​What do I want?

I want to run my own legitimate business that makes a lot of money.

1. Why?

Creating and running my own business would make my life meaningful.

2. Why would creating a business make your life more meaningful?

I love creating new things that impact people in a meaningful way.  Creating a business that helps people is the best way I know to create meaningful change.  

3. Why do you love to create new things?

I have an urge from deep inside to create big things.  I want to have a big impact.

4. Why do you want to have a big impact?

To prove I am great, that I can do more than most people, that I am unique, more determined and more driven than most people.

5. Why do you want to prove you are more determined and driven than most people?

I decided when I was young that I was great, and I would become rich by accomplishing great things.

6. Why did you decide you where great when you were young?

I made the decision in in 4th and 5th grade.  I knew I was smart from getting straight "A"s in 4th grade.  My dad taught me not to take shit from any body.  In 5th grade I ran into my first "Bully" after moving back to Sioux City from Mapleton.  I think I started to identify myself as someone who was smart and would accomplish great things as a defense mechanism to deal with being bullied.  I also fought back and stopped two different "bully"s in 5th grade and a couple more in 6th grade.  I think I was treated special by both parents out of guilt from their divorce when I was 3.  Slowly throughout my childhood and school years, I decided to identify myself as someone who was determined, hard working, and great.  Now with the bar set so high, I have to live up to my own expectations, OR face coming to terms with not being who I thought I was.

I really just want to start my own business and make a lot of money to prove I can do it.  Prove it to myself and everyone around me.  Prove I really am great just for the sake of being it.  I don't care about construction, it's just a vehicle in an impossible profession to prove to myself I am hard working, determined, and great.  

7.  Why did you decide to identify yourself as someone who was great?

It is a product of how I was raised.

I get why I want to be great, but what do I do with this new info?  How does it change anything?  

I feel calmer knowing why I am how I am.  Not sure what this means yet.  I'm going to start with another line of "whys" and see where it takes me.

1A.  Why else do you want to make a lot of money?

I want to have and experience great things.  

2A.  Why do you want to have and experience great things?

I only get to live once, and I want to make the most of my experience.

3A.  Why do you want to make the most of your experience?

Because it will be more fun.

4A.  Why do you want to have more fun?

Ha Ha, To prove I am great, prove it to whoever cares to watch.  (which is really no body)

5A.  Why do you want to prove you are great?

So I can keep my self identity.

6A.  Why keep your self identity?

I am scared to be someone new.  I've spent 35 years trying to be who I convinced myself I was at a young age.

7A.  Why are you scared to be someone new?

Damn, I've set myself up for stress in a pressure cooker.  It's just as scary to do what I have to do to keep my identity as it is to change my identing by not acheiving my goals.  My only relief is in succeeding at building a business that makes good money so I can finaly be "great".

I looked at my coworker and I said "Oorah".  It was the best word I could think of to describe the moment. We had just both poured ourselves into the task at hand as if our lives depended on it.  We were laying out dowels for caissons.  Against all odds, we had found control points from over 50 feet away and transferred them into a future elevator core to determine where to stab eight #10 bar twenty two feet long each.  We had done this while a concrete truck was about to get hard, which would cost us not only the concrete in the truck, but also the entire caisson we had already poured half of.

The moment was a lot like the feeling you get when you win a little league game in a tournament with the teammates you fought beside all season long.  It's the feeling you get when you know you just accomplished something important.  You did something meaningful.  At the time you may not even know why it is meaningful, but that doesn't matter, because you knew it was.

43 years ago my grandpa served as a Lieutenant Cornel leading a squadron of F-100 fighter jets in the Vietnam war.  My grandpa, and the other pilots who flew with him, knew they had done something bigger than themselves fighting together in that war.  They knew what they had done together was meaningful and it kept the group coming back to support one another for over 43 years. 

The two common elements in each of these examples are 1.  A group of people working together, and 2.  Achieving something bigger than themselves.

All it takes to live an inspired life, to be "successful", is to achieve something greater than yourself.  The key to a fulfilling meaningful career is set the bar high and follow through to hit your goal.  Throughout history, bringing a group of people together to work towards a common goal, has been the most consistent and reliable way to achieve extraordinary things.

