Refuse Defeat with Megan

After hearing Kristie's story, this was the first image that popped into my head! (I do not own copyrights to this image)Your next move may be your best move. As long as you keep moving, you are moving closer to your dream! I repeat this to myself at least once a week. It is your duty, to share the knowledge and the passion about your service or product with anyone that will listen!

Can this be hard, YESS! I can’t say that enough. Will everyone understand what you are talking about or your passion, no, but that twinkle behind your eye may catch the attention or your largest producer or your best client. It is possible to make a sale without being salesy and just sharing what you love. The excitement, the drive, the creativity that goes into the way you explain your service or product may just be the right words to turn a no into a maybe. Then by showing consistency, that maybe may turn into a absolutely.Krisitie has multiple examples of types of business, so this does not fall into just one category. I like to think of this message as more than just business and in life.What are you willing to do to reach your goals? Are you willing to continue sharing your knowledge and your passion?Never live you life in a “what if” and start living to the fullest! You are an amazing human being. It can only go 2 ways. Not right now or yes, you decide.Get ahold of Krisite Belliston:BeautybybellistonBellyFitClub

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Chris’ shares his story on firing a high paying, high stress, high maintenance client. These clients can be detrimental to your business, your health, and your all around being. Imagine hating your job. Hating going to the company YOU built because of one client.I have had these and I know I have been this client (not going to lie to you)! From personal experience, why was I this client? After much research I realized the company we were paying to be experts in a specific field was taking advantage of the lack of our education in this market. While, doing a poor job on their job I started to ask questions. As I started to learn and seek information on what they do, what they should be doing. I realized this can go 2 ways. They will shape up and do what they should be doing because we have been a paying client for well over 5 years or they will get fired. Around the time I was going to fire them, they beat me to the punch! They hated that I questioned them, held them accountable, and checked up - but that was my job. My job was to make sure the task was completed in a timely manner. After that “timely manner” was up, I am sure this was when they thought I was the client from hell. Except, they were very overdue for an expensive project and were doing a poor job on communication.Unlike the example Chris gave, I didn’t call multiple times a day or send a crazy amount of emails, but I did expect a check-up every day to tell me where we were and if we were still on track to complete the project at the 2nd date they provided. Let’s just call this accountability! Now, before I say fire every client that doesn’t fit your new mold of a dream client. I believe it is important and very valid to take a step back and look at your company. Is this client being hard or high maintenance because of your mismanagement or over promise?Have you listened to their side of the story without being defensive?Is there a way to fix this and everyone either separate happy or remain working together with a new understanding. I ask myself these before I “fire” any clients and I also give the client the benefit of the doubt that that day or even week was a bad week. I have sat on the phone, ready to fire clients, and then realize they were taking out their anger of a different situation on my staff because my staff was not going to yell back. Is it right, absolutely not. Has each client come back and apologize later, yes - every time! Have I fired a client after this, no, thankfully everyone was on the same page, they felt listened to and have never had another problem. (Side-note: some of our BEST reviews came from these clients, they also continue to refer us.) Sometimes, even if it isn’t your job, people just want to be listened to! Please don’t take that to the extreme and give advice or listen to every story, but just think of a time when it would have been really helpful when the service representative just asked you how they could help you, then actually help you!Chris’ story is different, his client(s) were just draining his staff without a reason. Do you have some of these? It is possible. Should you get rid of them, probably! Should you get rid of them right now, maybe, it depends on your business model!I believe it is possible for you to build your dream business, your dream company, and take it further than you ever imagined! I do know at some point everyone will run into a client that is hurting you more than helping you, you just need to be strong enough to know when enough is enough. Hopefully, prior to that point, you follow your instinct and do what is right for you and your company.

Books Mentioned:

Book Yourself Solid

Beyond Booked Solid

Chris TompkinTheGoAgencyUSA.cominfo@thegoagencyusa.

STOOOOPPP WHAT YOU ARE DOING! If you have ever thought I’m nervous what blah blah blah will think. What if people unfollow me. What if they talk bad about me this interview is for you!As I interview people, it is the exact message I needed to hear that day. It has been the craziest circumstances, but very eye opening. Monique hit on perfection and not worrying about other opinions. I have yet to meet someone that hasn’t suffered from 1 of these 2 issues, if not both! Being too perfect can be a barrier to entry for you + finally launching your business. Evaluate what is benefiting you and what is limiting. Recognize things can be excellent without being perfect, and they are still very good. It is ok to revise! Think about YOUR why and why it is important to you. Why is your passion important + why does someone else’s opinion matter to me. Your passion is going to help you help people, show people the correct way of doing something, and bring financial abundance in your life. Why are you letting someone else’s opinion get in the way of your happiness!Once you know your why, the messaging behind your why just may show that what is important to you and they can get on board or move.Keep in mind if you are hiding from perfection or opinions of others people are not benefiting from your messaging, your why, and you.

