Tag Archives: Internet Business

Internet Business, Reviews

He’s Baaaa-ck

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poltergeistJames

From March 12, 2006 to the middle of 2008, James Brausch was among the top bloggers of the internet business arena.

During these two years online, James amassed a huge following because of his no nonsense shoot from the hip style, dishing out a lot of value to the online business community.

His teachings, of course, were always backed with solid statistical evidence based on his own research as he grew.

If I remember correctly, James worked as a statistician at one time, and was a programmer before declaring his freedom from the work force back on September 1, 2003.

By June of 2008, James had migrated his business to a new domain – diegonorte.com, and was living in Costa Rica (and still is as far as I know). He sold his business shortly afterwards and went off into retirement with a one year no compete clause as part of the terms from the sale of his business.

Even though he’s been under the radar, it seems that he has been busy with some new innovations. He has developed an interesting product called IBB, or Internet Business Box. This is a complete blogging system, or more accurately, a business system with built in continuity.

Beyond that, I don’t know too much more about it at this point, but it appears to be structured as a membership oriented blog, with a complete system onboard similar to a traditional offline business franchise.

This looks very interesting indeed, and will warrant further investigation.

Since his retirement, many who really didn’t know much about James, thought that he was in reality many different people on the net. I’ve heard that he was Stephen Dean, Aaron Brandon, Kristi Daniels, and even Michel Fortin!

I’ve always gotten quite the chuckle from these types of ridiculous rumors, so for the heck of it, I decided to try an experiment. I found a photo of Aaron Brandon and used photoshop to superimpose a Hawaiian shirt onto Aaron.

Much to my surprise, with the Hawaiian shirt, Aaron Brandon looked exactly like James! Okay, this was just too weird, so next I took a photo of Frank Kern and again, superimposed a Hawaiian shirt on him… again, he looked exactly like James!

Now surely, this couldn’t happen with Kristi Daniels… but alas, the same result!!! Kristi became the splitten image of James. Now this was just getting downright scary.

“How could this be?!”, I asked myself. Later I consulted a well known professor from Cambridge University who explained to me that this is a simple result of the “Superman effect”.

He went on to explain that Superman was able to render himself completely unrecognizable simply by putting on a pair of eyeglasses. James Brausch has mastered this same technique, only in reverse using a Hawaiian shirt. Without the Hawaiian shirt, James is able to morph into anyone, anytime, at will!

So the shocking truth is, that James is everybody that you see online who has an internet business presence. Don’t believe me? Try the Hawaiian shirt test for yourself… You’ll be shocked, amazed, and maybe even a little terrified.

Once you recover from the shock, jump out to James’ blog and either get to know him, or get back on his list. Whichever the case may be, you can find him here:

http://www.jamesbrausch.com

Oh, and welcome back James!

Internet Business

Expand Your Universe

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Image credit: Stephen Van Vuuren, created from a simulation of 80,000 star imagesWhen I started my internet business back in 2005, I was pretty excited about it.  This was something that I had previously mulled over for quite some time, but never really took the action to just do it.

Then one day I finally decided to step outside my comfort zone and make that product, release it to the public & start my business.

In that very instance of commitment, my universe had suddenly expanded.  A few moments ago, I was a wage slave doomed to a life sentence of repetition until the day I finally retired.

Now all of a sudden, my future was changing.  I made the conscious choice to change my future, but was it realistic?

Maybe I couldn’t make a video & teach people what I knew.  Suppose they think I’m some kind of chump and all demand refunds.  My friends might laugh at me for making a fool out of myself and then failing!

Those were some of the negative self-doubts that kept me from taking action the previous months as well.  It really finally got to the point where I just had to say “you know what Jack? Either crap or get off the pot… do ya want it or not?”

The truth was, as much as I didn’t like living paycheck to paycheck, in debt, and being subordinate to someone else, it was comfortable in some off beat way.  Looking back, I can now see that the comfort of having  just this one stream of income was in reality a false security.

Having a J.O.B. means that I can pay my bills & be socially acceptable, right?.  It also means that you don’t have to think so much for yourself.  You are told when you are going to work, what you’re going to do, when you can take a break, have lunch, a day off, and a myriad of other things.

