Daily money making activities is about discovering the activities or actions that are earning you the most money and putting them first on your list of ‘things to do.’ My theory is that if you’re focused on getting the money making stuff done, the other things will just seem to get done as a mater of course.

The idea is to resist procrastination and get started doing the essence of you work. This would be called the one principle of a good work ethic, i.e., if you are writing a book, you don’t sit there shuffling papers around your desk . . .  or if you are a sales rep, you don’t just research you product, you get in front of people who are likely to buy from you and you sell the your products.

There is an 80-20 principle I like as well. It’s simply the principle that 20 percent of the things you do are the things making you money and the other 80 percent you could do without. It’s about finding out what your highest 20 percent money making tasks are and spending your time on these jobs. The other 80 percent can be either delegated or completely discarded.

I am talking about simple things such as writing a list of things to do today and then crossing off all but the most important, then rewriting the list with only the top three most important thing on it and doing those. (You can hand the remaining task to someone else to do.) . . . or, if you absolutely need to do the other things, too, set aside one hour of the day to blast through he less important things all in one hit.

Many good sales professionals have a great team working for them who help them keep their calendar booked up with prospective client visits so they do nothing but sell. That’s the environment we’re aiming for. It’s ideal for growth and profit. There’s nothing worse than being scattered between tasks when you need to be focused on the prospect during a presentation.

When you walk into a prospective client’s office, leave everything else outside the door, and I mean everything. Stay focused on what you are doing, if not, the potential client will see you are ‘elsewhere’ and wonder why he or she is not important enough to warrant your full attention and probably go with someone else who does give them their full attention.

Problems are another item that takes away from the task at hand and making money. Try to avoid bringing your problems into the clients office, like I said, leave them outside the door, pick them up on your way out, they will still be there. Hold a meeting with your team to work on the problem; many heads are better than one, if you can’t figure out a solution on your own.

If procrastination is creeping up on you, stop and ask yourself, ‘is this making me money or am I just avoiding something?’ if the answer is you are avoiding something, take a deep breath or go for a short walk, clear your head and get back to work. Stop the procrastination in its tracks, take it away from your desk, stick it in a draw and leave it there until you are ready to deal with it.

Remember the “A” “B” and “C” list of what you should be doing and this should also help you with your ‘Daily money making activities’ and keep you on track.

“Plan your progress carefully; hour-by hour, day-by-day, month-by-month. Organized activity and maintained enthusiasm are the wellsprings of your power”.                 Paul J. Meyer

How is it that some sales professionals hit the mark every time, while others can’t even find the target?

Advances in technology and social networking through the Internet groups, have made advertising an unprecedented and acceptable way to focus their pitch to a select few, namely your prospective clients.

Targeted advertising focuses on specific niches rather than a broad range of interests your potential customer might have. This way, if they know what they are looking for, they will surf right to your website or pick you right out of the phone book because you know your market and you are targeting these specific groups of people, your potential clients.

Say you apply for a credit card. All of a sudden, you get more and more offers for credit cards from advertisers you never even heard of. You’ve been placed on a mailing list or targeted as a ‘more likely purchaser’ of certain items using a credit card then others consumers who have not applied or received a credit card in the past few months.

Of course targeted advertising has been around for years; however, it usually targets small groups of people instead of individuals. If you take out a subscription to a car magazine or a home décor magazine, you will be inundated with offers from car dealerships or home furnishing stores. It’s not exactly “who you are” but rather, “what you are.” What you are is a consumer of home décor or automobiles because you showed interest in these items through your subscription to the magazines.

If there is a specialty magazine for your product or service, first of all, you should be reading it, secondly, you may be able to acquire a list of subscribers from the company. Although, some magazines have a strict policy against distribution of mailing lists, but the names are generated from somewhere, aren’t they?

Things may be changing as new technology in search engines and social networking sites become more sophisticated with information and the possibility of tracking people through purchases and zip codes or phone numbers given at the cash register. Tracking people through their purchases gives the sales professionals an insight into their individual tastes in products and services.

So if you don’t have a website, what would be the easiest way to reach your target potential client? Walk in their shoes, think like they think, do some research. Find out who they are currently doing business with and why. What is your competition doing for them that you can do or offer to do better? What solutions to their problems can you come up with that they haven’t even thought of yet? These are all great questions that will help you hit your target consumer with the right ammunition.
“My advice is to go into something and stay with it until you like it. You can’t like it until you obtain expertise in that work. And once you are an expert, it’s a pleasure.”         Milton Garland