Having the right attitude helps you to cope more easily with the daily affairs of life. It brings optimism into your life, makes it easier to avoid worries and negative thinking and makes you happier, brighter and more successful.
With a positive attitude you see the bright side of life, become optimistic and expect the best to happen. It is certainly a state of mind that is well worth developing and strengthening.
That’s why we need to protect ourselves against “diseases” that can impact negatively on our attitude, because they are always lurking, always ready to infest and infect your mind.
Be on guard and avoid these “diseases of attitude” at all cost!
1. Complaining
Have you ever been in a situation where no matter what is being said, some people always tend to complain. If it’s not the weather, it is the economy. If it is not the economy it is the political situation. If it is not the political situation it’s their work and so they go on and on forever and a day. They always blame something for the situation they are in.
Complaining does nothing good for you. It is only working against you, draining your positive energy and contaminating everything you experience.
When you catch yourself complaining, stop and rather focus on something other than the thing you might be tempted to complain about. A trick to not complaining is to constantly remind yourself of how blessed you are (even if you don’t feel blessed at that moment). Just remind yourself about everything that is still good in your life and as long as you focus on the good things; you will soon forget to complain.
ALSO if you are in the company of a “complaining culprit” simply excuse yourself and run!
2. Negativity / Pessimism
We all can relate to the situation where you are excited about a new idea or project and wanted to tell everybody about it and they responded with “Yes, but ….it won’t work; it’s not the right time etc. etc.” It is like these pessimists are throwing cold water directly into your face!
What happens then is you put yourself in defence mode and even start to doubt your own dreams and abilities. This is also when fear settles in: “What if they’re right and I waste all this time, money, effort.”
Guard your thoughts from negativity and pessimism – whether it is coming from yourself and/or others.
The best antidote to negativity and pessimism is simply to surround yourself with positivity. Spend more time with positive people. Get involved in fun activities and things you like to do. Surround yourself by positive slogans and quotes. Create a habit to wake up each morning with the first words: “What a beautiful day! I’m so excited about ……..!”
3. Lack of confidence and self-doubt
Many situations, words and actions performed by ourselves as well as people around us, can hamper our confidence and make us doubt our abilities. Self doubt has many causes. It can be age, education levels, fear, looks or many other reasons and can cause you to say that you are not good enough or that you cannot do something.
For me the quickest way to get more confidence is by making a list of all the things that you have accomplished in your life so far. Believe me, when you start making that list, you will be amazed of what you’ve actually accomplished so far.
Then every time you doubt yourself, take out your list and see for yourself how good you really are. Remind yourself that you have no ground to stand on to doubt yourself! You CAN do this!
Remember, if you say you can OR if you say you can’t, you’re always right.
Become an “I can” person and believe in yourself.
4. Predjudice
The Dictionary defines prejudice as “an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason”.
It’s like in a conversation I overheard about a book called “The Secret”. One lady asked someone else what she thinks of the book. Without hesitation the second one responded: “That is utter nonsense.” I could see the first one was a bit stunned when she asked: “Have you read it?” to which the second one responded “I’ve heard about it”. Now that’s what I call prejudice.
The truth is, we all sometimes fall prey to this one – judging people or things without having the right knowledge and information.
Do not be prejudiced. Rather, give things the benefit of the doubt. Be open-minded and do not pass quick judgment. Almost every time when you have all the facts, your opinion will be more objective and you can better substantiate your point of view with facts.
Your Assignment this week:
We can change our business, our lives and the lives of those around us by changing our attitude.
John C Maxwell says in his book, The Winning Attitude: “It is hard to soar with the eagles when you have to live with the turkeys.”
Take the decision today to leave the turkeys of complaining, negativity, self-doubt and prejudice behind.
Develop a positive mental attitude and go soar with the eagles.
Did your position your business correctly to attract more clients and make more money?
What is the right position you may ask?
Well, being in the right position is where you have products and services that effortlessly attract the clients you want to work with and your clients are extremely happy working with you because you provide solutions to the problems they have. They therefor readily pay your fees, enthusiastically recommend you to friends and colleagues and never even think of exchanging you for your competition?
Is that at all possible?
Yes, it is.
But before you can create this favorable position, you need to answer the following strategic questions.
Q1: Who do you really work with? How do you help them?
Sometimes, we think we know who our clients are. But do we really?
For example: Do you work with a specific group of people who can be clearly identified and who have some common characteristics? Do you know what they struggle with and what their particular issues are? Do you know how your services can alleviate those issues?
A secret behind effective positioning is that it always starts with the client in mind.
It starts with choosing a specific group of people you can help best with your talents and skills; then getting to know them really well and giving them exactly what they need.
That’s step 1 in positioning your business correctly to effectively attract client, earn a higher income and take your business from merely surviving to thriving.