You could compare this to when convicts are incarcerated for long periods of time.  Eventually they become “institutionalized”.  For example, if Vinny the fish just completed a 25 year stretch in the State Penitentiary and is then suddenly released, Vinny’s going to have a tough time coping without the regimen that he’s been conditioned into for so many years.

The big house had become comfortable in the sense that for 25 years he was told where he would stay, when & what he would eat, when to go in the yard for exercise, etc.  Now suddenly, to experience freedom (relative to prison), he’s thrust into a very uncomfortable zone.

In order for you to break out of your ‘prison’, whether it’s a J.O.B., a relationship, an addiction of some sort, or whatever, you have to be willing to step outside the zone of comfort and make yourself do it.

If you already have a business, what can you do to make it even more profitable?  What are those things which maybe you haven’t acted on, because it was beyond your comfort zone?

Perhaps it’s making that video, or doing a webinar.  If you haven’t done it because it’s a ‘scary’ thing to do, but you know it will increase your business, just remember this; your universe will always expand to wherever it is that you decide to go.  You are the master.

If you step out of your comfort zone (your known universe), your universe will automatically expand with you into this new zone. Before you know it, your universe has just gotten that much bigger, and you are all the better for having experienced it.

The next time that you come up with an idea or think “that would be nice but…”, don’t let that fear from inexperience, or fear of the unknown stop you!  See this as the opportunity to expand the real estate of your personal universe.  Stepping out will always expand it in some way.

When your universe becomes bigger, you become more confident.  The opportunities and possibilities will grow exponentially with each expansion of your universe.  Now is the time to do it.  Dive in, and see for yourself where it takes you.  You’ll be amazed!

Copywriting, Internet Business, Traffic

5 Ways To Milk Your Articles To The Max

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Milk Your articles for all they're worthWhen most marketers write articles, the typical scenerio is to submit them to their favorite article directories.  Many article marketers also invest in article submission software to help speed up to process and to get their articles out to hundreds & even thousands of article & ezine directories.

After that, they’re finished.  On to the next one… But why stop there?  Why not milk that article for all it’s worth?

You might be thinking, “well what the heck else can I do with it?  I’ve already submitted it to a zillion article sites, c’mon Jack!”

Well, don’t just stop at the article directories, here are 5 quick tips to super charge the pulling power of your articles.

1. Stick your article on your blog and convert it to a podcast using Feed2Podcast.com.  Now submit the podcast to itunes and other podcast directories.  Don’t have a blog?  Not to worry.  You can use ReadTheWords.com to create a podcast from your article instead.  ReadTheWords.com will even covert .pdf files and other documents.

2. Now format your article into a press release and submit it to PRWeb for premium exposure.  If you prefer the free route, try some of these links:

i-newswire.com
clickpress.com
free-press-release.com

3. Modify your article into a step by step tutorial format.  Now you can submit your tutorial to eHow.com and Tutorialized.com.  If this is a really good article, you could also use it as a bonus incentive to include when marketing your own product, or an affiliate product.

4. Now that you got a snappy tutorial created, why not convert it into a PowerPoint presentation?  Remember to add your link to the first & last slides so that people can click through to your site. You can now submit it to ScreenCast.net & SlideShare.com to name a couple.  Give this an extra kick by breaking it up into a couple parts & link part 2 back to your website.  This is sure to get them clicking through.

5. Finally, convert your tutorial into a .pdf file & upload it to sites like scribd.com, or yudu.  Sites like these get tons of exposure & the .pdf files tend to rank pretty decently in the search engines as well.  I recommend using OpenOffice.org. OpenOffice Writer has a button right in the toolbar to convert to .pdf.  OpenOffice is a free office suite and just as good, if not better than Microsoft Office.

As you can see, by using your imagination, you can stretch out a simple article into a whole host of things that can drive traffic and revenue to your online business.  You can even turn a well written article/tutorial into an info product, especially if you took your PowerPoint & used Camtasia studio to step through your PowerPoint while elaborating on each point in your slide.  Voila, instant info product!

All this from one article.  Just imagine if you made this a regular practice when writing articles.  You will discover that a little extra effort goes a long way.

