I’ve been a proud Chicagoan since moving here 11 years ago, but I did spend the first 18 years of my life in New York and the next 17 in Boston. So you might think that I would be rooting for either the Giants or the Patriots to win on Sunday.

Nope.

I’ve been a New York Jets fan ever since I was a kid, growing up less than 7 miles from Shea Stadium, where they played throughout my childhood. I remember watching on TV with my Dad over 40 years ago as Joe Namath lead my beloved Jets to their historic upset victory in Super Bowl III – and I remember even more vividly the more recent 4-plus decades of incompetence, as they haven’t been back to the big game since.

However, I’m as loyal as they come – and no matter how embarrassing they perform on or off the field, I remain a dedicated Jets fan.

Which makes me a lifelong sworn enemy of both the Giants and the Patriots.

So, while I can’t figure out which team I want less to win on Sunday, one thing is for certain: Like an estimated three-fifths of the 110 million+ viewers, I will be more interested in the commercials than the actual game being played.

And as a student and teacher of advertising that really works, as usual I’ll be shaking my head at another batch of relatively ineffective Super Bowl ads again this year.

Yes, many of the companies that advertise will get modestly positive results, but that will be due in large part to many factors other than the ads themselves, including media hype about the ads both before and after the game, elaborate and carefully orchestrated social media campaigns before, during and after the game and even how well-known the company is by the general public before the ad is even seen (according to Philip Herr of Advertising Age, “The more established the brand, the better the extended ROI from a Super Bowl Ad”).

Almost all of Sunday’s ads will be filled with big-name celebrities, sports stars, sexy women, cute animals and even cuter babies, but only a few – if any – are likely to contain highly-effective, proven advertising elements which lead to extraordinary results.

So, what are those elements, you ask?

As Bill Glazer, author of the best-selling “Outrageous Advertising That’s Outrageously Successful” (get a free copy here ) teaches all small business owners: To have the greatest possible effect (and make the most money), advertising must do two things:

1. Stand out from the clutter and get noticed; and
2. Use Direct Response Marketing principles.

Most, if not all, of the ads you will see on Sunday will do an excellent job of being outrageous, entertaining and attention-getting, but very few – if any – will use Direct Response Marketing principles, which is why the advertisers won’t experience the financial success that they otherwise could.

One company which does almost always do a great job of using Direct Response Marketing principles in its outrageous, entertaining, attention-getting Super Bowl ads is GoDaddy (in fact, the company was almost unheard-of before its first Super Bowl ad campaign back in 2005 catapulted it to the #1 web host in the world).

On Sunday, you’re likely to see more great examples of GoDaddy’s effective advertising strategy, which last year resulted in the company’s highest spike in internet traffic in their 7-year Super Bowl advertising history, and much more important, a 466% increase in the number of domain registrations over the same time the previous year.

As small business owners who need every hard-earned dollar we invest in advertising to return a quick, measurable profit, those are the numbers we like to see!

Meanwhile, almost all of the other companies that will spend record amounts of money to advertise in this year’s big game will call it a major victory if they see their sales jump by even just a few percentage points.

And so-called “marketing experts” will judge the ads on fuzzy, general, mostly-subjective criteria such as “likeability,” “memorability” and Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management’s “ADPLAN” judging formula, which includes intelligent-sounding — but dubious — factors, such as “Linkage” and “Amplification.”

Salaried marketing executives with fancy degrees but little real world sales experience, who work for big companies with huge advertising budgets to burn, are pretty much the polar opposite of small business owners, who operate in the real, day-to-day, in-the-trenches world of income and expenses, and who need every dollar of our precious advertising investments to generate real, measurable and near-immediate results.

So we’ll be watching Sunday’s Super Bowl commercials much more for what NOT to do than for good examples of effective advertising (although we’re almost sure to see a few of those, if we look hard enough).

Oh, and maybe we’ll watch some of the game, too.

Coming next Wednesday: My specific post-game report on just how bad this year’s crop of ads was.

I don’t watch a lot of television, but when I do, I love to watch entrepreneur-related shows.

I’ve been a fan of the CBS-TV show “Undercover Boss” since its U.S. debut on Super Bowl Sunday two years ago. 10 days ago, I watched Stephen Cloobeck, Chairman and CEO of timeshare giant Diamond Resorts International, explain his business philosophy “The Meaning Of Yes.”

Essentially, this means that Diamond Resorts employees always seek to say “yes” to its customers, resulting in “a relentless commitment to customer service.”

Of course, such a philosophy is crucial in the hospitality industry, but it certainly applies to every business.

