Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Planning for 2015


"Commitment is different. It's different than a goal or a dream or a wish or even a plan. Commitment is done. Complete, already, in your soul. Finished. It's something that you can count on and the world can count on. You are committed. As far as human power goes, it's unlike anything else in the world.

 It's what we can count on from you. Not what we're hoping for."

 - Steve Chandler

Over the last few weeks I have been meeting and working with clients on their Strategic Planning Process Documents for 2015 and Q1. We have been reviewing Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Trends/Threats. The Strengths don't change that much, but it feels great to see some of the Weaknesses come off the list. That is why I do what I do - to hear them say "no" when I ask if it is still a weakness, and they take it off their list. Progress and results - that is the payoff for committing to executing the plan.


I then always ask them what one or two Big Things they committed to and accomplished in 2014 that had the biggest impact on their business. Again reinforcing the results that have been attained by focusing on some big issues, committing and working on their business versus working in it.

Now we come to planning for the New Year. Prior to meeting, I have them complete their Destination Postcard for 2016. This concept is simple but powerful. Imagine you are sitting down on January 1, 2016 and writing a postcard to yourself about how 2015 went. The goals you achieved, the 2-3 Big Things you accomplished that made the business better. How do you feel about it? What does your day, your week look/feel like?  This is then kept on their desk for the whole year to remind them of the commitment they have made to make that postcard become reality.  

Next we review the goals for 2014 and the actual results, and set new goals for 2015 from the postcard they did last year.

Remember - commitment to these goals, actions and plans means they are done, you will do whatever it takes to make it happen.

Here is to your 2015 - commit to some planning of your own and complete your destination postcard. If you want to review it with someone, please send it along to me and I'll call you back and provide my thoughts and questions. A gift and a commitment from me to you.

All the best, 
Rick Wallace 

Tuesday, December 23, 2014

2014 Awards- Making the Biggest Impact for My Clients

"You will be the same person 5 years from now except for the people you have met and the books you have read."

- John Wooden, Basketball Coach

"Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young."  

-- Henry Ford, Industrialist

We usually have some down time over the holidays - what better time to take an hour here or there and "keep your mind young"? Question some long held, false beliefs about how things are supposed to be done and learn better, proven ways to do things. Here are my 2014 recommendations that have had the biggest impact on my clients this year.

Here is a start -
  1. The book Simple Numbers by Greg Crabtree is the best and easiest to follow guide to growing your profits by looking at, tracking and leveraging two key numbers.
  2. Watch this presentation on "Always be recruiting" . Learn the power of having A Players in every position and having a virtual bench to go to when you need a replacement for the team.
  3. Watch this presentation on the difference in Coaching vs. Managing, and the impact it will have on you and your team.
  4. Watch this presentation on pay for performance and getting all of your employees thinking like an owner.
  5. Watch this video on the power of content/information marketing, by an attorney of all people, who has experienced tremendous growth by sharing relevant information with customers and prospects.
  6. Watch this presentation on managing your priorities, your actions, because you can't manage time.
  7. Lastly, read the book Essentialism. It is all about focusing on the essentials in your life and career (the rocks) and letting the pebbles fill in the gaps.

I hope you learn a lot and keep learning, and yes, stay young.
All the best, 
Rick Wallace 

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Tired of Being "Let Down" By Others

"Don't try to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed, but people must be lead (coached)."
- Observation from Ross Perot

Of all the concepts I have worked with clients on, this one has the biggest effect on their lives and businesses. All it takes is a small shift in your thinking, and taking a minute to sit down with someone and discuss what it is you want done, get an agreement of what you will do, and what they will do. You cannot manage people, but you can manage agreements. Read on and listen at the end to a short audio to further explain.  

From Steve Chandler:
You have two choices in your relationships with others. You can have relationships based on expectations, or relationships based on agreements.

Expectations are cowardly and self-defeating. They are cowardly because by expecting things of others I place all responsibility outside of myself. I expect my co-worker to do his job right, I expect my family member to behave a certain way, and the list goes on. When I am unhappy it's because of them. Expectations lead to disappointments. It's a miserable life expecting so much of others and suffering so much disappointment and betrayal.

