Choices: Succeed Or Not Succeed

It’s your choice. You can do exactly what you want to do! 

The mindset we will discuss has always been around. It just seems to have become more prevalent since the Internet dot.com days began seven or eight years ago. Several recent comments by affiliates make me realize the idea which should have gone away when the dot.com bubble burst is still here and growing. The American Dream is still alive. Everyone reading this is a current or prospective entrepreneur who will be in constant contact with entrepreneurial people, and you need to thoroughly understand the realities of Internet business life.

Affiliates often ask for specific instructions about how to make money on the Internet. Through the years, there have been many examples on our own SFI Discussion Board. Some affiliates get very irritated because they can’t quickly begin to earn significant amounts from their online businesses. Among the requests I’ve personally received was from an Asian affiliate who asked how to create an "Automatic Internet Money Machine." Another wanted instructions from those who are actually making a lot of money. This is a frequent request; people want a cookie-cutter kind of 1-2-3 plan to instant riches. 

All anyone needs to know about how to run a successful Internet business is available on the IAHBE and SFI sites. But you must read and absorb the information, and you have to do what they tell you to do. If you choose not to heed the advice you get, what good is it? All the instructions in the world won’t help if you don’t use them! You have to choose whether to succeed or not succeed.

So our success in business, Internet or otherwise, boils down to the choices we make. If we receive a lot of excellent advice, but fail to do what we have learned, we will certainly fail!

The Washington Post queried prominent historians in 1995 about whom they considered to be the most influential man of the millennium. Thirteenth Century Mongol leader Genghis Khan was their overwhelming choice! He brought relative peace to what began as many feuding nomadic tribes. He rewarded loyalty and demanded religious tolerance. He established perhaps the first public education system, opened trade routes, and established communication among many diverse peoples and cultures. 

Urgunge Onon, in The Secret History of the Mongols, says the Great Khan—with only two million people and 129,000 soldiers—made the Mongols rulers of an empire extending from Northern Russia to China on the East, Poland on the West, and Arabia to the South. They did this while living beside much larger and more developed nations like India and China. The Mongols accomplished more because they weren’t restrained by the passive religious beliefs of Buddhism or the rigid discipline of Confucianism. The Mongols were able to think outside the box and, because they were nomads having no country restraints (not even a word in the language for country at that time), the entire universe was their country. They decided to conquer the whole thing! 

Another strong attribute of Genghis Khan is that many knowledgeable historians have called him the greatest strategist of all time. His armies were extremely mobile, capable of covering 100 miles a day for continued periods. Mongols used longbows with a range of 200 yards or more, with a pull strength of 166 pounds! The Khan used intimidation, negotiation, and cunning strategy to subdue his enemies. He would send a small force in a frontal assault while the bulk of his forces went a long way around through impassable swamps and swiftly attacked from the rear or other unexpected direction.

What does this have to do with making money on the Internet? There’s no way anyone can give you a blueprint “one size fits all” way to profit from your business. It’s all available from IAHBE and SFI. Entrepreneurs making hundreds of thousands of dollars each month detail exactly how they are doing it. Other articles explain how to use leads, how to advertise, supply products online and off, and even provide gateway replicating Websites are ready made for you. But you need to have a plan for acting on all these ideas. For example, the Websites furnished are hard to get listed on most search engines; you must have your own domain with a page linked to your free site. Your page needs to have some information a person might want that contains a few key words so the search engines can find you. And just to be able to obtain leads guarantees nothing.

You must act on the knowledge you have been taught about how to use leads.

Reach inside of yourself like Genghis Khan and choose to succeed.

Even with the best leads, be aware most people who use the net aren’t interested in any kind of business. Wordtracker is a well-known key word analyzer program. During the last 60 days before May 12, Wordtracker’s list of most used search terms showed “Paris Hilton” led the list with over 200,000 queries. The only possible terms of a business nature were “simple plan” with 35,000 hits and “jobs” with 24,000 inquiries. Is it any wonder Internet entrepreneurs have trouble identifying and selling prospects?

