Leaving For Las Vegas

Hi, and I hope you all had a nice Christmas.

I'm still recovering and I did't even drink alcohol last night...

For what remains of this week, I will have the new business website up and running AND I will have a proof read and fully finished & published ebook ready for JV partners.

The lack of back end products or even autoresponders is a bit of a downer, but I have an idea involving audio...

I have a rather long todolist for the next few days for a number of reasons - like having committed to completing a number of products by then and to launching this website for my publishing business.

We've created the kind of look and feel we want for the publishing site already and the next step is to create the content for it. And plan the future articles.

The plan is quite clear - I simply have to learn to stick to it!


In summary,
Finish the ebook & package it & find JV partners to work with.

Finish the website, publish it & create the content & plan the future content.

Much like the last few weeks to be honest, but I have decided to postpone the digital niche topic book for my publishing business for a little while until I get this stuff out of the way. And I have other things to get on with as well - niche wise.

And I am going to Vegas in less than two weeks. Got my tickets through just before Christmas and I am staying at Bally's. One week of 6am breakfasts, 12 hour seminars plus networking in the evenings.

I will learn so much in that week it is unreal!!

Between now and then I will have to complete a great number of tasks. I was hoping to have set up my plans for 2005 this week but I'll have a lot of time on the United Airlines flights to and from Vegas so I will at least have the opportunity to think and write on the plane.

Have you noticed how my "next week" plans have begun to include things that need to be completed several weeks into the future?

I'm beginning to think that the planning I have been doing on a weekly basis is helping me reach the next level of planning: medium to long term. I am certainly finding it easier to see how I can achieve something by this summer. For instance. Or even for NEXT Christmas.

But, if you don't mind, for now I'll concentrate on getting this book and this website ready...

Cheers,
Jon

= Every Day in Every Way, I'm Getting Better And Better =

Time To Re-Invent

Right.

This week I am mostly drinking Holsten Pilsner. Well last night I did at the company party.

And this afternoon two people were fired.

I wasn't one of them. And it wasn't because of anything they did. My company just didn't want to pay for their employment anymore.

Anyway. That sort of sets the mood.

Have I progressed this week though? At this point in time, it doesn't feel like I have as my week has not had any structure. I'll use my weak memory to run through the week day by day and we'll see what happened. Trust me, I'll be as surprised as you when we get to the end!

Saturday. As far as I remember I only did my accountability call that day. I can't remember if I did anything else that day so I will assume I didn't. The headaches got progressively worse and I slept for a while in the afternoon. Oh yeah - we went to see Father Christmas and his Huskeys (!!!) at the nearby outlet shopping village. and had an eggnogg latte I think in Starbucks. THAT won't happen again! Overpriced and under quality. And I would never have believed that so many staff members could do so little in such a long time, had I not seen it for myself how 6 people behind a bar can cause such chaos. But I should have believed you the first time you mentioned it in Kickstart Martin!

Sunday we took our son to the companys Santa's Grotto arrangement. I did some research for my accountability call that day I seem to remember, but in the main tried to stay off the computer. I think I registered my blog on yahoo that day to. By tuesday about 20 of my blog pages were indexed. Today: 67 on alltheweb, 66 on yahoo & altavista 65. Msn has been kind enough to index 5 pages.

Google?
whose ads I am showing?

TWO....

So registering your blog on yahoo certainly gets your pages indexed with the inktomi based network..

Monday. Walked in to Fareham again after having seen the GP for my eyes and Thomas'es Eyes in the morning. Or at least I think I walked in to Fareham on Monday. Checked out specs again but there is really no way I can get myself to spend £160 for something I can get for £50 online. Although I want to make absolutely sure I have the right frames before I go and order online. My face does not look good with the wrong type of glasses on. I think I also did some Camtasia video on this day, but I am not sure.

REcorded something on Instant Buzz at least at some point. Also using camtasia to record my actions while I am researching my various projects - and it is of tremendous help! It helsp if, like me, you like the sound of your voice though.

