Online Video…The Future
Posted by Brian Tracy on Sep 17, 2009
Is your primary concern to increase your sales and profitability?
If you’re like me, that is definitely your concern… especially today.
So where is the best opportunity today to increase your sales and profitability?
Read the rest of this entry »
3 Laws of Business Success
Posted by Brian Tracy on Jun 17, 2009
There are certain laws of the universe that are working whether you know about them or not. They may even determine some of your success in business and life. Below are just 3 of the business laws to consider for success…
Law #1: The Law of Purpose
The purpose of a business is to create and keep a customer.
Read the rest of this entry »
How to Get What You Want by Helping Others Get What They Want, Part 2 of 4
Posted by Brian Tracy on Feb 19, 2009
A critical part of power and influence in your life and work revolves around the subject of “ownership.”?
When you have something that you want to get done, you “own” the job or task. If you simply tell someone else to do all or part of the job, they may comply because they are required to, but they will not accept ownership. As far as they are concerned, if the job is done well or poorly, it is still your job.
Highly effective people however, are those who have developed the ability to transfer the concept of ownership into the mind and heart of the other person. This is done by bringing the subject up in a casual way, discussing thoroughly with the other person, asking for his or her ideas and input, as well as suggestions on how best to do the job, and then giving the other person both the authority and encouragement to do the job within a certain time and to a certain standard.
“Leverage” is the key to great success. You need to be able to take your talents and abilities and multiple them times the talents and abilities of many other people if you are determined to accomplish great things and realize your full potential in life.
There are five keys to wealth and great success in our highly competitive society today. The first, which you have heard of for years is called “OPM,” or “Other People’s Money.” You will only be successful to the degree to which you can tap into, borrow and deploy the funds of other people. This is why it is so important that you accumulate your own funds and that you keep a meticulous credit rating throughout your life.
All success in life, in relationships and in business is based on the foundation of trust. As Benjamin Franklin has said, “Cash is money and credit is money, and the person who can call upon the credit of others has no limit to the funds at his disposal.”
All great fortunes and great success in life is built on the ability to attract and leverage the funds of other people. Every loan that you ever take out, from a simple credit card all the way up to the financing of a home or business, is based on the use of other people’s money. This is a key leverage factor that many people have used to go from rags to riches.
Another form of leverage is called “OPE,” which refers to “Other People’s Effort.” Your ability to attract people who will willingly work hard to help you to be more successful while they are helping themselves is a key to your success. If you want to accomplish great things in life, you must have the help and support of lots of other people. If you are going to work by yourself running a shoeshine stand or working a farm, you can get by with the limited efforts and support of others. But if you are going to achieve all that you are capable of achieving, you must structure your life so that you can tap into the energy and efforts of lots and lots of people, at all levels.
You will find that, at every turning point in your life, there is a person standing with advice, support, direction and resources. In fact, the more people you know, and who know you in a positive way, the more successful you will be.
You have heard it said that “success leaves tracks.” This means that you should find out what other successful people do and then do more of it yourself and you will eventually get the same results.
Well, when you look around you, you will find that the most successful people in your society are the ones who know, and who are known by, the greatest number of other successful people.
Of course, it is absolutely essential that you become the kind of person who both attracts and deserves the respect of others. The very best way for you to become a major player, an influence in your business and your society, is for you to become very, very good at what you do. This, more than anything else, will attract into your life the kind of people who can be extraordinarily helpful in advancing your life and your career.
Learn to attract what you deserve in your life with The Law of Attraction - In Action
The third form of leverage that you can develop is called “OPI” which stands for “Other People’s Ideas.” One good idea is all you need to start a fortune. Every change in your life comes about when your mind collides with a new idea of some kind. A very small change in your thinking, or in your mental paradigms, as the result of your bumping into a new idea that enables you to see things in a different way can change the whole future direction of your life.
Successful people are those who are always organizing their life so that they are in the mainstream of ideas, rather than sitting on the shore watching the ideas flow past. They continually bombard themselves with books, magazines, articles, newsletters, audio programs as well as regular attendance at seminars and conventions.
