I’m at the local coffee shop where I do most of my writing.

A grandma is treating her granddaughter, probably 10 years old, to breakfast at the table behind me.

But Granddaughter is paying a price for this ‘free’ breakfast. She’s got to listen to Grandma.

“Your biggest meal should be your breakfast. Then you work off the calories throughout the day…”

“My friend Judy eats fruit and fruit juices for breakfast. Then she’ll have a carbohydrate meal, like sushi… When you come this summer, I’ll introduce you… She exercises…”

She then went on to talk about table manners. And how to treat other people.

Five minutes into the lesson, something began to nag at the edge of Grandma’s consciousness. She could sense that her message wasn’t being received as she intended.

So, hardly pausing for a breath, she assured Granddaughter “You’re perfect just the way you are.”

And then quickly returned to her agenda.

“When you see a person who has a quality that you admire, decide to incorporate that into yourself. Into who you are. And you can become like that person.”

To top it all off, she advised her granddaughter, who seemed more interested in her omelet, that she should focus on improving herself because “You can’t change anyone in life. You can only change yourself.”

All in all, this was good advice. But will it be effective? Does Grandma realize just how hard she is trying to change her young granddaughter?

Does she realize how she would influence Granddaughter far more if she was living the example rather than talking about her friend Judy?

It’s always easier to help others when you’ve got that particular area of your own house in order first.

If you’re trying to help others improve their businesses or lives, but you’ve got lots of work to do yourself on many of the same issues, NOTHING will do more for your own impact than to get your own house in order.

You can’t change anyone in life. They can only change themselves. And they do it when they’re inspired by your example. Not by empty words.

If creating a steady, consistent, predictable flow of your own ideal clients is an important step for you, then this is your immediate next step.

Dov Gordon

Last week I sent out an email saying that to attract better clients, you need to stop trying to sell to those who are not a good match.

I had written that recently someone reached out to me and we exchanged half a dozen emails. “…It quickly became clear to me that this gentleman had views about business that were very different from my own and we were not a match.”

Well, several hours later, this fellow, who we’ll call “J” wrote me the following:

Hey Dov,

I did not have that impression during our dialogue. I don’t feel that we had very different views on business. I believe that the difference between our views was in that I was looking for coaching more from the ground up. I think you are looking for clients that are further down the path than I am. In short, I am working towards being one of your prospects and do not qualify. Yet. I believe that will change soon.

Regardless, I am not at all offended by being the subject matter of your email blast. I actually appreciate that you appreciate my response. It is still refreshing to deal with people like this in business. It gives me hope for the future!

Hope all is well,

“J”

I went back and reviewed my email dialogue with “J” and he’s probably right. It’s not so much that we have a different views on business. It’s that he’s not yet ready for my coaching programs.

What does ‘ready’ mean?

From our email conversation, it seemed to me that “J” is still at a stage where he’s trying many things, going in many directions, running hard, playing hard. So he’s not lazy and not afraid to work. From that sense, he’d be great to work with.

At the same time I got the sense that even though he know that he’s chasing too many rabbits, it doesn’t yet bother him enough. He’s not yet ready to focus on mastering the fundamentals.

It’s like if you go to a karate studio and all I would want to do is learn the fanciest katas. So you dance around punching, kicking, swinging the nunchucks or whatever flashy things the advanced students get to do.

Then it comes to a real world fight and you get your teeth kicked in because all that prancing around is useless if you never mastered the fundamentals.

So yes, “J” is correct. It’s not that we have fundamentally different ideas about business. It’s just that I work best with people who’ve had their teeth kicked in and are now ready to master the fundamentals and build up from there.

It’s a stage I had to go through myself, so I understand it all too well.

As soon as he gets there, he’s welcome with open arms.

Dov Gordon

PS – If you’ve been doing the fancy pants kata dance and you’ve come to understand that it’s time to master the fundamentals, you can apply for a free “Consistent Flow of Clients” strategy session with me.

Who is it for? If for coaches, consultants, experts and entrepreneurs who should be able to add $100,000 or more to your income in the next year. You’re just not quite sure how…

If that’s you, go request a session at http://dovgordon.net/freesession and I’ll get back to you within a few days.

We live in a world where slick marketers like to promise us overnight millions.

There are two problems with overnight millions:

1. Only one in a thousand (probably less, really) can do it.

2. Even the few who do manage it tend to crash as fast as they rose.

I’ve taken the approach that even if I could make overnight millions, I’d rather build a business that will serve me – and my clients – for decades.

