The most lucrative Joint Venture one can engage in usually involves a Center of Influence.

• This is a person who has the respect, admiration, trust, cooperation, and attention of a large group of people with whom he or she regularly communicates.
• This database of people is strongly inclined to follow the directions, instruction, advice, and suggestions of their leader, and they often do so blindly, as do most sheep.

And herein lies the challenge:

There are some dishonest and psychopathic centers of influence that misuse and abuse their power and their people, selling their loyal followers pigs in pokes, and taking advantage of their position of power to the disadvantage of their flock. One wants to identify and avoid these centers of influence like the plague.

You will be judged by your associations and the company you keep, and aligning yourself with con artists is financially tempting, but is as unwise as eating chocolate cake doused in strychnine.

The Most Valuable Activity of Any JV Broker

Seek out the honest and sincere centers of influence.

I would rather spend $2,000 working on a relationship with one genuine center of influence who has integrity, than reach hundreds of individuals who are not centers of influence. Those who have successfully Joint Ventured with good centers of influence know how valuable those relationships are. This is BY FAR the most valuable activity of any JV Broker: finding and pitching centers of influence.

7 Pointers for Gaining Top Notch Associates

Here are seven pointers that you would do well to be aware of:

#1 – Not everyone who has a large database is a center of influence.

There are characters lurking on the Internet who have plagiarized lots of information and built large opt-in databases under false pretenses – those databases are usually low quality, and your hit rate and conversion rate will be very low, while those you do convert will be low quality, too.

You want a high quality relationship between the center of influence and his or her people, and a high quality person in the database. Quality is more important than quantity.

#2 – Centers of influence can lose their credibility…

…with their flock as the products, services and investments they sold their followers prove to be scams at worst, and empty promises at best. The chickens come home, as it were, to roost.

Be on top of things and be current in your information about your target centers of influence. Things change, and there are a lot of posers and has-beens out there. Some centers of influence are on their way out.

#3 – All centers of influence are busy

…and what we hate more than anything else is an MLM type that sells lotions, potions, swill, and pills, snake oil and weight loss products, magic drinks, and overpriced vitamins and placebo effect products.

Realize that JV’s that involve the aforementioned and start-ups, unproven, miracle investments, gold mines in far-away places, and property/real estate “investments” in volatile, unstable third world countries are not JV’s most intelligent and honest centers of influence will even consider. We hear a lot of hype, and we have “BS Detectors”.

#4 – Don’t be intimidated by a center of influence.

They all want more money, and they all realize they can leverage their database. And they’re all looking for good, solid, lucrative, and viable JV’s that don’t involve cost, risk, or time.

#5 – Your Presentation:

Look, act, groom yourself, dress, and present yourself at least at the same level of professionalism as your prospect.

Showing up badly dressed, unshaven, covered in cat hair, answering your cell phone in the meeting, surreptitiously  glancing at your Blackberry or cell phone every few minutes (usually the sign of a lack of discipline and/or desperation), being unprepared, or smelling of tobacco, will simply irritate your prospect and end the meeting before it begins. And if you’re overdressed (glitzy, embroidered French cuffs, bling, big mouth, loud, ostentatious, aggressive and egotistical), you simply reveal that you’re intimidated, nouveau riche, or stupid. (Or all three.)

Be demure, professional, high quality, self confident, relaxed, and focused.

#6 – Your Offer and Approach:

Your offer has to be sufficiently financially rewarding to get the avid attention of your prospect.

• Get it in writing.  Click here for information about writing up an MOU, otherwise known as Memorandum of Understanding.
• Run it by your lawyer. I use Pre-Paid Legal and save a fortune on lawyers.
• Be very specific.
• Be concise and to the point, and remember that you have little time and only one opportunity to make a good impression. Talk about the bottom line and the time it will take to deliver the profit.
• Also mention who will control the money. This can easily be a deal breaker.
• Do your homework and position yourself.

#7 – This is a JV between equals.

…and you’re not a sales person or employee, so don’t act like one.

Be prepared to walk away from the deal. No center of influence wants to deal with someone who is in financial distress or under pressure to make money.

By seeking out solid, professional, and honest JV partners, you build your financial future on a firm foundation. Be selective, patient, and focused, and the sky’s the limit when dealing with centers of influence. DollarMakers is built on JV’s with good people.

I just noticed that a fellow with a massive database is following me on Twitter. He knows who I am. I could show him a system that is:

1. Simple
2. Proven
3. Safe
4. No-cost
5. Risk-free

- that he could introduce easily to his database.

