This post is a response to a question that came in from Susan W. from San Francisco, CA, after listening to the telephone seminar, “Becoming Wealthy During Turbulent Economic Times”.
On Tuesday November 25th, 621 small business owners, sales professionals and entrepreneurs tuned in to an 84 minute, information packed, no B.S. telephone seminar on both how to think AND behave in order to maximize their ability to thrive in any economy.
QUESTION: How can I proactively direct my attention towards opportunities that I can learn from or even create on my own?
“Jon, I have never before heard such a convincing case for the value of looking for opportunities – especially during the current down economy…I want to know if you have any further recommendations as to regular actions I can take to make sure I’m focusing my attention in a direction that will allow me to see more opportunities for my business or my team?” Susan W., San Francisco, CA
ANSWER: Jon Berghoff
Susan, great question. Seeing opportunities is about creating “pro-active awareness”. Not just waiting for great ideas to pop up, but actively putting our attention in places where the ideas are more likely to spring from. Then analyzing the ideas to see where they apply..
Pro Active Awareness
Regardless of industry or role, anybody who is serious about pro-actively shaping their own entrepreneurial destiny should be vigilant in knowing what is going on in their industry, trends, patterns, what competitors are doing, what other industries are doing that could be applied to their business, what is being written about in trade publications, local related publications, what their customers think, what they want, etc. These are all areas that upon being looked at individually, could give birth to awareness of an opportunity, but what really makes sense is to look EVERYWHERE, not just one or two places for ideas.
Read, listen to, and expose yourself to every bit of information that relates to your industry or profession, what is working and what isn’t – to not do so is ignorant and a big mistake.
Look at and listen to success stories from inside and outside your business. Make the process of exposing yourself to ideas a regimented, routine activity. Example, I read every issue of Entrepreneur, Inc, Fast Company, Wall Street Journal, Washington Business Journal, cover to cover, with extra “learning time” put aside for books, blogs and E-Zines. My secret weapon is good old fashioned person to person interviewing – mostly over the phone. As designed, my Influence Mastermind coaching programs force me to do so, keeping me up to date on what the mega successful are doing, and how this can help the small business owner.
Application
What I did not talk about on the call, but alluded to when I said, “control your input”, was what to do with the positive input. For example, I routinely analyze the 3 M’s of my marketing funnel to see if I should be tuning (or completely reinventing) my Market (who I am selling to), my Message (how I am getting them to listen), and my Media (what methods I am using to get my message to my market).
My marketing isn’t the only area where I think about applying what I learn, I go through the same process with my sales presentations, my business as a whole, pretty much every area of my life that I am proactively working to grow, including my personal relationships.
Susan, hoping this gives you a path to guide your focus towards finding and creating more opportunities!
Jon Berghoff
Jon Berghoff is the founder of Global Empowerment Connection. GEC has a history of creating sales, leadership, and entrepreneurial success through ‘harmonic influence’ over ourselves, others and the world. Subscribe to Insights on Influence, our free e-zine at www.geconnection.com.
