“And Moses said unto the people, Fear not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will show to you today….”  Exodus 14:13

Believe it or not, there really is a time to stand still — to bring our physical body into a state of peace. Moses wanted the children of Israel to get out of fear and see the salvation that God was about to bring, but first he had to bring them to a place of rest.  Suppose you have a small child who is afraid and is running around the yard in a panic. To help them get control of their emotions, you must not only calm their fear, you need to get them to stop running around and stand still so they can receive the next instruction. As long as they are running around the yard in fear, they will never be able to receive their deliverance.

Try this today. At some point in the day, simply stop what you are doing, bring your busyness to a standstill and commune with the Father. Stay long enough to see His salvation. Experience the exponential impact of bringing your whole spirit, soul and body into alignment with God. Many of you are gripped by fear, paralyzed by depression, riddled with guilt and see no way out. But there is. And it begins with stopping. Stopping your fear. Stopping the continuous motion or activity that keeps you from hearing the still, small voice of God.

And when you have come to a stop… when you have come to the end of yourself and you stand at the precipice of faith, open the eyes of your understanding and see His salvation. See the hope of his calling, the riches of the glory of his inheritance in you and the exceeding greatness of his power toward you who believe. Then lift up your rod (the Word of God) and declare with everything in you the outcome you know God has for you. Fully express with every fiber in your being what you know God wills for you.  Then walk confidently into the future, trusting God to make a way where there appears to be none. This is not theory. I have walked this path and experienced His great deliverance and so can you!

Look to God. Change your self-talk. Declare a different outcome. Set a new expectancy. What have you got to lose? Now, what are you doing that is equivalent to running around the yard in fear? What action or movement is keeping you from coming to a place of self imposed rest so you can see the salvation God has for you? That’s what you need to stop today. Selah.

P.S. On an unrelated but important note, David Johnson of Epiphany Marketing has a very few openings remaining on his calendar for the free 30-minute consultations he offered. If you haven’t heard it yet (or if you’d like to hear it again), listen to last week’s call here and take advantage of this unique opportunity!

Hello Friend,

If you, like so many others, were unable to catch one of the meetings that I held last week with David Johnson from Epiphany Marketing, then I’ve got good news!

For the next few days, you can catch a replay of one of the calls from last week.  We’ve had an overwhelming response from businesses who are interested in filling their pipelines with new leads and prospects, so I wanted to make sure you had a chance to hear the information.

Also, listen closely to the end of the call to find out about how you can get a free 30-minute consultation with David.  You and he can talk all about how you can make sure your future customers find you instead of your competition.

Listen to the replay here.

I hope you enjoy it.  We had a lot of fun doing it!

Blessings,

Michael

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

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!

By now, you’ve been enjoying what David Johnson of Epiphany Marketing has been sharing with us on marketing for several days. Don’t forget our conference calls beginning later this morning. Now here’s David…

Yesterday, we talked about listening to your customers to pay attention to the “why” behind their purchases. Today, we’re focusing more on the “who.” It probably goes without saying that another critical component in getting to know your customers and clients is that you gather as much demographic and psychographic information about them as possible.

If you’re a larger company or if you serve multiple market segments, then you need to compile this data for each of your major product or service offerings. Look at factors such as whether they are businesses or individuals, single or multiple decision-makers, one-time or recurring purchasers, their age, gender, location, background, likes and dislikes, etc. My clients and students use a 16-point questionnaire as a starting point to build a profile of their typical buyer.

The main goal for this is that when you’re working to craft a message that will impact your customers (or future customers) meaningfully, you must be intentional about who you’re “talking” to in your marketing. Your customers will ignore (read: not take action on) your messages that they don’t connect with personally. This seems obvious, but for some reason we tend to get temporarily stupid when we get to this point. Many a potentially great marketing effort has been stymied when the intended audience is left out of the equation. We end up with efforts that are focused on us and not on them - in more ways than one.

I say it often: you are not your customer. I frequently have my clients and students find a photograph that represents their ideal customer, and hang it on the wall. Then we have them craft everything as if it were intended for that one person.

Take some time to look back at your previous marketing efforts. Be honest with yourself and ask yourself how narrowly focused you’ve been on your ideal customer. Notice any trends?

Tomorrow: why it’s so easy to focus on your customer in the 21^st century. Don’t miss it!

Here’s your last chance to get in on today’s conference calls with David and myself. Does Friday work better for you? Choose your best time right away!

Have you signed up for one of the conference calls yet? Details will follow today’s guest content from David G. Johnson of Epiphany Marketing…

So far this week, we’ve focused on you and your identity as a business. Now it’s time to do something every bit as critical and just as important, if not more so: focus on your customer.