It’s an unfortunate fact of our increasingly impersonal culture that simply providing basic customer service is a powerful differentiating factor in the marketplace. If your business adopts a policy of seeking to please every customer, you will be in a position of tremendous advantage over your competition that offers only an impersonal, lackluster or unsatisfactory customer experience.

Even if you can’t always say “yes” to any request, one of the most important things you can do as a business owner is to manage the expectations of your customers, clients or patients.

That being said, with this concept of “The Meaning Of Yes” fresh in my mind, I feel compelled to share a recent personal experience of mine that stands as a cautionary tale for all small business owners and entrepreneurs.

On a friend’s recommendation, I reserved a suite in a luxury resort hotel on a recent business trip to meet with an out-of-state client. I was told that the resort had recently emerged from bankruptcy, and was a beautiful property looking to make a clean start.

Unfortunately, my experience was more telling of why the company went into bankruptcy, instead of how they will rebound from it. Later, I was informed by one candid employee that while the resort had new ownership, it was still under the same poor management. Here’s my personal horror story…

When I first pulled up to the entrance, there was no valet or bellhop in sight – in fact, there was a couple who told me they had been waiting for an attendant to show up for over 15 minutes. So, after my own short wait, I proceeded to unload my own bags out of the trunk of my rental car and carry them into the lobby myself.

(As I was standing at the check in counter, an out-of-breath young man came running up behind me, explaining that he had been on his lunch break when I pulled up. A valid excuse for him personally, but that did little to overcome my negative first impression of the resort. Only one valet/bellhop for a property with over 400 rooms? And no one to cover for him on his lunch break? Really??)

LESSON: Are you properly prepared to handle the number of customers you plan to acquire? As my companies grow, I am always quick to add additional staff to handle customer inquiries and problems. After a booming 2011, I have already hired three additional customer service assistants here in January 2012, with plans to add at least two more in the very near future.

Not a great introduction to the resort, however I had not yet heard the deadly word “no.” That was about to change – and change drastically. Before I would unpack a single item in my suite, I would hear the word “no” more than my rambunctious cocker spaniel on his most rebellious day…

• Could I check upon my early arrival three hours prior to the regular 4:00pm check-in time? “No.”
• Wasn’t there even a single empty suite available? “No.” (The front desk clerk had the audacity to lie to me that the hotel was full, when I knew full well that it was operating at only about 25% capacity.)
• Had the maids cleaned and prepared even one single suite in the three hours since the 11:00am check-out time? “No.”
• While I waited, was there any hotel information I could read (I asked, pointing to a stack of such material right in front of me at the front desk)? “No.” (Of course, I was later handed that exact material with my room key tucked inside when I was finally allowed to check in.)
• Could I please be seated outside at the hotel restaurant when I decided to grab some lunch while waiting to be allowed to check in? “No.” (Changed to a “yes” when I politely refused to eat indoors, offering to stand in the middle of the near-empty restaurant and wait for an outside table to become available.)
• Could I be placed into a suite with one of the hotel’s famous spectacular views? Here’s where I heard my first “yes” – but unfortunately it was a case of over-promising and under-delivering, as it took no fewer than three moves of me and my luggage to finally put me into one such suite.

The annoyances continued, as I had to make no less than four calls to the front desk for items which should already have been in my suite, such as hangers and an internet cable. (I was promised a wireless router to make up for all my troubles – but it never came, despite repeated assurances over the remainder of my stay.)

Overall, the resort and its employees were extremely impressive. But it was unfortunately a case of “too little, too late” to make up for my initial hours of frustration upon my arrival. Do you think I’ll ever consider returning to that resort, or referring others to it? Not a chance, of course.

LESSON: Even if your initial knee-jerk reaction to a customer request is “no”, as business owners we must train ourselves and our representatives to approach every customer request with an attitude of “Can I figure out a way to make that happen?”

A response of “Let me see if I can do that for you” will go a long way toward gaining favor with prospects and customers, especially in this difficult economy when everyone is much more careful how and with whom we spend our money than ever before. But the attitude of “No, that can’t be done” can absolutely kill your business.

Should you adopt such a dangerous mindset towards prospect and customer requests? My simple advice: “No.”

I learned my lesson in more ways than one from a recent holiday gift buying experience…

BEFORE: One of the Christmas gifts my wife asked for was a “couples massage.” That sounded like a simple enough request, so I set out on what I thought would be a quick mission to make her wish come true.