And a business like that needs a strong foundation, which has a couple of ingredients:

1. You need information and knowledge. But more importantly you need wisdom and mastery. And this only comes from learning, implementing what you learn, and getting feedback from a mentor, coach and peers walking the same path.

2. You need restraint. It wouldn’t be wise to mix your concrete with ashes and it’s not wise to accept inferior clients.

That’s why I politely turn away the people who are not a good match for my philosophy and way of working.

Recently someone reached out to me and we exchanged half a dozen emails. It quickly became clear to me that this gentleman had views about business that were very different from my own and we were not a match.

While I was polite and helpful, he got the message because he ended his last email to me like this:

“Anyways, it sounds like I am not the type of person that you are looking to work with at this time. I have, however, enjoyed the dialogue. Thank you for your thoughts!”

If you read my emails and have listened to my free seminars and have a feeling that you and I might be a match, go and request one of the handful of “Consistent Flow of Clients” strategy sessions I’ll be giving away this month.

Fill in the form here and I’ll get back to you.

Dov Gordon

While I’m traveling, here’s an article from my colleague Peter Sandeen. I’ve seen the results of Peter’s copywriting, including a case where his salesletter generated 500% more sales than it’s competitor in a split test. — Thank you! Dov

You’ve done your homework; you know how to get visitors to your site.

But if they don’t ultimately hire you, what was the point of getting them there?

In a recent study (by Adobe), it turned out the average business spends $92 on traffic for every $1 they spend on conversion optimization.

In other words, they spend $92 to get people to their sites but only $1 to turn those visitors into clients.

Even if your $92 gets your ideal clients to your site, the money and effort can easily go to waste.

If they don’t convert, your bank account will show a steady decline no matter how impressive your traffic statistics are.

Give people a reason to listen to you

As harsh as it may sound, people expect a new site to be a waste of their time.

That bias to looking for reasons to not care about what you’re trying to say causes the typical small conversion rates.

The antidote? Communicating a clear, strong value proposition.

Sure, there are countless things that affect your conversion rates. But nothing comes close to how the clarity (and strength) of your  value proposition affects conversions.

Your value proposition is a believable collection of the most persuasive reasons your target clients have for taking the action you’re asking for.

The most effective websites revolve almost entirely around the value proposition they’re intended to communicate.

When you go to one of those sites, you know immediately what you can get. And you know why you should choose that company, product, or service instead of any other.

That’s what your website needs to be like.

You need to tell your visitors what you can help them with. And why they should choose you rather than your bigger, better-known competitors.

Whey else would they even consider you? Unless you’re already the market leader, you’re fighting an uphill battle.

The core of your value proposition is the short-list of reasons people should choose you. That is, even if you’re not nearly the cheapest option.

The reasons that make the short-list describe what you offer. They’re the things your target customers value, your competitors don’t offer, and you can believably claim to deliver.

Getting across those two or three aspects makes all the difference.

When people understand them, they stay on your site.

It’s the foot you can stick in the door. It earns you your visitors’ attention and gives them a reason to want what you offer.

If you need help with figuring out what the core of your value proposition is, try this 5-step process.

And if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask them in the comments.

Right now, Peter Sandeen is probably knee-deep in snow with his wife and dogs (he lives in Finland). But you can download his 5-step system for finding the core of your value proposition and landing page checklist to improve your conversion rates.

Peter Sandeen

Hello from New York City!

I hosted a small meetup last Thursday night in the lobby of the Roosevelt Hotel in New York. Right under the portrait of Colonel Roosevelt.

If you’ve been around here awhile, you know I study the US presidents, with Teddy Roosevelt being a particular favorite.

Here’s me standing under a portrait of TR, each of us holding a tool of our trade.

We had a small but high quality group trek over for the meetup.

Everyone shared a bit about what they do – and their most perplexing challenge right now. We then solved them.

Here are some things I learned from the discussion:

• - Retirement isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
• - You can have a highly valuable skill, in a great niche. But if no one knows about you…
• - Many of us just have to go through years of frustration or suffering because that’s how we learn what we need to know to go and help others.
• - It’s really hard to see our own situation clearly. To the point where when you’re asked about your most perplexing question, it’s common to have a hard time putting it into words.
• - There’s tremendous power in process. When you approach any problem by following a relevant process, you can quickly spot the few things that make a big difference.
• - Most people, even when they know that they should be focusing their marketing on a single problem, still have a hard time articulating it in a way that gets the interest of their ideal client. By default, they still talk about it from their own professional perspective. That won’t work very well.
• - We tend to over-complicate things. To over-think our issues. Another benefit of process is that it helps you simplify. And there’s power in simplicity.