Internet Business

The Portability of Internet Business

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Photo from flickr - anyakaWell, it’s been over a week now since I arrived back in the good ol’ USA, and I have to say that it was a great trip.   Every time I visit China I discover new and fascinating experiences that make the trip just that much more rewarding.

While we were enjoying ourselves in China, seeing the sights and experiencing the sides of Beijing that normally only the natives are privy to, my internet business was still perking along as if I had never left.

My product & affiliate sales continued right along just like clockwork.  This is one of the biggest perks of having of an internet business.  Portability!

Back in the day, I owned a ‘brick & mortar’ business.  It was an electronics repair shop.  The income was pretty decent, but the problem was that there was no freedom to go with it.  It wasn’t unusual to work 15 hour days.  When all the bills were paid & given the number of hours I worked, I was usually left over with less than what I would make on an equivalent day job.

I was one of those people that got caught in the classic self-employment trap of the day.    I took my skill and turned it into a ‘business’.  The only problem was the the ‘business’ was really a J.O.B., only I was the boss.  If I wanted to get paid, I had to work alot of hours & be at my store everyday.

Taking a vacation was unheard of.  My business would have been tanked in a week.  Looking back, I now know that a freedom system could have been built into my business, had I thought about my core desires in the beginning.

What I love about online business is that you can start a very profitable business for almost nothing compared to a traditional brick & mortar type.

Creating a freedom system is also very easy compared to the latter.  Online business procedures can be automated in many ways including software & outsourcing.

For example, for digital software products, you can set your autoresponder & thank you page to automatically send the download info to your customer after they pay for their product.  This is the basic concept of ‘autopilot income’ that you hear about so often.

Affiliate marketing is another such example.  As an affiliate marketer, you are providing a service to your visitors.  You are recommending products that may benefit the visitor and referring them to the vendor.  In return, you are automatically paid a commission when they purchase the product.

It doesn’t matter where you are in the world as long as you have a laptop & an internet connection, you are in business.  You can be living in Brooklyn, but sitting on a beach in Maui with a laptop and a wireless internet connection and monitor your business anytime.

Never before has starting a business been so inexpensive while giving you exposure to potentially millions of people. Never before has it been so easy to just pick up and go anywhere in the world where there is an internet connection, and still run your internet business.

Home no longer has to be a fixed location.  Home can be anywhere that you are.

Like any type of business, building an internet business takes effort, practice & time.  Many things will fail before seeing any impressive results.  Don’t buy into the ‘automatic riches with no work’ B.S. out there.

It takes focusing on one objective and seeing it through until you succeed.  You must take your online business just as seriouly as an offline business.

Once you accomplish success in your online business, you can take your ‘office’ anywhere.  You have achieved portability.

Making the decision to start your internet business is the first step.  Taking action on making your dream a reality is the second and most vital step.  As your business grows, start outsourcing & automating the repetitive procedures so that freedom is part of your formula.  If your business can run without you, then you have attained true freedom.

That’s what being an online entrepreneur is all about.  Without the freedom principle in your business, you are just working another J.O.B. minus the boss.

If you haven’t taken the plunge yet, then make today the day to declare your freedom!  Join the ranks of the portable lifestyle and discover what you have been missing.  It all starts with taking that first step, and then never looking back.

Internet Business

The Beijing Olympic Center

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This was a great time.

The first page shows pics of the indoor national gymnasium,  the birds nest and one from inside the birds nest stadium with me, my mother-inlaw & Kevin.  The entry fee to get inside the birds nest was 50 Yuan each ( around $7 USD).  50 Yuan each is pretty steep in China, but a bargain for us yanks.

Page 2 – some pics around the birds nest square, some night shots of the birds nest & watercube (very cool), and more from inside the stadium.

Finally, on page 3 – more stadium pics, including a Kevin admirer from Iran. 🙂

More to follow from Tiananmen Square in the next post.

Internet Business, Other Blog Stuff

Beijing Day 1-4

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The May Day holiday (international labor day) is over today (May 4th).  Tomorrow we are going to check out the Bird’s Nest, Watercube & other olympic sites.

