The past few weeks had seen me occupying myself with other commitments apart from my website. I had been working on creating and launching my viral marketing software product by promoting it on several internet marketing forums, purchasing leads, distributing articles and approaching editors of internet marketing newsletters.

I confess I had not done any conscious or 'serious' goal setting or even any visualising at all to help me in this effort, but I have achieved a significant measure of success in this after all.

Only now do I realise that what I had been doing and been through was a good lesson on how not to set goals and achieve them. In fact, in a way, I had stumbled upon what could be the easiest goal setting and achieving formula you'll ever hear.

The formula is this:-

1. Know what you want to achieve. Not just 'know' by having a vague idea in your mind but set for yourself, in your mind (and you don't even have to write it down on paper, unless you want to, which is not necessarily better, but sometimes good in some ways), the specific physical (or visual) outcomes that would tell you that you have achieved your goal 100%. For example, let's say you set to achieve a goal of earning $1000 from your online business by the end of the month. The physical (or visual) outcomes that would tell you that you have achieved that goal 100% would be an increase of $1000 in your merchant account and sales figures of your product that earn you $1000 worth of profits.

2. Come up with a simple and straightforward plan of action that had been used by many other people seeking to achieve the same goals as yours, and launch your attack. If you have no other idea about where to look, start with the internet and search for websites run by these successful people. Or you can even check out the news, magazines or books that talk about the tactics used by these successful people.

3. Keep attacking your plan of action, modifying it along the way should you encounter any setbacks or difficulties or changes of circumstance, until you succeed or you truly feel you're going nowhere and you stop to take a break and re-evaluate things.

4. If in Step 3. you achieve your goal, congratulations! If not, do an infinite loop by going back to Step 2. and never stop until you reach your goals.

It really is that simple! Trust me, Thomas Edison had to struggle with Steps 2. to 4. for 9,000 times before he achieved his goal.