Here are some more pictures from the evening:

L-R above:  Laverne Berry, Kristin Fraser, Ruthi Backenroth and Mike Krasner

L-R:  Mike Krasner, Slava Gordon (my sister), Dov Gordon, Laverne Berry, Ruthi Backenroth and Kristin Fraser

Dov Gordon

I’m getting on a plane to NY in just a few minutes – I should be over the Atlantic when you read this.

A few weeks ago I was interviewed by Tera Maxwell together with 20+ others, each sharing ideas about what it takes to be prosperous.

While many of the others, I believe, talked about mindset – very important, I talked about practical next steps. And as usual, I was probably a tad too opininated.

Go here to register and watch my video interview with Tera Maxwell at The Prosperity Summit.

Dov Gordon

There’s a page on my site that gets lots of traffic – but drives zero business. And I figured you may as well benefit from it.

A few years ago I wrote an article called “What to do when you’re unclear, confused and don’t know what to do.”

I also have a chat box, which is a convenient way for people to ask questions when they want to buy something, such as my “Manual – How to Systematically and Consistently Attract First-Rate Customers.” Or occasionally someone will use the chat box to report a mistake.

But at some point a couple of years ago I started getting lots of chat requests from people who were on the “What to do when you’re unclear…” page. They were always something like this:

“What should I do, I’m so confused…”

“I broke up with my boyfriend and now he wants to get back togther. What should I do? I’m so confused!”

“My parents want me to go to medical school but I want to do something else. What should I do?”

I’m a softie. And at first I would reply with a few minutes of guidance.

Then one day I felt a flash of suspicion. I wrote: “Hi. Did you read the article on this page?”

“No. Not yet. I was hoping you could help me…”

“Read this article. And do what it says. It will point you in the right direction.”

Next time I asked the same question. Again, they had not read the article.

I continued to ask out of curiosity. And not once had the person asking for free help bothered to read the article first.

I no longer respond to those kinds of chat requests.

As nice as I am, I only work with people who do their part first, not those looking for me to carry them around on my shoulders.

But how are people finding this page? I wondered.

Somehow – I don’t recall how – I discovered that if you type “What to do when you’re confused” into Google, my article is the #1 result.

So while this page does nothing for my business, it does have some really good advice on what to do when you’re confused.

And it’s got more Facebook ‘Likes’ than any other page in my site. (Hey, if you like the article, would you please press the Like button?)

Who doesn’t feel confusion from time to time?

The human condition, for most people is darkness and fog with the occasional flash of lightning. You’ve only got a brief moment to take it all in and burn it into your mind, or you’ll soon be groping in the dark again.

In the article I share another way.

A way that can make clarity your default with only momentary confusion.

If you ever feel that you’re groping around in the dark as you grow your business, go read “What to do when you’re unclear, confused and don’t know what to do.”

But please, don’t start a chat asking me if you should dump your girlfriend or run away from home or disown your oldest son.

Dov Gordon

PS – On Thursday, April 25th, I’ll be hosting a small, informal and free ‘meetup’ in mid-town Manhattan. We’ll meet from about 4:30 pm until about 7:00 pm.

If you want to join us, email me at dovgordon@dovgordon.net and I’ll tell you where we’ll be meeting.

The other day I got on Skype with my client Raj Varatharajan, owner of a premium web design firm in Sydney, Australia.

I had asked Raj to share the story of how he led a prospect who had $6,500 budgeted for a new website to spend $32,000 instead. And pay it all up front.

The result is an 8 minute audio recording in which Raj shared:

• The most important mental shift that enabled him to move from selling websites for $5,000 – $10,000 to where he now sells sites for between $10,000 and $30,000.
• How DO you lead your prospect to come up with 300%+ more than they had budgeted for, to invest in your product or service?! Raj explains how he did it.
• You’ll hear both the old way Raj used to approach putting together a quote and how he does it now. The new way has added tens of thousands of dollars to his income in just the past few months.
• Finally, you’ll hear about another project Raj just won – even though his quote was higher than two competitors. AND he has less experience than those two competitors!

.mp3

Is it worth 8 minutes of your time to listen to this? I do think so.   And feel free to leave a comment or question in the comment section below.