First, I thumbed through a local, upscale “advertiser”-type publication, certain that I’d come across a few “Holiday Special” offers, from which I’d make my choice. I was surprised when I didn’t find anything special there, so I picked up another similar ad-filled circular – but again I came up empty.

3 1/2 years’ experience working for a major yellow pages publisher taught me that there was practically no chance of me finding even a half-decent offer in any of the ads there, so I didn’t even bother getting up from the living room couch to walk the whole 20 feet to get my local directory out of the back cupboard.

Finally, I fired up my computer and typed “couples massage Barrington” into my favorite search engine, hoping I’d be bombarded with irresistible offers to choose from.

No such luck.

I found a few local business websites with some mention of a “Holiday Special” for a couples massage – but they were the weak, run-of-the-mill, plain vanilla, anything-but-compelling offers typical of most small businesses.

The most compelling offer I found, along with the easiest-to-navigate website (hours, driving directions, menu of services, etc.) was a local location of a national chain of massage centers. So I hopped into my car and drove to the nearest clinic to check it out and make my purchase.

Lesson learned: Undoubtedly there were at least a dozen better massage therapists closer to our home, but none of them did a decent enough job of making that fact known (“marketing”) to get me to spend my money with them.

DURING: About a week after Christmas, we went to the clinic for our “couples massage” experience. We were running a few minutes late en route from another appointment, and called on our way to let them know.

Apparently, that didn’t matter, because when we got there we were told that our massages would still end at our originally-scheduled time. A pair of young, inexperienced and impersonal massage therapists then rather mechanically performed our services, finishing 5 minutes before the end of our originally-scheduled hour and telling us to take our time getting dressed (as long as we were out of the room by the top of the hour!).

My wife complained that it was the shortest massage she’d ever had (it was for me, too – but that’s because it was my first). She also told me about her first-class treatment at some of the luxury resorts we’ve stayed at, explaining that every other time she’d been told to take her time getting up off the massage table, the masseuse really meant it. She also questioned why I chose the clinic I had, letting me know that her regular masseuse would have provided a much, much better all-around experience (who knew she had a “regular masseuse”?).

Lesson learned: Small business owners can’t assume that shoppers will magically know that they provide superior service to that of their competitors. They must do as excellent a job of marketing – conveying a powerful message to a hungry audience interested in their product or service – as they do of delivering the goods.

Sadly, local business owners almost always hide out working in their businesses and fail to sufficiently work on their businesses – which, while less comfortable for the vast majority, also happens to be where all the money is in any business.

AFTER: It has now been a little over two weeks since we had our massages. Have we gotten a single phone call, thank-you card, postcard, newsletter or even one lousy email? Nope. Not one bit of after-the-sale follow-up whatsoever.

Do they just expect that everyone who comes to one of their clinics will automatically be eager to return? (Or do they somehow know that people will have such a thoroughly disappointing experience that it’s not worth any attempt at all to invite them back?)

Lesson learned: Business owners spend a lot of money to acquire new customers, clients or patients. One sure way to increase revenue and profits is to maximize every single lead and customer with excellent marketing and overall business practices – including, but in no way limited to, first-class service – before, during and after the sale.

Learn how to do that well, and you’ll find growing your business much easier than otherwise – regardless of the overall state of the economy.

Oh, and here’s one bonus piece of advice for this week: Make sure not to rely on me to select a massage services provider for you!

If you have, you’re not alone.

In 2007, FranklinCovey surveyed 15,031 of their customers about their New Year’s resolutions. Surprisingly, they found that 35% of people break them before the end of January, with another 42% breaking them at some point after that.

I’m surprised, because I would have thought those numbers would be higher.

In my 30+ years’ experience working with over 2,000 small business owners, entrepreneurs and salespeople, I’ve found that people who only set goals once a year just because it’s the socially-accepted thing to do are not truly goal-oriented – or results-oriented – people.

I personally don’t believe in making “New Year’s Resolutions” that are, for the most part, either casually made or routinely broken – or both.

I believe in getting serious about setting goals and making plans all year long, and I work with my clients to do the same.

It takes discipline and forethought, but for me it’s the key to massive, sustained achievement and success.

Here’s my own personal system…

First, I block off all known dates in an annual calendar – events, projects, tasks I get done on a regular basis.

Then I add in all related tasks – including the marketing, planning and follow-up for each of my scheduled events, projects and tasks.

I include time for non-business interests, such as recreation and relaxation.

This alone gives me “something to do or get done” for about 80% of the days of the year. Then, I look for ways to fill in the remaining dates with other opportunities that either come along or are purposefully pursued.