Q2: What makes you and your business unique?
Why would clients work with you? What is your unique message? What makes you different from any other person who delivers the same services you do? What makes you stand out in the crowd?
In today’s overcrowded marketplace and trying to compete online it can often be difficult to find something that makes you completely unique, right. That is when there really are only three things that can help you stand out.
Your story – the good and the bad in your life that is useful to share with clients;
Your skill set – your previous experiences, knowledge and credentials;
Your style – your personality and the way you do things.
When you embrace your “story” and share it with others; use your skills fully and live out your style you can create a very unique position for your business in your market.
Q3: What are your clients really buying from you?
It is important to understand that your clients do not buy your products or services; they buy the solutions or benefits you offer.
The example most often quoted in marketing to explain this concept is the one of selling a drill. When you sell drills and drill bits, what your customer actually wants is a hole. So the drill is just a means of making the hole.
It however does not stop there. Why does he want the hole? Lots of people really want a hole so they can put a screw through it to fix something. So, the customer is actually buying a way of fixing things and you are in the business of selling ways of fixing.
When you understand what your clients are really buying from you, you can provide them with better ways or different ways to get what they want and as such better position your business to thrive.
Answer these 3 strategic questions, can help you position yourself and your business skillfully to create a unique position where you become the go-to person in your niche, attract more of the right clients and as a result increase your income to live the lifestyle you want.
To Your Success
******
P.S. What will you will do to position your business better this year? Share it with us below…. and as always, if you enjoyed this article, don’t keep it a secret :). Use the buttons below to share.
When you’re building a solo business from scratch, the key word for many months or even years is ‘surviving’. In the beginning, your main focus is normally on getting enough clients, keeping the bank manager happy and being able to pay the bills.
The truth is your business is literally in survival mode until you can find your groove, kick things up a notch and start implementing strategies to take your business to the next level.
So, over the next 6 weeks, I want to give you 6 easy and cost effective, but crucial strategies to take your solo business from merely surviving to thriving in the next 12 months.
Okay, so let’s fire away with…
Strategy 1: Discovering YOU First
May I ask: How well do you know yourself?
When I ask this question to my private clients, we always have a good laugh, especially when I compare them with onions… and illustrate the question on the hand of the movie Shrek.
Can you recall the situation where Donkey and Shrek had the following discussion?
Shrek: For your information Donkey, there’s a lot more to ogres than people think. Donkey: Example? Shrek: Example… uh… ogres are like onions! Donkey: They stink? Shrek: Yes… No! Donkey: Oh, they make you cry? Shrek: [peels an onion] NO Donkey! Layers. Onions have layers. Ogres have layers. You get it? We both have layers.
Like ogres, there’s a lot more to you than meets the eye. You have layers too. How well do you know your layers? Are you prepared to peel back a few and see for yourself… you may be surprised at what you find.
Truth is, we often think we know ourselves pretty well, but when we are confronted with some thought provoking questions we sometimes choke on the answers. Questions like:
What are you truly passionate about?
What gives you untold energy when you do it?
What motivates you to keep going when the business road starts to creep uphill?
What are your values and those things you won’t compromise on while doing business and marketing your services?
What are your fears and the things holding you back from playing a bigger game?
What is your greatest strength or weakness in your marketing?
Why do you want to be in business for yourself?
What do you ultimately want from your business?
Building a thriving business while marketing your services fearlessly and effectively starts with knowing yourself. It starts with being aware of who you really are and what you truly want.
So take some time out today to really, really answer those questions about yourself. The answers might surprise you, but will also give a lot of insight and self-awareness on how to operate your business and how to market it successfully.
For example, when you know what motivates you, you can build it into your marketing plans to help you keep momentum. When you know your fears, you can start working on overcoming or eliminating them from your marketing to move forward. When you know your strengths, you can build on them to attract more clients.
Thus, self-awareness and the knowledge of what makes you tick is the starting point of building a client-rich business and taking your business from merely surviving to thriving….
Love and Success
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Time Management is one of the most important aspects in building a successful solo business.
It remains however a very difficult monster to tame.
We all know that spending your time on those things that can make a difference and have the biggest impact on your business success is vital and that it requires you to have some dedicated focus.
But truth of the matter is, most solo-entrepreneurs have a to-do list a mile long. There is just always something you need to take care of or something that needs attention …and often unexpected things topple the apple-cart and make it easy for you to lose focus.
Sometimes things even get so out of hand that you don’t know what is important anymore and what you need to focus on first, because everything seems important and very urgent.
This is when you need to take a step back, and re-evaluate your priorities… and I know, this is often easier said than done.
When things get out of hand in my business, I usually force myself to take some time out, to look at my to-do list of 101 and to re-evaluate and re-prioritise the tasks.
