Before I turn things over again to David Johnson from Epiphany Marketing, I want to make sure you’ve reserved your spot on this week’s conference calls.  They start tonight!  (And for those outside the US… in just a matter of hours!)

Both Michael and I have written recently about the economy.  Obviously it’s been on the minds of a lot of people, and certainly some industries and regions have been more affected by it than others.  Either way, the battle is definitely heating up — regardless of external economic conditions — especially for those of us who are believers and whose work and purpose is about expanding the Kingdom of God and not just “making a buck.”

I’m not certain (although I do have a few guesses) where this notion came from, but somewhere along the way in the Church, we got this idea that if God is “blessing” your life and/or your business, things will be easy.  You’ve probably heard it.  There’s a “flow.”  Things are “smooth.”  Doors open for you.

Listen, friends.  I don’t want to deny the supernatural power of the blessing — not even in the slightest.  But one thing I’ve learned is that while we may have seasons where there is less pressure, the notion that things will be easy is absolute garbage.  Don’t get me wrong — we can and should experience greater levels of peace and greater freedom from stress, especially in our interior life.  And we can walk in confidence, knowing that we are being led by the Holy Spirit and carrying out the purpose of God for our lives.

But take a look at what Jesus said Matthew 11:12.  Here it is from the Amplified Bible:

“And from the days of John the Baptist until the present time, the kingdom of heaven has endured violent assault, and violent men seize it by force [as a precious prize–a share in the heavenly kingdom is sought with most ardent zeal and intense exertion].”

Let’s face it, if God has called you to the marketplace, then you are on the front lines of taking territory for the Kingdom.  That’s where the battle is the hottest.  Be encouraged today that you are operating in a sin-cursed world system dominated by powers that do not want you to be fruitful nor succeed.  There is and there will be resistance — just like swimming upstream.  But friends, we have access to all the resources of the Kingdom, and we can put them to work today.  If the battle is hot where you are right now, remember the “ardent zeal” and “intense exertion” is par for the course in this fight.  All who take territory will do so because of intentional effort at times when it would be easier to give up.  Take a moment and reach out for help from heaven!

Now, I’m not someone who believes that more revenue is necessarily the answer to every business challenge.  But, if you’ve taken a hit because of changes in the economy or in your business, then here’s a fact: you won’t succeed at fulfilling your purpose (in business or otherwise) unless you connect with those who you are called to serve — those who need what you have to offer.  I urge you to join Michael and I are on our conference calls this week so we can share with you some tools to help you do exactly that.

In the meantime: be encouraged!

“In conclusion, be strong in the Lord [be empowered through your union with Him]; draw your strength from Him [that strength which His boundless might provides].” (Ephesians 6:10)

Friends, as you can tell, David is as passionate as I am about advancing the Kingdom.  There are 4 opportunities to participate in this week’s conference calls.   If you haven’t already done so, choose your best time.  We’ll talk to you then!

My fellow marketplace warriors…
Here is the invitation I promised you to join me for a meeting this week.  If you’ve been with us for a while, you’ll recall that we held a meeting with David (whose marketing thoughts you’ve probably been reading recently) just a few months ago and had an overwhelming response.

If you’re a newer subscriber, you may not yet be aware that our mission is to help believers worldwide build successful businesses so they can in turn (with their profits and influence) make a significant and lasting impact on the culture within which we live. How you make that difference is up to you. Helping you succeed in that calling is our privilege and our mission.

20-Fold Increase…
Recently, I was evaluating some statistical information related to our business.  It seems like it wasn’t all that long ago (in fact, it was just a couple of years ago) that I was getting excited about the 1,000 or 2,000 visitors coming to our website every month.  When I saw the more recent information, I found out that we’re averaging 10,000 visitors to our site every single week!  This has been due, in large part, to the efforts of David Johnson from Epiphany Marketing, who we retained just over a year ago to help us expand our reach.

Even more than multiplying the number of visitors, what has excited me is when I found out why they’re finding us… David showed me how to view the terms that people are typing into search engines like Google in order to find us.  Wow!  It’s amazing how well-targeted the results are.  We are connecting more than ever with the people who need what we have to offer.

David wants to share information with you…
…about how you can experience similar results.  And, more importantly, how to apply timeless marketing strategy to every facet of your business so that you’re best prepared to create relationships with the people you are reaching out to.  In fact, David would also like to introduce some of the people he’s been training for the last couple of months so you can hear directly from them about what they’ve been learning.