For each event, project and task, I write “To Do” lists. Throughout every day I am constantly crossing items off my list. Then, at the end of each day, I prepare my schedule for the next day, listing each task and the time I allot to it. Most importantly, I stick to my schedule.

As the world’s #1 small business-building expert, Dan Kennedy says:

If you don’t plan your day, someone else will plan it for you.

That goes for your week, your month and your year as well.

We live in a world where people are constantly fighting for our attention, with most people choosing to be vulnerable to near-constant interruption by way of any number of technological means, including email, cell phone, text messages and social media – just to name a few.

But at the same time, most of us know that single-mindedness and focus are the keys to getting the most out of our time and talents.

So the question is: How do we stay focused in an ever-increasingly fractured world?

In my opinion, one of the most effective ways of ensuring that we stick to our plans – and therefore accomplish our goals – is to dedicate ourselves to constantly setting, evaluating and updating our personal goals and action plans to get us to where we want to go.

Not to make vague, casual, once-a-year “resolutions” out of thoughtless habit or just because “that’s what everyone does this time of year.”

Dan Kennedy, The Millionaire Maker

We’re going to talk about the inner game of building your business. I believe that the inner game is simply all-important. “The inner game” is a new term for a classic idea explained many different times, many different ways by virtually every success educator, and even philosophers.

In the book Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill reveals the secret using the words, “thoughts are things.” Dennis Waitley has worked with U.S. astronauts and Olympic athletes on their inner games. Author Tim Galloway explores the ideas of his books, The Inner Game of Golf, The Inner Game of Tennis and The Inner Game of Selling.

Interestingly, there is a never-ending connection between the inner game in sport and the inner game in business, allowing experts like Waitley, Galloway, ex-quarterback Fran Tarkenton and golfer Arnold Palmer, among others, to step back and forth between expounding on success techniques in the athletic and business worlds.

In all cases, these people speak much more about attitudes than aptitudes for a good reason. Surveys, studies and research consistently reaffirm that 85% of your success will depend on attitudinal factors, 15% on aptitude.

Yet in your formal education and in most continuing education, the emphasis is on the opposite – 15% on attitude, 85% on aptitude.

Certainly technical knowledge and skills are important. In your profession, you must deliver excellence based on your staying up to date in techniques, products, materials and ideas.

However, such excellence alone will never build a successful, growing, profitable business. The excellence that will is an excellence created and sustained in your own mind. This is the most difficult, least tangible aspect of building your business that we’ll ever talk about, but it is also probably the most important.

Yeah, but what is it?

So what is the inner game? The way I see it, the inner game can be broken down into four major components:

• Self esteem
• Self image
• Self confidence
• Self discipline

Quality in these four areas is a necessary foundation to personal and professional success.

Self Esteem

Self Esteem is essentially your feelings of worth. How much success do you deserve? How much money should you make? How much is your time worth?

Here, briefly, are seven ideas for strengthening self-esteem:

1. Establish worthwhile, meaningful goals and values.
2. Take massive action to get your own financial house in order if it isn’t now. Reduce debt, bring expenses under income, and invest every single month.
3. Give yourself recognition for each and every accomplishment.
4. Manage your time productively. Procrastination and disorganization rob many people of their self-esteem.
5. Associate with positive-minded, happy people who encourage and motivate you. Don’t hang out with folks who are negative, unhappy, critical or jealous.
6. Continually acquire new know-how in you profession and in the areas of business, sales and communication.
7. Regularly invest in improving your office and home environments, tools and equipment, wardrobe and other external things that impact on your attitudes.

Self Image

Self-image is how you see yourself; it’s who you think you are. Your self-image is controlled mostly by self-imposed limits. Very few people ever perform beyond those self-imposed limits.

A salesman whose father never earned more than $25,000 a year in his life may well see himself as a $25,000 a year guy. And he will subconsciously screw up the opportunities to earn more that come his way.

In the financial area, the controversial Reverend Ike calls this a money rejection syndrome, and I am convinced that such a thing definitely exists. One man I know, who made over $100 million in his business in its first three years from scratch, had gone broke in business several times before. After the three years of remarkable success, he said, “Making $100 million is about the easiest thing I’ve ever done. Believing it could happen to me was the hard part that took 20 years.”

Your self-image was created and is sustained through self talk, the use of affirmations – and that is also the method you can use to alter and modify your self image, literally as you wish.

I call the process self-image goal setting, because most people who set goals set only “to get” and “to have” goals; they fail to set “to be” goals. I encourage you to balance your approach to goal setting by including some self-image modification.