Something that continues to amaze me is how easy (and common) it is for businesses to lose touch with their customers and clients. Just as you must know your own identity, you must also get clear on the identity of your customer. This is both harder and easier than it sounds. Customers are diverse, which is why it seems to be a daunting task to keep in touch with who they are. That being said, it is critical to look for and discover the common factors in your customers that are keys to the big question: why are they buying from you?

One of the easiest - and most often overlooked - means of getting to that answer is to very simply ask the question. When was the last time you got a list of some of your best customers and called to ask them, out of the clear blue sky, “Why did you buy?”

Let me guarantee you something. If it’s been a while since you’ve done something like this, you may have some ideas about what they’ll say, but the answers will surprise you. You will learn something. And what you learn will be important.

The fact is, we tend to give lip service to the idea of listening to our customers. Listening to and getting to know them is something that occurs only deliberately and with focused, intentional effort. It’s a lot like a marriage. If it’s going to last, it’s going to take work. Sometimes it’s easier to let customers slip away due to neglect than it is to face the painful fact that they may tell you something that you don’t want to hear. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather hear that thing I don’t want to hear because I asked than by letting them speak with their dollars.

I may have to give up my pet project that is missing the mark. But, when there’s a good match between my identity (which I’m hopefully now clear on) and what the customers are begging for, shouldn’t that be my pet project anyway?

More on this subject tomorrow…

In case you missed my invitation, please join David and me for one of our conference calls tomorrow and Friday. Some of them are already nearly full, so you need to choose your best time slot right away!

My fellow marketplace warriors…
I want to invite a few of you to a special conference call at the end of this week. Let me tell you why and then please let me know if you can make it. As you may know, 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.

A mere 18 months ago…
Our business was dependent on me going out somewhere in the world and doing consulting or training. Product sales were minimal and not much of a focus. The revenues generated through our website were limited to five or six hundred dollars per month. Insignificant. I began applying some of the rainforest lessons to business and it grew substantially. Then we retained on a consulting basis, David Johnson of Epiphany Consulting to really help us establish a long term, reliably growing stream of income using the internet.

Last quarter what used to be less than a couple thousand dollars per quarter, was over $100,000 using the internet. That’s 50-fold increase! Our ranking on search engines has also improved significantly, our number of e-mail subscribers has more than doubled, and many good things are occurring. I know there are many of you who could benefit from his knowledge so I asked him last week if he would be willing to get on a conference call with me and share some of his wisdom and experience with you. He agreed with one stipulation…

He wants to focus his input…
…on folks who have an established business or who are responsible for generating leads or demand for an established enterprise. For example, one of his clients is a specialist in the medical profession who got virtually no business off his website and was skeptical that people would come to him via the internet. But… he was wasting money on ineffective advertising and he knew it. About a year later, over 50% of his patients find him from the internet, due to the help David was able to provide.

David and I have set aside several time slots this Thursday and Friday 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. Get your calendar out and choose your best meeting time now… these calls will fill up quickly!

Today, we continue with guest content from David G. Johnson of Epiphany Marketing.

Yesterday, we talked about getting clear on your identity. Knowing who you are is absolutely fundamental to marketing - no matter what business you’re in. So… what business are you really in?

The Starbucks example is a fun one (thanks for the great feedback, by the way). They definitely sell coffee. They make a variety of beverages. Legal addictive stimulants are in virtually every beverage they make (does anyone really buy decaf?). And they truly create an experience designed to bring pleasure to the senses… to truly entertain. Of course, this is the factor that adds the most value to the commodity they sell and… yes, it’s why people pay more than they have to pay every single day. Starbucks customers are not buying just a commodity. Are yours?

Given that they could key off of any of those options (there isn’t a “wrong” one in the list), do you see the far-reaching implications of their choice? That simple, critical decision will determine virtually everything about the marketing decisions they make. And yet, simple as it is, when you’re working on this for your own business, this step can be one of the most difficult. Why? Because most of us are dealing with some degree of fuzziness about our identity.

If you are fuzzy about your identity… how can your customers and future customers possibly be clear that you are the right choice to meet their needs? Fuzzy logic may be great in mathematics, but in marketing it’s deadly. It’s the difference between nailing the bullseye and missing the target entirely.

Don’t make another marketing decision until you settle this essential question. You’ll get your best results on this work when you pair up with someone outside your business who can serve as a “sounding board.” As my clients and trainees have all heard me say, you can’t read the label from inside the bottle.

Tomorrow: who are your customers?

Don’t miss the upcoming conference call on marketing that David and I will be holding. All the details will be in your inbox shortly!