Tuesday?
It's all a blur. Last day before going back to work & I can not for the life of me remember doing anything other than ebay auctions ( sold 3 books on ebay so far ) and monitoring the amazon progress. So far December is proving FAR more impressive than November. I did some more research on the first digital-only title from our publishing company at least but left it early as I was getting worn out.

Wednesday was some more accountability research recorded with camtasia. I didn't do much else. Oh, I checked google and found to my horror that although I am still getting the clicks, the sales have vanished. so I have reduced the max click cost in the hope that it will both reduce the number of clicks and the daily cost.
December last year was like this as well, but I have at least sold for more already this month than what I did in all of December last year.

Thursday was a wasted day. Well for most of the people I was out with as there was a free bar. I was driving and the most I drank was beer with 0.2 % alcohol in it. Even though I asked for non-alcoholic beer. I finally had to leave after the two glasses of Coke started working on my Irritable Bowel.

I was hoping to proof read some books and add content to the digital title. Doubt I did either, but I can't remember! I have an appointment to see an osteopath in the morning tomorrow and then it is off to celebrate my step daughters 21st birthday. So that is the weekend taken care of!!

Monday & Tuesday is a two day course in selling, which will hopefully come in handy one day. And then there is 3 days full of telephone calling getting people ready to close deals. In Norway it is legally forbidden to trade past 3 o'clock and staff must not be allowed to remain on the premises past 4. Only a selected number of bars used to have a special license that allowed them to open up on Christmas eve after 9pm I think it was, but with the increase in the single population, they have relaxed that now. Or maybe abolished it - what do I know _ i haven't lived there for 8 years...

But it DOES mean I MUST

- finish the latest publishing website as we've sent out a press release to the industry rag saying we launch the site on Jan first!
- proof and edit my money book & get it ready for publishing.
- finalise the content to be added to the digital copy of the book ( although this one can wait until Feb to be honest )

Eye Have My cunjunctivitis Glaucoma'ed on you!

How I'm Doing This week:

Been off sick this week. I bet it's just the tension in my shoulders but the GP thinks it's my eyes and the optician thinks it isn't. Although she was concerned with the pressure in one of my eyes. So I bet it's the tension in my shoulders. Or Glaucoma. So it's time to start looking for blindspots in my vision!
And all of this started just because I felt sick with dizziness last Friday.

So It's been an interesting week!
But I am going to have to keep this short, because if it is glaucoma ( tension) then I need to get away from the computer for longer.

Current Goals:
= My Clickbank Money book: One evening a week at least ( up to 3 hours )
= Our Business must grow ( 2 to 3 Evenings a week ) - 6 to 9 hours )
= Succeeding in my new job. It is commission based and I need to focus on getting great.

New things I will TRY to do:

Setup the video conferencing to work when we have Christmas dinner on Christmas eve. Both my brother and I have installed skype and it works a treat. There should be a video conferencing option available, and now we both have broadband, the connection could be quite good!

Things I am Dropping:

moaning. I haven't got time to feel sorry for myself any more. I need to get cracking!

Last Weeks Achievements:
I've launched the ebay auctions for the business. Lots of opportunities there. I have registered my website via my RSS feed on yahoo. I am also getting closer to deciding on what content management tool to use for the websites our business will be launching on the first of January.
My money ebook has not been looked at this week, but I will proff read it tomorrow morning. I am tempted to turn it into an audio thing to be honest. But I have decided to publish it in it's current format and give it away from the related website.
And I got camtasia for £5.99 and recorded my first video with it!
And I got my brother to get skype working. Although I didn't need to do much - it worked straight away!
As I was in Fareham this morning anyway, I decided to try the Martin Avis life style ( aka the Andy Henry Saturday experience ) and spent 4 hours sitting in a coffee shop having a pannini and a grande latte ( there is only two types of latte in this coffee bar: Large or Grande ) while writing up my focus plans in my newly purchased big blue book and then worked on a number of the actions I set myself.
.
.
.
It was the most productive 4 hours I have ever had!
Got a press release sent out to the trade rag just in time to get included in the January issue.
got 6 other possible press releases to work on.
worked on two other actions that would progress the business and help us with our advertising income.
Did I finish al my actions?
Bet your bum I did NOT!
Of the five focus areas ( what a contradiction in terms! and how ironic if I am going blind! ) I only worked on one. And I defined a total of 25 actions.
Critical path analysis? no I forgot to do that!