Self Discipline

Self-Disciple, the fourth component of the inner game, is quite possibly the most important.

The late success lecturer Jim Rohn said that most people do not associate lack of discipline with lack of success.

Most people think of failure as one earth-shattering event, such as a company going out of business or a home being foreclosed on. This, however, Jim Rohn said, is how failure happens.

Failure is rarely the result of some isolated event; rather, it is a consequence of a long list of accumulated little failures, which happen as a result of too little discipline. I agree. I find that most people understandably tend to look everywhere but in the mirror for the sources of their failures as well as the victories.

I’m here to tell you it’s not the town you’re in, not your location, not the economy, not the weather, not your competitors – it’s your own discipline that makes the difference between excellence or mediocrity, between getting by or getting rich.

It’s interesting to observe professionals. I often say to my associates, “Let me watch the professional’s behavior before, during and after the seminar, and I’ll guess his annual income within a few thousand dollars.” It’s actually pretty easy to do.

Jim Rohn says that discipline is the bridge between thought and accomplishment.

I’d encourage you to take the self-discipline challenge very seriously.

Select those areas that you know are your weakest links – timely paperwork, punctuality, daily self-improvement study, being happy and enthusiastic first thing in the morning, whatever your personal stumbling blocks are – and apply new, tough, demanding disciplines to yourself in those areas.

You’ll find that success in these particular areas of your day-to-day life will roll over into greater success in all parts of you life.

For example, let’s look at the ultimate game players – professional football players. A pro ball player knows that every single moment of his on-the-job performance is recorded on film, to be replayed and reviewed later in stop-action slow motion, for critique by his superiors and co-workers.

If your day was filmed and reviewed, how would you feel during the replay?

Of course, the professional football players who have to put up with this sort of thing are highly paid.

Yes, the inner game stuff is tough. If being a big success were easy, everybody would be one. You’ve got to decide what you really want to be, do, have, accomplish – and decide whether or not you’re willing to adhere to the disciplines necessary to get it.

In order to have the opportunity to accomplish virtually any goals you honestly desire, you must accept the related responsibility for everything you get.

DAN S. KENNEDY is a serial, multi-millionaire entrepreneur; highly paid and sought after marketing and business strategist; advisor to countless first-generation, from-scratch multi-millionaire and 7-figure income entrepreneurs and professionals; and, in his personal practice, one of the very highest paid direct-response copywriters in America. As a speaker, he has delivered over 2,000 compensated presentations, appearing repeatedly on programs with the likes of Donald Trump, Gene Simmons (KISS), Debbi Fields (Mrs. Fields Cookies), and many other celebrity-entrepreneurs, for former U.S. Presidents and other world leaders, and other leading business speakers like Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy and Tom Hopkins, often addressing audiences of 1,000 to 10,000 and up. His popular books have been favorably recognized by Forbes, Business Week, Inc. and Entrepreneur Magazine. His NO B.S. MARKETING LETTER, one of the business newsletters published for Members of Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle, is the largest paid subscription newsletter in its genre in the world.

WE HAVE ARRANGED A SPECIAL FREE GIFT FROM DAN FOR YOU including a 2-Month Free Membership in Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle, newsletters, webinars, audio CD’s, and more, plus free membership in “Chicagoland’s Sharpest Entrepreneurs”. For information and to claim your free gift, visit:

www.TheMostIncredibleFREEGiftEver.com

Last week, I hosted and sponsored Chicagoland’s “Ultimate Entrepreneur Holiday Party” for the fourth straight year.

Many of my clients had their Best Year Ever in 2011, which means that my consulting practice reached new heights. So it felt great to give back to the 200+ Chicago-area small business owners, entrepreneurs and sales professionals who are members of my group, “Chicagoland’s Sharpest Entrepreneurs.”

But in between enjoying all of the beer, wine, champagne, shrimp, lobster, steak, etc., we got down to work improving our businesses, as we do when we gather every month. One of the sessions I taught last week was “12 New Year’s Resolutions For Your Business In 2012.”

The timing was perfect for such a topic, since “New Year’s Resolutions” are front and center in most people’s minds as another year comes to a close.

*Just so you know, I personally don’t believe in making “New Year’s Resolutions.” Instead, I am constantly evaluating both the current state and future goals of all of my businesses, and as a result I make “resolutions” all throughout the year.

But for those of you who do believe in making “New Year’s Resolutions,” I recommend one above all others. This one I tucked away in the middle of my list of 12, at #7:

Do something that makes you uncomfortable.