On the first page of the gallery, you’ll see pics from the first day.  We had to register with the local police office, because we were staying with relatives (Tingting’s parents).  Failure to register when foreigners are staying with you will result in a 500 Yuan fine (about $75 USD). 😛

You can see Kevin (my son) with Tingting’s Mother.  I snapped these pics while waiting for the paperwork to complete with the local bureau.

We then had lunch at a traditional Beijing Hot Pot restaurant.  If you’re ever in Beijing, dining out for Hot Pot is a must do.  Mutton is sliced razor thin and you put it in the boiling water in the center of the table.  It will cook within a minute.  There is a special sauce that you then dip the mutton into for the full effect.  The special sauce is what differentiates the Hot Pot restaurants.  The recipies are a closely guarded secret by the restaurants.  They are recipies that are kept within the families of the restaurant owners.

These first few days we’ve been pretty much getting over jet lag & just hanging around Beijing, shopping & eating out alot.

Page 2 of the gallery shows the Birds Nest, watercube, & Olympic torch building.  We were just driving past, on our way shopping on that day.  Other Pics on page 2 are from around Tingting’s neighborhood.  Her parents live in the Haidian district of Beijing.  This building group houses many high level officials in China. Page 4 shows a few more of these, plus a family get together at another restaurant in Beijing’s Gu Lou Street.  The people in the pics are myself, Tingting, her aunts, and uncle.

Tingting & I had lunch yesterday after some shopping & our treatment was 5-star all the way by western standards.  This is the restaurant that is featured on page 3 of the gallery. Amazing food and service that I’ve yet to see matched in the states.

Even when using the restroom, there was an attendant who dispensed the soap & handed the towel for me.  What made the whole dining experience so fascinating was that when all was said & done, our bill was only 68 Yuan.  That comes out to around $18 USD!  Only in Beijing. 😛

Internet Business, Other Blog Stuff

The High Road To Beijing

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Right now I’m flying along at around 35,000 feet with my wife Tingting & son Kevin to Beijing.  If you haven’t done much traveling, you should consider getting out there and creating some memories to cherish and look back on when you’re old & decrepit.

Every time I visit China, I experience something new and exciting.  I’ll be sharing pics and videos that I’ll be taking during my 3 weeks there.  I hope you’ll follow along and share in my experiences. 🙂

Helpful Tips & Tricks, Internet Business, Product

Instantly Beef Up Your Affiliate Conversions

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Affiliate Marketing Money PictureWhen I first got into the online marketing scene back in late 2005, I immediately came out of the gate with my first product.   To me, it seemed logical that having your own product line is ultimately the best way to build a business online… at least for me.

There’s tons of ways to make money online, including creating e-commerce stores, providing services to online & offline businesses, affiliate marketing, etc.

Well, in the beginning, I had no Idea how to market my product, so I stuck it on eBay & did quite well with it.  This was when they allowed digital products.

In the mean time, I was also curious about affiliate marketing.  The idea of putting up a review site with a couple affiliate links, then passively making money every month seemed very appealing.

No tech support, no dealing with refunds, none of the typical headaches that come with having your own products.

So like everyone else, I jumped onto the affiliate review sites & landing pages bandwagon.  I put up my product reviews, pointing out how great product ‘X’ was and pointing my visitor to the affiliate link where they could make the purchase.

I remember after setting up my first affiliate review page thinking that the money was going to immediately start rolling in.  I would check my email about every 10 minutes looking for that coveted “Congratulations! You Have Made a Sale” type email.  Really! No kidding, almost every 10 minutes, heh heh!

Needless to say, that first day came & went, and so did the next… and the next.  Hmmmm, maybe they don’t like the way I write?  Does the product suck?  But it’s a hot seller!  So I started testing different variations of the review page.

Hmmmm, two weeks and counting – still no sale.  Uggggh!  I had already sold dozens of my own product, but nothing from these stupid affiliate products.  Maybe affiliate marketing was just a crock.

About this time, I was ready to pitch the whole affiliate marketing thing out the window.  Around this same time, I had injured 3 of my fingers pretty badly on a Skil saw, and they were sliced up pretty good.  I had lost much of the feeling in them at the time.  Because of this, I was interested in finding some type of skin cream that could help my fingers heal faster and maybe even minimize scarring.

So I did the next natural thing.  I Googled for “best skin care for injuries” and many variations including keywords like “review”, etc.