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Business can be very fun and lucrative! It can also be soul crushing all around money, family, and friendships. Let’s be honest, being an entrepreneur has some REALLY good days and some REALLY bad bays. What makes you an entrepreneur is the fact you keep going and conquer all days!One would never ideally think about a family member or friend purposely giving them  bad advice, right! Well, it happens. I think most cases I hear about a deal doing bad there is a family or friend involved that meant well at the beginning. I know when you are out there hustling for business and spending your last few cents on pb&j or 1 more campaign it may be hard to see the value in discussing with an attorney or advisor. I didn’t see the value either when I was starting, but just like John, $100 could have saved him thousands + all the time spent. There are pretty inexpensive options when looking for quick business advice. Below I listed two I found from a simple Google search, keep in mind you can always interview attorneys in your area and they may have a lower fee for inquiries. I have not tried these or give any advice on which is best. Please do your research!www.legalshield.comwww.legalzoom.com

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This takeaway is a little different. I normally like to give specific actionable steps on how to avoid the type of failure we discussed. I don’t want you to think, ugh I am wasting my time there’s no steps here, but this is something I had to do myself to really determine my journey. In this take away I want you to dive deep! We can give millions of excuses, but why do you actually tell yourself NO! Are you justifying your lack of conscience? Are you worried about what some may think? What about if you fail?Dig deep to find your no. Most likely this is a seed that was planted in you very early in life. It may even been by mistake, but ultimately it comes back to your responsibility to determine it and fix it. Find your “problems” and when you take the time to learn about yourself, that may be your passion project. You may be a warrior in finding your problem that you can actually help others in overcoming that struggle or battle. I know it sounds so crazy! A year ago, I would not be writing anything like this! If I didn’t dig deep myself I would have NEVER known what I really wanted in life and everything would just continue being a dream.Most importantly, I need you to understand that the way you feel about yourself and the thoughts you allow to control your mind. Think honestly and openly how you feel about yourself. Seriously, do you tell yourself not to eat that because you are fat. Do you say things like “I’m too broke” are you putting yourself down any time you can? You can write this down or just keep this in your mind when you go to make a little decision in your head. You will begin to notice how you speak to yourself and what you allow yourself to believe. Now that you are aware of your thoughts. You have cleared your mind and you are working on talking positive to yourself, your passions and business will come next. You must operate on a clear & honest mindset. Without faith, awareness, and honest mindset you will not be able to think of goals clearly. Nor will you connect with your audience because it will probably feel like you are hiding something. Think of your audience as your best friend that knows everything about you. Now, take it away! I cannot wait to see your business thrive.You can hear my personal deep dive story (well the specific highlights) on The Stranded Phase Podcast. The link will be added after this goes live!LinksTedX Video: The Ripple Effect of MentoringGet to Your First TedX Talk: www.thestrandedphase.com/guideInstagram: @jessicahurley__Website: www.thestrandedphase.com

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Investing money without a plan on how you will get a return on investment. We need to be aware of how we are feeling. Money is a hard point for many people, and realizing that we have been spending our money in the wrong places.

Learning lesson on how she was showing up and why she was investing in the wrong places without having a strategic plan.

You may think this next big course is it. It will help you finally reach your ideal business goals, everyone is taking it, this person has this popular course, but then you purchase it. You may get caught up doing other things other than fulfilling the course or you made find the next shiny object that deter you from your original goal taking this course.

Always ask yourself Is this an investment in my business or yourself.

Is this an expense?

Can I do without it?

Is this my best route?

If you think you can do without it this may fulfill the creativity you were looking for in entrepreneurship. What else can I do without spending any money or a lot less and still get a great result. What can I do without spending an additional dollar. We think someone else has an answer or this is a faster route.

There are many paths up the mountain. We may be able find the next best method and fulfill our goals.

Action items:

Look at all of your expenses or the ones you think you want to invest in. Did this expense directly make me a profit? (yes or no).

Were these entirely necessary or are they replaceable? Cut out unnecessary expenses.

Any ongoing purchases revisit this list and ask yourself these questions prior to purchasing the item.

You will feel better about bills getting paid and your business growth!

FREEBIE → 2018 VISION PLANNER

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Establishing your business. Ready to prove you are the best in your niche. You have it all figured out, and you are ready to go. Now, just minor details…

How do you get paid?

Do you get paid at the beginning, middle or end? Do you get paid on a payment plan. Will you always be ahead or even? These are questions you will want to think about. I love math, so this is what I break down before I even do research on my idea. I have to know if I should continue with this thought or move on to the next.

Although you may be a person with high integrity and be on top of your bills, many others aren’t and sadly, many will take advantage of nice people.

