that should be taking a back seat to the truly important tasks in your business? Are you trying to design the perfect backend to the sells process but you’re ignoring actually finding clients? Are you focusing on producing content, but ignoring building a community of people interested in your content? Are you putting all your efforts into growing your online presence, but you’re COMPLETELY DISCOUNTING your local market?

Don’t confuse action with productivity.

Figure out the right “trenches” and then maximize your efforts THERE!

~Ivan

002 – How do I get so much done? Prioritize

September 13, 2011 in Video Blog with 5 Comments

This is the first part of a two part series based around the question:

How do I get so much done?

I’ve been getting this question from friends, family members, clients, and people I’ve been interacting with online.

So let’s dive in:

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There you have it! The way I’m able to get so much done is through prioritizing. And once I’ve prioritized I spend time working on those priorities.

I hope this helps you and business grow into your dreams.

~Ivan

Are you excited?

September 12, 2011 in Motivation with 4 Comments

I started typing this at 5:11 AM on a Saturday morning.

What time did excitement get YOU out of bed?

I’m surprised it didn’t happen much earlier seeming how I thought my alarm was about to go off, I mean I was just laying in bed wide awake and thinking the alarm was going to go off at any moment. After a few minutes, I’m very impatient, I got up and walked across the room to check my alarm clock. 3:39 AM. Yeah… I can’t get up that early. We have to drive to Macon this morning to pick something up, close to a two hour drive, I need SOME sleep!

So why am I awake so early? What could possibly cause me to miss out on some oh-so-precious-sleep???

Excitement!

OK. If that were typed how I just thought it (didn’t say it out loud because Alexander just whimpered in his sleep and I don’t want to wake him yet) it would be EXCITEMENT!

I am PUMPED RIGHT NOW! I had a hard time going to sleep last night. I woke up several times during the middle of the night. And I laid in bed waiting for my alarm to officially sound at 5:00 AM all because of EXCITEMENT!

And this has happened a couple days in a row now. And it’s happening more and more frequently.

So what’s got me excited?

A Better Way of Business. And all the things going on here. I’m excited that my first video blog was a huge success. WAY BIGGER than anything I expected. I’m excited about the relationships I’m building with people over the last few months. I’m excited about getting to get up and work on that oh-so-special-project I keep hinting about but haven’t divulged yet. And I’m excited by getting feed back that I am motivating other people to LAUNCH THEIR BUSINESSES!

Check out part of this feedback I received yesterday from Curtis Hollembeak from http://www.fundamusic.com/:

I have been encouraged by your postings at FAA to go ahead and do something. Your energy has already motivated me. FundaMusic.com went live this week, and I too am excited about the possibilities.

It’s feedback like this from Curtis that erases any doubt as to whether or not I’m heading in the right direction. I read his comment last nigh a little before bed. I as tired, I’d had a long day, and I was ready to go to sleep. After reading his comment I could have run a marathon! OK, I could have walked a mile or two and then collapsed from asthma is more realistic, but STILL! You get my point. That comment got me EXCITED!

So I ask YOU! What’s got you excited? Are you so excited about your business idea that it keeps you awake at night? It wakes you up in the middle of the night because inspiration just hit? It can force you to get up early on a weekend morning so you can get started and devote focused time to it?

What is it?

Do you HAVE anything that gets you this excited?

I can tell you that this is new to me. This level of excitement isn’t normal for me. Yes, I get excited easy, and lose it just as fast. This is different. This is POWERFUL. This keeps me going when I want to throw in my towel and quit.

So I ask you again. What gets you THIS excited?

~Ivan

THANK YOU!

September 10, 2011 in website with 3 Comments

I just want to say a GREAT BIG THANK YOU to all you awesome people that made yesterday by FAR the busiest day at A Better Way of Business!!!

THANK YOU!

As many of you know, yesterday was my first video blog. I think it went well. I received NUMEROUS personal emails containing encouragement and some helpful tips on things I can improve. I received the most comments in a day on a single post, 7. And… I received the most page views in a single day…

99!!! This is a 254% increase over the previous best day of 39.

I know, I know, I KNOW! I JUST published the post on Quantity vs Quality where I explain as bloggers we should be more focused on having the right people view our blog than shear numbers. BUT IT’S REALLY GRATIFYING TO KNOW THAT SO MANY OF YOU VISITED MY BLOG!