There is a happier, more creative way ... a way that is both effective and spiritual at the same time, and that's a life of NO EXPECTATIONS. If something isn't happening, I create an agreement.
  

Agreements are courageous and creative. They honor the other person. They are co-authored between two composers of the agreement. People give their word and keep it. People honor agreements to a far greater degree than they live up to expectations. They feel stressed when your head is full of expectations of them. They feel pressure and resentment. They rebel. (Ever notice? Do you have children? Do you have employees?)
  

But create a good agreement? Both sides win. It's like writing a song together, like Lennon and McCartney writing together...."and, in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make."
  
Powerful way to coach and lead people.


All the best, 
Rick Wallace 

Tuesday, December 9, 2014

Asking For Help

 "Bottom line: if you show a genuine interest in learning about how others became successful, you can open up a world of opportunities."
-- Armstrong Williams, Political Commentator

"The recipe for perpetual ignorance is: Be satisfied with your opinions and content with your knowledge."
-- Elbert Hubbard

From Steve Chandler:
The paradoxical power of setting your ego aside and seeking help is that it suggests strength, not weakness. It means you are committed to an outcome. Most people are not fully committed to success, they are only committed to looking good in the eyes of others. They may be somewhat committed to making a living, but that's a completely different thing! If you are only committed to making a living, then that's the most your career will ever do for you. It will only give you a place inside of which you can TRY TO MAKE A LIVING.

But is that why you go to work? Wasn't there a bigger idea than that? Didn't you find your career or start your business because you saw the possibilities of having a great life, full of freedom and joy? When you finally commit to success (to building a life rather than making a living), you will get lots of help. It's as simple as that. (And the very fact that you are reading this message will tell you that you are already reaching out in that direction and therefore truly committed to success.)

In all walks of life, you can tell whether someone is committed to something by whether they are getting help. Whether they are reaching out, free of ego, free of pride (and the paranoia that comes with pride) and connecting with someone who can help.

Of course I couldn't have said it better, because I know how true it is. Seeking help, through books, webinars, workshops, mastermind groups or coaching is the only way to get unstuck, to stay young, and to really succeed. As the great basketball coach John Wooden said, "You will be the same person in five years except for the people you have met and books you have read."

Take action now and reach out for help, it is a strength.

All the best, 
Rick Wallace 

Tuesday, December 2, 2014

He Gets It - Do You?

 "Some people have thousands of reasons why they cannot do what they want to, when all they need is one reason why they can."
-- Willis R. Whitney

Jacob Sapochnick, Attorney
Who the heck is he? Well, John Assaraf, Author of The Answer, introduced him to me via a video the other day. John uses Content/Information Marketing techniques with the best of them. I get a weekly TIP from him, like I do from Seth Godin, Vern Harnish, Steve Chandler and several others. They practice content marketing, giving away free information, slowly becoming authorities in their markets. I have been working diligently to convince clients that we all need to be serving vs. pleasing (selling). This sharing of information, creating a hub or platform for sending it out, and putting it on your website will create a great stream of leads and new customers, while serving the customers you have.

Marketing has changed and you have to change to get the return on the dollars you spend.
Watch this 16 minute video with Jacob on how he has built a large, growing law practice which has double and tripled in size each year as he has employed this strategy. Maybe not all of the tactics are something you want to do but the strategy - building a hub, sharing information everywhere you can and serving not selling - will work for you too. He talks about trust and giving everything he knows away for free and how that generates new business every day. It works -just listen to what Jacob has to say. 
 
What One Lawyer Did Differently To Get A Massive Amount of Leads & Sales
What One Lawyer Did Differently To Get A Massive Amount of Leads & Sales
 
All the best,
Rick Wallace

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Pleasure Vs. Happiness

"Don't mistake activity with achievement."
- John Wooden 

Have you ever noticed how we get such pleasure in doing the urgent all day and mixing in the pebbles (the small things) on our "to do" list? The pleasure we get from putting out that fire, answering employee questions, scratching through that small to do - sound familiar?