The most successful people have learned that a single idea can save them weeks, months, even years of hard work and that the Law of Probabilities applies to the entire world of ideas. The more ideas you expose yourself to in a given period of time, the more likely it is that you will expose yourself to the right idea at the right time for you. If you bombard your mind with hundreds of ideas during the course of a year, you are much more likely to be successful than the person who reads little, listens to the radio and goes home and watches television at night. The odds are very much in your favor.
Next time, I will explain more secrets of getting what you want by helping others get what they want.
The Law of Attraction - In Action
My Formula For Success
Posted by Brian Tracy on Dec 11, 2008
Whenever I give a speech, make a presentation or participate in a workshop, entrepreneurs and startup business owners ask me the same key questions:
"How can I generate more leads?"
"How do I close more sales?"
"What do I need to do to make bigger profits and more money?"
And they ask me what my formula for success is.
I’m delighted when they ask me the last question, because it provides the answer to the previous three.
A. Think Big
Over and over I talk to entrepreneurs who are struggling to get the next sale so they can cover current expenses. Or they want to make two more sales per day or per month.
Their biggest problem is that they’re thinking too small. If you’re only aiming for a couple of additional sales a month, you’ll never plan big and you’ll never be truly successful. You might be a little better off than you are now, but I bet you want more than that.
What do I mean by thinking big, and how do you do it? Find out how the top marketers and sales experts think. Tap into their minds, and use the same approach.
B. Find Out How The Most Successful Marketers and Business Owners Did It
As a young child, I was embarrassed when my Dad would stop and ask for directions when we were on car trips. Dad was supposed to know everything — and he wasn’t supposed to let on if he didn’t. There are far too many small business owners who still think this way.
Just because you created and launched your business, don’t assume you’re supposed to have all the answers. Seek out the expert advice you need to succeed.
Over the years, I’ve built Brian Tracy International through hard work, smart marketing, and a dedication to helping my clients succeed. I also got some help along the way; help from people who have "been there, done that" and were willing to share with me some of the things they had done to become incredibly successful.
With a little bit of knowledge and a small nudge from the right people, your sales and your profits will boom.
C. Don’t Throw Money Away
Any smart entrepreneur knows that it’s not only sales that count; it’s profits that matter. Now, let me ask you a question. Ever take a hundred dollar bill and flush it down the toilet — or throw a whole handful of bills into the fireplace and watch them burn?
Of course not! You’d never do that. Or would you? I see many small business owners throwing money at marketing, and in most cases it not only isn’t working, it’s hurting their sales. And then they do it again. They’re killing their profits.
Let me tell you a secret about marketing.
Some of the most effective ways to generate leads, get more sales and double or triple profits are practically free. The key is knowing what works and what doesn’t and when to use each strategy.
21 Great Ways to Start and Build Your Own Successful Business
See Also
- Brian Tracy International
Helping you achieve your personal and business goals faster than you ever imagined!
The #1 Way to Make Money Online In This Economy
Posted by Brian Tracy on Nov 20, 2008
Is your business struggling?
Are you looking for a way to ramp up sales and keep your business growing, even in this economy?
If you’re like most entrepreneurs and business owners, you know that a website should be part of your marketing strategy. And you also are smart enough to know that most websites don’t work.
Most websites are like boats: holes people pour money into. I should know; I pour money into my boat on a regular basis…but I don’t mind because I don’t expect to make a profit from my boat.
My website is different. The purpose of my website is to maximize revenue, not swallow up cash.
Are you pouring time and money into the hole that is your website?
Do you want to know how to use your website to maximize your revenue?
The Secret To Making Money In This Economy
Want to know the secret to making money with your website?
Simply having a website isn’t going to help you make more money. And if you think all you need is more traffic, you’re wrong (although that can help)…lots of visitors doesn’t equal lots of money.
So what’s the secret to making money with your website? The secret is having a system that converts prospects into profits.
Ready to discover how easy it is to convert more prospects in profits?
The #1 way to make money online is to use a simple set of steps to convert website visitors — your prospects — into profits. That’s the simple strategy we’ve used with incredible success here at Brian Tracy International.