Now, I’m not talking about getting rid of your fancy leather chair in favor of a plain wooden stool, or wearing shoes that are two sizes too small, or getting married to a professional athlete and then divorced just 72 days later. There’s no profit in any of those (well, maybe there’s a little bit of money to be made for doing that last one – thanks to our celebrity-crazed culture).

I’m urging you to step outside of your own personal “comfort zone” when it comes to how you think and act in your business, in all areas, including:

• Mentally: Realize that there are plenty of strategies and tactics others are using with tremendous success, even during this difficult economy, and stop looking for good excuses why that can’t be YOU.

When you hear of someone else doing something that works, be bold and give it a try, even though of course it’s easier – and far more comfortable – to just sit idly by and convince yourself that it wouldn’t work in your industry, or your geographical area, or with your target market, etc.

You can make excuses or you can make money – you can’t make both. I wish you nothing but the latter throughout the coming year.

• Physically: There’s that “famous study” that showed how people fear public speaking more than death itself (as if that were really possible!). However, mythical studies aside, it is true that if you “put yourself out there,” you will definitely be criticized and talked about – not only behind your back, but often right to your face. That’s true for all of us who are aggressive about our own personal promotion and positioning.

Still, my wish for you is that you resolve to put yourself into more uncomfortable places in the year ahead, including but not limited to: live events, online events, social media, mainstream media and your own written materials (newsletters, articles, books, etc.).

You may not feel comfortable at first (in fact, even Barbra Streisand admits she has suffered from intense stage fright for decades), but your business and bank account will definitely grow – which will in turn, of course, afford you a more comfortable lifestyle.

• Financially: Have you been in “cutting back” mode for the past few years, afraid to make financial investments that you know could pay big dividends for your business? I’m not talking about buying stocks or bonds or gold – I’m talking about hiring an expert to get something done for you quickly and well, instead of you taking a long time to do it yourself, and then getting disappointing results because you didn’t really know what you were doing.

I’m talking about sending an actual newsletter through the (gasp!) U.S. mail, instead of sending only an email version that over 90% of recipients will delete or skim, at best.

I’m talking about doing whatever it takes to hang around successful, positive, powerful people – instead of trying to convince yourself that you can’t afford to join that group, or attend that event, or hire that expert copywriter or consultant who could make all the difference between continuing to struggle on your own and experiencing wild success.

Could you resolve to do all of this at any time of the year? Of course you could – and the most successful businesspeople are always creating new goals for themselves. But since we’re only a few days away from January 1st, now would be as good a time as any for this powerful and profitable promise.

And unlike millions of New Year’s Resolutions which are about to be made and broken soon thereafter, vowing to do more things that make you uncomfortable in the year ahead is one resolution you most definitely should keep.

Happy New Year, faithful reader. May 2012 be your Best Year Ever, in your business as well as personal life.

At this time of year, we’re reminded that Santa makes a list (he even checks it twice).

Many people have shopping lists – for groceries during most of the year; presents during this holiday season.

And most entrepreneurs and business owners are constantly making – and hopefully completing – “To Do” lists.

But one thing most business owners are sorely lacking is a list of customers and prospects with which they communicate regularly and build an ongoing relationship.

And that’s a shame.

Building and improving such a list is what makes all the difference between a transactional business and a relationship-based one – between one where the business owner must always wonder where his or her next sale is coming from and one with long-term security and value based on systems.

All sharp marketers know that “the money is in the list” (and more accurately, in the relationship with the list).

Yet the overwhelming majority of business owners refuse to realize this truth.

Think about it…

When’s the last time you enjoyed a great dining experience, and the restaurant was actually savvy enough to collect your name and contact information?

How often do you walk into and out of a retail store, sometimes even shopping for a significant amount of time, without anyone asking how they can keep in touch with you? (Someone always asks “Can I help you?” – but unfortunately they’re really only referring to that one visit.)

How many websites do you visit and leave without ever being asked to enter your email address (or asked in a thoroughly non-compelling way)?

All are prime examples of businesses run by people who don’t get it.

You want to make sure that isn’t you.

Actually, don’t worry if that is you right now – it used to be me. It’s not your fault; you’ve probably never been taught where the true wealth is in any business. Ask any business owner what his best assets are, and he’ll likely talk about things like his employees, or his equipment, or the money in his bank account.

Yes, it’s certainly true that all of those are valuable, but if a sharp businessperson lost all of those, she would get them all back sure enough – if she were only able to keep her list.

If you get the opportunity to sit on Santa’s lap during this holiday season, you should ask for a list of your ideal prospects with whom you’ve built a great relationship.