Notice I used the word pleasure. Too often people confuse that word with happiness. They are entirely two different things. Pleasure is all about the short term. We get pleasure from eating a nice warm donut. We get happiness from being active and eating right and staying in shape.

We get pleasure from being busy, knocking off those must do's. How often do you look back on your day, your crossed off lists and unhappily say to yourself, "Did I really accomplish anything today"? You might be thinking, "I never got to the Rock, the big thing I needed to do". We get happiness from working on the big things (the Rocks), the essential things that will keep us energized, passionate, and fulfilled.

We put off the big things until we don't feel like doing them or try to fit them in and procrastinate.

So think about it for tomorrow morning. Do the big things first (the Rocks) while you are the most energized and in a good mood.

Steve Chandler:

"Know ahead of time what the Big Thing is.  Set it up to be TAKEN OUT WITH MASSIVE UNSTOPPABLE ACTION while you are at your most resourceful and energetic.  That is the ultimate source of a person's professional happiness...the feeling of accomplishment you get when you take out the big thing!

 The look on your face alone will motivate others to follow you."
I might add, it will also give you a tremendous amount of energy to take on the rest of the day, and at the end of the day you will be happy with what you got done. Put the Rocks in the bowl first, the pebbles will all fit in.
 


All the best,
Rick Wallace

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

The Rabbit Is Not Real

"If you don't design your own life plan, chances are you'll fall into someone else's. And guess what they might have planned for you? Not much."
-- Jim Rohn, Motivational Speaker

My guest blogger this week is Michael Neill whom I met at a coaching school with Steve Chandler in 2007.

Over the years, each one of these stories has helped me to step back, slow down, and enjoy my days more than ever before...

1. On Best-selling authors and Billionaires

True story, Word of Honor:

Joseph Heller, an important and funny writer
now dead, and I were at a party given by a billionaire
on Shelter Island.

I said, "Joe, how does it make you feel  to know that our host only yesterday may have made more money than your novel 'Catch-22'
has earned in its entire history?"

And Joe said, "I've got something he can never have."

And I said, "What on earth could that be, Joe?"

And Joe said, "The knowledge that I've got enough."

Not bad! Rest in Peace!

2. The Reverend and the Greyhound

I suspect it didn't happen quite like this, but I'll let Dr. Fred Craddock share a surprising encounter he had with an old greyhound dog his niece had recently adopted...

I said to the dog "Are you still racing?"

"No," he replied

"Well, what was the matter? Did you get too old to race?"

"No, I still had some race in me."

"Well, what then? Did you not win?"

"I won over a million dollars for my owner."

"Well, what was it? Bad treatment?"

"Oh, no," the dog said.  "They treated us royally when we were racing."

"Did you get crippled?"

"No."

"Then why?" I pressed.  "Why?"

The dog answered, "I quit."

"You quit?"

"Yes," he said.  "I quit."

"Why did you quit?"

"I just quit because after all that running and running and running, I found out that the rabbit I was chasing wasn't even real."  
3. The Rich Man and the Beggar

Many years ago, a man was sitting in quiet contemplation by a riverbank when he was disturbed by a beggar from the local village.


"Where is the stone?" the beggar demanded. "I must have the precious stone!"

The man smiled up at him. "What stone do you seek?"

"I had a dream," the beggar continued, barely able to slow his words to speak, "and in that dream a voice told me that if I went to the riverbank I would find a man who would give me a precious stone that would end my poverty forever!"

The man looked thoughtful, then reached into his bag and pulled out a large diamond.

"I wonder if this was the stone?" the man said kindly. "I found it on the path. If you'd like it, you may certainly have it."

The beggar couldn't believe his luck, and he snatched the stone from the man's hand and ran back to the village before he could change his mind.

One year later, the beggar, now dressed in the clothes of a wealthy man, came back to the riverbank in search of his anonymous benefactor.

"You have returned, my friend!" said the man, who was again sitting in his favorite spot enjoying the peaceful flow of the water before him.  "What has happened?"

The beggar humbled himself before the man.