Making money online isn’t rocket science, but it’s not obvious, either. If it were, everyone would be doing it. So how, then, do you create a system that turns prospects into profits?
The System We Use
Our website at Brian Tracy International has always had a good conversion ratio, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t always looking to improve it.
In early 2007 my staff discovered the "Insider Secrets to Creating Web Sites That Sell", created by Internet marketing expert Charlie Cook. What we discovered was an easy-to-implement, step-by-step system that helped us turn our web visitors into massive web profits.
Want to benefit from the same online success strategy?
Within just a few weeks of using Charlie’s system, our conversion ratio had increased — along with our profitability — and our business was growing.
Even today — with the economy struggling — we are turning huge profits by converting online prospects into paying customers.
The "Insider Secrets to Creating Web Sites That Sell" spells out the steps you need to take in order to create a system that will convert prospects into profits. It is easy to use and it works.
Find out for yourself how much more you could be making with your website.
How You Can Turn Prospects Into Profits — Fast
With a tough economy, I know you can use higher profits without increasing your costs. That’s why I convinced Charlie Cook to make a special offer to Brian Tracy subscribers.
Charlie’s "Insider Secrets to Creating Web Sites That Sell" is the fastest way to increase your profits in this market and he has agreed to offer Brian Tracy subscribers an exclusive risk-free 30-day test drive for only $2.95.
If you want to make more money with your website and maximize your profits, I highly recommend you pick up Charlie’s system today.
Use this web marketing system to transform prospects to profits.We did. Take action today. I’ve persuaded Charlie Cook to give Brian Tracy subscribers an exclusive, risk-free 30-day test-drive for only $2.95.
See Also
- Brian Tracy International
Helping you achieve your personal and business goals faster than you ever imagined!
3 Ways to Succeed In This Economy
Posted by Brian Tracy on Nov 11, 2008
Are you wondering what to do to attract clients and create a surge in sales?
Are you frustrated by getting minimal response to your advertising or online promotions? Are you asking yourself, "How can I avoid having my sales and profits dry up in this market?" "Should I reduce spending on marketing to preserve cash?" If you’re like most business owners and marketers, you’re doing everything you know how to bring in more sales, and you’re still not realizing the profits you want. You’ve worked for years to grow your business and now a financial meltdown that you had nothing to do with is making it harder. What can you do? You could bury your head in the sand and hope you’ve still got a business in a few years. You could copy your competitors’ marketing, but their sales are hurting, too. Or you could ask yourself, "Is there a way I can actually grow my business in this economy?" Yes, there are easy and inexpensive ways to increase your profits. Start with these 3 steps: 1. Change Your Marketing Strategy In good times you can get away with fairly ineffective marketing, and the rising tide will float your boat along with everybody else’s. In an economic downturn, you can’t afford to be haphazard about your marketing. You’ll pay the price in reduced sales. Spending money on ads or mailings that barely generate sales isn’t affordable anymore. 2. Focus Your Efforts Unfortunately, most small business marketing isn’t much more than a mess in the kitchen, a collection of sales and marketing activities that don’t work together. Many businesses don’t grow as fast as they could because they don’t have an optimized marketing strategy or a system for implementing it. 3. Use Cost Effective Marketing Strategies You may be doing all the right marketing activities, but without an effective marketing system, you could be struggling for a long, unprofitable time. Now, thanks to marketing expert Charlie Cook, there’s an easy way to transform your marketing, grow your business and maximize your profits.
When we get the rare cold spell here in San Diego, I change the clothing I wear. I put on a sweater or even a jacket. The same is true for your marketing strategy; when the economic climate changes, you need to respond.
While fusion food is popular here in San Diego, we don’t have a single restaurant that is a combination of French, Italian, Mexican and Chinese cuisines. Can you imagine a pasta dish with jalapeno cream sauce and a ginger root topping? It’d taste terrible. That’s not a time-tested combination of flavors; it’s a mess in the kitchen.
Let me tell you a secret. Some of the most effective marketing and selling tools are inexpensive or even free. Most people don’t use them, so when you do, you can easily beat the competition. 92% of businesses overspend on marketing. They’re wasting money on marketing that isn’t getting results. 