So I honestly feel like I’m still in the crawling stage with A Better Way of Business. But soon I’ll be walking. And even quicker after that I’ll be RUNNING!

Hold on! It’s going to be a FANTASTIC ride!

Can I be so bold and so brave as to ask you for a favor? If you like what you’re seeing here. If you’re motivated and inspired by my writings and the lone video I’ve put out. Will you tell someone? Will you let your friends know about what’s happening at A Better Way of Business? Will you click the “Like” button for Facebook you see directly beside this post?

Thank YOU for making this happen.

As always, if there’s anyway I can help show you that there’s a better way of business, let me know!

~Ivan

001 – Do Something

September 9, 2011 in Action, Friday Free Form, Video Blog with 17 Comments

Ladies and gentlemen! Boys and girls! PEOPLE OF ALL AGES!

Today you’re about to experience the first video blog for both A Better Way of Business and myself!

And I’m EXCITED!

Enjoy!

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There it is! What did you think??? I’d LOVE TO KNOW!

Special thanks go out to all the people who have encouraged me to try this out! You guys rock!

~Ivan

Quantity vs Quality

September 8, 2011 in Blogging, Motivation, Priorities with 2 Comments

Quantity vs Quality

So I’m a numbers guy.

As a kid I grew to love baseball. And do you want to know what turned me on to baseball? It wasn’t the actual game. I had to FORCE myself to watch the game. It was long, and boring, and I only had about a five minute attention span (it’s up to 10 minutes now!).

It was the cards. Specifically the back of the cards, where several years worth of stats were kept. I LOVED looking at those stats. What was the batting average? How many doubles? Homers? RBI’s? Who had the highest average, per year, for the cards I had? Most homers? What about for 3 years? Add up the total number of hits for three years and divide by the total number of at bats. Who has the best average???

I loved it. I would make my own note books and hand write out all the stats from the back of the cards so I could then analyze the players easier (I wasn’t introduced to Excel until my college years). I would even go so far as to create my own stats and see what kind of numbers I’d get. Let’s give John Smith 605 at bats, with 203 hits, 47, doubles, 39 homers, and 146 RBI’s. Is that realistic?

Crunch the numbers!

It was great.

My love of stats transitioned into video games. Favorite sports game of all time? Tecmo Super Bowl. Why? It was the first game I came across that kept stats.

One of the reasons I love role playing games so much? You have to level up your characters, thereby changing and improving their stats.

To this day I’m still obsessed with numbers. Take this blog for instance. I found out I can monitor traffic at this site. I can see how many page views I get a day. I can see where the views are coming from. I can see so many numbers, and not all of them make sense to me yet.

I LOVE IT! Actually, I can see myself getting obsessed with it. Are my links from Facebook and Twitter working? How can I get them to funnel more readers over here? Do I get more views on Monday or Thursday? How can I tweak the titles of my posts to make them more attractive to drive more traffic? HOW CAN I GET MORE PEOPLE?! MORE TRAFFIC?!?! MORE MORE MORE!

You get the picture.

I actually had a bit of a melt down last Wednesday. I got to work and was pretty busy, so I didn’t check the blog until around lunch. That’s the day I wrote, “Can you accomplish everything that needs to done?” This was and is a topic that’s near and dear to my heart as I start A Better Way of Business. I was really excited about this post. So when I checked at lunch I was expecting this post to have a decent number of views, for me that would have been 20 by lunch. So I opened up the dashboard and what do I see???

To my GREAT surprise I see 1. One single, solitary, lonely page view. And that one view just so happened to be me because the way I get to my blog is by clicking on this link that I set up that takes me to the daily post (guess I need to change that so I don’t skew my stats) and then I click on the dashboard. So really, I had had ZERO page views by lunch.

I was crushed. I was defeated. I wanted to throw the whole site away as a failure.

I sent Skye a text asking her if I was making a mistake trying to get A Better Way of Business going.

About 30 minutes later it hit me. I was obsessing over the wrong thing (I do that too often). And I think I discovered what the right thing IS!

