Every day I take a look at the recent posts in the online InfoGuru Support Forum. Here are the kind of things InfoGurus on the Forum are focused on right now:
The ins and outs of tradeshow booths
Advice on tracking incoming ezine subscribers
Mindset of a successful marketer
Recommendations for "pithy" business books
How to get in front of audiences of business people
Search engine optimization strategies
Feedback on logo/tagline
Consulting retainer do's and don'ts
Fear, reluctance and procrastination
Quick audio expert question
Poll: HTML in your email newsletter
So far there hasn't been a topic or question that doesn't get half a dozen or more responses. In fact 20 or 30 are not unusual. Some, such as John Williamson, Sean d'Souza, David Feller and Geoff Bryan (our most stalwart Forum contributors), often give several pages of ideas, feedback and resources.
What's my point?
Getting the information you need to market your services is not the problem. It has never been the problem and will never be the problem. The answers are out there, readily available and actionable.
Books, manuals, teleclasses, eZines, online discussion groups, forums and, of course, Google. You name it. You can find the answer you want, often in a few minutes.
But if that's the case, why doesn't everyone have as much business as they can can handle? After all, with a little research, you can find the ideas, resources and how-tos you need and apply it to your business.
Can't you?
You'd think so, but au contraire. No matter how much information we have, we tend to get stuck in putting it into action.
This past week I led my new MAPP Program in a large professional services firm. Half a billion big. The division I worked with was doing $100 million in sales and not making a profit.
They had all the talent, information, resources, and ideas they could possibly want to help them figure out how to be profitable. But they weren't. They were struggling. And they really had no idea why.
The first part of the MAPP Program is about paradigms and how they limit us. We all have our own limiting paradigms. In marketing it's things like "Marketing takes too much time," or "Marketing myself is an interruption," or "I'm just not the marketing and sales type."
Sound familiar?
Organizations, like individuals, live within their own limiting paradigms. This organization had an interesting one: "It is what it is." Sounds pretty innocuous, but what that meant was that nothing could change or improve. It was just the way it was. Forever.
The resignation in the room was palpable. Any initiative to make changes within this paradigm was bound to simply produce more of the same. Efforts to improve profitability weren't going to come out of this old paradigm.
Remember the Einstein quote: "No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it." Another way of putting it: "No problem can be solved within the paradigm it was created inside of."
In the InfoGuru Forum today, I read a post by George Huang who dramatically turned his business around. He went from someone with an allergy to marketing to someone who is addicted to marketing (his words).
Essentially he shifted his paradigm:
"If I could boil the shift in my marketing mindset down to any one thing, it would be the shift in my being that led to a shift in my thoughts and feelings about marketing, which in turn led to a significant shift in my actions and results."
In the MAPP Program the firm shifted their paradigm from "It is what it is," to "We work together to make it right." It wasn't a slogan or an affirmation, it was the expression of a new reality. By the end of the program, this paradigm was being expressed through a new level of participation, cooperation, commitment and action.
What paradigm do you have to shift to take your business to the next level? What thoughts or attitudes are currently limiting you? What negative things do you keep saying about marketing? Where do you feel stuck, hopeless or frustrated?
Identifying the paradigm is the first thing, and the second is realizing that the paradigm or mindset is not YOU. It is not real. It is simply a creation that you bought into, and that has shaped you.
The rest is pretty easy. I ran my group through the five questions of Byron Katie's Work and the shift happened very quickly.
1. Is this paradigm true?
2. Can you absolutely know it's true?
3. How do you react when you think that thought (or think from
that paradigm)?
4. Who would you be without that paradigm?
Now turn the paradigm around (create a new, more empowering one).
With a new paradigm to work from you'll discover that business and marketing ideas come easier. It will be less of a struggle to implement what you already know. And you'll have fewer barriers to getting the information and resources you need to produce great marketing results.
Paradigm shift anyone?
The More Clients Bottom Line: More information isn't the key to success in marketing. That information is everywhere and easily accessible. You've got to apply it. But you may find that application is a struggle if you're living from a paradigm that says, "Marketing is a struggle." Change your paradigm and end the struggle.
What limiting marketing paradigm are you stuck in? Please share on the Blog.
Learn about the new MAPP Program.
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
;)
Posted by: Hippolytus | July 16, 2007 at 05:18 PM
Thank! Cool Site! The Best!
;)
Posted by: Boleslava | July 12, 2007 at 05:33 PM