See Also
- Brian Tracy International
Helping you achieve your personal and business goals faster than you ever imagined!
What’s The Secret To Building Real Wealth
Posted by Brian Tracy on Nov 3, 2008
What would your life be like if you doubled your income this year?
What would your life be like if you doubled your income this year? What if you doubled your income AND you doubled the time you spend doing what you love with the people you love?
How can you go from dream to reality?
Think it’s impossible in this economy? It’s not! In every shift of the economy — down or up — there are winners and losers.
Even in the Great Depression, people came out new millionaires. Today will be no different.
The Secret You Need To Know
The key to being successful in life and with your business is focus.
Focus? What am I talking about?
The key to being truly successful is knowing how and where to focus your time and efforts. For example, just yesterday I was talking with someone who sells fiber optic cables and computer hardware. He wanted to know if I thought it was a good idea to diversify and try to resell self-improvement programs online.
Here was someone who was doing fairly well with one business and about to take his eye off his primary source of income and try something he knew nothing about. Bad idea!
If you want to be successful, the key is finding something you’re good at and focusing your efforts to help people…and become rich doing it.
For example, every successful business owner knows they need a marketing strategy to attract new clients and make more money. But most don’t know how and where to focus their marketing. They try a little of this and a little of that and get little in the way of results.
Knowing how and where to focus your efforts is the key to success.
With a proven system for getting prospects’ attention, generating leads, converting leads to clients, maximizing sales and generating repeat sales you can easily double your income while cutting your time on the job in half (or even more).
4 Options For Achieving Your Dreams
Try copying what others are doing
This could work. Anything is possible but most new businesses fail. Even if you try copying one that appears to be making money, it’s impossible to know what’s working for them and what’s not. You could easily end up copying one of their failed strategies.
Wait for lightning to strike in the form of a revolutionary product or service and then hope you get featured on Oprah. Your odds are slim but again, this could happen. Counting on it would be a mistake.
Maintain a positive attitude
I’m sure you’ve heard it before: your chances of success are higher when you focus on creating opportunities…but at some point you’re going to need more than just a positive attitude. You’re going to need guidance and tools to reach your dreams.
Find a proven system, one that shows you exactly how to become a sought after expert, how to grow your business, and how to maximize your profits so you have a steady stream of leads, sales and profits (so you can make more money).
See Also
- Brian Tracy International
Helping you achieve your personal and business goals faster than you ever imagined!
The Foundation of Leadership
Posted by Brian Tracy on Oct 20, 2008
The most important quality of leadership, the one quality for which you want to be known, is extraordinary performance, with the goal of achieving extraordinary results.
These results then serve as an inspiration to others to perform at equally exceptional levels. People ascribe leadership to those men and women who they feel can most enable them to achieve important goals or objectives.
Why People Respect You
We develop great perceptions of those men and women we can count on to help us achieve what is important to us. Men and women who make great sales, or who establish admirable sales records, develop influence in the minds and hearts of their coworkers and superiors. They are spoken about in the most positive way.
The Halo Effect
Men and women who are responsible for companies or departments that achieve high levels of profitability also develop charisma. They develop what is called the "halo effect." They are perceived by others to be extraordinary men and women who are capable of great things. Their shortcomings are often overlooked, while their strong points are overemphasized. They become charismatic.
The Source of Charisma
Charisma actually comes from working on yourself. It comes from liking and accepting yourself unconditionally as you do and say the specific things that develop within you a powerful, charismatic personality.
Become a better manager with 21 Great Ways to Become an Outstanding Manager.
Be Determined and Purposeful
When you set clear goals and become determined and purposeful, backing those goals with unshakable self-confidence, you develop charisma. When you are enthusiastic and excited about what you are doing, when you are totally committed to achieving something worthwhile, you radiate charisma. When you take the time to study and become an expert at what you do, and then prepare thoroughly for any opportunity to use your knowledge, skill or experience, the perception that others have of you goes straight up.
