As a consultant, business growth strategist and results multiplier, I constantly encounter clients and prospects making one, some or all of the following common marketing mistakes:

Mistake 1: Not testing all of your marketing ideas.
Corrective action: Test and measure all of your marketing.

Mistake 2: Small or medium-sized businesses who waste vast amounts of money on image and brand advertising.
Corrective action: Run only Direct Response Advertising. Invest in advertising that highlights powerful benefits, a strong offer, providing powerful reasons why people must buy your products or services, plus supported by a clear-call-to-action. Your advertising must sell your products or services or you are wasting your money.  

Mistake 3: Not articulating or demonstrating the differences that your business offers.
Corrective action: Develop a powerful Unique Selling Proposition and use it in all your marketing.

Mistake 4: Not understanding your customer and their needs and desires.
Corrective action: Clearly determine and address the real needs of your clients and prospects.

Mistake 5: Not making doing business with your company easy, appealing and even fun.
Corrective action: Make doing business with your business easy, appealing and fun.

 Mistake 6: Stopping marketing campaigns that are still working. Corrective action: Don’t stop marketing campaigns that are still working just because you are tired of them. I assure you that you clients or prospects have not seen them as much as you.

 Mistake 7: Not capturing prospects’ addresses, email addresses as well as pertinent and valuable contact information.

Corrective action: Capture everything on a prospect or client that you can in an organised and retrievable system.

 Mistake 8: Being stuck doing “what works.”

Corrective action: Always be open to new ideas, innovations and be willing to change.

 Mistake 9: Not knowing and leveraging the lifetime value of a client.

Corrective action: Always understand the lifetime value of your clients. This way you will understand and serve them better.

 Mistake 10: Not being strategic. 

Corrective action: You MUST have a detailed, strategic marketing plan with specific performance growth expectations.

 In your marketing you have the greatest upside leverage environment imaginable. Improve your marketing and you will improve your profits. 

Two lumberjacks were given axes and told to go into the woods to cut down trees. The first lumberjack found a tree and immediately started chopping. He chopped all day without stopping.

The second lumberjack also did his share of chopping, but at various points during the day, he would stop, walk away, and then come back a few minutes later. Meanwhile, the first lumberjack just kept chopping away.

At the end of the day, the second lumberjack had cut far more wood than the first. The first was much more tired than the second. What happened?

The second lumberjack who took breaks went to sharpen his axe.

The point is that both men were given the same tool, but the only one took the time to learn how to use it properly. The simple message of this story is, work smarter, not harder.

We all get similar tools. We have similar rules. We possess the same amount of time each day to achieve our goals. Some of us learn how to use our tools and time better than others.

What makes one person better than another? It’s not the playbook that’s important, it’s the execution.

What will give you the success you need? Is your execution of the tools that you have got any better? Your ability to carry out the “execution” of the plan can make you better than your competition. It can give you the success you need.

Article by John Lloyd, Brandstorm

“Dream as if you’ll live forever. Live as if you’ll die today.” – James Dean

On the day you were born people gathered and laughed with happiness while you cried. Hopefully the day you die people will gather and cry while you gaze down upon them and smile.

If you knew for sure that tomorrow would be your last day, how would you live today? Would you live it to the fullest? Would you be your very best? Of course, you would! To live each day as if it is your last day is to be your best. Real living boils down to being your best, and to be your best is to live a principle-centered lifestyle. This is the only kind of life that truly satisfies. Live each day as if it is your last by greeting each day with love in your heart.

When you greet each day with love in your heart you live a life of gratitude. You wake up grateful and thankful for every situation and blessing.

When you greet each day with love in your heart, you live a life of optimism. You focus on the bright and productive side of life. You don’t worry about anything. You live with confidence and wonderful expectations.

When you greet each day with love in your heart, you live a life of joy and happiness. You think thoughts of creativity and speak words of life to every creature you meet. Your mantra in life becomes MAD – ‘making a difference’.

When you greet each day with love in your heart you live a life of thoughtfulness and unselfishness. You think of the well-being of others before yourself. You come to understand that your life is about service.

When you greet each day with love in your heart, you live a life of generosity. You are sharing and caring. You never give with the expectation of reciprocity. Although the Universe will always ensure that you get more than you give.

