To get clarity you need to put your relationships into one of three categories. Are they nice, nasty or necessary? If they are nice you may want to expand them. If they are nasty you must look for ways of limiting them or deleting them. If they are necessary then these need to be limited.
The facts are that negative people will cause you to lose your focus and energy while positive, forward thinking ones will move you to your goals more quickly. Regardless, the truth is that relationships do have a huge effect on you and your life.
Relationships with Like Minded Entrepreneurs
When you have relationships with other entrepreneurs who are motivated, ambitious and confident, you will benefit greatly. You are exposed to this positive business thinking and it affects you positively.
It's similar to kids in school. If a child is involved with a group of children who are very smart and motivated to make good grades, they will inspire him or her to do well also. That child will want to make good grades, will have the secrets for making good grades and will have a positive support system in place in order to help make good grades.
This is the same way you will be affected when you spend time with entrepreneurs like the ones described above. So, appreciate your friends and business associates who are very smart and motivated! They are, after all, helping your own career or business to grow.
Relationships with Those Who are Lacking in Motivation and Confidence
When you have relationships with people who have low motivation, self-confidence or ambition, they will affect your life and your career negatively. Taking this same situation with children, if a child spends time with children who don't know how to behave, who are not motivated to do their schoolwork and who don't care about their grades, that child will be affected. He or she will feel pressure to be like the rest of the group and will eventually begin to display characteristics like those of the other kids. This child will most likely start to receive bad grades and do poorly in school as well. This is the same for an entrepreneur. Those who associate with entrepreneurs who have poor motivation and lack of organization will be dragged down by them and their negative traits.
Take care with what kind of relationships you form and the people that you spend time with. Their impact on you can end up accelerating your career or taking it downward. It is important to remember that you can always spend more money, but you can't spend more time. Make an assessment of your relationships and the time you are investing in them. When you do you will better utilize your time to create the road map for your success.
For starters, we have to build credibility with our audience and get them to begin looking for our messages, because they know that what we say has value. How do we do that? Let me show you.
Let's take a look at a simple principle that I call the Ladder of Credibility, Power & Influence.
At the bottom of the ladder you have the Generalist.
The Generalist is anyone who has a general knowledge about the subject matter at hand. You can lump many people into this category, because a generalist is anyone with a working knowledge of the subject who has no specialized niche.
On the first rung of the ladder, there is the Expert.
The Expert specializes in and should ideally know everything about a narrow field. In our society, we value the opinion of the expert more than that of the generalist. If you don't believe me, imagine that you have a brain tumor. Who would you call first: your family practice doctor or a brain specialist? That's what I thought.
Towering above the Generalist and the Specialist, the Celebrity is at the second rung of the ladder.
I know it sounds a bit absurd, but studies show that in a marketing message, consumers will value what a celebrity has to say over pretty much any expert you can put in front of them. One example is the long-running infomercial for the acne medication, ProActiv®, which is a product of Guthy-Renker, one of the most successful direct marketing companies in the world. They pay celebrities, including Jessica Simpson, Sean "P. Diddy" Combs, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Vanessa Williams and Serena Williams, to convince consumers that their product is the right solution to fight acne. They could afford any physician in the world for the amount that they have to pay these celebrities, but the celebrities outperform the experts all day long.
Last but not least, the Holy Grail top rung on the ladder of Credibility, Power & Influence is the Celebrity Expert.
Not many celebrities ever rise to the status of Celebrity Expert, but you can bet that when they do, their marketing planner is full! In order to reach this status, the celebrity has to find a way to communicate their knowledge of a subject to consumers. This can be done in many ways: by writing a book, sharing their knowledge with another celebrity like Larry King, or posting blogs on their website. There are many ways to do this; the point is that to reach this status, the celebrity has to do more than just be good at their chosen profession, e.g. acting, music, sports. Consumers value a celebrity expert over all other categories of people who deliver marketing messages. Some great examples of Celebrity Experts are Rachael Ray (Cooking), Martha Stewart (Domesticity), Donald Trump (Real Estate), Oprah (Self-Help), Robert Allen (Real Estate), Jay Abraham (Marketing), Dan Kennedy (Marketing), and there are many more. If you don't know who all of these Celebrity Experts are, that's ok! To their chosen niche, they are celebrities and experts on their subject matter.
The point here is that most people's preconceived notions about who consumers listen to are wrong. If you are willing to put in a lot of time and effort, you too can reach Celebrity Expert status and turn your prospects into raving fans.
Copyright (c) 2008 Nick Nanton
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Steve Scott has sinced written about articles on various topics from How to Sell on Ebay, Recreation and Sports and Small Business Marketing. Steve Scott is a business/life coach and a business development consultant. He specializes in teaching entrepreneurs and solo and sales professionals to create their own unique success stategies-bringing them balance, more freedom and greater abundance.. Steve Scott's top article generates over 18100 views. to your Favourites.
Nick Nanton has sinced written about articles on various topics from Limited Liability Company, Physical Therapy and Accounting Bookkeeping General Svc. WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR E-ZINE OR WEB SITE? You can, as long as you include this complete blurb with it: JW Dicks & Nick Nanton, lawyers by trade and entrepreneurs by choice, publish the Business Growth ezine monthly covering marketing and busine. Nick Nanton's top article generates over 6600 views. to your Favourites.