4 Ways To Build Your Email List Today (Without Spending Time Learning New Tactics)

When I first started out in the online business and blogging world, I tried every tactic I could get my hands on to try to gain more traffic and build my email list. I felt like I was throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what would stick, and what I ended up with was a splotchy wall and very little traffic to show for it.

Today, things are different, and I have a much better “big picture” view of how to generate traffic and conversions, and what works best for different people. You see, I realized all of the information out there about traffic was valid, and it was just a matter of combining the right tactics into a bigger strategy based on the outcomes I wanted.

Let me walk you through the 4 strategic ways to apply common list building tactics, no matter what kind of business or blog you run. The trick is knowing which one to use and when to use it, but don’t worry I’ll go over that too!

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(Note from Caleb: When we talked a couple weeks ago about what we wish we’d known before starting our businesses, many of our friends mentioned not focusing more on their email list was their biggest mistake. In today’s post by Nathalie Lussier, she discusses four ways to build your email list faster than you are now. Take it away Nathalie.)

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4 Strategies – Which Is Right For You?

Most of the how-to articles you read about list building strategies are actually talking about specific list building tactics. You know, like how to use SEO to drive traffic, how to use a specific type of squeeze page, or how to guest post. These are all specific actions you can take to get more traffic and subscribers, but they don’t constitute an overarching strategy.

If you’ve tried to apply all the list building advice out there with less than ideal results, it’s probably because you didn’t have the strategy in place to make these actions work together.

1. Build Your List The Slow & Steady Way

When I was first starting out online, the slow and steady way is how I built my list. It’s the default way to build up an audience, and it’s not bad but it does take time. This is a perfect strategy to help you build your traffic and list over time, because it’s consistent: you create content, blog, guest post, apply SEO techniques, get word of mouth, and repeat on a regular basis.

This is ideal if you’ve got an actual business to run, or maybe you have a day job and this is your side project. It’s simple enough to dedicate a few hours per week to showing up and creating content. Over time your site’s authority will increase in the search engines, you’ll develop word of mouth from your fans, and things will slowly pick up the pace.

The problem? It’s slow, so if you want to results fast, it’s not going to happen for you.

Many bigger sites started out with the slow and steady path, like Digital Photography School, and my first business Raw Foods Witch. These sites weren’t overnight successes, but now they get steady traffic from the search engines and when people think of the topics for these sites they can point people to them, generating word of mouth.

2. Use Short Focused Bursts To Build Your List

For this strategy, you set aside a month or two dedicated to traffic and list building. During these few months, you put everything you’ve got into building your list. Because it’s timed, it has more of an immediacy factor, and it feels more urgent and fresh.

The types of tactics you’d use for a short focused burst are putting on a live webinar or livestream, running a contest, doing a joint venture, or running ads to your opt-in (since you might not want to run ads 365 days a year but you might do it for a short period of time).

All of these things have an end point, so you can set aside time in your yearly calendar to focus on traffic and list building. If you run a seasonal business, this might be the type of activity you do during your off season.

Here’s an example from Amy Porterfield running a joint webinar with Melanie Duncan about Pinterest. This works great because it’s a specific point in time, and the nature of joint webinars is both parties build their lists.

Another example is the 30 Day List Building Challenge I hosted, which is a contest that runs for a short period of time. It’s also got social sharing built into it, which is also something that works best in short focused bursts.

3. Make a Big Splash With a Launch

You’ve definitely seen the big splash model, it’s usually attached to a product launch and it seems to take over a corner of the internet for awhile. You know someone is doing a launch when suddenly you see their name everywhere at once, they’re being interviewed, guest posting, showing up left and right on social media.

The big splash works wonders because you capture the attention of the market. It’s the be everywhere at once advantage. But to understand how to pull off a launch, you need to know exactly how much time goes into it. The reason a big splash is different from a short burst is because there are usually months of time dedicated to the launch leading up to it. And by months, I mean upwards of 4 months for really big launches.

Securing all the guest spots, interviews, affiliates, and making sure all the buzz goes live at the same time is no easy feat. But when a launch comes together, it really has the potential to drive so much traffic and grow your list like nothing else.

You’ve no doubt seen big launches, but a few notable ones you keep an eye out for are Only72, and Marie Forleo’s B-school. There are entire courses on how to pull together a killer launch, and if you’re offering a new product or service you’ll want to spend some time figuring out your positioning and creating the best product you can.

4. Or, Focus On Reaching New Verticals

One often overlooked strategy for list building is to step outside of your immediate market, and get known in new verticals. Take for example, my list building advice: it works for bloggers, but it can also work for photographers, dentists, and jewelry designers. I’ve been able to repurpose my content and do short focused bursts of list building in these different markets.

You can actually choose any of the previous 3 strategies to go into new verticals, you could do a big launch in a new vertical or go the slow and steady route. The benefit here is you can usually jumpstart your efforts because of the previous work you’ve done in your main market, and you can get more specific in how you serve people.

Someone who has done a great job of becoming known in many verticals is Chris Guillebeau, he sits at the intersection of many markets like travel, entrepreneurship, artists, and so on. I personally stumbled upon this idea with my different blogs and businesses in the raw food market, when I realized there was a lot of overlap and people would follow me from one topic to the next.

Can you think of a few “sub markets” you could focus on, in order to help you reach new people and grow your list further?

Which Are You Going To Use First?

All of these are winning strategies, but which one are you committing to doing next? If you’re already in one of these categories, is it the right one for you and your goals? Leave a comment below, I want to know!

42 Timeless Ideas for Attracting More Visitors to Your Website

The latest social media fads may come and go, but some strategies for attracting an audience online will always be in style.

Here are 42 of my favorite timeless ideas for attracting more visitors to your website. You can bet the farm on these. They’ll be as effective in five years as they are today.

Make Your Content Irresistible

1. All the promotion in the world won’t build a thriving audience if your content sucks. Truly incredible content, products or services can be your best marketing tool. Everything you do online has to start with creating something incredible.
2. Don’t be afraid to say what everyone else is thinking but not saying. Other people are probably thinking about it too, and they’ll love you for being brave enough to say something.
3. Write epic shit.
4. While you’re at it, make a real case for why the world should actually give a shit about what you have to say.
5. Put your words in a different format. Go visual. Try creating an infographic or slideshare presentation.
6. Go big. Write something so incredibly thorough and valuable that people are compelled to share it.
7. Interview someone exciting. You’ll learn something and the interviewee will probably share your session if you do a great job.
8. Learn how to create a viral post, and try creating one yourself as many of our readers like Maria, Benny, Steve and Jim have done.
9. Cut out the fluff. Publish when you have something worthwhile to share, not when your calendar says you’re supposed to publish.
10. Headlines! Headlines! Headlines! They’re ridiculously important. Enough said. Try these 5 easy tips for writing catchy headlines from Jeff Goins.
11. Give away your secrets. All of them.