Next Weeks Targets:

Where do I start?
Well, the job thing is kinda on hold as I am not in the office.
The money book will need proof reading and editing.
This weeks lessons:
Taking breaks is a good thing. Not taking breaks can have consequences far beyond what you think. Like giving you RSI or eye problems.
That's it from me. Time for a rest.

Inspired, Tired & Strangely Empty

How I'm Doing This week:
There will be very little excitement over the next few weeks thankyouverymuch.

I can tell you now that the goals, project and everything else will change very little, if any at all.

There is STILL the small issue of whether I should leave my job in the hope that something bigger and better will come along and replace the income I am currently getting as the only one with a regular salary. I am hoping it may have somthing super highway-esque about it.

So generally, I am feeling pretty fed up, tired, drained but inspired. Perplexing doesn't even begin to describe the emotional state I am in. But at least I keep on moving.

Current Goals:

= My Clickbank Money book: One evening a week at least ( up to 3 hours )
= Our Business must grow ( 2 to 3 Evenings a week ) - 6 to 9 hours )
= Succeeding in my new job. It is commission based and I need to focus on getting great.


New things I will TRY to do:

Still List & Sell the 43 things I have marked for ebay sales. I am also going to launch some sales efforts from ebay that relates to a product from our business. It seems the logical place to try it. and maybe on froogle as well


Things I am Dropping:

Anyone want to help me automate more content creation on my money site? This business takes up so much time I really don't seem to get around to it. The alternative is to drop it, which is a shame as we've put in some good effort getting it out there.

Last Weeks Achievements:

I have finished writing my book!! Now I need to decide what to do with it, or how to publish it. It's never ending this book writing lark!

I created an exercise schedule. Then I ignored it. Someone else recognise themselves?

And don't get me started on my newsletter! I just don't seem to get the time. I know I could put aside maybe 20 minutes a week writing about money. I know I can do that every day. But Now there are so many things to do and so little time to do it in. It's just not important enough to get done.

Our business is humming along. My wife went to an industry fair back in November and our sales on amazon has since picked up quite dramatically. The most selling title used to be on position number 59 THOUSAND on the best selling list. Now it is in the top 5 thousand. Compare that against the 120 THOUSAND new titles published EVERY YEAR and be suitably impressed when I say that that particular title was first printed in 1999. I have also set up google advertising which is directing 3-8 clicks through to our books on amazon every day. I have also set up a campaign that will hopefully send clicks through to our website, although that campaign is on "manual approval" keywords according to google... go figure. I will be setting up an ebay campaign and an ecommerce solution for it. I want to use paypal, but I am having difficulties convincing the CEO that it is better to give people SOME means of electronic payment than none at all.

Yeah. work. Making calls to customers now. Which is suitably amusing. Called maybe 5 customers. 2 of them is interested in doing business on specific projects, NOW. The other three will let me know more about their projects when I ring them back in January. If selling continues to be this easy, I'll be a very rich heart attack victim within the next 8 years.

Next Weeks Targets:

= Proof read & edit the book
= follow exercise schedule
= Complete all assigned business tasks
= moneytips newsletter ( You just HAVE to have one of these perpetual goals on your to-do list. Might as well make it obvious which one it is ;o) )
= pick up my ebay selling again

This weeks lessons:

There is only one thing that stands out for me this week. It relates to the post I made on MArtins forum ( )
and that is that I do not link goals with rewards. If I do all the things I should do with my exercise, what will be my reward? NO Idea! So maybe that's why I don't put so much effort in?

I also need to write down my business goals for myself, as I seem to forget I need to do them until later in the week.