Money is a factor in the lead and traffic part of your business but less than most think. If you spend money, don’t just dribble it around. Make a plan for at least several months and then spend enough to do some good. I once bought 1,000 inexpensive leads recommended by an opportunity, expecting to get at least one or two affiliates. Four visitors looked at my site in a month with no sales or sign-ups. My follow-ups were all e-mails which is a great problem now. Spam haters have just about eliminated e-mail as an easy way to do business. It is still important for transferring information but most business data you wish to communicate should be on a Website referred by e-mail. 

A better lead solution would be to buy more expensive quality leads and contact them by phone or buy 100,000 or more cheap leads and expect to get no more than one to four signups out of each batch. And you need a large dose of patience! Your target audience isn’t on the same urgent track you are. They will procrastinate, forget they asked for information, and research an opportunity to death. I do this myself. People who over-research miss out on a few wonderful business ideas, but they never ever lose any money on a scam! Their opportunities for finding a successful business at the right time also are much diminished.

A very fine lead system is SFI's Eagle Co-op. Still, it takes time to get the ads going and more time for people to respond. Anyone who has done prospecting or other advertising for any length of time knows people may read an ad months or years later before they reply. This long lead time between information and action is a prime reason your business should be started as soon as you think about it. Once you’ve picked an opportunity, begin at once; you’ll be 50 or 60 before you know it and there seems to be no safety net for anyone anymore. You’ve got to save and get money for your future any way you can as soon as you can.

The point of all this is to emphasize that you have to decide what you are willing to do. As examples here are some opportunities I’ve failed with because of what I was willing (or unwilling) to do:

• Watkins - Two years ago, I became an eager associate of this wonderful opportunity. I was told in great detail exactly what I needed to do, the same very successful things others were doing themselves. Though I still use the products, I failed as a Watkins representative. Why? I was unwilling to do what my great mentors told me to do. I would not spend my weekends at flea markets, I would not canvass door to door, I would not go to or conduct prospecting meetings, and I refused to sponsor home parties. So I made little money.
  
  
• Later, I discovered Pre-Paid Legal Services. I am still a member and recommend this service to all, but I was a failure as a sales associate. After thousands of dollars and many days of training, I never sold anything. I despise appointments and face-to-face selling, so I chose not to do what I had learned to do.
  

That said, I also knew a successful medical doctor and his wife who realized Amway could make them a fortune. He left his successful clinic practice and together they went to every meeting and did everything they were told on a full-time basis for about five years. Now, they do only what they want with no financial worries of any kind. They were in their late 30s when all this happened. They chose to succeed, using the training they had acquired.

Many of those who are looking for a simple success blueprint mention ways they have tried or heard about that seem to make a lot of money quickly. Some of these may in fact succeed, but they require a different set of choices. Here is a brief discussion of some of these so-called “sure-fire money-makers.” Reader, beware...

• Internet gambling. Information on this business is here and here. Be very careful.
  
  
• Online dating has become quite popular with a crowded field. There are some risks to this as well, but I personally have two good friends who are happily married because of a dating service and another who found a long-term soulmate this way. There are many software programs that can help with this business. Get more information here or here.
  
  
• Christian related business plans are becoming very strong. If you can relate your plan to anything Christian you will have a lot of interest. In fact the SFI opportunity popped up on several of the sites I investigated. More information is here.
  
  
• Then there are the extremely risky doubling or cycler programs which seem too good to be true. Read this and choose whether to proceed.
  
  
• The High Yield Investment Program (HYIP) often is mentioned as a sure money maker. You MUST do a Google search as well as serious due diligence using a company like Rainmaker before risking your money.

To summarize this discussion:

• There is no set path to success, only personal choices.
  
• You must acquire the knowledge to enable correct choices.
  
• Forget the non-existent AUTOMATIC INTERNET MONEY MACHINE.
  
• Do what you must to think outside-the-box.
  
• Develop a personal business strategy.
  
• Choose to succeed.