Take Your Show on The Road

12. Be everywhere (as my friend Pat Flynn likes to say). Make videos, create a podcast, represent on different social media platforms.
13. Write guest articles for other blogs. This is still one of the most effective and underused strategies for building your own audience. Just do it and stop making excuses. Start with this complete overview of how to land guest posting spots by Glen Allsopp.
14. Join Help a Reporter Out (HARO). Do a good job and you might just end up on the front page of Yahoo like our friend Jaime Tardy did.

Make Your Case Clear

15. When someone comes to your site, you have to answer the question they’ll be asking themselves: “why should I spend any time on this site instead of one of the dozens of other sites I already know and love?” You have to answer this question quickly, clearly and compellingly. Your Unique Selling Propositionis the key to making your case. If you don’t have a USP, it’s time to get one. Start with our guide to finding your USP.

Keep Them Coming Back

16. The best audience is a captive one. Instead of constantly relying on other sources of traffic, create your own by getting your visitors to subscribe for updates from you (focus on email first, social media second).
17. Directly ask people to subscribe once in a while. Tell ‘em what’s in it for them.
18. Create special subscriber-only content.
19. In your welcome email for new subscribers, point them to your social media profiles so they can connect with you in different ways.
20. Optimize the heck out of your email sign-up offer. Try placing email sign-up boxes in different places (in your header, sidebar, within posts, end of posts or footer). Try changing the wording, button label, call to action and offer. See what works best over time. Just keep the best interests of your audience in mind and don’t do anything you don’t appreciate yourself.

Make it Pretty(ier) and More Functional

21. Your site’s design matters more than you think. If you have a crappy looking design, you’re missing out because too many of your hard earned visitors are leaving before they read your incredible content.
22. Design for function. What do you want your site to achieve? You want to hook your visitors and keep them coming back. Design with the end goal in mind.
23. Use social proof. New visitors are looking for clues about whether your site is worth spending time on. Use validation (in the form of metrics, testimonials, “as seen in” logos, etc.) to reinforce your value.
24. Make it easy for people to share your content (try using a plugin like Digg Digg, for example).

Play Nice with the Search Engines (SEO)

25. Optimize your headline and content URL for the search engines. Use the Google Keyword Tool to find popular keywords. Don’t worry about optimizing your content. Write for humans like normal but use keywords in your headline and content URL.
26. Make sure your site is Google friendly. Offer a sitemap, use an SEO-optimized platform (or plugin) and register for Google Webmaster Tools.
27. Focus on optimized content instead of link-building for long-term SEO success.
28. Make your site as fast as possible. Site speed is now a factor in search rankings, and a faster site will keep more people from leaving before your page loads. Consider moving to a faster webhost and leverage caching (if you’re on WordPress try using a caching plugin like Quick Cache).

Borrow What Works

29. Innovation is important, but using proven formulas is smart and effective. Don’t be afraid to borrow from what you’ve seen work elsewhere. Try to figure out how other sites are bringing in visitors and try their techniques. Don’t copy directly, just tweak things to suit your own needs and audience. (For example, thanks to Chris Brogan for the inspiration for this post)
30. Your own successes can be borrowed upon as well. Look through your old content and think about your most successful strategies. Reuse what works until it doesn’t work any longer.
31. Use past behavior to predict future results.

Organize Group Projects

32. Organize a group writing project. Each blogger writes on a central theme, and each article links to all the others in the series.
33. Start a social media promotion group. Invite people you respect. Each person can submit content for others in the group to Tweet, Like, etc. only if it’s a good fit. Organize this for free using Google Groups.
34. Organize a group survey in your niche.

Make a Splash

35. The best way to rise above the noise of the billions and billions of pieces of content being shared every day is to do something remarkable.
36. Create a big ambitious group project and invite your readers to participate.
37. Set a big audacious goal for yourself and report on your progress over the months or years it takes you to get there. Chris Guillebeau is visiting every country in the world by his 35th birthday, for example. That’s a story worth tuning into.

Launch a Product or Service

38. Did you know that launching a new product or service can actually help grow your audience? It’s true. Launching a product also always leads to tons of interview requests, links from other blogs, partnership inquiries, and a different kind of respect from colleagues. Plus, because your new product will generate revenue, this should be top on your list.
39. Offer an affiliate program and pay commissions to people who refer customers to your product. Reach out to these affiliates before your launch and offer to help them with content, interviews, webinars or anything else that will help them drive sales. You’ll be getting access to a whole group of customers you wouldn’t have otherwise.

Make Friends in High Places

40. The most consistent source of highly desirable visitors you can tap into are links for other respected sites in your niche. To attract these links on a regular basis, you need to 1) create remarkable link-worthy content and 2) make friends with other great content creators who could link to you. Just don’tmake connecting with people online harder than it actually is.
41. Link out freely to content you admire and think your audience would appreciate. Linking out is one of the best ways to get noticed and start making friends online. Make sure you include the name of the site or content author you’re linking to increase the chances of the author learning about your link.
42. Try creating a “follow friday” or “link love wednesday” type of post on a regular basis. It’s a great way to get noticed, make friends and share useful content with your audience.

Now, there are two things I’d love you to do.

First, choose three or more of the items on this list. Implement them in the next day or two. Come back here and report on your success.

If you’ve already tried some of these strategies, let us know below which are your favorite.

Next, I’d love to also know, what would you add to this list? What are your favorite timeless ways to attract more visitors to your website or blog?

Tell us below in the comments. And don’t forget to put some of these into practice today. Action is what this is all about, after all.

How to Attract Enough Visitors to Your Website to Earn a Living From It

How much is enough? How many visitors, subscribers, comments, tweets and Facebook fans do you need to achieve your goals for your website?

I know we all have different specific goals, but many of us share at least one thing in common. We aspire (whether secretly or openly) to earn a respectable living from our websites and blogs.

If you’re planning to make enough money from your site/blog to support yourself or build a business around, you’re probably wondering what it will take to get there. I get questions from readers on a regular basis about how much time and effort and how many visitors are needed to start earning a living. It’s a common thing to want to know.

The good news is, it’s partially up to you how much traffic you’ll need to reach your income goals. There are many ways to go about supporting yourself online, and we’ll cover a few options here.

A Little Background

If you’ve read much of this blog, you probably know I’m a big fan of startups and lifestyle businesses. You’re not crazy for wanting to support yourself through an online business.

I’ve been working online myself over the past four years and absolutely love both the challenges and satisfaction that come from helping people through a web-based business and being rewarded for it.

However, I’ve learned that there are many different ways to earn revenue online, and the model you choose will affect how many visitors you need to earn enough to support yourself or your business.

“How many visitors do I need” is a question that can only be answered when we know how much revenue your site will earn per visitor, how many visitors will become customers, and how much revenue you’re trying to earn.