"Many wonderful things have happened to me because of the diamond you gave me so graciously. I have become wealthy, found a wife and bought a home. I am now able to give employment to others and to do what I want, when I want with whomever I want."

"For what have you returned?" asked the man.

"Please," the rich beggar said. "Teach me whatever it is inside you that allowed you to give me that stone so freely." 

This week, do your best to enjoy your life and everyone in it. You have enough. The "rabbits" you've been chasing aren't real. And there is something alive inside you which will make your life richer than the wealthiest beggar in all the world.

Have fun, learn heaps, and happy exploring!


- Michael

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

But What Do YOU Do?

 "You can't be in the parade and watch the floats."
- Tony Beets, Gold Miner

For Business Owners, Management and Coaches:

From Seth Godin:
"Do you make your own paper? Do you start with wood pulp and mix and bleach and set and produce the sheets you use? My guess is that you save time (and a lot of money) and just go to Staples and buy a ream or two.
The theory of the firm shows us that when people work together in an institution, they are able to produce more than if they work separately. Pareto optimality makes it obvious that if one person mixes the dough while the other bakes the loaves, they'll get more done than if each did the whole job.

This explains one reason why big companies keep getting bigger. They gain economies of production and marketing as they specialize their workforce.
But what about the small enterprise, the freelancer, the soloist?

The web now makes just about every task outsourceable with a click. Not only don't you have to make your own paper (or hire a paper maker) but you can have someone process payroll and bills, design a website, answer customer calls, schedule appointments and a thousand other things you used to need to do on your own.
Which leads to the key question: When you can outsource everything, what do you do? When you can choose the kind of value you create, you are also choosing what you're going to outsource and what you're going to do yourself.

Here are three reasons to do something as part of your work, from worst to best:

  1. Because you are the cheapest available worker. Because you need to do something, and it's more profitable for you to do this task than to pay someone else to do it. Because you can't find something more beneficial or profitable to do.
  2.  Because people (clients) will notice when you do it. That might mean that they notice your presence, or they notice the unique nature of what you create (your art) or they will notice that you've learned something doing this when it leads to you doing something great later on. Mario Batali doesn't cook for 99% of his customers (physically impossible), and they can't tell. And he doesn't design 99% (or 5%, I have no idea) of his recipes, ecause we can't tell. In fact, the only thing people can tell is that it's him on the TV, and that his decisions are guiding what his organization does next.
  3.  Because you love it. Because the work matters to you, and this task, right now, is the best version of the work you can find.
Every time you hire yourself to do something (make paper, pay a bill, change a logo design), you've just decided not to do something else instead.

The first step: your job is to make decisions about what you do. And my guess is that what you do is make decisions."

Focus on the Essential things, the right things. The things that will add the most value to your company and not the comfortable things, the easy things, the reactionary things. Delegate or outsource those things.
All the best,
Rick Wallace

Tuesday, November 4, 2014

Pay Attention - Grow

"If I have an area of the business I want to improve I simply set some goals and begin measuring and posting the numbers to the team every week and it gets better. "

- Keith Koetting - Owner North Texas Sales and Distribution

 
From Steve Chandler:

"It will become amazing to you, your client or friend can increase whatever she wants in her life if she only remembers to pay attention.  She "pays" attention because she "invests" it.

My friend Jim Blasingame hosts a popular nation-wide radio show called The Small Business Advocate.  He recently told me that the first year he was on the air with his show he directed all of his attention to the worries and problems of the show......and the show really struggled.  The next three years he began to pay more and more attention to the audience....and the audience grew!  Whatever he put his attention on would grow.

Anything you pay attention to expands.  It grows.  Pay attention to your house plants and they grow.  Pay attention to your favorite sport, and your passion for that sport grows.  Attention is like that.  Anywhere you point it, the object of that attention grows.

When you have conversations with people who are struggling, you will notice that their attention is fastened on problems and obstacles. If you want to help them, your work will be easy. Shift that attention to the goal - e.g., shift it to the customer."