One day, tomorrow will be your last day. I assure you that on that day the only thing that will matter is the people you love, the relationships that you formed and the contributions that you made. I guarantee that you will not wish that you had spent more time at the office or earned more money.

Your life is a one-time deal. Live with love in your heart, live life to the fullest and be your best. There is no other way.

“Every man dies – not every man really lives.” – William Ross Wallace 

An extract from my book: Smart Thinking for Crazy Times

1. Not everyone is going to like you . . . Get over it.
2. Stuff is going to happen . . . Deal with it.
3. The person who buries their head in the sand will eventually get their butt kicked.
4. You cannot change the past, but you can create the future.
5. Everyone you meet is a reflection of who you are, so it’s a good idea to look for the best in people.
6. When you step into judgment, you step into ignorance.
7. Regret is a wasted emotion and keeps you stuck in the past.
8. Life should not be a fast food meal eaten on the run, but a banquet, with each mouthful, savoured.
9. When change knocks on your door, it won’t go away just because you do not invite it in.
10. Before you can be happy, you have to figure out what makes you happy.
11. Love is not giving all that you are, but accepting the other person and all that they are.
12. It is easier to tear something down than it is to build it up.
13. You don’t have to play with the hand life deals you – you can always shuffle the deck.
14. Your soul mate may not be the one you never argue with, but the one whose presence pushes you into growth and understanding.
15. Always assume the words you speak are being spoken to you, and then ask yourself, How does this make me feel?
16. Put your hand over your heart, feel it beat, feel it pulsate life throughout your body and know with absolute certainty there was a compelling reason why your Creative Source (God, Universe, Spirit, or whatever name reflects your beliefs) placed you on this Earth.
17. It doesn’t matter who writes the words, the only person who can give them power and meaning is you.
18. The only way through a challenge is to take one step at a time, one moment at a time and one day at a time.
19. Think win-win. Always seek mutual benefit.
20. You can get whatever you want in life if you help enough people get whatever they want.
21. You are a divine walking miracle.

An extract from my book: Smart Thinking for Crazy Times

Do you procrastinate? Are you a daydreamer? Does it take very little to divert your attention from the task at hand? Do the words ‘I’ll do it later’ feature prominently in your vocabulary? Be careful. Procrastination lies in wait to hurt you, whether at your place of work or in your relationships with family, colleagues, and friends. Procrastination is a silent killer of purpose and relationships.

Do you tend to put off or delay doing things? Sometimes putting off decisions is a good thing. It allows time for reflection and may result in a better course of action. However, when it becomes a general pattern or habit, it will prevent you from attending to the things that matter, and that becomes a problem. Add to that feeling of inaction; it can also lead to feelings of guilt.

The solution is to become aware of when and why you procrastinate firstly. Face it head-on and commit to taking action. Just try to force yourself from time to time to do things immediately. That alone will make you feel good about yourself.

Someday is now. Just do it!

A quick win:
The five-minute procrastination solution

“The greatest amount of wasted time is the time not getting started.” – Dawson Trotman

Do you tend to put off or delay doing things? Sometimes putting off decisions is a good thing. It allows time for reflection and may result in a better course of action. However, when it becomes a general pattern or habit, it will prevent you from attending to the things that matter, and that becomes a problem. Add to that feeling of inaction, and it can also lead to feelings of guilt.

I’m going to share with you one of the best solutions for people struggling with procrastination. It’s simple, and it works. It involves only two simple steps:

1. Ask yourself: ‘What can I do TODAY and right NOW that moves this task ahead even by a little bit?’

2. Once you are done identifying the action, start working on that task for precisely five minutes. It has been proved by research studies that once you get off to some work, you end up completing it. This happens because of a psychological effect that is known as the Zeigarnik effect. The Zeigarnik effect states that people remember uncompleted or interrupted tasks better than completed tasks.

The best way to get something done is to begin. A small action taken is still an action taken and can make a huge difference. Once you start the seemingly trivial task, a loop will keep running in your mind to finish it off as soon as possible, and this is how those productive five minutes will prove to be useful for you.

“The bad news is time flies. The good news is you’re the pilot.” – Michael Altshuler

An extract from my book: Smart Thinking for Crazy Times