To put things in perspective for me, I first use the following criteria: What will make the biggest impact on my bottom line in the shortest period of time and with the least amount of effort?
Secondly, I apply the 80/20 rule or Pareto Principle to those tasks.Now, the Pareto principle states that roughly 80% of your results come from 20% of your efforts. For example:
20% of your marketing methods results in 80% of your clients: Focus on those methods.
20% of your clients contribute to 80% of your income: Nurture those clients.
20% of your business tasks gives 80% of the results: Focus on those tasks.
So when you’ve narrowed down your huge to-do list to the actions that will have the biggest impact on your business, apply the Pareto Principle and choose the 20% actions that will give 80% of the results you want and start doing them first.
The secret here is to complete each action before you move on to the next action.No multitasking ladies! Sticking to one action and completing it is the only way to get results fast.
This way you can easily tick off the important actions from your to-do list, while you simultaneously see the results in your business.
The value of applying the Pareto Principle (80/20 rule) is that it can help you to successfully identify those aspects where spending your time produces the most results. By focusing your time on those actions, you not only move your business forward faster, you also feel better and much more in control.
Vice versa, applying the 80/20 rule can help you identify those 20% actions that take up 80% of your time, but are doing zero to nothing to increase your bottom line. Those are the tasks that you can easily outsource to free up even more time.
Bottom line: You can tame the time-management monster when you don’t just “work smart”, but when you work smart on the right things.
If you like the 80/20 rule and think it can also work in your business, why not commit yourself to apply it on at least one aspect of your business. Share with us below what you will focus on first :).
As we approach the end of the year, it’s always a good practice to take a look back at the last 12 months and to take stock of what happened in your business. Were you thrilled by all your successes or perhaps disappointed in how it turned out in the end?
No matter where you are in your business and what the results looked like over the previous 12 months, NOW is the right time to assess everything and create the success you deserve.
Setting aside some time for a little planning is a best practice ALL successful entrepreneurs apply and it will work for you too, even if you’re not the “planning” type.
So why not take some time RIGHT NOW and use the 4 steps below to outline what you are going to accomplish to ensure you have an even better next year.
Step 1: Reflect on the past year.
The big question is: What happened in your business over the past 12 months. On face value it might feel as if you had an excellent year, but to get clarity on what exactly happened it’s important to evaluate specific points such as:
Income: Did you reach your expected income?
Expenses: Did you overspend or under spend on your budget?
Marketing: Did you reach your marketing objectives and did you do everything that you’ve planned for this year?
Clients: How many clients did you have, how many new clients did you get and could you retain your clients?
Business Weaknesses: Were there any areas of your business that you struggled with?
Business Strengths: Were there any areas that you had successes in?
Operations: Could you easily perform all the work you received – are there room for improvement? Do you need to get help?
Is there anything new that you want to do or want to learn for the New Year?
Do you need any new or different equipment and resources?
Step 2: Evaluate Performance
Answering the above questions, will give a pretty clear picture about your performance over the past year and will also give some pointers on things to do the same (or differently) for the year to come.
You can even dig a little bit deeper and answer the following questions
Why did you do well or why didn’t you do well?
Where can you improve?
What can you do differently?
Who can help to make a positive impact?
When do you need to implement changes?
How will changes impact on the rest of your business?
Step 3: Set new Goals
Knowing how your business performed as well as the reasons for performing good or not so good in each area, will definitely help to determine what to keep the same and what to change for the new year. Now is the time to set new goals and make those new plans.
Setting clear and specific goals for the next year is the first step to filling the gaps in your business. If you perhaps didn’t reach your goals from the previous year, that can be a good place to start for next year. Whether you’re looking for more clients, more visibility or more income in your business, you can reach all of those goals by creating and following through with you plan.
Step 4: Write it down
It won’t help much just having the information in your head and not do something about it. That will only raise the statistics bar of forgetting about all these wonderful plans early in the New Year.
So, map out your goals and give it specific deadlines. Write it down, schedule it in a calendar and put it up in a place where you can see it on a daily basis. This will help keep you accountable to not forget about the important details of the plans.
A wise man once said: “Planning will not guarantee success, but it certainly increases the probability of succeeding”.
Why not put it to the test this year.
If you liked this post, feel free to share it by clicking on the social media buttons below.
Also, share with us the one thing you want to improve in your business next year. By sharing and committing to it, you take the first step to actually achieve it! So, do share your thoughts below.
Francis van Wyk is an experienced business and client attraction mentor who supports women solo-preneurs with planning and achieving business success online.
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Having the right attitude helps you to cope more easily with the daily affairs of life. It brings optimism into your life, makes it easier to avoid worries and negative thinking and makes you happier, brighter and more successful.