As a business owner pay attention to ONE BIG THING a quarter. Inventory, Customers Acquisition, Virtual Bench, A/R, whatever it is, set some KPI's or goals then decide on 3-5 Rocks (Projects, Actions) that, when executed, will return big dividends from the Attention you Paid to them. Then measure and track progress of those goals and Rocks in your weekly Huddles. The results will astound

All the best,
Rick Wallace

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Save Cash Instead of Saving Taxes This Year


  "You can only build wealth with "after tax" income."
- Craig Crabtree

 
From Craig Crabtree, author of "Simple Numbers":

Every business owner knows the drill; we made a profit this year so we need to spend our cash to save on taxes. I want to challenge you to think differently this year to "save cash" not "save taxes."

The inherent flaw in spending your cash is that you have to spend a dollar to save 40 cents in tax. Last time I checked, that just seems like a bad idea. Every year, you come up with every excuse to go ahead and spend money that you think you would have spent anyway. You buy new computers, you buy some extra supplies that you always use, buy a new vehicle because you heard you can "write it off."

My argument is that if you did without all of those costs up to December, maybe you did not need to spend it after all! My most successful entrepreneurs spend a dollar at the last possible moment it is needed.

Build Wealth or Save Taxes?
You can only build wealth from "after-tax" income, so every attempt to lower your taxes lowers your ability to create wealth. The number one key performance indicator of wealth creation is "how big of a check did your write to the IRS." If you did not write a big check, you either cheated or you did not make any money, both are bad. Do not pay more taxes than you should, but you should be focused on building wealth above savings taxes.

What if I am Cash Basis? For those of you who are cash basis businesses, you can easily fall into the trap of draining your cash paying off vendors at year end. While this seems enticing, you eventually take it to the illogical extreme and have such a huge amount pushed forward it causes you to make sloppy decisions at year end. Here are just a few of the issues that you could encounter:

  • Bank financing - Your year-end financials are more important than ever these days. By focusing on taxes instead of good business fundamentals, you distort your balance sheet at year end and spend the next year explaining why your balance sheet looks bad at December so you can get your line of credit or bonding renewed.
     
  • Missed Opportunities - Because you dumped all of your cash in December, it takes longer than you think to build it back in January and February. By not having cash available to start new projects, you delay or miss out on new opportunities. To delay acting on an opportunity wastes a day of potential productivity that can never be recovered.
     
  • "Deferring Taxes" versus "Saving Taxes" - Did you really save taxes or did you just defer them? Be honest with your language when you spend your year-end cash. It is not saving taxes unless you are saving at a high rate this year and you pay a lower rate in the future. Not likely to happen. Most entrepreneurs defer taxes at year end and push their rates down into the lower brackets to end up paying at a much higher rate in the future when they have kicked the can as far down the road as they can.
     
  • Borrowing money to finance that year end equipment purchase - This is the ultimate tax trap. You borrow $100,000 to buy that new piece of equipment (that could have been delayed) and you end up taking the expensing election on the equipment. Inevitably, this purchase pushes you down into the 20% or lower bracket. The only way to repay debt is to make after-tax profit. To make enough profit to repay the loan, it pushes you into the higher brackets and you end up paying close to 40% tax to generate enough cash flow to get out of debt (if you are lucky). The politicians (and most tax advisors) are not doing you a favor to trap you into this bad decision by calling this a tax break.

Please heed Mr. Crabtree's advice - especially the part about kicking the can down the road. Saving on taxes this year by buying non-essential things or incurring non-essential expenses only costs you more and pushes the inevitable down the road.
Don't make financial decisions about your business or your personal finance based on avoiding taxes. You can't build wealth unless you pay taxes.

 
All the best,
Rick Wallace

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Pay Attention

From Steve Chandler:

This I mean to remember: whatever I pay attention to grows. 

That's why they call it "paying" attention, it operates like a money investment. 

If I pay into a certain stock, by investing in that stock more each month, my holdings grow.

If I pay attention to my worries, they grow. I become more worried. 

If I pay attention to my opportunities, they grow. I see more and more and bigger opportunities, because that's what attention does. It grows things. So, if I want more of something (anything) I need to pay more attention into it.