But if you don’t find one all nicely packaged and wrapped under your tree, you should make it a priority for yourself in the coming year to concentrate your efforts on building and growing not only a sizeable list of your ideal prospects, but developing a strong relationship with them.

Will that take work? You bet it will. But by investing your time, money and effort into it, by the time next year’s holiday season rolls around you’ll be able to buy all the fancy presents you want – for your loved ones, and for yourself.

And that’s my holiday wish for you.

"Crazy" Marty Pavilonis

As everyone knows, this is by far the busiest time of the year for retail stores.

But that usually doesn’t apply to motorcycle stores in Chicago, because it’s not exactly ideal weather to be cruising around town on a two-wheeler.

Well, Marty Pavilonis, owner of The Zone Honda-Kawasaki , is looking to change all of that this holiday season.
He came up with a “Let It Snow Promotion,” which started last Friday and continues right up through Christmas Eve.

Very simply, here’s how it works…

If it snows at least 6 inches on New Year’s Day, Marty will refund his customers for every single purchase anyone makes in any department of his entire store during the entire month of December.

Yes, that could result in well over $1,000,000 worth of new and used bikes, service, storage, parts and accessories that lucky Chicagoans will get without paying a dime (well, they’ll still have to pay the sales tax – this is Illinois, after all).

So is Marty “crazy” to do this, as his website says?

Well, on the surface, the primary dictionary definition of the word (“senseless; impractical; totally unsound”) seems to fit a business owner who would run such a risky promotion.

But in reality, of course Marty isn’t taking such a huge, reckless risk.

He simply purchased an insurance policy to cover all of his December sales in case we get anything close to a repeat of New Year’s Day 2001, when 17 inches of snow fell on our great city.

So Marty will win either way – whether it snows 6 inches on New Year’s Day or not:

(a) If it doesn’t, he gets a big boost in December sales
(b) If it does, his customers love him for letting them get all their free stuff

And either way, he’s likely to get a ton of free publicity for his outrageous promotion – all for only the cost of the insurance plus advertising.

So instead of just admiring Marty for his initiative and ingenuity, the question you should be asking yourself is: “How can I run a similar promotion in my business?”

In fact, you should be asking yourself that question about almost everything Marty does to market his business. As a private client of mine and the reigning “2010 Marketer Of The Year” of my “Chicagoland’s Sharpest Entrepreneurs” group, Marty is constantly implementing effective, fun, out-of-the-box marketing strategies in his business.

Which is why two other definitions of the word “crazy” fit Marty best of all: “intensely enthusiastic; passionately excited” and “an unpredictable, nonconforming person.”

Want to see some more “crazy” things your fellow Chicago-area small business owners are doing to grow their businesses despite the current challenging economy? Come watch the top competitors showcase their best as they battle to be named “2011 Marketer Of The Year” at “The Ultimate Entrepreneur Holiday Party!”

Ahhh… It’s “the holiday season,” that time of year that always brings with it certain tried-and-true traditions.

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…

Children laughing and playing in the snow…

Friends and families gathering, full of holiday cheer…

And small business owners and sales professionals giving up on even trying to make any sales during the month of December, using excuses like “no one’s buying this time of year” or “December’s always a crummy month for sales” or “everyone’s too busy to see me.”

Which means that it’s time for managers of sales organizations to dip into their motivational bag of tricks for one of their patented “whip ‘em into shape” messages, designed to inspire the troops to get out and sell, sell, sell!

Speaking of which, one of my followers recently forwarded an email to me which contained this brief excerpt:

“You are not seeing enough people every day. You spend time on your laptops at home getting issues resolved and you justify it in your mind as it is so important. What’s most important to me is that green stuff that goes into my wallet and allows me to do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it, buy what I want and have the rest of the country talk about me as being one of those 1-2- or 3%’s.

I’m not going to apologize for being successful and making more money than you. The fact is if you are not running hard, EVERY DAY, you are missing a ton of money…..a ton. Opportunities like these don’t come around much so spend your 40 hours per week in front of prospects instead of your computer. Times are tough and this is one of the best sales jobs you can get. If you don’t believe me, look it up, right now. Are you at home? You are messing up big time.”

We can learn so much from these two short paragraphs, but let me touch on just three points here:

1. Messages like these serve a very important purpose. Even for those of us (the self-employed and commissioned salespeople) who determine our own income level, we can use a little extra motivation from time to time. The key is for us to deliver these types of pep talks to ourselves, and not depend on or need others to do so.