Different Approaches for Earning a Living from Your Website

Approach 1: build a site so massive you can attract advertisers

When people first start thinking about earning a living online, advertising is usually the revenue source that comes to mind first. “I’ll just build a really popular site and then slap some ads on it” is the type of thing newbie entrepreneurs might think.

But here is the reality of online advertising. Advertising won’t pay you anything significant unless you attract massive traffic. And even when you have that massive traffic, the payout is probably much lower than you can earn through other revenue models.

Typical CPM rates (the amount an advertiser will pay you per thousand page views) might be around $5 or less, depending on the size of your site, your topic and your visitor’s demographics.

That means if you’re trying to earn just $5,000 per month, you would need over 1 million page views. Can you build your site’s traffic to that level? Sure, but it will take significant effort, and I’d say $5k/month a pretty awful return for that effort.

Another thing to note about advertising is that it generally isn’t even an option for smaller sites. Advertisers want to reach a large audience, and they don’t deal much with sites which have less than 100k page views per month. Google Adsense and some other advertising networks will work with smaller sites, but the CPM rates tend to be lower.

Approach 2: forget about advertisers and maximize your value per visitor

Let’s compare our $5k/month advertising example to other revenue models.

The three other most common revenue models online are: selling products, selling services and affiliate marketing. I assume you know what selling products and services is about, but maybe you’re new to the concept of affiliate marketing. Essentially, affiliate marketing is when another business pays you a commission for referring customers.

If you’re working to earn $5k/month, we also need to know how much revenue you’ll earn from each customer, and how many of your visitors will become customers.

Let’s take affiliate marketing as an example. Let’s say you represent an affiliate offer that meshes well with your site’s purpose, and that if you refer a customer to purchase that product you’ll earn a 50% commission on the $50 sale price. That’s $25 for every customer you refer. (this would be a common situation in affiliate marketing, btw)

So, you’ll need to make 5,000 / 25 = 200 sales per month to reach your $5k goal.

Next, you need to know how many visitors will end up purchasing the product you’re representing. This will depend largely on how you offer the product, and how relevant/helpful it is to your visitors.

For example, if you just slap up a 125×125 banner ad in your sidebar, you won’t get many sales per visitor. If you write a blog post about the offer, however, and include some useful information and a compelling reason why your visitors should buy the product, you’ll make a whole lot more sales.

So, let’s say you write a great post about your affiliate product, and that 25% of your visitors click through to the affiliate product’s page. Then, 1% of those visitors end up purchasing the product.

Are you with me here? Sorry for all the calculations, but this is the type of thing you want to think about when planning a revenue model.

Anyway, 1 / (1% x 25%) = 400. That means 1 out of 400 of your visitors will purchase the product, resulting in a $25 commission. To reach your goal of 200 sales, you would need 200 sales * 400 visitors per sale, or 80,000 visitors to view your offer.

Your “CPM” (or revenue per 1000 visitors, just to compare to our advertising example) is 25 / 400 * 1000 = $62.50 earned per 1000 visitors. If each visitor views 2 pages on your site on average, we need to further divide by 2 for comparison (CPM is measured in terms of page views, not visitors). That would make your “comparative CPM” $31.25. That’s more than 6 times better than our advertising example.

These are simple back-of-the envelope calculations, and your actual results could be better or worse. In my experience with affiliate marketing, I’ve had results as good as $500 per 1000 visitors for a well-targeted product to a very specific audience.

A More Realistic Example

In reality, your revenue model will probably be more sophisticated than offering one single affiliate product to your audience. Instead, you might mix a combination of affiliate marketing, selling your own products and offering some services. You could even mix in some advertising if it makes sense.

In that case, you should be able to improve further on our affiliate marketing example by a significant margin. A freelancer might be able to earn $5k per month from inbound marketing on their website with just 10,000 visitors per month, for example. That would be a return of $500 per 1000 visitors. Mix in some products and affiliate offers and that number could be higher.

Targeting is Key

The big wildcard in all of this is how interested your visitors are in what your site offers. This is known as targeting. Essentially, the more interest a visitor has in your topic, the more likely they will be to purchase something from you or perform other actions you want them to.

You may have seen the effects of targeting in your own promotions already. An easy way to see this in action is with guest posting on other blogs.

If the topic of the blog you guest post on is very related to your own blog, you’ll find that visitors from that other blog are likely to subscribe to your blog. Those visitors would be said to be “well targeted.” If your site is about dog training, and you guest post on a site about mountain biking, those poorly targeted visitors would be unlikely to care much about your site.

Got all that? Good, now stop thinking in terms of “visitors” and “traffic.”

Which ever approach you’re contemplating, this type of revenue modeling exercise is useful just to know how many people you’re probably going to have to reach. Beyond that, however, thinking in terms of “visitors” and “traffic” will actually hinder your progress.

Instead, you need to be thinking in terms of “people” and “relationships” and your “audience.”

Your visitors won’t buy anything from you unless you help them out, provide value and think of them as individual people. To really maximize the revenue you earn per visitor, you first have to maximize the value you provide to them through your content, products and services.

I hope this discussion helps put some bounds around just how big your site will need to be to earn a living from it. If any of you have different experiences,please share with us in the comments.

The Best Sales Pitch Ever

Most people hate selling. They hate having to sell things to other people, and they hate being sold to.

If you’re the seller, selling can be a frustrating process of rejection. And if you’re the potential buyer, nothing is a bigger turn-off than a blatant sales pitch.

Unfortunately, if you have a business, you have to sell products or services or advertising to earn revenue.

Just the thought of selling is enough to keep many people from going into business for themselves, and many people who do decide to start a business end up failing because they don’t accept the fact that products don’t sell themselves.

Selling in some form is just a fact of life when you’re running a business.

I’ve never been particularly good at selling directly and used to cringe at the thought of the sales process just like everyone else. That was, until I discovered the best sales pitch ever.

The best sales pitch ever is no sales pitch at all.

That’s right. The best sales pitch you can use is no sales pitch at all. At least not in the traditional sense. This isn’t a trick. Let me explain how it works.

I run an independent small business based primarily around this blog. The business supports me comfortably and is starting to provide opportunities for other people as well. I built the entire business in about 18 months and I sell products, services and other people’s products. I’ve never cold-called anyone to make a sale and I’ve never made a hard sales pitch either over the phone or online.

I don’t cringe at the thought of sales anymore because I don’t have to do much of it at all. The selling I do is actually something I look forward to.

This is all because of (get ready for a couple of buzzwords here) inbound marketing and permission marketing.

Inbound marketing is about attracting people to your website or business who are looking for information on the topic you cover. Search marketing, blogging and social media are three channels for inbound marketing.

Permission marketing (coined by Seth Godin) is about reaching out to people after they’ve given you permission to. It’s the opposite of the old standard of interruption marketing.