Accept Complete Responsibility
When you take complete responsibility and accept ownership, without making excuses or blaming others, you experience a sense of control that leads to the personal power that is the foundation of charisma. When you look like a winner in every respect, when you have the kind of external image that others admire, you build your charisma. When you develop your character by setting high standards and then disciplining yourself to live consistent with the highest principles you know, you become the kind of person who is admired and respected everywhere. You become the kind of person who radiates charisma to others.
Focus on Results
Finally, when you concentrate your energies on achieving the results that you have been hired to accomplish, the results that others expect of you, you develop the reputation for performance and achievement that inevitably leads to the perception of charisma.
You can develop the kind of charisma that opens doors for you by going to work on yourself, consistently and persistently, and becoming the kind of person everyone can admire and look up to. That’s what charisma is all about.
Action Exercises
Here are two things you can do immediately to put these ideas into action.
First, ask yourself every day, "What is the one thing that I and only I can do, that if done well, will make a real difference to my company?" Whatever your answer, go to work on that.
Second, decide upon the most important results you can get for your company and make sure that you and everyone else is working on those results every hour of every day.
21 Great Ways to Become an Outstanding Manager
See Also
- Brian Tracy International
Helping you achieve your personal and business goals faster than you ever imagined!
Your Most Valuable Asset
Posted by Brian Tracy on May 29, 2008
What is your most valuable asset?
According to Dr. Theodore Leavitt, Dean of the Harvard Business School, the most valuable asset that a company has is its reputation.
Dr. Leavitt defines reputation as “How you are known to your customers”.
In marketing and business, we refer to this as your “positioning” or “brand.” Your reputation is determined by the way that your customers and prospective customers talk about your company in the marketplace.
When we work with business owners and executives, we ask the question, “How would it be helpful or useful for people to talk about your company?”
In other words, if you could be a fly on the wall and listen to one of your customers talk to one of your prospective customers about your company, what would you want them to say?
Would you want people to talk about your company by saying that you have high quality products and services, excellent customer service, before and after the sale, that you are a high integrity company and that your people are some of the nicest people to deal with in the industry?
What would you like people to say about your company? More importantly, what could you begin doing, starting today, to make sure that people talk about you in a positive way after they have done business with you?
In positioning, you build your reputation around the words that you want to own in your customer’s mind. Top companies like BMW own the words, “The Ultimate Driving Machine.”
Wal-Mart has become the most successful retail company in history with the words, “Everyday Low Prices.”
Every company that is successful, and every product that is successful, can be summarized in one or two words in the minds of its customers and prospective customers. What are yours? What could they be? What should they be?
This brings us to the most important part of these Words of Wisdom today. It is the discovery that your personal reputation is your most valuable asset as well. Your personal reputation, the way that you are known to others and talked about by others when you are not there, is the most valuable asset you have in determining your success and happiness.
People who succeed over the long term are invariable those who have excellent reputations. The people around them respect them and talk highly of them when they are not there. Top people are known for certain qualities, especially integrity, honor, straight-forwardness, quality work and dependability.
In other words, your most valuable reputation is your character. It is your willingness and ability to make commitments and then to keep your word. It is your ability to deliver on your promises, to do what you say you will do, every time, without exception.
One of the great weaknesses in the human character is the tendency to follow the path of least resistance. This leads people to do things that are fun and easy, and which offer immediate gratification, rather than to do the things that are hard and difficult, but which lead to greater success in the future.
The key determinant of character is self-discipline. Self-discipline was defined by Albert Hubbard as, “The ability to make yourself do the things you should do, when you should do them, whether you feel like it or not.”
It takes no character or discipline to do things when you feel like it, such as getting up earlier in the morning to plan your day, engaging in vigorous physical exercise to keep healthy and alert, eating the right foods, and fewer of them, etc.
It takes tremendous discipline and willpower for you to discipline yourself to do those things that are hard and necessary, but which lead on to success and happiness.
The most important emotion determining your happiness and your relationships with other people is your level of self-esteem. The more you like yourself and respect yourself, the more you like and respect others, and the more they like and respect you in return.
There is a direct relationship between self-discipline and self-esteem. The more you discipline yourself to do the things that you know you should do, whether you feel like it or not, the more you like and respect yourself. The more you like and respect yourself, the more you like and respect others and the better is your entire life.
