Hi and Happy New Year or New Year’s Eve,
depending upon what part of the world you are in.
As with many people, the end of one year, and the start
of another year, causes me to reflect upon what I’m doing
with my life, and why.
I was at my local Glazer-Kennedy Insider Circle meeting
two nights ago, and this topic came up among hard-nosed
business people… serial entrepreneurs who had started
and often built several very successful businesses over
the past several decades. Some were multi-millionaires.
It felt strange to hear them openly discussing in a
networking meeting … how to get more satisfaction out
of what you do, and how they stay pumped up, and feel
like they are contributing something worthwhile to the
world.
I had taken my personal inventory a few weeks earlier…
looking at how I use my time, the results that I’m
getting, and if I want to continue using my time the
same way.
I had to ask myself, “Am I truly happy doing what I do,
and do I want to continue doing the same thing?”
I hope that you periodically ask yourself that same
question, and answer it honestly.
When I did this deep introspection a couple weeks ago
I reached many conclusions and decisions. I’ll share
some of them with you as they pertain to my business
life.
First of all, I acknowledged the old 80/20 rule. That
rule says that we get 80% of our results from 20% of our
activities. Many of my mentors, and very successful
contemporaries, emphasize that we SHOULD be focusing on
that 20% of activities, and not doing the rest.
For some of us that means we need to outsource, delegate,
or somehow get others to do the less productive 80% of
activities that we do. The reason is because we simply
can never do everything on our “to do” lists, so we
need to make sure that we are doing the things that we
personally should be doing.
To me that does mean that I will be outsourcing a lot more
tasks in the coming year.
I also looked at how FOCUSED I am in my businesses
activities. Being honest with myself, I had to acknowledge
that I was involved in too many VASTLY different projects.
So, I committed to focusing on fewer projects this year,
but really, really committing to them, pushing them all
the way through to massive results.
At the Tuesday night GKIC meeting we discussed “finding
your passion” and concluded that first of all it’s
something internal (your don’t find it out there), and
secondly that you often develop it by really throwing
yourself whole-heartedly into your work. If you hold
back, you won’t be passionate about it.
As you can tell, I get a lot our of my local Glazer-
Kennedy meetings. They are held in my area the last
Tuesday of each month, and if you live anywhere near
Pensacola, Florida, you’re invited to attend the next
one at my chapter. You just need to contact me for an
official invite… and you can attend as my guest… and
get a nice gift 
Back to my inventory…
Over the years, as I looked at literally hundreds of
potential projects, I developed this habit of buying a
domain name as soon as an idea popped into my head… I
wanted to lock in that ideal domain name to make my project
easier to do.
Now, I have HUNDREDS of domain names that I just parked,
and never built anything on. So, I’m selling many of them
off to whoever offers me a reasonable price… I’m accepting
bids. I’m listing those domains in a database, and my
website displays the domain names and the appraised fair
market values. Next to each domain name is a button that
you can click on and submit a bid to me.
When you click on the button at:
http://timic.org/domains
and submit the bid, I get it in my inbox in a few seconds,
and I’ll mull it over and get back to you shortly.
By the way, you’ll notice in future issues of my ezine,
in blog posts, in Twitter posts, etc., that most of my
links will contain my domain name “timic.org.” I’ve
set up a url-shortening script that lets me generate links
akin to what you’d get using tinyurl.com or budurl.com or
any of dozens of other url shortening services.
I’m using a script written by my friend, and Inner Circle
member, Will Bontrager. You install this script on your OWN
site, and then when you use shortened links you are branding
yourself, you are generating search engine “link love” to
your domain, and you are not at the mercy of outside
services which DO often delete customers links… if they
get any type of complaints, etc.
You can check out the script that Will wrote at:
http://YourOwnShortURL.com
That’s actually MY domain. Will is a member of The
Internet Marketing Inner Circle, a membership site that I
started in 2006. He is a programmer who prefers programming
to marketing… so I offered to JV with him and market his
script. I JV with a lot of members of The Internet
Marketing Inner Circle.
I also facilitate a lot of joint ventures among TIMIC
members. As a trained and certified JV broker, and co-founder
of The JV University, I use my knowledge to put together
projects, and involve many of our members who probably
would never create and launch a product on their own.
However, they love taking part in group projects.
I invite you to check out TIMIC. Just drop by:
http://timic.org/joinus We have a $1 trial membership, so
you can look around, say hi, and see if it’s for you. We’re
all about helping each other succeed massively.
In fact, as I looked over my goals for 2010, one of them is
to really push more TIMIC members to strive for their full
potential. Many people need an accountability partner, or
someone to keep them on track. So, I’m going to be the
“daddy rabbit” for many of our members 
I will also focus on two other projects/areas in 2010…
One will be working with local offline businesses. I already
network with members of my local Chamber of Commerce, and
GKIC group, and I do get business from this networking.
I’m the Internet marketing expert in both groups, so I often
agree to help them with their marketing. I help them to use
their website to:
- Generate more lead and customers
- Build relationships and follow-up more effectively
- Actually reduce their advertising expenses by doing online
promotions that are often MORE effective than the advertising
that they are currently doing.
If you can show a local business that by working with you
they can actually spend LESS on marketing while getting
better results, it’s a no-brainer for them. They’ll happily
shift those budgeted advertising dollars to you
If you’re like me, you can get them great search engine
position, and teach them to use the Internet marketing tactics
that we understand inside-out to build much more successful
businesses.
Much of what I do for them comes from this system:
http://timic.org/offline
I even use the outsourcing team at the url I just gave you
to do MOST of my work. I find the client, map out what I
want done, and then have someone else do most of the work. I
MANAGE things and for that I get paid nicely. I typically
set clients up on a monthly maintenance contract, so I get a
nice monthly residual income.
You can do the same
Speaking of residual income, my other focus in the coming
year is also gradually building me a residual income. I’m
rapidly building my team at SendOutCards, a business that
lets you sell real, physical greeting cards over the Internet.
Call me “ambitious” but my goal is to build that business,
which I’ve actually been a part of for four year, to where
it’s paying me $40 – $50k per month. I know people, who are
no smarter than I am, already at that level.
If you are not familiar with SendOutCards, you can check it
out at: http://WillieCrawford.com/greetingcards/
From that url, you can even send a few greeting cards at my
expense. I want you to test out the system, and then I want
you to contact me and find out how you can become a part of
my team.
A side benefit of being on my SendOutCards team is that I’ll
put a lot of time and effort into training you on how to
actually build a business. I don’t do much one-on-one coaching
any more… but am willing to work one-on-one with SOC team
members who show me that they are serious.
As I did my “where am I and where am I headed” inventory
a few weeks ago, I was very satisfied. I honestly believe
that EVERYTHING that I’m involved in adds real value to
people’s lives. It isn’t just “selling the dream” it’s
teaching them how to turn their dreams into reality, and
helping struggling businesses experience major growth.
I encourage you to do a personal inventory over the next
few day. Ask if you are truly happy with what you are doing.
If not, ask why, and look for what it would take to make
you happier. I’m willing to bet that it will be doing
things that add real value to the lives of everyone that you
touch.
I look forward to talking with and working with you in the
coming year.
Willie