Well, wouldn’t you know it.  Every website I came across had affiliate reviews of how great THEIR product was.  Hmmm.  I didn’t put much credibility into it because I knew that they were probably just trying to get a sale.

I searched onward…  Onward some more… and more!  I must have went through a hundred results before I finally found ONE site that didn’t appear biased.

This site pretty much had a fact sheet format which did comparisons of different skin care products for fast healing & scar reduction.  I was able to use this information to make an informed decision and I bought the product through their link.

YIKES! I suddenly had the “Duh!” moment when I realized how aggravated and frustrated I was getting, trolling hundreds of search results just to get some real info on what I needed.

I already had made my mind up that I wanted to buy, but I had to have real validation that my purchase decision was okay.  I went back to my own affiliate review page and realized that it didn’t look any different in format that those other hundred sites that did absolutely nothing for me!

This time, I changed my landing page from a fluffy, feel good review, to an informative fact sheet, modeled after the website that I had purchased through.  It wasn’t an exact copy of course, but by educating the customer in a complete non-biased fashion, using bullet points and snippets of customer reviews from other shopping sites (with credit back to them of course), I suddenly realized that this page was now an authority page, not a pre-sell.

This time I was excited again, but I didn’t check my email every 10 minutes like I did before.  The next morning while checking my email, there it was… “You Have Made A Sale!”.  I could hear the angelic music in the back ground as I clicked the email link.

I’ll never forget the excitement of my first affiliate sale and the valuable lesson I learned from that whole experience.  I started to realize right then & there not to follow the herd.  Do the opposite.  As marketers, its easy to get so focused on making a landing page, and pushing your visitors to that affiliate link, that we forget about their real needs.

I have found that the real secret is to intercept the buyers.  People who have already decided that they are going to buy.   Generally, we need to validate our decision before pulling out the credit card and that’s where you should come in.  No need for pre-sell, just the facts validating to your visitor that they had made the right decision, and now it’s time to click the link.

It’s brain dead simple.  Not something the ‘gurus’ want you to know, LOL.

From that point on, I stayed in the affiliate marketing game which ultimately inspired my next product.  That product was AmazingCloaker.   Between the fact-sheet layout and the AmazingCloaker embedded-cookie feature, my affiliate projects became a whole new ballgame!

Internet Business, You Posts

The Answers to Those Magical Numbers

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Well, as promised, I’m going to elaborate on the magic numbers in the last post.  Firstly, to Robert Plank I have to say nicely done!  You nailed them.  The one that stumped you (number 1) is the same one that stumped me.

Here’s the answer that James twitted back to me:

1 represents focus. There is only one of anything that is really valuable. Life, wife, self, mission, today, moment, etc.

Man, so true on all counts! Remember how I have been pushing the concept of focus in the last few posts?  That’s why I felt a little dumb when he came back with 1 representing focus.

At the same time, it further validates the importance of focus as a key element for success in your online business.  Now let’s put these elements together.

86,400 – We have this many seconds each day to spend or throw away as we please.

If you decide to spend your seconds wisely and get the biggest bang for your time-bucks, then you will invest some of it in defining your vision and your financial goals for your business.

You have to know what you want & were you want to go.  Just think if you just set off for some foreign city that you’ve never been to before without a map, a plan, or any idea where you were going to stay, or go to when you arrived?  It would be pretty tough to get around & accomplish anything if that was your mission.  You could wander aimlessly for ages, so why would you do the same thing with your internet business?

Let’s say your financial goal is $1 million in a year.  For such a large number, it’s logical to break that down into digestible pieces, so that we can make this more ‘real’.  Of course, just starting out you may want a smaller starting goal, such as $100, 000 in a year.  That’s only $274 bucks a day!  Pretty doable once you have a few decent products and a real business going.

Yes, it’s true – instant wealth with no work in the beginning resides in the realm of the tooth fairy or winning the lottery.  If this is where you are, wake up & start creating your future now so that it becomes the present that you want.

So, $1 million a year is broken down into bite size pieces so that you can get a realistic goal of what you need to make each month, week, day, etc.