The point of both of these types of marketing is that you’re telling a friendly and interested audience about products that might help them instead of forcing your message in front of people who are trying to avoid it.

Your goal for building an audience for your website or blog should be to attract people who you can help fill a need or desire for. Once you’ve attracted those people, you can ask for permission to stay in contact with them (for instance by getting people to follow you on Twitter or Facebook or subscribing to your email newsletter).

Rinse and repeat and eventually selling will be easy (you might even start to look forward to it).

Hot leads! No selling required!

This site is just eight months old and yet it has already become a powerful driver of clients and customers to my business.

Because I’ve focused on both inbound and permission marketing (instead of pushy old-school sales tactics or shady internet marketing trickery), every day I wake up to email from potential customers and notifications of sales of products.

The people who contact me don’t require any convincing or inspired speeches to become customers. They’ve reached out to me because they already know I can help their business. I’ve already demonstrated my expertise every week through the value in every piece of content I publish.

They feel like they know me already. No sales required.

Someone recently asked me why I blog. Part of the answer is personal. I love the process of writing and connecting with people through words. The other part of the answer is purely business. Blogging is a fantastic vehicle for building an audience of people who want more of what you have to offer. Some of those people will become paying customers to get more of what you offer.

But blogging certainly isn’t the only way to take advantage of these superior marketing strategies, it just happens to be something I’ve used successfully and I tend to write about my experience.

If you don’t blog, you can still use these strategies to your advantage. The point is simply to attract an audience which is interested in what you have to offer and ask for permission to reach the audience members on a regular basis.

Once you’ve done that, the selling part is easy.

What about you? Have you tried inbound marketing or permission marketing? How has it worked compared to traditional sales techniques? Please share in the comments!

Where Do Great Ideas Come From? (Hint: Not Where You Think)

Do your best ideas come from sitting down, focused with a pad of paper, and trying to come up with them? Or do they come spontaneously, when you least expect them to, and then quickly float away before you can capture them?

We all need great ideas. Ideas for projects, blog posts, product names, tasks to do, people to email, etc.

Over the past few months I’ve been intrigued by how great ideas are formed as opposed to mediocre, bland, ignore-able ideas.

I’ve even asked folks on Twitter about where they get their best ideas. The responses were surprising.

Let’s dive into why. Plus, we’ll cover the five stages of ideas and how you can implement them into your own workflow.

Where Great Ideas Come From

I assumed that most people came up with their best ideas when they set aside an hour, turned off all distractions, and opened a blank text document on their computer. I assumed incorrectly.

Here is a quick rundown of the most common responses to my question: Where do you come up with your best ideas?

• Walking
• Running
• Traveling (airplanes, airports, trains, buses)
• Falling Asleep or Waking Up
• In Conversation with Friends
• Listening to Audiobooks or Podcasts
• Showering

You get the picture. (You can see all of the responses here and here.)

Notice how no one responded anywhere near my assumption. Very few of these are actually even “sitting down” either. It turns out great ideas come most when you aren’t trying to think of them.

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Great ideas come when you aren’t trying to think of them.” Tweet this

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Great ideas don’t happen when you want them to. You can’t make them happen.

However, you can set yourself and your environment up to be ready for your next great idea.

How To Have Great Ideas & Implement Them

Ideas follow five simple steps:

1. Generate
2. Document
3. Organize
4. Cull
5. Execute

If you fail to take an idea through all of these steps your idea may be worthless because it will never see the light of day. You’ll never end up “finishing” the idea by delivering the final product.

(For more on that concept check out episode 008 of the podcast).

Let’s walk through each one of the five steps, discuss why it is important, and then showcase a couple tools that are great for capturing and organizing ideas.

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1. Generate an Idea

By this point you should realize that great ideas come from external stimulation and non-work experiences. Every day you should be doing things that generate ideas passively.

Can’t think of a name for your latest project? Then stop looking through synonyms online and go somewhere like a grocery store or market. Places with many colors, smells, and people will get your creativity flowing.

Whenever you feel stuck and can’t think of great ideas, change your environment.

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2. Document That Idea

If you don’t document your ideas immediately you may lose them forever.

Don’t trust your memory. Don’t think that you’ll remember it in five minutes. Have a system for documenting your ideas the second you have them.

When I asked people what systems they used to document their ideas, most came back with physical systems. Post-it notes, moleskins, pen and paper, etc. They all said they carry them with them at all times though.

Personally, the only thing other than my wallet that I carry around everywhere is my iPhone, so here are two of my favorite apps for documenting ideas.

• Drafts – A quick text entry app that I then export to email, Omnifocus, or Evernote. This is the app that all of my text starts in.
• Evernote – Think of Evernote as a giant filing cabinet or Trapper Keeper (remember those?) that can store any text, audio, or image notes. All of my ideas, brainstorming, and planning happens in Evernote.

Whether you use a digital or analog tool, make sure you have a way to document your ideas quickly so you can get back to whatever it was you were doing.

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3. Organize Your Ideas

Once you get all of your ideas down you’ll need a way to organize and categorize that idea list. This is especially true if your ideas are all over the place (in your email inbox, on post-it notes, written on your hand, etc.).

I prefer to organize my ideas based on what “project” they fall under. If I have an idea for a blog post here at Think Traffic that is the section I put it under. If I have an idea for an episode of The Fizzle Show it goes in a different section.

Figure out what each of the major categories of ideas that you may have are and then set aside some time once a week to sort through all of them.

If your ideas aren’t organized you’ll never be able to figure out which ones to actually act on.

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4. Cull Your Ideas

Let’s be honest. Not all ideas are great. Heck, most aren’t even good. If you’re going to figure out which one of your ideas you should execute next you need to filter out the ones that are garbage.

One of the biggest mistakes I see people make with idea generation is that they never trash any ideas they’ve had. Every time they go to their list of ideas they see ones that have been sitting there for over a year. Instead of focusing on the 5 or 10 great ideas they’ve had in the past month for new content or projects, they have to waste time sifting through 100’s of notes and ideas they’ve jotted down over the past few years.

Make a habit of going through your lists of ideas and culling out ones you are never going to use.

It is okay to forget bad ideas. Think of it as making room for better ones.

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5. Execute Your Best Ideas

The most brilliant idea, with no execution, is worth $20. The most brilliant idea takes great execution to be worth $20,000,000. That’s why I don’t want to hear people’s ideas. I’m not interested until I see their execution.” – Derek Sivers

Here it is. The most important step. Without execution, ideas are worthless.

Corbett likes to bring up the Idea + Execution equation that Derek Sivers wrote about a few years back. (Take a second to go read that quickly if you aren’t familiar with it. It will only take a minute.)

We even talked about the importance of executing ideas a bit on this episode of The Fizzle Show.

And if you need help with executing your ideas, 99U has a great resource of 10 Videos on Idea Execution & The Creative Process that you should definitely check out.

