Internet Marketing Coaching

I know my headline is not the most positive quote, but in so many ways this quote has been so true to me and also to many of my successful friends. In so many stories of success you hear how people were almost beaten, broke and riding a one-way train to failure before they turned and became successful.

If I was a personal development expert I might say that for you to achieve success you firstly need to feel an aspect of pain. I could even go so far as to say that people are motivated by pleasure or pain and that pain is the biggest motivator…

…In my experience though it’s less about your motivations and more about the fact that you need to take risks. In taking risks you obviously have two outcomes:

1. Success
2. Failure

My question to you for this week is:

Are You Scared Of Failure? If So Is That Holding You Back From Success?

If you are an avid reader of my blog, follow me on twitter or read my status updates on facebook then you would know that last Thursday I lost tennis to my Mum and Dad.  Well, lose isn’t the right word, my brother (@MattStenning) and I were absolutely flogged

I am not the kind of person who is going to take this loss lightly so I was eager on Friday to re-challenge my parents to another game. We finished work on Friday and went out for a game of tennis, this time Matt and I had a steely resolve. This time we were determined that we were not going to leave that court losers, we were going to be winners.

After the warm up we opted for my Dad to serve first, we won this game easily.  In fact we won the first 4  games easily and without even breaking a sweat. It was at 4-0 our way that my parents got together for a team huddle, to discuss how they could turn the game around.

And turn the game around they did, out of the next 14 games they won 13 of them ending with a score of:

7-5

6-0

Now you be wondering, why I am sharing this story with you, well I am an avid believer that games like tennis are not only good for your fitness but can show you internal learnings.  Here are a few of mine:

1. Systems Work - While my parents were trying to play fancy tennis and not follow the normal system of playing tennis, Matt and I were winning.  Let me explain, the aim of tennis is to win a point by continuing to hit the ball over the net until your opponent, misses the ball, hits the ball out, hits the ball into the net or you hit a winner past your opponent.

Out of the 4 ways to win a point only one of them calls for you to make a remarkable shot or play “fancy” tennis.  The other three ways of playing tennis is to just hit the ball over until the other person makes a mistake.  So tennis is really just a very simple system, hit the ball over the net.  It’s us as humans that complicate that system and make it more difficult then it really is.

For the first 4 games of the match Matt and I had this system down pat, we just hit the ball over the net.  But when we started winning, well that’s when we threw the system out the door. The only reason my parents ended up winning that game was they followed the system while we didn’t

2. An Ego Can Destroy A System – Reflecting back on our game of tennis now I realise why we threw the system out the window. Quite simply we let our egos get in the way. You see, not only did we want to win but we wanted to win with “fancy” unnecessary shots. Once Matt and I had established the lead we started playing more difficult tennis shots to win points quicker and finish the game with flair.  While this was good for our “ego” in no way was it productive to following the “winning system”.

Those are just a few of my learnings from a simple game of tennis. Have you taken the time lately to sit down and assess what games are teaching you in your life?

I feel like I am writing this post a few days late, I jumped on the computer while sitting on my balcony at Couran Cove Island Resort (one of my favourite Australian holiday destinations) to find hundreds of posts like this one circulating the web.

So I though twice about it, with so many “New Years Resolution” and “Goal Setting” style posts out there, is it worth me writing my own post?  I set about reading as many of the posts as possible and found as I read more and more, I became more passionate about writing this post.  So many people were talking about goal setting, but very few of them using a proven, goal setting guide.

One of the things that I have learnt over my years of goal setting is that without a proven formula or guide my goals just don’t get achieved.  Think about how many times you have set a goal and not achieved it?  Think about how many times you have dismissed your own goals after setting them?

I know that in my family that New Years Resolutions were often laughed at and were more of a traditional joke then something to guide your year.  With that said though, in my family’s defense, most of our New Years Resolutions were set on the spot with no prior thought.  I believe for a New Years Resolution to be really powerful, to get results, to be your guiding light you must follow this Step by Step Guide to Goal Setting:

1.    Make Space – The first step might seem simple, but it is so often not followed.  How often have you set goals on the run?  How often have you run out of time when setting goals?  Making space could be the most important part of the goal setting process.  When I talk about making space I mean, set aside some time (not just an hour or so, a good half day would work well), find a quiet, personal space (somewhere you won’t be interrupted and won’t have distractions), grab a notepad and pen (no computers allowed, way too many distractions there) and most importantly clear your mind (you can’t make life changing decisions while wondering what to make for dinner).

2.    List 5 Key Areas Of Change – The most liked and universally used number is 5, we know that in offline marketing the number 5 results in the most sales.  By choosing just 5 key areas we are providing targeted, focused, results-driven goal setting while using strong number marketing to make our subconscious more susceptible to our conscious programming.  In most New Years Resolution posts I have read, it is here that they list down some examples of areas of your life you might like to change.  I personally believe that is counter-productive.  It is YOUR life, YOU need to take the time to analyse it to work out what YOU want to change in YOUR life.

3.    Write Your Goals – You have been doing this for years in your mind without realising it. Simply write down under each area of change what your goal is, what you want to achieve.  How you write them and what you say at this point is not important, we’ll come to that in a moment. If you have multiple goals under each key area, that is fine.

4.    Copywriting Your Goals – This is the process of taking what you have written and converting it into a powerful goal using a proven copywriting formula.  When writing sales letters, marketing pieces or even business cards there is a proven formula which will get you predictable results.  The same can occur when writing your goals, use a proven formula for writing your goals and you can expect a more predictable result.

Here is the formula that I Use:  On <insert date> I will be <insert action that shows I have achieved my goal> celebrating my successful achievement of <insert goal>.  For example: On the 23rd December 2008 I will be standing on the front beach at Sonaisali Island Resort in Fiji celebrating my successful achievement of 1000 new customers on the Internet Marketing Coaching database in 7 business days.

5.    Market Your Goals – This is the part where you make as much noise as possible about the goals that you have set.  Tell everyone that you know, everyone that will listen about your goals.  This way those people can help you achieve those goals, as well as keep you accountable to your success.

Now I am not a personal development guru, this is just my personal formula for goal setting that has worked for me.  Some of this is taken from courses that I have attended, books I have read, people I have talked to and some of it is just my personal belief.

I wish you luck with your own goal setting and hope that 2009 is the year that you achieve all that you have hoped for.