2. The fact is that in any capitalistic society there always has been and always will be 80% of the people “just getting by” or worse, 15% doing well, 4% doing extremely well and 1% wealthy. It doesn’t matter how many politicians and protestors try to fight this fact – it’s still a fact. The beautiful thing about the United States is that each one of us can (and must) determine for ourselves whether we are willing to do what it takes (in terms of investing our time, energy and money) to be one of the “Top 1%” – or not. The author of the above message has made his personal choice very clear.

3. This sales manager is expressing a “hungry hunter” mentality that is typical of most businesses. He makes it clear that he values prospecting and selling FAR more than “getting issues resolved.” In other words, he is focused on the “short-term hunt-and-kill” instead of the relationship-building and nurturing process that leads to long-term, loyal customers who stay and refer others.

(I experienced a similar mentality when I spent three eye-opening years selling for a large corporation. I was constantly laughed at and derided for my insistence on working tirelessly for my clients long after the sale was made, and had to ignore derogatory comments from other reps such as, “You already made that sale. Forget about him and move on to the next one!” Can you imagine if this company’s clients only knew how they were truly viewed?)

What companies like this don’t realize is that we all do subconsciously realize how little they actually care about serving our needs. That’s why we’re in such a “crisis of trust” in this country, and it’s also one big reason why practically all you hear these days is doom-and-gloom about “how bad the economy is.”

Yes, things are tough for organizations with penny-wise, pound-foolish short-term thinking. But small business owners and individual sales professionals don’t have to make the mistake of thinking and acting that way.

Entrepreneurs are much more nimble, and have far less short-term pressure than many people in charge of larger operations. We can treat our customers, clients and patients with the respect and care they deserve and crave – and don’t get from big, dumb companies.

Which means we can thrive “in this challenging economy” while the overall picture of business in America will continue to suffer for years to come.

Dan Kennedy, The Millionaire Maker

Many years ago, I took over a business with mammoth collection problems: almost all of its customers had open accounts and paid their bills ten to sixty days late (except those who didn’t pay at all). We quickly instituted a number of corrective measures, including tighter credit controls and policies, interests charges, a sequence of past-due notices, and collection calls.

However, we also instituted a positive strategy. We started sending hand-signed thank you notes for prompt payment to anybody who did pay on time…those who were almost on time…and even late payers who responded to a past-due notice. Guess what happened? Those customers who received thank you notes became better paying customers.

I know a Doctor who started a procedure of giving fresh, long-stemmed red roses to his women patients who showed up for their appointment on time, or paid their bills on time, or referred another patient. “Funny thing,” he told me. “We no longer have patients missing appointments. Our collections have improved. Referrals are up. And, some guys are asking how they can get roses, too!

Here are a few specific ideas you might adopt, as ways of saying thank you:

• Keep customers’ birthdays on file and send cards and/or mail gifts.
• Send Thanksgiving cards or letters.
• Make it a habit to drop a personal thank-you note in the mail each day, to at least one customer.
• Send a gift certificate or discount certificate to a customer who makes an unusually large purchase.
• Host a “Customer Appreciation Event” – a Christmas party, a backyard bar-b que.
• Have an occasional closed-to-the-public, preferred customer sale.
• Drop in personally on your best customers, with a surprise gift.

I figured it up just the other day; last year, personally and for my various businesses combined, I signed checks for well over one million dollars, in payment for goods and services to all sorts of people and companies. And I don’t care what anybody says – a million bucks is a lot of money. Yet, I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of the recipients of all that money who have expressed any gratitude in any formal kind of way. Only one of them found out and recognized my birthday.

Just saying “thanks” is a big step ahead of the competition today.

DAN S. KENNEDY is a serial, multi-millionaire entrepreneur; highly paid and sought after marketing and business strategist; advisor to countless first-generation, from-scratch multi-millionaire and 7-figure income entrepreneurs and professionals; and, in his personal practice, one of the very highest paid direct-response copywriters in America. As a speaker, he has delivered over 2,000 compensated presentations, appearing repeatedly on programs with the likes of Donald Trump, Gene Simmons (KISS), Debbi Fields (Mrs. Fields Cookies), and many other celebrity-entrepreneurs, for former U.S. Presidents and other world leaders, and other leading business speakers like Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy and Tom Hopkins, often addressing audiences of 1,000 to 10,000 and up. His popular books have been favorably recognized by Forbes, Business Week, Inc. and Entrepreneur Magazine. His NO B.S. MARKETING LETTER, one of the business newsletters published for Members of Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle, is the largest paid subscription newsletter in its genre in the world.

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