Are you thinking that those aren’t your “avatar” or ideal client so you shouldn’t attract those people?

Sometimes it may be a true error, but why put your life, your money, your bills, your dream business in risk of not getting paid because of someone else’s mistake?

Business is business, tell your clients your rules and establish a clean business relationship! You are going to change people’s lives! You are going to build your empire!

But, you must get paid to do so.

Let’s walk through some payment method ideas:

Subscription: If you choose subscription, I highly suggest automated billing or charging. For a small fee you will be getting paid without even thinking! I help build a pool service company and we set up automated invoicing in the same amount of time as creating 1 invoice and just set it on a calendar forever. The owner was able to get paid consistently. If it were my company, I would have paid a little extra for a credit card processor that automatically charges, but he had customers that paid cash and/or check so he opted for invoices.

Payment plans: If you are creating a payment plan, you can just add an end date to the automated invoices or credit card processors.

Beginning: How will the service/product be delivered? Do you have an email sequence to notify the customer their payment has been received? Make sure you have all systems in place so your customer knows their money will not be lost and they will not be forgotten about! This is my personal favorite

Payment Schedule/Middle: Customer pays some up front, you do service, customer pays for next steps, you do service, etc. I prefer to pay this way with contractors. The trick is to never get behind in payments or work. I find this to be a balancing act, however for large projects this is so necessary. I have personally had people just disappear in the middle of a project, so I was thankful I didn’t pay them completely because I was able to pay someone else to finish for the same price. Now, since this is your business and you are a person of integrity, you will have to think if you really want to be chasing payments in each section of project completion or again, this can be set up on automated invoice or credit card processing.

End: As Trivinia said, don’t do this. I cannot think of 1 exchange of service/product where this is the best method.

Are you thinking, numbers just aren’t your thing so you are avoiding this subject.

PICK UP YOUR CALCULATOR.

It is not hard math, simple addition and subtraction - maybe some multiplication!

Questions to answer at any stage:

           How much do you want to make per month (income)?

Current price of what you are selling?

How many clients/products do you need to sell each month?

If you are in business/If you are not in business you can use these questions to set your goals quickly so you can reach your ideal income per month quickly:

          What is your close rate (out of all your calls, how many become a customer/client)?

If I could, I would delegate my life.

After my burn out, I spent HOURS learning about delegation. My mentor told me about it, told me I needed help, but never explained how to find it or how to train and actually delegate. My doctor kept telling me I needed to unload my schedule and make my life less stressful. Basically, delegation is necessary, but can be SO hard for any business owner!

You may be thinking, well I can’t afford to hire someone. Do you know how much the service cost? How much time or money are they costing you? Can your business afford a burnout? If hiring someone for a few dollars will skyrocket your business, would you do it?

David mentions that not delegating is like running your business looking at your feet. Then when you look up you are hitting a wall of either financial struggle or burnout. A few hours a day or a few tasks weekly that can free up your time may be worth looking into a Virtual Assistant for or finding services like the ones featured below to free up some time!

There are so many different ways to delegate “easy stuff” in your life. Below is a list of services I use to delegate tasks I can live without doing!

UberEATS - Pick up take out

Use my code to get $5 off your first order: eats-megang3375ue

Instacart - Grocery Shop

Mynt - Car Wash

HootSuite - Posting on Social Media Consistently

Chewy - Auto Ordering Pet Food

Uber - Driving LOL

Use my code to get $5 off your first order: eats-megang3375ue

Thrive Market - Healthy Foods (they have automation)

Other ways you can automate, that I don’t use

Hiring Cleaners - I actually enjoy this if we follow the Guide to Unwind method of a little cleaning each day.

Fill your gas tank

Grocery Store Automated Shipping

Care.com - I was a nanny on here in college and found an AMAZING family I worked for, for years. They still use girls from my sorority - for mostly driving the kids around now!

Rover - I am hesitant to share this because I would never hire someone to walk my dogs because they are a handful and Baby gets overly excited with little dogs.

Call Centers - that answer and have a call log for your business

Service Providers (tax professional, virtual assistant, marketing, social media, website, IT people, etc.)

Laundry services

A tip that I revisit every 90 days is to write down a list of everything I do and make sure to add everything you hate.

If you have an assistant or someone to delegate tasks to - make videos (I have an example in the FREE Virtual Assistant Course at the bottom)

If you do not have someone and do not want to hire - look for a service. Go to Google, look for a service and one of my FAVORITE new tricks is to wait a couple days after visiting a service provider’s site (make sure you are signed into facebook on your computer) and. They find you now! I have hired, purchased, or looked into companies I found this way.

How to contact David Minor:

www.Vesado.com

DavidMinorOfficial

Free Hire a Virtual Assistant Course

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Whether you are pitching for a potentially life changing event, like Joshua was for TEDx, preparing for an interview, or pitching your services to a potential client you should know about your audience.