Dov

PS – In this recording, Raj mentions my training program “How to Elegantly Control Your Next Sales Conversation.”   A few weeks ago I completed the live presentation of that program and it was so well received, that I promptly doubled the price.  

And then I decided I would give my subscribers one last chance to get it at the old price.

If you like paying full price, you can get it here at the regular sales page.  If you want the old price, we set up a special page over here.  But it comes down on May 1st, 2013.

Most consultants never earn enough money.

And, most consultants rely on networking and referrals for most of their business.

Now, if you’re into following the herd, you’d see this research and conclude, “OK, I need to spend more time networking and trying to squeeze out referrals.”

But if you’re into striking at the root while everyone hacks at the leaves (the approach we take around here) you might realize a deeper message:

“Hmm, if that’s what most consultants rely on, and most consultants never earn enough, that’s reason to do something else.”

Watch the herd and then go the other way. But where to?

I’d suggest you take a serious look at joint ventures and email marketing.

Only 3% of consultants spend most of their time on joint ventures. And 7% on email marketing.

Now, learning how to write a profitable email has been key to growing my own business.

My most successful clients use joint ventures and email marketing. Many of them having learned it from me.

My most successful colleagues do lots of joint ventures and email marketing.

All of us write emails and get clients.

So if you ask me, the lesson to learn from this is: Learn how to write emails that get clients!

Write Emails > Get Clients!

On April 29th, 2013, from 10am – 1pm, I’m doing a special mini-workshop called “Write Emails > Get Clients!” for a maximum of 5 people somewhere in Manhattan.

In this small, casual group, I’m going to share my process for quickly writing emails that compel your ideal clients to read your emails and reach out to you.

UPDATE: Originally, I was going to teach this for an hour, and then spend the next 2 – 3 hours on general masterminding.

The new schedule: The morning of April 29th will be the “Write Emails > Get Clients!” workshop will be for a full 3 hours. We will then have some time to practice right there. And get feedback.

I’ll be scheduling a free ‘meetup’ for another time.

If you like to write and you want to learn how to Write Emails that Get Clients…

And if the $250 fee (including the workshop and feedback from me on emails you write for the next month!) feels fair to you, hit reply and I’ll send you more information.

Dov Gordon

PS – The deadline for enrolling in this mini-workshop is Wednesday, April 17th. If we get enough people, it’s a go.

PPS – If you’re not interested in the Write Emails > Get Clients! workshop, but you would want to join a small ‘meetup’ in NYC, hit reply and let me know.

In the past week, I’ve interacted with a number of subscribers via email.

One confided in me this:

“…I began consulting in January 2012. I was laid off from a corporate job as a marketing and communications manager in Dec 2011 and just sort of dove right in without a real plan. Things went pretty well for a few months, as some of my old contacts wanted to continue working with me as a consultant, until not having a plan or a system caught up with me. Since that time, it has been a school of hard knocks and I have learned quite a bit (one piece at time)….”

“…I am under significant financial pressure, but I believe inside that if I can get things aligned properly, things will turn around and quickly too. I’ve learned enough to know that most of the traditional corporate business development stuff your hear (ie; cold calling, expensive advertising, scripted selling, blind SEO, etc.) doesn’t work in the modern market place. It’s a cycle that has never seemed effective or sensical to me and I have learned the hard way that if I don’t believe in something my self, I can’t cant make it fly… Your approach resonates and makes sense…”

It could take a few months to build a simple marketing system that brings you a consistent, predictable flow of ideal clients.

And you want to do this before you burn through your cash.

It’s one thing to live each day with the frustration of knowing that you have so much to offer – but can’t seem to get the clients – when you still have cash in the bank.

But it’s altogether something else to wake up knowing that:

(1) You have so much to offer

(2) All that hard work you thought would bring you clients has turned out to be little more than an expensive – and incomplete – education in what doesn’t work.

(3) You need cash NOW. Yesterday, really.

If you did well as a corporate executive and now you’re going out as a solo consultant, don’t wait until you burn through your savings.

The best time to get help building your marketing system – and have your own consistent, predictable flow of ideal clients – is now. Before you need it.

If the approach I spelled out in my “Five Steps to A Consistent Flow of Customers” seminar (hit reply if you need the recording) resonated with you and you’re looking for the right person to help you, go now and request one of the handful of free “Consistent Flow of Clients” strategy sessions I’ll be giving away this month.

Looking forward,
Dov