What goal will you set?  How will you know what extraordinary goal you were meant to achieve?  Those are the magic questions.  Once you are certain of the answer, you can go to work on building your meaningful life.

What do you currently do for work?  How did you end up in your line of work?  What had you envisioned it would be like when you first were interested in doing the work you do?  Write down your answers and look at them.

Think of the last time you were lost in the moment, completely loosing track of time. What were you doing? Write down your answer and look at it.

Remember the last time you had an adrenaline rush? What were you doing? write down your answer and look at it.

What is the last thing you produced that you were proud of? What skills do you have that other people have gave you praise about? Write down your answer and look at it.

Looking back over your answers (or let's be honest, you're just thinking about the answers because you didn't actually write anything down), you'll notice you've found meaning and excitement about a lot of different unrelated things.

The truth is, the distraction of figuring out your "passion" or "finding your purpose" is a barrier you've subconsciously created to hold yourself back from achieving great things. You can find meaning and accomplish things greater than yourself in many different fields of work.

The key to achieving greatness and living an inspired life is learning to live in the present moment. In the moment you can be larger than life and perfect your trade, regardless of what that is for you right now.

Last Thursday, in the moment I managed a caisson crew, a grade beam crew, a utility crew, a concrete core crew, put a real estate deal back together that was falling apart, and answered some last minute questions to get final approval on a fix and flip loan from a bank, all while dealing with the new news that my grandpa had died in his sleep the night before.

I could remain larger than anything life could throw at me, and I did it by remaining present in the moment, ready to give my all to ANYTHING life could come up with.

When you are in this flow state, it's contagious. The people working with you can feel it. It's the reason sports teams rally and crowds in the stadiums feel "magic".

When everyone on your team starts to work in the moment, lost in the process of achieving your work, the outcomes are limitless....but it all starts with you and your ability to get lost in the moment by finding the meaning in the work you do.

More on how to do that in future posts.

Never start out your relationship with your customer teaching them what they need.  Your customers are only interested in seeing if you will be beneficial in helping them solve a problem or fill a desire they are already aware of.  

If you're trying to convince your potential customers you can help them solve a problem they don't know they have, they'll be out the door long before you've had a chance to prove you can be helpful.

Here are a few ad headline examples.  For these examples, I'll assume your target market is people already in the network marketing industry:

GOOD: Learn how to grow your downline.
BAD:  Help teach your potential clients how to sell.

GOOD: Learn how to sponsor more reps.
BAD:  Sell your customers the tools and coaching they need.

GOOD: Learn how to quit your day job.
BAD:  Learn how you can help other people so you can build a business around it.

GOOD:  Learn how to get more leads.
BAD:  Learn how to show your potential clients what you have to offer.

Make a list of the problems and desires your target market already knows they have.  When you're finished, you'll have a list of headlines for future marketing campaigns.

Only after you have demonstrated that you can help fix your client's initial problem, have you earned the right to teach your client what they may really need.  If you want to build long lasting solid relationships with your customers, it's essential that your services extend past your client's initial problems to fix your customer's real underlying problems. 

In your chosen field, you want to know your customers better than they know themselves.  You should be ready to continue solving their problems as they evolve with your products and services.  After all, you're an expert in your business, and you should be a couple steps in front of your client.  Here's an example for people in the multilevel marketing business:

The real problem most multilevel marketers face is not knowing what they value most in life, or how to make money spending their time doing what they love. If you're in the multilevel marketing business, this is the problem you'll want to eventualy help your clients solve. People end up building MLM businesses because they hate their day jobs. The only reason they hate their day jobs is they ended up in a field that doesn't match up with what they value. As you help your clients build their MLM business, this won't solve the underlying problem.

The real problem your client has is knowing what they value most so they can focus their time and efforts on having a meaningful life. If you started out your relationship with your client telling them to see a councilor to help identify what they value, they'd quit listening to you before you finished your first two sentences. So instead, you can help your client most by helping solve the problems they are aware of.

Initially your customer wants to know how to sponsor more reps, so you give them the tools and the coaching they need to start building their downline.  As your client evolves, you start to show them how to coach their downline members.  Eventualy your client will start to free up their time from their added MLM income and may be more interested in exploring alternative business ideas.  Now you'd want to help match up your client with a councilor who specializes in helping people identify their values. 