Here’s a breakdown, taken from Robert Plank’s comment in the last post:

114.20 = amount per hour you would need to make 24 hrs a day to make $1 million per year
2,740 = amount you would need to make per day to earn $1M per year
19,231 = amount you would need per week to earn $1M per year
83,333 = amount you would need per month to earn $1M per year

The other two numbers are simply a reflection of what is, and the choice that has to be made as to where you want to reside.  This depends on how badly you want it.

98 = 98% of the population watches TV and works for someone else
2 = 2% of the population actually gets stuff done

If you aren’t already, and you decide that you want to be a part of the 2% club, then remember that all of the numbers above (including escaping from 98) are really only going to be feasible with the magic number 1 – focus.  This must be the center point in the wheel.

Focus on your vision and take the action to bring it into physical reality.  The keys to the kingdom are there for the taking.  All you have to do is look, lift your hand, take them, insert & turn.

P.S. – Robert Plank has some really cool software products & great online marketing advice.  You can check out his blog here:

http://www.robertplank.com/

Internet Business, You Posts

86,400

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86,400… Millionaires, future millionaires,  & CEO’s know exactly what the number 86,400 means.  They know the value and importance of this number.  98% of the sheeple population don’t.  If you find yourself still caught in the 98 percentile mindset, there’s still hope.  You can sign up for my blog announcements in the right hand corner of this page.

Okay, if you don’t know the significance of 86,400 then it is probably a good idea to continue reading. 86,400 is the number of seconds in a 24-hour period. Each and every day we are all allocated the exact same number of seconds, whether we are rich or poor, handicapped, healthy, young or old, the one thing we all have in common is the number of seconds that we have in a day.

So why is it that some people are able to accomplish so much during their 86,400 seconds, while others seem to fritter away those seconds and accomplish absolutely nothing? Is it because they have the mindset that tomorrow they will be given another 86,400 seconds to again play with as they choose?

Perhaps it is this very notion that their ‘bank account’ will be replenished at the stroke of midnight with another 86,400 seconds that encourages people to be frivolous with their time.  Suppose we changed this example to money, and we were all given $86,400 to spend anyway we pleased every day, and then at the stroke of midnight our bank account reset back to $86,400 to be used again the next day.

I would be willing to bet that many people would be spending money right and left on every frivolous pursuit imaginable. After all, you would have unlimited wealth $86,400 at a time.  There’s one major difference however between time and money. Yes, it’s true that time is money, but with that said, money can be replaced, but time cannot.

Once time has been spent, it is gone forever. There is no way to regain wasted minutes that could have been used in some constructive way, such as building your path to freedom, or spending it with a loved one or spouse, and kids if you have them. It’s easy to forget that we all have a limited number of years on this rock, which we are living out every day, 86,400 seconds at a time.

Suppose you were told that in a week you would be dead? yes, dead… deceased, shucked the mortal coil, worm food, feeding the tree, assuming room temperature, etc. Would you live out your remaining days differently? How would your priorities change? Would you look back and say to yourself — “Gosh, I wish that I could have watched a heck of a lot more TV”. . Or maybe this one — “Gee, I really wish I could have worked more hours & spent even less time with my family”! Of course you wouldn’t!

Now let me ask you this; why would you do things differently if you knew that you only had a week?  Maybe those things that we would be doing differently, are the very things that we should be doing now!

Do you find yourself in the position of still wishing for more freedom to be with your loved ones? To really accomplish something? If so, maybe it’s time that you redefined your real goals. Maybe you’ve already begun on that road to building an online business, but you find yourself working long hours for little results because you haven’t properly defined the element of freedom into your vision.

Defining exactly what your vision is which you intend to accomplish is extremely important to successfully reach your goals.  Maybe your goal is building a freedom system.

Most people never succeed because of one fatal flaw, lack of focus. I don’t mean to harp on this one issue so often, however I really can’t stress enough the importance of focus.

Unless you define your goal, focus, and take action on building your online business so that you can attain the freedom that you deserve, you will continue to fritter away countless seconds, minutes, & hours – day in and day out.

Use your 86,400 seconds wisely every day and you will soon discover that this more efficient use of time will have a compounding effect, and will add up very very quickly. Changing this one little aspect in your mindset can make the difference between success and happiness, or the steady downhill slide straight into regretsville.