Take your best ideas and execute them. That is where success comes from.

8 Great Examples of Personal Domain Names in Action

Having a personal domain name can be a great resource. Whether or not you have bought a domain that is your actual name, there are a lot of different reasons to do so.

Even if you have a hard last name to spell (like mine or something like Guillebeau) you can use your personal domain name as a living, breathing business card or host your full-fledged blog and website on it.

For example, Corbett transitioned his pre-TT blog FreePursuits.com to just be at CorbettBarr.com before merging it with this site. And I used to just useCalebWojcik.com as a portfolio of sorts, but then I “unbranded” my own blog and host it there. Many other people I know just own their personal domain name to redirect it, like my wife does with JenWojcik.com to JenWojcikPhotography.com.

After seeing some of the examples below I think you will agree that using your FirstNameLastName.com or a variation to “brand yourself” with an online calling card should definitely at the top of your to do list.

(If you don’t own your full name domain or want to do a domain re-direct watch this video and we’ll show you how to buy a domain name from BlueHost and set it up in 5 minutes).

1. Joshua Fields Millburn

Josh primarily writes on The Minimalists, but he also writes fiction and nonfiction books. He uses his full name domain as a living resumé, to direct people to all the places he can be found online, and to show anyone at a glance some of the press he has gotten. This site was designed by the talented Spyr Media.

2. Tara Gentile

Tara uses her full name domain as the complete “home” for all her work online and her home page does a lot of great things in just a small amount of space. Above the fold you see:

1. A high quality picture of her.
2. A big call-to-action.
3. Her “as seen in” sources (like was talked about in yesterday’s PR article)

3. Seth Godin

Seth has one of the most popular blogs on the internet and it is simply just a Typepad hosted site. But, Seth’s calling card on the internet is SethGodin.com, where you can quickly see at a glance how many books he has published, and “click on his head” to go to the blog.

4. Danielle Laporte

Danielle’s “White Hot Truth” blog is now fully branded around her name. She has injected herself fully into the brand and has everything all in one convenient full name domain.

5. Joel Runyon

Joel has so many projects going on that this is the perfect example as to why it is good to have a single place to showcase everything you have your hands in. His primary blog, The Blog of Impossible Things, is hosted as a subsection of his full name domain. This is another incredible design by the team at Spyr Media.

6. Chris Guillebeau

When Chris started The Art of Non-Conformity he hosted it at his full name domain and he hasn’t turned back since. He hosts his blog there but has the Unconventional Guides store and the Travel Hacking Cartel on separate domains.

7. Laura Roeder

Laura has branded her business around her persona, especially through her heavy use of videos (in both her blog and in the courses she offers). The branding of her products are then separate brands in and of themselves (i.e. “Zero to Facebook“).

8. Marie Forleo

Last, but certainly not least is Marie Forleo. If I had to recommend just one example of how to inject your personality into your brand, Marie would be it.

Everything she does on her site and in her business includes high quality media of herself (from the videos she creates to the rotating header images).

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What if My Name is Already Taken?

If you have a fairly common name, your full name might not be available as a .com domain name. What should you do if yours is taken?

Here are some alternatives.

• Use a different domain extension. Instead of .com, go for .net, .us, .info or whatever else is available and makes sense.
• Add a middle initial. If JohnSmith.com isn’t free, maybe JohnZSmith.com is.
• Get creative. Matt Mullenweg uses the domain ma.tt for example.

Other ideas? Please share in the comments.

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Your Turn: Comments + Action

Let us know your answer to the following questions in the comments below:

1. If you already have a “full name domain,” how are you using it?
2. How do you plan to change it up after seeing the above examples?
3. If you don’t have a personal domain, do you plan to get one?

If you don’t already own your personal domain name just pick it up on the cheap from BlueHost (starting at just $4.95 a month, that’s an affiliate link and we’ll get a small commission if you sign up, and we appreciate that).

At a minimum you should at least use it to redirect people to your website or blog, and secure the name now in case you want it for bigger things later.

9 Examples of Killer Unique Selling Propositions on the Web

Two weeks ago, we talked about why a unique selling proposition is so important in building a high-traffic website or blog.

Today let’s make this discussion a little more concrete.Below are 10 websites and blogs with phenomenal USPs.

These are the types of businesses that quickly draw you in (or repel you, which can be a good thing) because of who they are. They reek uniqueness and it’s clear from the first minute what they’re all about.

Notice that few if any of them have invented entirely new topics or products. Each of these businesses sells something people already buy (advice, marketing services, handbags, chocolate), but they have each taken a unique approach that gives them a significant advantage over other players in their respective markets.

Don’t compete directly in a crowded space. Instead, make your site stand out for its uniqueness and building a big audience will be so much easier.

Here are 10 examples of websites with kickass unique selling propositions (numbered for your pleasure, but in no particular order):

1. Saddleback Leather

There is no other leather bag company on the planet like Saddleback Leather. This company oozes personality. The website is full of tales of Mexican bullfighting, travel in third-world countries, simple pleasures and touching stories about the owner’s beloved Labrador named Blue.

And Saddleback’s slogan is killer: “They’ll Fight Over it When You’re Dead.”

2. Mast Brothers Chocolate

The Mast Brothers (seen above) have an unhealthy obsession with crafting chocolate. They literally make every bar themselves, from the cacao bean all the way to packaging. The dedication itself makes for a great USP, but then there’s the rest of the story.

Rick and Michael Mast have a personal style that stands out. It says “we’re from the 18th century, back when craftspeople were revered and took pride in working with their hands.” The Brothers travel by wooden sailboat to foreign lands to find the best cacao possible, and then ship the beans back by sailboat. Strange and over-the-top? Yes. An unforgettable story of dedication that no other chocolate company can match? Indeed.

3. World’s Strongest Librarian

What the hell do kettlebells have to do with being a librarian? What is life with Tourette syndrome like, especially for an author?

Read the World’s Strongest Librarian by Josh Hanagarne to find out. It makes for an incredibly unique and unforgettable story.

4. Nerd Fitness

How many sites out there are about health and fitness? Probably tens or hundreds of thousands. How many sites out there about fitness cater specifically to nerds? You let me know in the comments if there are any besides Nerd Fitnessby Steve Kamb.

5. TOMS Shoes

TOMS Shoes are quirky, comfy, light and inexpensive. That alone maybe isn’t enough to make a company stand out in the shoe business. The most unique and compelling part of the TOMS Shoes story is that they give a new pair of shoes to a child in need for every pair you purchase.

Who else cares that much?

6. Far Beyond the Stars

If you’re a regular reader of Think Traffic, you’ve probably heard me mention Everett and Far Beyond the Stars a few times. Far Beyond the Stars has grown into a 5,000 subscriber blog in about 9 months. Everett’s writing is inspiring, and his unique selling proposition is brilliant.