Try to continue adding meaningful value to your clients as they grow, and you'll reap the rewards.  It will also help you see a deeper meaning behind helping your clients solve their current problems.

What do your clients think they want, and what do they really need?  Please share in the comments below.

"If you don't like your job, why don't you just quit?",  I ask. 

You rebuttal with "Yeah, like it's really that easy.  I need to pay my mortgage, feed my family, and make the car payment.  If I quit my job, I'll loose everything I have... and my family will be homeless."

"Why not replace your income when you quit your job?  Wouldn't it make more sense if you work on replacing your income first, and then quit your job?", I probe.

"Of course." you respond, "If I knew how to replace my income I would have already done that."

"You don't know any other ways of making money?  You must not be looking very hard...  or at least you havn't found anything that seems like it would be better than the crappy job you already have.  Does that sound accurate?"

"Of course I know of other ways to make money, but like you said, they are even worse than my current job, or they require skills I don't have." You exclaim.

"Now we're getting some where." I think to myself and reply, "Why don't you start working on getting the skills to do something you would enjoy more?"

And here is where the light bulb starts to turn on and you start to realize your REAL dilemma, reponding with: "I don't know for sure what I would rather do to make money.  There are so many options, and most of them require a lot of time, money, and energy to get started with.  What if I pick something new, go through all of the work to gain my new skills and then hate that job too!?!" 

and I reply with "So it sounds like you have started to realize your problem isn't your current job.  It's actualy your lack of knowing what it is that you really want to do with your life." 

and you relpy with a resounding "YES!  That's it.  My real problem is not knowing what would really make me happy.  If I only knew FOR SURE what direction I should go, I could start making some real improvements to my current work situation."  and as you continue to think you say to yourself:

"This may be a deeper issue than I thought.  Maybe my root problem is more about figuring out the purpose and meaning in my life than it is about my crappy job.  Maybe my crappy job is just a symptom of the real problem."

Would this conversation have gone differently if you and I were speaking to each other?  What part would have been different?  Please comment below.

Click here for a free trial of Inspired Vocation.  Get free one-on-one coaching.
 

Here is how to get the best traffic for the lowest cost on Facebook:

Step 1: Create a Facebook Page.  If you don’t already have a Facebook page for your business, go to https://www.facebook.com/pages/create/ and follow the steps to create one. 

Step 2: Identify what you will offer your potential customer, making sure it is presented in a way that matches what they already know they want.

 Step 3: Click on“Edit Page” in the admin panel at the top of your Facebook page, then select “Update page info” from the dropdown menu. Edit the “Short Description” to state what you are offering to your potential customer. This text will show up  in the “ad” you are about to create.

 Step 4: Embed your landing page as a tab on your Facebook page.  If you are a member of Inspired Vocation, we’ll do this for you.  All you’ll need to do is temporarily make me (Eric Young) an admin for your page.  If you’re not an Inspired Vocation member, and want to do this yourself, you’ll have to google “How to embed a web page as a tab for my Facebook page”.

 Step 5: Create an image for your Facebook “ad”. It has to be 111 x 74 pixels.  Make sure the image is something that screams “I’ll solve your problem” to your potential clients.  Next you’ll upload this image as the image for your new page tab (the one you created in step 4 above).  If you’re an Inspired Vocation member, just email us the image and we’ll do this step for you.  If you’re not an
Inspired Vocation member, google “How to update the image and title for my Facebook page tab”.     
 
Step 6:  Update the title of your new Facebook page tab.  The title is something that should scream “I’ll solve your problem” to your potential clients.  If you’re an Inspired Vocation member, just email us what you want the title to be, and we’ll update it for you.  If you’re not an Inspired Vocation member, google “How to update the title of my custom facebook tab.”

Step 7: Go to your new embed landing page tab on your facebook page and copy the URL to your clipboard.

Step 8: Create a new post on your facebook page. First paste the URL you just copied in step 6. Let the Picture and text for your landing page populate in the post. Delete the URL you just copied and type in some text that matches the offer you identified in step 2 above. Click Post.