Event Pitch:

Choose the event you wish to be apart of.

Do your research on HOW TO APPLY. Most of the time, you can Google the event and someone has written an article on their experience or you may even find the perfect how-to apply guide.

Do your research on the actual event type. After this interview I did some research on TEDx talks in my area. I found it extremely easy to find information once I started looking for it. (I even applied for one! The one I applied for had a theme, and I’m not sure if I am actually a good fit - but I will let them make the decision.)

*Make sure to know if there is a due date for submissions!

Now, the lesson Joshua mentioned is knowing the audience. If you do enough digging, you can find the information on the people in charge of the event. I am not sure if you would be able to find the judges information, but being aware of your surroundings.This was at a college - if he thought about their audience it probably was something they wanted to appeal to colleges. Now, this is a mistake that I would have easily made because it is an opinion. That is what TEDx represents is a new way of thinking, so to vito someone based on a different way of thinking is a not an ideal situation.Another important lesson is, instead of choosing a huge uproar he applied for another event and nailed it! I included the link below if you would like to watch!

Joshua mentions that he actually has attracted a client from this TEDx talk.

What if he did the first one and the new client never saw it?!

He could have ran away from the organization and never reapplied - and never got that client or the next that comes from it!

I am a huge believer in the power of the mind and how you react to situations. This is a lesson I have trained myself to believe. Over the years, I felt like I messed up or I did something wrong. Training myself to take this as a lesson and learning from it instead of hiding has been life changing.

If you get the opportunity to share your ideas or present: Study, be prepared, and do amazing! This is what you dreamed of!If you don’t get it, reapply or find a way around. The only no you should listen to is the one that you accept. MAKE THIS A LESSON.

How to contact Joshua Lisec:

www.JoshuaLisec.com

Email: [email protected]

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joshuatheghostwriter

LinkedIn: Joshua Lisec

Joshua Lisec’s TEDx: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7fX7sgp-NE

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Do You Need a Business Partner?

Have you lost time from a bad business deal? What about thousands of dollars? Ugh, what a stomach wrenching situation. You may be losing a relationship with a family member or a friend. This is someone you trusted to build your dream business, and they failed you. They potentially failed employees, your community and your reputation is on the line.

When something starts to go wrong or went wrong, address the problem. Follow your gut feeling with each situation. If you ever feel like something may have been unethical or it may keep you up at night - address it as soon as possible. Communication really is #1 with a business partner.

Here are some pointers to talk about prior to partnering in business:

Review Personal Finances - how will bills continued to get paid while you are in “start-up”? What happens if the business needs more money? What happens when… anything to do with money. Depending on your business this can be a make or break situation. You want to know your partner is 100% committed. I like to get in depth and ask about accounting software. I think this is important even for personal finances!

Time Expectations - how many hours do each of you think you will spend on the business weekly. Time can be just as valuable as cash when it comes to a partnership. Think back to high school, no one wants to be in the group with the person who doesn’t do their work….right! Time is important. You need to depend on this person to get their share of the work done in a timely manner. If you are learning like Jason was, time is a great resource to leverage! Working for little to no pay is something necessary to advance personally.

What about commitment? Do you have other commitments that come first? You should know where each other stand on what you will do for the business and how committed you are.

How do you act under stress? Are you going to run away when it gets tough? I know that sounds negative, but I can be open about this - I am the WORST broke person ever. I have full emotional breakdowns or get mean if I feel the stress of low bank accounts. If I openly go into a partnership I am upfront about this., but I will do whatever it takes to get the job done to get paid!  That is a for sure! Knowing yourself will only set a better relationship with your business partner.

Put everything in writing! When I thought about going into business with my friend we both brought questions we had to an open conversation meeting, wrote everything down, and if we would have moved forward we would have put it in a legal document. After doing this, we found we were probably better just friends for at least that project! Neither of us were 100% committed to the idea. If anything, we became more close as friends because now we know the ins and outs of each others lives but respect each other in our professional fields and still bounce ideas off of each other for ourselves!

Do you need a partner? Will you not do your business without one? I find this to be a serious personal soul searching question when I start a project. I ask myself would I do this by myself with or without a partner? If yes, then I think do I need a partner? If so, why do I need a partner? What does this partner bring to the table? Am I just entering a partnership for accountability? *Shameless commercial - I have an accountability program for only $10 a month, no contracts, no long-term commitment. Don’t enter a partnership because you need accountability.

What happens if everything goes bad? Put in writing what will happen and who will get what, will there be a buyout or just a give it all up? If assets are involved, will those get sold and profits split? List out the whole process on a legal document if something goes bad! Laugh together now at it and hopefully you will never need the document!!