David and I have set aside several time slots Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to discuss specific strategies to help you experience similar results. This is not for everyone, but if you want to grow your business using 21st-century strategies, you are welcome to join us. Register here now so you can be sure to reserve your spot on one of these conference calls. (As always, we are limited on the number of callers we can have on each conference call, so it’s a first-come, first-served basis.)

Warmest regards…

Michael Q. Pink

P.S. I know you probably checked your calendar previously, but I urge you to choose your best meeting time now… these calls will fill up quickly!

Here’s the next in a series of messages I’ve asked David Johnson of Epiphany Marketing to write for you. I hope you enjoy the thoughts on strategic marketing as much as I do…

Did you ever stop to think about the fact that “marketing” is happening all the time in your business — whether you want it to be or not?  Here’s an example to illustrate what I mean…

Picture yourself walking into a restaurant for dinner with your spouse.  It’s a reasonably nice restaurant with an energetic atmosphere.  There’s plenty of activity… you might even say it’s “alive” with excitement.  You’re looking forward to a nice meal.  After a friendly greeting and a brief wait, you are shown to your table where you sit down to look over the menus.  “At any moment,” you think to yourself, “someone will come by to take our drink order and tell us about the specials.” But you wait…

You chat with your spouse and even comment on how unusual it is for you to wait this long.  10 minutes go by.  A large group at a nearby table is served their piping hot meals.  Everything smells good.  People are talking and laughing and having a good time.  Your stomach growls.  You and your spouse exchange small talk and odd looks as you wonder aloud about the service.  You consider going to find someone to ask about your server, but you don’t want to ruin the evening for your spouse…

Ever had this happen to you?  Isn’t it frustrating?  At that moment when you’ve waited for 15 minutes and even tried to get someone’s attention, what message has that restaurant sent to you?

“You’re not important.”

“We don’t care.”

The business owners reading this are probably getting antsy.  Despite our best efforts, sometimes we inadvertently treat customers poorly and send them the wrong message.  We don’t intend to do it, but it happens sometimes.

This is one example of how we are always marketing in business.  In hundreds, perhaps even thousands of small (and big) ways, our business is constantly sending a message — to our customers, future customers, referral sources, and even partners.  My point — and one that my clients and students will tell you is one that I harp on — is that if you don’t intentionally design this message and execute a strategy for communicating it, then your chances of sending an undesirable one go way, way up.

What message is your business sending?

Registration begins today for the conference calls that David and I will be conducting this week.  I’ll send you a link a little later so you can sign up, but for now, check these time slots in your calendar (times shown in US Eastern Daylight Time — click for your time zone):

• Tuesday at 9pm
• Wednesday at 1pm
• Thursday at 7am
• Thursday at 4pm

Before wealth manifests itself in tangible form, it exists first and foremost in an intangible form. What we see with our natural eyes is a manifestation of something that first existed in an unseen state. The rainforest we see was once a seed we didn’t see. In our lives, everything is “twice created” — first in your mind, then in physical form.  If you go through life only seeing the effect or the outcome but never discern the cause of things, you will live at the mercy or lack thereof of those who see into both worlds and move freely between them.

Wealth is first of all an internal possession. If you don’t have it on the inside, you will never have it on the outside. You can only manifest in life what you possess on the inside. Nothing more. The life you lead on the outside is a reflection of the things you believe and the truths you understand on the inside.

Some years ago in the dead of winter, I took on a new client in small Midwest town. He picked me up in the morning to take me to his office which turned out to be a rundown, clapboard house in the poor side of town. When we walked through the front door, the carpet was thick with dog hair and shredded newspaper. I thought it must be where he kept his dog when it got cold and where he stored his construction equipment. As we worked our way through piles of old newspapers and stacks of magazines we found ourselves in the room he called his office.

He sat down at his desk as I stood awkwardly looking for a chair I could clear off and be seated in. Not finding one and looking intently at him and the disaster that was his office, I asked him a question… “Can I be frank with you?”

He winced as he seemed to know what was coming and replied, “I am paying you thousands of dollars. I expect you to be frank with me.”

With kindness and directness I replied, “This place is a pig sty. There is no point in me helping you bring order to this mess. It’s a reflection of the mess on the inside of you. Unless we deal with the mess on the inside of you first, this mess will just come right back!” He agreed and we left immediately for a restaurant to have breakfast.