Your most valuable asset then is your character, based on willpower and self-discipline. It is your ability to keep your promises, no matter what it costs. It is your determination to do high quality work, and to do it on time and on budget, as you promised.
When you develop a reputation as a high-quality person, who’s word is absolutely trustworthy, and who does high-quality work, your future will be guaranteed.
See Also
- Brian Tracy International
Helping you achieve your personal and business goals faster than you ever imagined
Back to the Balkans
Posted by Brian Tracy on Dec 13, 2007
Business seminar in Macedonia
Some months ago, I received an invitation from a company called Triple S Learning in Skopje, Macedonia to conduct a business seminar on Management, Sales and Personal Effectiveness.
Last Monday, I flew from San Diego to San Francisco, caught a ten-hour flight to Frankfurt, and then flew on to Vienna and Skopje in the South of what used to be called Yugoslavia, arriving at 4:30 in the afternoon.
Macedonia has been one of the poor countries of Southern Europe for many years. Now, it is aggressively seeking foreign investment by introducing a 12% flat tax, plus a series of incentives for new business development that make it one of the most attractive places in Europe to start a new business.
In the U.S., the debate about the flat tax has been going back and forth for many years. In 1995, I facilitated the Kemp Commission on Tax Reform in Washington. Our goal was to bring together the opinions of leading economists and businesspeople from throughout the country and consolidate their ideas into a single proposal for a flat tax for the United States.
Our final proposal was so good that, when it was rejected by the politicians, Steve Forbes took it up and ran for president in 1996 on this single issue.
Today, the flat tax idea is sweeping the world. Russia has a flat tax of 13%. Estonia has a flat tax, Lithuania has a flat tax, and several other countries are introducing the flat tax. To the amazement of the economists, under the flat tax, not only do people pay less, and more easily, but the government actually collects more money because there is less tax evasion.
The current proposals for a flat tax in the U.S. would exempt the first forty-six thousand dollars of income for a family of four and then charge a flat tax of 17% to 19% on all income earned above that balance, with few or no deductions allowed. You could fill out your tax return on a large postcard, as opposed to the forty-four thousand pages of the tax act that are currently strangling the U.S. economy, individuals and businesses.
We had a very successful seminar for 350 business owners and entrepreneurs in Skopje, Macedonia on Wednesday, November 28th. The next morning at 6:00AM, I flew to Belgrade, the capital of Serbia, where we conducted another full day seminar for 550 Serbian Businesspeople. The people of the x-Balkan countries are eager to learn how to start and build successful businesses, improve sales and marketing, boost profits and achieve financial success. The audiences were open, responsive, positive and very enthusiastic.
My new friends at Triple S Learning – Dusko, Dragan, Igor, Teo, Marko, and Marija, are aggressively building a multi-national business training organization and doing a wonderful job. We went out for dinner on Tuesday night at a traditional Macedonian restaurant, with violin players, music and Macedonian wine. On Thursday night, after our seminar in Belgrade, we went to a traditional Serbian restaurant, again with wonderful food, wine, music, minstrels, singing and a lot of laughter.
At 4:00 AM Friday, November 30, I woke up in Belgrade, caught a 6:30AM flight to Frankfurt, flew to San Francisco, and arrived home in Solana Beach at 6:00 PM in the evening for a total of 22 hours of travel. Whew!
Even with the sub-prime meltdown, the American economy is still strong. We have low unemployment, and a growth rate of 4.9% in the last quarter, one of the highest and best in the world. The estimate is that 265 million dollars of mortgage loans will default over the next few months. But there are 15 trillion dollars worth of mortgages issued, and even the mortgages that default will not result in the complete loss of the underlying home value. It will merely decline by 20% to 30%. Life will go on. The economy will remain strong. As we go into 2008, the US economy is still the strongest and most powerful in the word, and will continue to be for many years to come.
Each year at this time, I make a decision that, “Next year will be the best year of my life!” I suggest that you make that decision as well. Say to yourself, and even write it down, “2008 is going to be the best year of my life!”
I’ll talk to you again soon.
Brian Tracy
