Your Precious Resources

This post relates to the fifth e-mail (Web Marketing Formula - issue 3)

Money:

Money is a big issue. Obviously, it is a very important motive for getting into business. And, here is one of the biggest challenges of all. You need money to ‘invest’ when you go into business. So, there is a BIG tension here. You want to go into business because, most likely, you have some financial goals that you have not yet realised. Yet, you need to spend before you can start making. It is really a question of sowing and reaping. Put in those terms, we really hope you can see the true value of our newsletter and blog.

Think of the farmer. He buys the land. He prepares the field. He buys the seed. He takes his valuable time to plough the field and plant the seed. But, he is not yet finished. He has to buy fertiliser, or whatever, then take more time to ‘encourage’ the crop to grow. He can’t sent sun and rain, of course, that is partly dependent on where he bought his field. You are just like him with your business. Buy the wrong piece of ground, and you are in trouble before you have even started! He did not plan. And, by failing to plan, he was planning to fail! He spent his resources, and he saw no results!

So, here is a very important and difficult area for you. How are you going to get this right? Actually, it is even more of a problem if you have already committed yourself. You have made an investment already. You have spent money. You have given up time in your quest to be successful. You have put in effort. But, you still have not earnt anything! What do you do? I suppose you only have 2 choices. Stop and start again, or keep going. It really depends on how convinced you are your current endeavour will end in success.

Here is a formula for you. Let’s pose a number of questions:

1) What will your earnings be when you start in business? 2) What savings can you use in your enterprise? 3) What do you need to live on? 4) How long do you expect it to be before you start earning money from your new venture? 5) What capital do you need to invest in your business? Obviously, if 2 is equal to or greater than 5, you have a head start. And, if 1 is equal to or greater than 3, you do not have too much to worry about. You have the luxury of being able to take greater risks, and wait longer for success to come.

However, if you have no savings and need to invest $10,000, plus have a deficit of $500 per month of income against expenditure, it is a different story. If it takes you a whole year to get into profit, you will be down $16,000. So, thinking about these figures is very helpful, and further reveals the picture of what you are facing.

Energy:

Another resource, as was mentioned earlier, is effort. This is easily overlooked, probably because it is not as obvious as the resources of time and money. Of course, it is related to both of those. Why is it important? For one reason, that if you are putting in effort into your business, there other things that you then cannot put effort into. That is how it relates to time. Very often, if you are putting time into your business, it is taking effort as well!

Allow us a large but important digression at this point. Let’s get the whole thing into perspective. It is not just about use of your resources, but the whole enterprise and endeavour of going into business. Let us get a very clear view of where this sits in the whole context of your life. What could be more important? Allow me to borrow something I heard many years ago, but is still relevant today. About 15 years ago, a friend lent me Brian Tracy’s audio program, “The Psychology of Achievement.” That was a life changing experience listening to those tapes, which are still relevant today!

During his introduction Brian Tracy said that success could be put into 6 categories. Let me list them for you:

1) Peace of Mind.  2) Health and Energy.  3) Loving Relationships.  4) Financial Freedom.  5) Worthy Goals and Ideals.  6) Personal Fulfilment.

Study those criteria for a minute. Can you add to it? It is difficult to do so. What about the order? That is so important. Think about it. If you do not have peace of mind, then what is the use of anything else. At the very least, it is lessened. Think of all the tragic cases of mental illness in some home or institution. What have they got? They might have all their physical faculties. They might have a large, loving and dedicated family. They might have a fortune in personal wealth. But, what is the us of it all? Peace of mind must come first. Mental problems are always very serious.

But, what about health and energy? Alright, to lose your health is not as serious as losing your mind, but it is a big barrier to success. These are the 2 problems that affect people when they are old, losing their mind and losing their health. My Granny lived to be 98 years old. Her body started to pack up part by part, but she was as sharp as a razor right to the end. She could still hold her own at bridge, right to the end. She was a bandit! But, I was very thankful that she still had her ‘marbles’ right to the end. So, mind and body come before anything else. Without them, or even one of them, life becomes a struggle and is painful.

Then, of course, loving relationships must come next. You do not have to have money to be happy, it might help, but it is not essential. Good relations with other human beings easily win over financial freedom. Years ago, my family used to like taking our holidays in France. The population of France is about the same as the UK, but they have about 3 times the land mass. Often, we would rent a little ‘gite’ in the French countryside. What always struck me was the standard of living of the French peasant farmers. They were not rich, they were poor. But, with the warm climate and plenty of land to grow things, they had a ‘good’ life.

So, the order of these categories is very important, and I, at least, think Brian Tracy got it absolutely right. This is so helpful for any of us wanting to go into business. Often the reason is to get financial freedom. We would like to get the point where we do not worry about money. That is to obtain freedom from the financial worries that most suffer from. Of course, it is different for everyone. I expect that most of those French, peasant farmers do not worry about money. They might worry about losing their crops, but that is slightly different.

So, I hope you see the perspective here. Studying those 6 points of Brian Tracy should help you realise what importance to put upon your business. If you lose from the top 3 categories because of it, then you might want to think again. How will your business help you with those top 3 points? That is a very good question, and one that it is hard to answer. Hopefully, you will not be thinking, “Perhaps I had better not start at all.”

If your business helps with the bottom 3, without affecting the top 3, then it is definitely a positive thing.

May you know real, true and lasting success!

Richard Mortimer