Is your business both focused and flexible?

Those words almost sound like opposites. They’re not. In business, they work together beautifully.

• It’s essential to know what you want to achieve and to stay focused on it.
• However, you also need to remain flexible regarding how it happens. Then, as new information and opportunities come along, you can adjust your approach.

So, you remain both focused and flexible.

You couldn’t buy a cup of coffee from Starbucks

It’s true. Starbucks had already been in business for several years (and opened its first 5 stores), before you could buy a cup of coffee from them. Until then, you could only buy their coffee beans. Flexible thinking allowed them to identify a new opportunity.

Starbucks’ focus remained the same: to build a successful coffee business. However, their approach changed.

And Apple only sold computers and software

Apple’s surge to being the world’s most valuable company started with a pivot. Initially, Apple was exclusively a computer company. Steve Jobs decided to enter the music industry, with the iPod and iTunes. Then, Apple pivoted again, creating the iPhone. If iPhone were a company by itself, it would be bigger than Coca-Cola and MacDonald’s… combined!

Apple’s focus remained the same: to create beautifully designed technology. However, their approach changed.

Learn from the success of others, my friend. Remain focused on what you want to achieve, but be extremely flexible on how you achieve it.

P.S. For more ideas on how to make this work for your business, I’ve written this:
Agile Thinking – A new mindset for a new landscape.

I have a question for you today. An important question.

The question is this: Does your business excite you and energize you?

Well, it should do.

In fact, it HAS to!

Seriously.

Here’s why

It’s impossible to build a truly successful business, unless that business fills you with energy and excitement.

Think about it.

• The energy is what keeps you moving forward. It’s the essential fuel source behind every successful business owner.
• The excitement is what the marketplace needs to feel, whenever they have an encounter with you or your business. It’s highly infectious. It’s what inspires people to hire you, buy from you and recommend you.

And that energy and excitement can be yours. If you want it.

You see, you get to choose

You can choose to either create an inspirational business, or carry on like 99% of small and medium-sized business owners, in a business you love, which doesn’t love you back.

Small business owners suffer more stress, work longer hours and work harder, than they would do if they were an employee. They work themselves harder than any boss would, with none of the perks of being a salaried employee.

And that’s nuts!

New clients often tell me they would see other business owners, who were brimming with energy, and wonder how those other business owners managed to be so motivated. Usually, they blame themselves for not being self-motivated enough.

Thankfully, they’re 100% incorrect.

ANY business owner can become highly motivated and fully energized. However, it isn’t going to happen, while they’re working in a business that’s zapping their energy or failing to inspire them.

Business owners are intelligent people. They’re not going to feel highly motivated and energized, working in a business that isn’t fulfilling them.

Clarity is the key

All that energy and excitement only comes, when you are crystal clear about what you want from your business AND you have a plan for exactly how to achieve it. This massively improves the way you think and feel about your business. That’s because you know what you want, know how to get it and can see daily progress toward your dream / goal / target. I see the impact this has on my clients every day. I’m telling you, it’s transformational!

And as your thoughts are what determine your actions, your newly-found excitement for your business provides you with the essential energy, excitement and motivation you want. That clarity and direction is all that separates you from those supercharged (and highly successful) business owners.

The challenge you need to overcome, if you want to access that energy and excitement, can be summed-up in one word: Settling.

Settling

Some business owners have spent so long with their daily grind, that they unconsciously start to settle for things the way they are. Sure, they hope things will improve. Occasionally, they’ll try something new. But they find themselves with the same core problem. So they (wrongly) blame themselves for lacking the self-motivation or energy.

Pretty soon, they realize 2017 is starting to look a lot like last year. And last year wasn’t much different from the year before that. It’s little wonder they lack motivation, when they know that January 2018 won’t be the start of a New Year, just another chance to relive the same old year, all over again.

Fact: You are in control

You don’t need to settle for ANYTHING.

You’re the boss.

That’s the whole point of being a business owner. You get to build whatever kind of business you want. You choose how enjoyable your “work” is. You get to decide what you earn, where you live, the number of hours you work and the quality of your customers. Everything is directly under your control.

Choose clarity. Refuse to settle for less than you deserve. And if you’d like some help, I’m right here.

[Note: If you missed my exciting news, you can read it here!]

Here they are in no particular order.

So, let’s get started.

1. They value their time. Time is your most valuable asset, yet many people surrender control of it. Guard your time. If you do, you’ll always have enough time to do all the things that matter each day.
2. They are approachable. If you want people to get in touch with you, they need to feel comfortable doing so. Some business owners are distant. Others are snarky. Warm and approachable is way more effective.
3. They are brave enough to risk being wrong. They know that the only people who never fail, are the people who lack the courage to try, (which is failure in itself).
4. They avoid costly detours. Don’t waste your time on shortcuts or growth-hacks. Shortcuts to success fail you on 2 fronts: Firstly, they’re seldom shortcuts. Secondly, they never lead to meaningful success. Instead of looking for shortcuts or hacks, look for the most direct, proven route.
5. They demonstrate leadership. Leadership is something you do. It isn’t something you self-proclaim. It’s an ongoing habit. So lead. And be very suspicious of anyone who calls themselves a leader.
6. They listen with intent. They listen to their clients. They listen to their marketplace. They’ve figured out that the more they know, the better their decisions will be. This allows them to create better products, better services and massively better relationships with their clients and future clients.
7. They are useful. They’ve figured out that the more useful they are, the more the marketplace will value them. This is closely linked to number 9.
8. They know that they can either be criticized or be ignored. There’s no middle ground. Every decision you make either helps your business stand out or camouflages it.
9. They turn up. If you want to remain relevant to your clients, customers and marketplace, you need to turn up regularly with something useful. A newsletter, blog, vlog or podcast are proven ways to achieve this. Bonus: By showing you can be relied on to regularly share ideas, you start earning the trust of your marketplace before they even speak with you.
10. They commit to lifelong learning. They read the books. They get expert advice. To see the effectiveness of this approach, we only need to look at those who take the opposite route. Those who don’t study and think they can do everything themselves, place a very low ceiling on their potential.

I hope you found these ideas useful, my friend. If you did, get to work on at least one of them today.

I have some very exciting news to share with you today! And I know it’s news that many of you have been hoping for. It also represents the biggest change I have ever made to my business and I can’t wait to share it with you.

Remember this post from July?

It explains how my main passion in business, is the work I do with small business owners. I find massive corporations frustrating and far less rewarding to work with, than my wonderful small business clients.

What you won’t know, is that despite this, just a tiny amount of my time is spent working with small business owners. Under 10% of my working hours!

Ever since writing that post, it’s been bugging me. I knew I was going where the money was, not where my passion is… the work I love, with small business owners. Then last week I was on a 7 day holiday with my family. It still kept bugging me. So, I thought about it. Deeply. Really deeply. I prayed about it. I meditated on it.

The answer was clear

It’s time for me to dedicate 100% of my business, to working with small business owners. So, starting today, I’m working exclusively where my passion is: helping small business owners thrive with their enterprises.

And as a result, I’ve never been more excited or energized about my work with the community I serve.

So, what does this mean for you?

At one point, there was a 7 month wait to get on my 1 Year Marketing Mentor service and a 5 month wait for a Marketing Results Session! Starting today, there will be a massive number of new slots available for you to choose from.

Sure, a chunk of these spaces will go fast, but there will always be a slot available to you, within a reasonable time frame.

If you want to build a business that energizes and excites you, a business that rewards you on every level, there has (literally) never been a better time to read this and get in touch. I look forward to hearing from you!