Step 8: Go to https://www.facebook.com/advertising and click on “Create an Ad”. Then click on “Page Post Engagement”, select your Facebook page, and select the post you just created. In the “Audience” section, try to target your audience as narrow as possible. 

You’ll notice that I suggested for you to use a Facebook page post as a Facebook ad. I also suggested that you embed your landing page within Facebook. Both of these are crucial to your success with Facebook advertising. The entire experience for the end user will be contained within Facebook. Not only will Facebook love this (and charge you less), but your potential customers will love it to. Your customer is on Facebook because they like Facebook, so let them stay there.

The landing page you embedded as a Facebook tab on your Facebook page in step 4 above should promise to solve a problem your customer already knows they have.  If you need to educate your customer on what they really need before you can sell them your solution, you’ll do this slowly through emails in an auto responder over time. 

IMPORTANT: DO NOT TRY TO EDUCATE YOUR CUSTOMER ON WHY THEY NEED WHAT YOU ARE SELLING BEFORE YOU HAVE THEM ON YOUR EMAIL LIST.  

Beware of getting stuck paying for fake leads.  Check out this video:

A great way to get around this problem is by creating your own custom audiences with the software at http://audiencemakr.com.  You can use this software to create lists of people from Facebook groups and events.  People on Facebook who are registered for events and members of groups are real people.  Try to pinpoint the groups and events your target market is in and create your own custom audience.  When you purchase Audiencemakr, they'll give you all the training you need on how to upload your new "audiences" into facebook and use them in your ads.

I'd love to hear how your facebook marketing goes in the comments below!

If you want to make money, you need to have an audience of people to sell your products or services to. When you're starting out, you'll likely need to focus at least 75% of your efforts on building your email list:  You need customers to serve in order to sell your products and services and make money.

There is a great technique for marketing on Facebook that I will share with you in next week's post, but before you are ready to start any marketing efforts, there are two things you need to get crystal clear on:

1. Who is my target market?

2. What problems do my target market have, that they are already aware of, and that my product or service can help solve?

In many cases, the problem your potential clients are already aware of is a symptom of a bigger underlying problem you can help them solve. The bigger underlying problem can often be something your customers are not even consciously aware of.  

For example: If you are selling the Inspired Vocation opportunity, your target market's underlying problem is not knowing what their purpose in life is. A symptom of this is hating their job. It's important that you know the difference between the symptom and the underlying problem, so you can market solutions to the symptom. It's way easier to sell someone a solution to a problem they are already aware they have.

Complete the following two steps:

Step 1: Ask yourself, "Who is my target market?". What Facebook pages do they "like"? How old are they? Do they have kids? Are they married? What books do they read? What jobs do they have? etc.... Try to write down as much as you can think of that would be common among people who would benefit from what you have to offer.

Step 2: You need to bridge the gap between what this audience of people think their problems are (the symptoms) and the solution you have to their real underlying problem. To start, ask yourself: What symptoms does my target market have as a result of their underlying problem I am trying to solve? What are the common frustrations among the people in my target market? What do they desperately think they want help with? What headline would grab their attention right away?
 
For example, if you are preparing to market the Inspired Vocation opportunity, your target market thinks they need to solve the following problems:

1.  They hate their current job and want to find a way to get rid of it.
2.  They need to sponsor more reps for their current MLM opportunity.
3.  They want to build their multilevel marketing business but don’t know how.
4.  They wish they could build their own business from scratch, but don’t know how so they are attempting to promote an MLM opportunity they don’t feel that great about.

Taking the time (days) to sit down and REALLY think about these questions is important. It's the most productive thing you can do to build your business. All the marketing tips and tricks in the world won't do anything for you until you figure out the answers to these questions.

Of course, as you interact with your audience more over time you'll be able to better define the answers to these questions. For now, you just need to make your best guesses so you can start testing them out.

In Summary:  When you’re trying to market a product or service, it’s always easiest to sell someone something they already want.  If your potential clients need to be educated on why they need what you are offering, leave that education out of your marketing efforts.  When you are marketing, you need to market to what your customers already think they want.  After you have your potential client on your email list, then you can start educating them over time on why they need what you are offering.

What problem does your target market think they want to solve and what is the underlying problem you will help them solve?  Please share in the comments below.