M o n e t i z e

...as much as possible, whenever possible.

I feel part of the issue is that I "know" this from the reinforcement I received last year by finally coming to the conclusion that one of the ways that business reality doesn't care is to understand that if its to be, it's up to me. The "idea" that somehow if you are a good or well-intentioned person and you work hard and do good things, you will somehow or another meet with success relies mostly on luck. In the book "BIG BUCKS" by Blanchard, et al. there is an admonishment about trusting your work and life to luck. It is definitely a must-read.

There is a revealing lesson in holding the assumption that if you build it, they will come. On one hand, you find yourself mesmerized by the "workings" of the assumption: i.e. working hard, doing good things--creating cool stuff! Yet, the other side of the equation is not actively pursued because you think you're taking care of business, when in fact, you leaving business to be taken care of by someone other than you. In fact, you're trusting it to luck!

Most brilliant ideas get monetized in one way or another.

However, the more I have read this week, the more I realize that there are a lot of really ho-hum ideas being monetized and a lot of brilliant ideas that lie in wait...until someone monetizes them. As I write this, I'm beginning to realize that while I know that monetizing is the key issue in reaching a level of freedom and releasing myself from the rat race, I have not integrated it in a way that is aligned with business reality. In other words, I'm not completing the work in such a way that the cash register is ringing. I'm going to quickly identify some steps to monetizing that I think will start to allow the cash register to ring.

First, understand that you may violate business reality!

In the beginning, business reality says that you find a market and you do the following:

Marlon Sanders, a psychologist who has made a fortune on the web, cites a simple formula for creating marketing systems that work!

Target it!

Survey it!

KSL it! (Killer Sales Letter)

Create it!

Test it!

Roll it out!

Notice that create it comes after the first three general steps. Therefore if you work from the creativity point of view as I'm doing (and many other creative types), then I have to realize that about 11 out of 12 of the things I create on average will not be monetizable to any extent in general. Most entrepreneurs and professionals are in the same boat.

Marlon indicates that if you're good and you use the formula above, about 1 out of 7 is the best you can expect to do, if you're a novice and you use the formula, then about 1 out of 12 will yield any return on investment.

Don't skip this point: Only about 1 out 12 of your ideas is monetizable!

I believe this is where creative people fall out of favor with business reality.

You have to follow the principles of business reality. Business reality states that if you want to improve your success rate in monetizing things, then you follow the formula above. You add creativity to the formula ONLY after you have identified a market, surveyed it to identify what that market wants and needs, have written a sales letter using a proven scientific marketing approach and THEN and ONLY THEN do you use creativity to create a product or service that meets that need.

Most of us have it wrong!

The obvious rub here is that in order to be successful we have to align with the universal principles of success. These principles of success are designed to improve the ratio of success to failure. Often they guarantee success if you apply persistence. In other words, if at first you don't succeed, try again. However, this is a trap! If you set yourself up to succeed in the first place, you're going to require a heck of lot less persistence and free yourself from the rat race that much sooner.

If you're interested in learning more, Click Here

Monetize

...as much as possible, whenever possible.