The only thing that would throw me off the road to success is this:  Distraction.

Being distracted all day.....all those things that clamor for my attention! They want my attention....so I don't really pay much of my attention during the day to my major Want in life...why? My attention was called away by other things.  

So the final determination of my success is this: does my attention get called away from me?

Or am I the one directing it?

In the end, that's what decides whether a large success in any area will occur. Who's in charge of my attention?

Another way of seeing this: 

 "The law of your mind is no respecter of persons. The law indicates that what you think, you create. What you feel, you attract. And what you imagine, you become."
- Joseph Murphy
 AND THIS:

 "When I open my eyes in the morning I am not confronted by a world, but by a million possible worlds."
- Colin Wilson

All the best,
Rick Wallace

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

The Choice

"Whatever you focus on grows."
"Winners focus , losers spray."
- Steve Chandler

A new study by Gazelles reinforces what we all know, but most of the time forget or ignore. Plus, some additional information we were not aware of:
"Executives who have four or fewer priorities on their dashboards in a quarter achieve strong results. But when an executive is loaded down with six or more priorities, only two get done well and the other four or five or more are not completed."
 
In other words, there is a tipping point where it is not just one or two Rocks that don't get done, but we are ineffective across the board because of lack of focus. What is more striking is that we are not aware of which ones will not get done. Thus we are better off narrowing the list down up front and following my favorite saying:
Success = Doing the right things, in small amounts,
over a long period of time.

Choose your Rocks well or fate will choose for you.

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Say Yes to No

 "You have to decide what your highest priorities are, and have the courage - pleasantly, smilingly, non-apologetically - to say NO to other things. And the way to do that is by having a bigger YES burning inside."
- Stephen Covey
 
From Steve Chandler:

If I am traveling on a plane to New York today, and I must be at the airport early, it is no problem saying NO when people request my time. Why aren't my own personally chosen priorities my Rocks --- my burning YESes that I declare and write down in the morning --- as strong a reason to say NO?

"Saying No is uncomfortable for a few minutes or an hour, but saying YES can be uncomfortable for weeks, months and even years"
                                    - Greg McKeown, author of Essentialism

In short guys, the only way to reduce the stress and truly follow your path to success is by saying no to things that are not essential and committing to focus on the things that are.

Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Horses, Sweet Potatoes and High Prices

"The oats are always cheaper after they have been through the horse."   
- Zig Ziglar

 
I have always loved this quote and I remembered this article from a while ago that provides some insights into how to overcome the price objection. It is not your prospects fault for being too price sensitive. It all starts with you and how you convince them of the value of what you are selling. What about the sweet potatoes? Read on.

3 Ways To Head Off Complaints About High Prices
By Howard Jacobson
October 24, 2012


If your prospects are too darn price-sensitive, stop blaming them. It's your responsibility to educate them about the difference and value of your stuff. Use these common-sense techniques to do just that.

Yesterday I spent three hours as part of a volunteer "Crop Mob" at a local farm, helping to bring in the sweet potato harvest. I learned a lot about farming, but the most significant lesson had nothing to do with growing or harvesting. My main thought was: "Sweet potatoes are a damn bargain at the farmers' market. I don't care how much they cost, the farmer didn't get paid enough." Once you realize how much work goes into them, lots of things seem like a damned bargain.

What Don't You Get Paid Enough For?

What goods or services do your prospects and customers take for granted? Which ones get the most price resistance? If you find yourself constantly competing on price or justifying your prices, you've got a buried sweet potato problem.

If your prospects walk past the overflowing baskets at the farmers' market or farm stand, perhaps they just aren't educated enough to know the intense work and costly inputs that go into producing that bounty. So they wonder why it isn't cheaper.

As you can imagine, a farmer working his ass off to bring in $24,000 a year can get pretty upset by an upscale suburban professional who just got out of a Lexus SUV professing shock and outrage at sweet potatoes at $3 a pound.

But it's the farmer's responsibility, not the consumer's, to make the value clear.

What's Your Big Difference?