We spent the rest of the day at his discretion, identifying the utter poverty and chaos that was on the inside of him. His story was painful and horrific, but completely redeemable. Over the course of our time together, we rooted out the lies that he believed and planted truth in the core of his soul. It was clear by the time I left that he was ready to bring order to his outside world because it had finally come to his inside world. Despite a significant financial inheritance, this man lived in poverty on the outside because that is what he had on the inside. We can only sustainably project to the outside what we consistently have on the inside.

IMPORTANT NOTE: David Johnson has been conducting some top notch training over the phone to a select group of folks who signed up for this in March. The response has been the best from anything we’ve ever done. I’ve asked David to conduct another free teleseminar next week to talk about how this can help grow your business substantially. He will have the input of current students and a lot more new stuff to share.

We will give you all the details you need on Monday’s blog but for now, here are the choices you will have to attend this free teleseminar exclusive to folks on our coaching lists. (If you are receiving this email, you are on that list) All times are listed in US Eastern time, so please click to calculate your local time.

• Tuesday at 9pm
• Wednesday at 1pm
• Thursday at 7am
• Thursday at 4pm

Good morning friends… One of the ways we’ve been getting practical and helping folks grow their business revenue is through the internet. I’ve been relying on David Johnson of Epiphany Marketing for our internet marketing expertise for the last year and the difference has been quite substantial. Our site use to get a few hundred unique visits per week. Now we are in the five figure range each week, and we’re ramping up for quite a bit more in the near future. I’ve asked David to share a few posts with you to give you some practical help. Hope you enjoy!

How to Drive Off Your Customers

Too busy at work?  More than enough revenue?  Here are some ways you can keep those pesky customers and prospects away…

 

#1: Make Sure Your Marketing is All About You
After all… people who want to spend money with you want to understand how your products & services benefit them, so if you focus on you, your company’s history, your features, etc., you’ll be sure to keep people from bugging you.  Whatever you do, don’t use pictures of the people most likely to actually buy from you, and avoid connecting their needs and wants to aspects of your business most likely to appeal to them.  Instead, just subtly communicate the notion that you’re in business for your own benefit and that you really aren’t interested in customers.  They’ll smell this a mile away and bug someone else instead.

#2: Ignore the Web
If your website hasn’t changed since the Clinton Administration, you’re on the right track here.  Even better: no web presence at all!  If you must have a website, make sure it doesn’t show up in any search engines… and whatever you do: don’t add fresh new content on a regular basis!  You should convey to visitors that you might already be out of business just by the aged look of your site.  To support this notion, hire a neighbor’s kid to build it — especially if he/she has no design experience whatsoever.  Websites that have that “we don’t care” feel do wonders at keeping people away.  If you’re still having response from your site, just bury the information that your customers want to find and add some contact forms to your site that do nothing and go nowhere.  If you can get them to generate an error message, it’s even more fun!

#3:  Keep Your Marketing Efforts Unfocused
If people have a clear idea of who you are and what you’re all about, they’re much more likely to pester you.  So, make sure that there’s no unifying theme to your marketing.  Buy ads at random, and always let whoever who sold you the ad design it for you.  This way, all of your ads will come out looking different from each other.  Make sure that your marketing doesn’t target any one type of customer, and stick with the “shotgun” approach.  Otherwise, your marketing might actually connect with someone, and then they’ll show up or call, expecting service from you.

I hope these tips are helpful for you.  We’ll continue this on another blog entry soon.  And… Michael and I will be holding another marketing teleseminar next week!  If you’re already busy enough and don’t want any new customers, don’t join us!  It could be dangerous!!

Michael here… watch your inbox on Monday morning for dates/times for next week’s event!

Hello Friend,

I know that you, if you’re like the vast majority of my faithful readers, are involved in the marketplace and are interested in becoming the very best that you can be at what you do.  I am personally committed — even called — to help you succeed and to provide the very best equipping, training, motivation, and inspiration you need to help you do that.

I also recognize that that calling is much bigger than me.  And over the years God has allowed me to build up some strong relationships with other people who have similar callings but whose expertise and experience are in different areas than my own.

Here’s the Exciting Part…

I want you to know that I’ve been working with my team and we have made a renewed commitment to be the very best source of information, training, and access to resources for your business and your calling to the marketplace as a believer.  We’re going to be stepping things up and increasing the quality and scope of what we offer to you.