My love of numbers and stats had been telling me the IMPORTANT piece of data is page views. The more page views the more successful I am. The more people stopping by my blog, the more people who actually value what I’m saying. The higher the number of page views the more business I have…

Wait a minute…

THAT’S IT! That’s where I was wrong. I was equating page views to number of clients that actually want to work with me and have me help them and their businesses grow into their dreams.

And that’s not necessarily the case. I realized, that what if I had 1,000,000 page views in a day. I would be TOTALLY PUMPED ABOUT IT! But what if NOT A SINGLE ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE WANTED TO DO BUSINESS WITH ME? It would be POINTLESS to the extent that I want and need A Better Way of Business to provide income so I can support my family.

So it dawned on me. I shouldn’t be so concerned with simply having a large quantity of page views in a single day. What I NEED is a much smaller number of the RIGHT page views in a day, page views that will actually lead to clients working with me and me helping them and their business succeed better.

My thinking had changed.

It was: Quantity is all that matters.

It is now: Quality at the right quantity will lead to success.

What about you? Are you focused on numbers for numbers’ sake? Or are you focusing on the RIGHT numbers?

Do your online interactions bring out the best in you?

September 7, 2011 in Blogging, Commenting, website with 8 Comments

Do online interactions bring out the best in you?

I’m fairly new to the online world. Not in using the internet, I actually starting going “online” back in the days of BBS’s, thanks to my childhood friend and neighbor, Dan. But until around the turn of this year I had never actually viewed the internet as a way to make actual personal connections. Prior to this year, I viewed the net as mostly for games, throw in a lot of emailing and social networking sites for friends I made offline, and you have my limited use of it in a nut shell.

But at the beginning of February I joined Free Agent Academy, an online community / school designed to help you start your business. This was the first conscious time that I joined a community online primarily to interact with people I had not first met offline.

Since then I have come across numerous blogs and podcasts that are crammed full of USEFUL, INSPIRATIONAL, and / or ENTERTAINING material. I have also made numerous new contacts with people that I would have never interacted with if not for coming across these people online. Several of these new connections have blossomed into friendships that I am very grateful for.

Of all the interactions with other people, be it through forums, comments, emails, chats, etc I’d say 99.9% have stayed positive and been beneficial. It’s the 0.1% and I want to talk about today.

And not even the 0.1% that I’ve experienced. Because honestly, I REALLY haven’t had very negative experiences online. I think once or twice there was the potential to get into an argument through the net with someone, but I didn’t see the point. So regardless of what was said to me, I let a negative conversation die. If need be, I’ll go so far as to block someone, but that hasn’t had to happen yet.

However, last week I came across two instances of people being unnecessarily rude online at other people’s sites. These two instances are what spurred this post. Both instances revolved around a follower of a blog spewing acid at a blogger. In one case, the follower left a stinging comment condemning the writer, and then explaining how the writer doesn’t live up to another blogger. In the second instance I didn’t actually see the email, but a follower decided they would take the opportunity to verbally dissect and destroy the blogger’s life due to a perceived slight from the blogger (in actuality, the blogger never slighted the follower, the follower simply didn’t read what was actually written, got offended, and then went on the offensive).

To top it off, the follower that left the comment was so BOLD and BRAVE that the comment was left under an “Anonymous” name on the blog.

Now I understand that as a blogger I am putting myself out into the public domain. And in doing this I open myself up to both constructive and petty criticism. Ok, I get that.

But what I want you to think about today is do your online interactions bring out the best in you? When you’re interacting with the online communities you participate in the most, are you providing people with a courteous, respectful you? Or do you just say whatever you want, however you feel the urge, because it’s online. Who care?

Because of your interactions with others online, do people get excited when they find out they’re going to get to meet you personally at an upcoming event? Or are you considering hiring security for yourself because you’re likely to get punched in the face because of vicious comments you make daily?

Do you consciously realize that you are dealing with LIVE HUMAN BEINGS on the other side of your comments or emails, or do you put down the first acidic thoughts you have with the thought of, “Take that you ASS!” when you hit send or post comment?

Because if you are participating online in an attempt to build your community I REALLY hope you make sure that your online interactions ARE bringing out the BEST IN YOU. Not the worst.

So please, please, PLEASE, before you hit send, before you click post, read over what you’re saying and make sure that it’s bringing out the best in you!

~Ivan

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