If you offer a premium product or service, then it's even more important to educate your market about the differences. After all, I can get industrial genetically modified sweet potatoes, loaded with pesticides and herbicides and synthetic fertilizers, for about 79 cents a pound at my local Kroger.

But the organic, pesticide-free, sustainably grown heirloom sweet potatoes available from my local farmer cost four times that. Until yesterday, I wasn't all that clear on the reasons.

Now I see how much effort goes into preparing the beds with hand tools and small tractors. Into propagating the slips ("seedling vines") in greenhouses. Into planting the beds. Into laying and monitoring thousands of feet of drip irrigation. Into protecting the growing plants from flea beetles, hornworms, leafhoppers, weevils, and rats. Into gently digging the beds to assess growth and harvest readiness. Into checking the weather hourly in fall to be ready in case of frost. Into digging out the harvest (or marketing to volunteers to help--and there weren't that many of us!).

Now I'll pay that sweet-potato premium gladly.

Three Ways to Communicate Value
How can you invite your customers and prospects behind the scenes, so they can vicariously experience and appreciate the efforts, costs, and sacrifices that go into the quality of your stuff?

You don't have to literally engage your prospects in your work. But there are plenty of ways to demonstrate that your prices are fair.

1. Demonstration of Difference

Joel Salatin, lunatic farmer, shares his blow-by-blow sales technique at his local farmers' market, displaying his eggs and chickens side by side with industrially produced eggs and birds.

The visual of the brightly colored yolk and the tactile experience of the firm flesh enable Salatin to make his point that his animals are healthy, and so eating them is better for your family.

How can you demonstrate the difference between your premium products and services and the competition's shortcuts?

An accounting firm can anonymize and post two sample returns for the same household, showing the one done by their accountants generated 30% more deductions.

A tree service website could show videos of the owner meticulously taking care of his chain saw, using old fashioned Oregon chain saw files that are no longer in production.

You can post video and audio testimonials of clients telling their stories of how you went the extra mile for them.

2. Supply Chain Transparency

When the late, great Tom Hoobyar was selling valves to the pharmaceutical industry, he knew a lot was riding on the performance of those valves: Millions of dollars of pharmaceutical gloop in giant vats could be lost if a valve failed.

So he created a slide show that he called "The Odyssey of a Valve" that followed a hunk of metal from its birth inside an open pit mine to its final shape as a highly machined, highly polished, highly tested valve. (You can find the slide show here.)

Anyone watching that is filled with confidence about the manufacturing process, and clearly is not in a mood to quibble over a few dollars. The effect of this slide show is a little like the rant that my friend Michael's father made in 1981 when I complained to him that the rate for a first class postage stamp had gone from 18 to 20 cents:

"Let's get this straight: You want an organization to send someone to your house and pick up this letter, walk it to a truck, drive it to a post office, sort it into a sack, put it on another truck, drive it to an airport, carry it to a plane, fly it across the country, unload it onto yet another truck, drive it to another post office, sort it, put it in a sack, drive it to your friend's street, and walk it to their mailbox for 20 cents--and you want change?!"

With this perspective, I never complained about another postal rate increase.

3. Teach Your Prospect to Do Without You

I discovered the potential of this means of communicating value when my book, AdWords For Dummies, was first published. At 408 pages, it was pretty comprehensive in its day (2007). And it laid out in clear detail, with lots of screen shots, exactly how I did what I did for clients.

I kind of figured that that $16 book had ruined my professional career as a consultant. After all, why would anyone pay me lots of money to do what I had just revealed in its entirety?

Naturally, the opposite happened. Once people read the book and discovered how complicated and time-consuming AdWords could be, they were happy to hire me to do it for them.

If you can teach your prospects to do without you, that's one of the best backhanded ways of demonstrating your value. They'll quickly see that they lack the experience, time, and desire to accomplish what you do at anywhere near your level of quality and efficiency.

(If this isn't true, of course, then you don't have a real business anyway, and nothing I'm suggesting is going to save you until you find a way to add real and enduring value.)

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to make a sweet potato pie. Because ain't nobody can make a pie like I can!