But… (and this is absolutely critical) we want you to be involved!  Over the next few weeks, you’re going to have the opportunity to help provide some direction about where things go.  I know that you want to take your business and your success to the next level, and I believe that together you, my team and I can create that result.  So… be on the lookout for this exciting opportunity and be thinking about what you would need to help get you there.  I am very excited about where all of this is going… and I want you to be involved!

Also… watch your inbox tomorrow for a special guest blog entry from someone who is with us on this journey.

Blessings,

Michael

“And Moses said unto the people, Fear not…” Exodus 14:13-14

In our last blog we began the discussion about fear. (My thanks to all of you for posting your faith-building remarks and stories!) Before God would deliver Israel from Pharaoh’s army at the Red Sea, he instructed them to get out of fear. Fear not! That would seem like a tall order because if ever a people had justification to be afraid, it would be them. The night before, every Egyptian family lost their firstborn son. They had endured nine other plagues from the Hebrew God and now the perceived perpetrators, the Hebrews — who had been their slaves as long as anyone could remember (400 years) — had left town with their families and with a bunch of the Egyptian gold, silver and jewels. After a night of intense grief and reflection, they were more than ready to exact their revenge on these defenseless, huddled masses and get their stuff back too!

The Hebrews, well aware of their plight and backed up against the Red Sea with no way of escape could hear the mightiest army on earth racing toward them with swords drawn and blood lust in their eyes. Yet the first thing God told them was, “Fear not.” Before we go any further, let me ask you, what have you been afraid of? How does it stack up against what the Hebrews were afraid of? I’m just asking. This isn’t to say that you don’t have plenty of natural reason to experience fear. It’s to make the point that God delivered them from a very large fear without breaking a sweat and He will do no less for you.

But the first thing you must do is obey His command and, “Fear not!” You see, fear and faith are very similar. Fear believes a negative outcome is imminent while faith believes a positive outcome is in store. Faith comes by hearing the report from God. (Rom 10:17) Fear comes by hearing the report from the spirits of darkness. Faith hears (Gal 3:2, 5) and fear hears. It boils down to who, or what, are you going to tune into?

God is always transmitting His report, His perspective, His answers. But if we are in fear, it means we are tuned into the wrong station — hearing the wrong message from the wrong source — and we can’t hear Him. We must turn the dial over to the faith station, so to speak. We must tune into the report God is giving. If we are in fear, it is evidence that we are tuned into the wrong source and therefore will miss the instruction, the wisdom, the hope that He is transmitting on the faith station.

Think of it this way: suppose there is a category five hurricane bearing down on your town in which there are two radio stations. One is telling the people they are all doomed and the other is directing them to strong area shelters. One station produces fear while the other gives confidence or faith. The one you listen to determines your outcome. When we are in fear, it’s time to change the station. It’s time to change the input we are receiving. We need to adjust our receiver to the Word of God, both the written (logos) and the freshly spoken (rhema). We hold the tuner in our hands and God expects us to tune into His station so we can get the right information and experience the result He has in mind. So, how does one actually go about tuning in to the faith station? What does that look like to you? Please share your thoughts with the community.

“And Moses said unto the people, Fear not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will show to you today: for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them again no more forever. The LORD shall fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” Exodus 14:13-14

This, of course, is from the most dramatic deliverance in human history, yet it applies to all of us in any situation in which we find ourselves needing God’s intervention. I want to draw your attention to a couple of things here. First of all, was the simple yet important statement God begins their deliverance with… “FEAR NOT!” To begin the process of deliverance, God instructs the Israelites to first of all quit being in fear.

One summer as a teenager on three different occasions I saved someone from drowning. One was a baby floating face down in a pool but no one noticed but me. The second was a child, but the third and most memorable was an adult who couldn’t swim. He had gotten into the deep end of the pool and when he realized he was over his head, fear took over and he began flailing and screaming for help, and he began to sink.

I swam quickly over to him and began to pull him over to the side of the pool, but something happened I was unprepared for… His abject, uncontrollable fear caused him to grab me and use my body to keep him afloat, nearly drowning me. With great difficulty, I was still able to keep his head above water and get him to the side, but it was his fear, not the water, that almost drowned him.

Fear can make you lose rational sense. It can also make you completely miss God’s voice, His leading and/or His deliverance. The first thing you must deal with when you need God’s deliverance is fear. Your fear. And according to God, it is within our ability to take responsibility for and to control our fear. We will deal with this subject in the coming days, but today I want to ask you to share with the group how you have overcome fear in the past. It might just be a lifesaver to another reader. Thank you.