Instead of just writing about minimalism (lots of blogs do that), or just writing about location independence (plenty of blogs do that too), or writing solely about earning a living online (god knows how many blogs do that), Everett combined the three into a powerfully unique message.

By applying the principles of minimalism to business, Everett shows you how to succeed much faster and create a business you can operate from anywhere in the world working only a couple of hours a day.

Note: Everett no longer is running Far Beyond the Stars

7. Outspoken Media

Outspoken Media is one of my favorite Internet marketing blogs. They stand out from the world of “me too” marketing experts. What makes them stand out? They’re brash, bold, and not afraid to say what’s on their minds when everyone else is spouting the same boring social media tips.

Oh, and did I mention the company is 100% female and proud of it? That’s a unique selling proposition for the online marketing world in itself.

8. IttyBiz

Naomi Dunford started by addressing a market in need of help (marketing for businesses without marketing departments), and then added her over-the-top personality and wit. IttyBiz isn’t for everyone, but people who love it really love it. I’m one of those people who love it.

9.  Kiva

There are plenty of places to loan money for a profit. There are also plenty of places to donate money to help change people’s lives. What about loaning money to change lives? That’s where Kiva comes in.

In 2005, Kiva launched and brought microloans online. Since then, over $100 million has been loaned to small entrepreneurs in the world’s poorest places. How’s that for unique and compelling?

The Ultimate Guide to Finding Your Unique Selling Proposition

Hands down, the question I get most from readers is “how do I make my business or website unique?” I’ve talked to at least 10 of you over the past couple of months about that very topic.

In marketing speak, this is known as the unique selling proposition, or USP.

Note: as a follow-up to this original post, you might also want to check out these 10 killer unique selling proposition examples from around the web.

And it’s a fantastic question because deciding on a USP is possibly the most important decision you can make about your business.

If you make your business stand apart from the crowd, everything you do will be easier. Customers will be easier to come by. Adoring fans will gladly spread the word about what you do because they love it.

On the other hand, if you don’t develop an effective USP, building an audience or getting any customers to pay attention to you will be a constant struggle.

Your USP can mean the difference between success and failure.

And every time I have that discussion with one of you, you say “you should really write a blog post about this.” That’s a great idea, so here we go.

What is a Unique Selling Proposition?

First off, if the word “selling” turns you off, you can think of it as the “unique market proposition” if you’d like. It’s not about selling, it’s simply about differentiation.

Your unique selling proposition is what makes your business stand out. It’s what makes you different and earns you a special place in the minds of your potential customers.

Now, before any of you marketing geeks out there get on my case about the definition of USP, hold on. I know there’s another concept known as the Point of Difference (POD), and that there are probably a dozen of other different academic marketing terms with nuances they taught you in grad school.

Whatever you want to call it, that’s fine with me. The point is, differentiating your business is a Good Thing, whether you’re talking about the business itself, your products or your marketing.

I like to think of your overall USP as your reason for being. Think about it from your customer’s point of view. With tens or hundreds of potential options out there, you have to answer the question, “why should I buy from you?” Or, “why should I read your blog, when there are millions of other blogs I could be reading?”

If you don’t answer that question quickly, your potential customers or readers will move on. It’s really pretty simple.

It’s Not About Being the Best

Having a great product or superb content is probably not enough of a difference to make your business stand out. In most markets, having a great product is just the price of admission.

When you’re small, it’s hard to compete on product or content quality alone. You need to change the conversation. Instead of screaming “hey, look at me, I have great stuff too,” you want to confidently say, “hey, I’m all about X, we do things differently. If you’re into X, we’re the only place you can get it.”

Cal Newport wrote recently about what he calls The Superstar Effect over at the 4-Hour Workweek blog recently. Cal showed why it’s a losing game to try to win by being the best at something everyone else is also trying to be the best at. Think about getting into an Ivy League school, for example. Virtually everyone who gets in is a valedictorian with perfect SAT scores. How do you compete against that?

The answer is that you don’t compete at all. Instead, you become the best at something no one else is attempting.

That’s how Michael Silverman got accepted to Stanford, despite his middling SAT scores and G.P.A. Michael focused his energies on a series of environmental sustainability projects, and earned a reputation and press coverage for his accomplishments. He became the best at what he did, and stood out amongst 32,000 applicants to Stanford earning a unique place amongst the 7.2% who were accepted.

Instead of playing a game he couldn’t win, he changed the game.

That’s the power of a unique selling proposition. You want to be the best at something, but you can make it far easier if you define your competitors yourself.

Promotion is Only a Small Part of Marketing

When I started planning to create this blog, it struck me that most people get traffic building all wrong. At its essence, “building traffic” is really synonymous with marketing. Only, I knew that the world needed another boring marketing blog like it needed a hole in the ozone layer.

I decided to use the word “traffic” in the site’s name because I knew that’s what every website owner craves. You want more traffic. The trouble is, getting traffic isn’t about what you think it is. Most people think getting traffic is about promotion, but it’s really about holistic marketing.

Promotion is an important part of building a big audience, there’s no question. But promotion alone can’t entirely make up for a crappy product, mediocre content or the lack of a unique selling proposition. That would be like putting lipstick on a pig, as one of my old bosses used to love to say.

Building a high-traffic website or successful business starts with your point of view. It begins with your thesis, how do you see the world, how you care for and help your customers, and extends through to your content, products, customer interactions and then finally to your promotion.

Attracting customers isn’t something you “bolt on” in the end. It’s something you work on at every stage of your business, and your unique selling proposition is the first stage.

How to Find Your Unique Selling Proposition

So, you’ve bought into the idea that a unique selling proposition is important, but how do you define yours?

There are a lot of different approaches you can take. Your USP might end up being a combination of things. There’s no one right answer. And depending on what business you’re in, even a small amount of differentiation could lead to a much greater shot at success.

Here are a few simple ways to differentiate your business. These aren’t the only ways, but it’s a starting point to get you thinking.

USE YOUR PERSONALITY

If you’re running a very small business (like I do), or are are the primary owner of your business, sometimes your personality alone can be a powerful difference.

You have to have a personality that resonates with some people to pull this off, but by putting your personal stamp on many aspects of your business, you create something no one can directly compete with (there is only one you, after all).Gary Vaynerchuk is a great example of this approach.

EXPLORE THE INTERSECTION OF IDEAS

Interesting things happen at the intersection of ideas, as Adam Singer likes to say, and plenty of ideas haven’t been combined before. Merge Manhattan-bred customs with African-inspired music and you get the band Vampire Weekend. Mix collective buying power with the social web and you get Groupon.

Think about the topic your business is about, and what you could add to the mix to make it more interesting and unique. It doesn’t require inventing something new, just combine two things you already know about.

NARROW YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE

Here’s another technique that’s pretty easy to pull off. You can choose a narrow target audience who has never had a business like yours cater specifically to it. For example, become a web designer for plumbers, or a plumber for recreational vehicles, or write about online marketing for dentists.

Think about this from the customer’s standpoint. If you were a dentist and needed help with online marketing, wouldn’t you be inclined to choose the business that specializes in dentists?

The other benefit of specializing in a narrow market segment is that promotion becomes much easier. You know where to find dentists together at conferences and where they hang out online, so you know how to target them.

NARROW YOUR TOPIC

Finally, you can also specialize narrowly in one particular aspect of your topic. Instead of being a web developer, become a web developer who translates visual designs into working WordPress websites. Instead of being an auto mechanic, become an auto mechanic who specializes in American-made electric vehicles.

Remember, You’re Not Trying to Appeal to Everyone

When starting out, creating a USP might seem like you’ll be leaving out some potential customers. It’s a natural tendency to want to please everybody.

But when you try to please everybody, you end up pleasing no one. The goal of your USP will be to connect more strongly with some people, and not so much with others. This is what you want because when you connect strongly with a smaller audience, your influence can spread much more quickly.

Have you heard the tale of the old man, boy and donkey? I read this in Michael Port’s excellent Book Yourself Solid. This might help:

An old man, a boy and a donkey were going to town. The boy rode on the donkey and the old man walked. As they went along they passed some people who remarked it was a shame the old man was walking and the boy was riding. The man and boy thought maybe the critics were right, so they changed positions.

Later, they passed some people that remarked: “What a shame, he makes that little boy walk.” They then decided they both would walk!

Soon they passed some more people who thought they were stupid to walk when they had a decent donkey to ride. So, they both rode the donkey.

Now they passed some people that shamed them by saying how awful to put such a load on a poor donkey. The boy and man said they were probably right, so they decided to carry the donkey. As they crossed the bridge, they lost their grip on the animal and he fell into the river and drowned.

The moral of the story? In Marketing, if you try to please everyone, you might as well… Kiss your ass good-bye.

Branding, Design and Messaging

Once you’ve developed a unique selling proposition, your job is to communicate it clearly and often.

That’s the role of branding, design and messaging. A great name, tagline and design can really tie this whole concept of uniqueness together.

And remember that the USP isn’t a one-time decision. You have to constantly remind people of what you stand for. Tell them in no uncertain terms on a regular basis why your business is different.

Be Unique, But Not For Its Own Sake

Being unique is an important marketing strategy, but beware of being unique for its own sake. Being the only business who sells waterskis in the desert makes you unique, but it doesn’t mean there’s a market for your product.

Your unique selling proposition only works when you’re addressing some demand. It’s not necessarily about defining an entirely new market with unproven demand.

Being unique also requires clarity. If the unique selling proposition you come up with takes someone minutes or hours to understand, it probably won’t be effective. Being clear is another essential aspect of building a successful business or popular website.

CAN YOU SUCCEED WITHOUT A DYNAMITE USP?

Yes, of course it’s possible to succeed without a great unique selling proposition. It’s possible, but definitely not as easy. And success without a good USP requires better product development and promotion, along with some outside factors (maybe a little luck).

Sometimes there is so much demand in a market that multiple (virtually identical) businesses can succeed without working hard to differentiate themselves. In these cases, as long as you have a great product and a way to reach the market, you might be able to break through.

Look at the WordPress themes market, for example. There are lots of successful players in that market, and not too much difference between them.

Another example is the tech news + social media blog space. Back in 2005,Mashable, Read Write Web and TechCrunch all became giants, and did so by focusing on content and promotion more than starting with a unique angle. Of course, Mashable had Pete Cashmore and TechCrunch had Mike Arrington. Remember that a strong personality can be a USP in itself.

In terms of audience building, a USP is really the foundation of your efforts and will have a multiplier effect on your product and marketing.

You can always create a great product and rely on good old fashioned hard work to grow your business, but by adding a solid unique selling proposition you’ll reach your goals faster.

WHAT IF YOUR BUSINESS DOESN’T HAVE MUCH OF A USP?

So, you have a website or business, and now you’re thinking, shit, I didn’t really think about this USP stuff before I started. What do I do now?

Don’t do anything rash, first of all. You can refine your unique selling proposition without scrapping your entire business, and still make a big difference. The important thing is that you now understand how to use uniqueness to your advantage.

And here’s a word of caution. All of this can seem a little daunting at first. I’ve seen plenty of people get hung up on the concept of the USP for weeks or months. But remember that research and planning with no action won’t get you anywhere. It’s better to start working on your idea and refine it as you go along than it is to get stuck contemplating the perfect USP without doing anything.

Heavy-Ass Weights

“Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but nobody wants to lift no heavy-ass weights.” ― Ronnie Coleman

I love that quote. It applies to anything difficult people want to accomplish. Bodybuilding, losing weight, language learning, becoming an artist/actor/musician, changing your life, building a business, getting rich…

Everybody wants something, but nobody wants to lift no heavy-ass weights.

This is going to be a tough love post. I’m going to pick on a reader for a minute, so bear with me. Of course, there’s a silver lining, which I’ll get to after the tough love part.

A reader wrote in recently with this:

I’ve started on my email list, and a few blog posts, worked on an e-book that’s not yet been posted, but I don’t feel like I’m getting anywhere. I don’t have any audience or visits either. I share them on my Facebook, Twitter, but it doesn’t seem to come with a response.

Really? You say you’ve completed “a few blog posts” and worked on an e-book that isn’t published yet, and you’re surprised you’re not getting anywhere???

Try writing a few hundred blog posts first, then see if you’ve gotten anywhere.

Seriously, getting people to pay attention to your writing, it takes WORK and lots of it. You have to earn it.

There are hundreds of millions of blogs in existence. Why should anyone pay attention to yours, especially when you’ve only put half-assed effort into it?

The world is filled with half-assed blogs and business ideas. It takes something special to stand out and grow a dedicated audience.

Not to pick on this reader too much. Honestly, I get emails along these lines every week, and it’s a pretty common mindset. People hope for all the results with hardly any of the effort.

I’m often asked how we built an audience of hundreds of thousands of readers.

There were strategies and tactics and lucky breaks, sure.

But here’s the biggest factor in our success: we just showed up every week, week-after-week, for years, even when no one was listening. We’ve published well over 500 blog posts over the past five years. And the audience grew, little-by-little.

I used to suffer from this horrible kind of know-it-all syndrome. It’s where you think being smart is the most important thing. You feel deserving because you know everything. You feel like your intelligence and knowledge alone should make you successful.

But success doesn’t come from knowledge alone. It comes from applied knowledge. Knowledge and ideas are just multipliers of execution.

I didn’t learn the value of hard work until later in life, and my situation reflected my lack of effort. I didn’t have the life I wanted because I skated by on intelligence, avoiding effort unless it was absolutely necessary.

There are plenty of reasons for not putting in the work. Laziness is often one of them. But this knowledge equals success syndrome is debilitating.

And if we dig a little deeper into this reader’s email, we get a glimpse of yet another powerful reason why people don’t put in the work:

I like writing, but to be honest sometimes I feel sad because there’s no one reading them, and it feels like a demotivation to me, and gets me wondering what step didn’t I do well enough?

It is demotivating and demoralizing to put content out week after week, that no one pays attention to. But this is where everyone starts. Those who succeed push through and keep writing even though no one is listening. You keep writing until you find your voice and until you figure out how to write things that are worthy of an audience.

The hard truth is, you have to work your ass off to learn to make yourself and your blog/podcast/business valuable to other people.

If no one is paying attention, try harder. Try something different. Once you make something useful enough for anyone to care about, you’ll know because you won’t have to work so hard to get the word out.

If you don’t feel like you’re getting anywhere, turn things around by learning to love lifting heavy-ass weights. Take the focus off of the results and put it where it belongs: in the craft itself.

And that’s the silver lining. Learn to love lifting heavy-ass weights and the results will come.

But you can’t control when the results will come. It’s different for everybody, so don’t look for results after a couple of visits to the gym.

The next time you feel like you aren’t making any progress, or like no one is listening, look at the weight you’re lifting. Are you sweating? Are you spent at the end of every day? Are you adding more and more weight every week?

That’s how you measure progress when no one seems to be listening: by the intensity of the work you’re doing, the boundaries you’re stretching, the experiments you’re learning from.

Need Some Motivation Right Now? Read This IMMEDIATELY

If you’re in desperate need of some motivation, we’re going to fix that problem, right here, right now.

Prepare yourself.

WARNING: I’m going to swear and yell a little in this post.

Desperate times call for desperate measures.

You said you needed motivation. I’m going to do what needs to be done to get your ass in gear. NO EXCUSES.

If this isn’t the kind of motivation you need, leave now. You’ve been warned.

Alright.

Here goes.

Do you want some motherfucking motivation right now?

I SAID, do you want some MOTHERFUCKING MOTIVATION RIGHT NOW?

Do you want to get some seriously useful shit done today?

Do you want to get off your ass and start producing instead of wallowing in despair, depression, self pity, fear, doubt or whatever is holding you back?

Are you sick of not getting anything done?

Let’s DO THIS.

The point of this exercise is to give you motivation to do something right now. Don’t just absorb this and continue sitting around procrastinating.

TAKE ACTION.

Follow the steps below carefully.

1. Quit bitching about how tired you are.

The world doesn’t care.

And if you’re feeling depressed or down, stop feeling sorry for yourself while you’re at it. It doesn’t matter.

We all face obstacles. How you deal with those obstacles defines who you are and determines how successful you are in life.

Did you catch that? It was the secret to life. Seriously.

Let me say it again.

We all face obstacles. How you deal with those obstacles defines who you are and determines how successful you are in life.

Period. End of story.

2. Read the quotes below. If you have a favorite quote or two you always refer to, read that too.

Some people die at 25 and aren’t buried until 75. – Benjamin Franklin

Here is the test to find whether your mission on Earth is finished: if you’re alive, it isn’t. – Richard Bach

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. – Steve Jobs

3. If the motivation you need is to work on building your own business, watchthis video.

I don’t care if you’ve seen it before. Watch it again.

Be warned, if you’re not working towards being self employed, this video might push you in that direction.

4. Put a pot of coffee on or get some tea brewing.

Try a bulletproof coffee if you need an extra kick.

5. If you haven’t eaten something, eat a little snack now.

For god’s sake don’t eat a fucking twinkie or some other junk food.

Eat something healthy. Eat some nuts or fruit. Take your vitamins.

6. Do one of the following three things:

A) Take a shower, OR

B) Go for a brisk walk, OR

C) Call the friend who most lifts you up and makes you feel great after every conversation. Tell him or her that you need a little pep talk. Put a 10 minute limit on the conversation.

7. If you’re around people right now, go tell one of them how much you appreciate him or her.

Just say, “hey, I wanted to tell you that I appreciate you because…”

If you’re not around people, think about something or someone you’re grateful for. Go over the reasons you’re grateful in your mind.

Gratitude is happiness. Happiness is motivating. Be grateful more often by thinking about who and what you’re happy for, or by telling someone.

8. If you normally sit down to work,stand up.

Standing up to work is motivating. It gets the blood flowing.

9. Turn off email, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and whatever other social procrastination network you’re part of.

Turn off the TV if it’s on.

Seriously, TURN THEM OFF.

10. Now, put on your favorite music playlist.

Play something that gets you jacked.

Hint: try the playlist you use at the gym.

(If you don’t regularly go to the gym or workout otherwise, start doing that tomorrow. You have to be healthy to stay motivated.)

11. List the top 3 positive outcomes of achieving your task.

Think about what you’re planning to accomplish today.

Don’t worry about everything that’s holding you back from accomplishing it. Instead, focus on the positive things that will happen once you get it done.

For example, if you have homework to do, your list might look like this:

1) I’ll learn something useful.
2) I’ll make myself and my teacher proud of what I accomplished.
3) I’ll get closer to achieving a good grade in the class so I can graduate and move on to doing what I’m really meant to do in life.

Write down the three things. Don’t skip this part. Make sure you focus on the 3 most important outcomes.

12. Think about the part of doing this task that you enjoy.

Most tasks have some enjoyable component to them.

Focus on what you like about what you have to do, no matter how simple or how small. Enjoy the very act of doing your task for what it’s worth.

13. Now here’s the most important part.

Lock yourself in a room with the thing you need to be doing.

Don’t leave until you make some progress.

Put pen to paper, fingers to keyboard, or axe to the grindstone.

Stop looking for external motivation. Stop letting yourself procrastinate.

Start going through the motions of making progress. At first it might feel forced, but eventually you’ll get in the groove.

What to do if this doesn’t work.

We all have things to do that we really just don’t want to do, but have to for some reason. These are the toughest to find motivation for.

For these especially difficult situations, I recommend two things.

First, question whether or not this thing really needs to be done.

What are the consequences of not doing it? Can you live with the consequences? Is there any way to not do this thing?

Then, if you still conclude that this thing absolutely has to get done, focus on simply getting past it.

Imagine the relief of not having this thing on your plate anymore.

How will that make you feel?

Dig deep. See how quickly you can possibly do this thing.

Do it now and move on to stuff you really want to do.

Bonus tip for creative entrepreneurs and online business builders

If you need an ongoing kick in the pants to focus your energy on building a business or becoming a successful freelancer, we have a brand new podcast just for you called The Fizzle Show.

Check out our new podcast for creative entrepreneurs and online business builders »

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Thanks for reading. Now go out and get something important done.

Please share this with someone else who needs motivation.

In the comments below, share your other favorite motivation hacks and tell me what this post helped you achieve.