Conservatively, it would earn him $5,000 per month in passive income within three months. (No, it’s not Network Marketing.) Yet I can virtually guarantee that he won’t even consider it. Why? His giant ego.

Seminar leaders, “gurus” and “trainers”, much like many of the owners of small and medium-sized business, allow their egos to steal massive potential profits from right under their noses.

The Most Sophisticated Tools In Business

We’re not in business to feel important or to impress people; we’re in business to make the most possible after-tax profit, with the least cost, time, risk, and effort.

The fact is that most “gurus” and “entrepreneurs” are not really entrepreneurs – they’re really just slick salesmen and pitchmen.

Anthony “Sully” Sullivan, the well-known “Pitchman”, says, “Life’s a pitch, and then you die.”

Smart entrepreneurs understand that Joint Ventures and strategic alliances are the most sophisticated tools in business –

• They are strategic,
• They employ leverage,
• They are scalable.
• They are not based on ego, but rather on profit.

Get Your Ego In Check

Look at the people who make the really big money, and you’ll find that they seldom sell their time, they actually prefer not to be on a stage unless they have no other option, and they evaluate business opportunities objectively and rationally.

When we get our egos under control, we suddenly see new options opening up. But for that, we need to understand the back-end, leverage, and positioning. Calvin Coolidge said,

“Civilization and profit go hand in hand.”

Most wanna-be business owners are simply broke, desperate, self-employed salespeople, whose arrogance is exceeded only by their ignorance, yet these are the very people who allow their egos to dictate their business choices.

A big fish is a small, rancid pond is only impressive to those even more pathetic and needy than he is.

Focus On The Bottom Line

The most successful businessman with whom I was ever privileged to work, partnered with me in my business and taught me a very important lesson. He said,

“Robin, it’s all about the bottom line. If you maintain your integrity and sublimate your personal feelings and pride, your profits will soar. There is always going to be someone richer and smarter than you are – don’t try to be a legend in your own lunchtime, don’t believe your own PR and BS, and focus on the bottom line.”

He was a very wealthy man, one of the most humble, soft-spoken people around, and very strong and disciplined.

If you want to feel important, act in a pantomime, join a service or fraternal club and rise in the ranks to get a title, or teach kids.

If you want to get rich, focus on the bottom line.

Here’s a simple formula to predict someone’s future choices and actions.

This virtual crystal ball has helped me significantly over the years to save time and money and allocate my resources more accurately.

Here’s How To Do It – Quick and Easy!

Sit down and do a spot of goal-setting with them, including the creation of an Action Plan.

There are really only two responses to this activity.

Winners who intend to produce will set goals with an Action Plan to Support them that are:

• very specific,
• realistic,
• measurable,
• time-related,
• and significant.

Those who do not intend to produce will set vague, mediocre goals that focus on activity rather than results, and are hard to measure and check.

Clues: What Winners and Losers Say

For example, the winner writes:

“I will make four paid, $2,000 sales by November 1st.”

The loser writes:

“Contact fifteen new prospects, advertise in the newspaper, ask for referrals from existing customers, read ‘Think and Grow Rich’ again.”

You get my drift.

How do I know he/she called fifteen new prospects or read the book, and how does reading the book put money in the bank? Did he/she really ask for referrals? It’s easy to advertise in the newspaper, but that doesn’t create sales.

Also, listen to their words:

• Winners says things like

“I will, I commit, definitely, exactly, certainly, I know.”

And they will put themselves on the line, invest, and face the consequences.

• Losers will use words like,

“I guess, I hope, I’ll try, IF, it depends on, maybe, I can’t control the future”, etc.

They will deflect blame.

Have Something to Show For It

When November 1st rolls around, the Winner will either celebrate their success, or they will have to explain why they didn’t attain their four sales, because it will be plain to see whether they succeeded or not.

The loser has protected them self by insulating them self from criticism; they will claim that they achieved their goals by reading the book, contacting people, asking for referrals, and advertising, yet they made no sales!

So he/she feels very successful with no sales, while the Winner, who in fact made three sales, determines to do much better next time by applying more self-discipline, something which the loser knows nothing about.

Motivation for Losers Vs. Winners

Losers (parasites and moochers) are motivated by:

• being busy,
• feeling important,
• impressing others,
• and teaching others (the blind leading the blind.).

Winners (producers and creators) are motivated by:

• results.

The way they set goals is the first way to predict their futures. The second way is to listen to what they say after their results are revealed.

Losers will:

• make excuses,
• blame others,
  • the economy,
  • circumstances,
  • their tools,
  • products and services,
  • pricing,
  • the market,
  • you name it.
• be “offended” if confronted with the fact that they failed to produce.

Winners will:

• take personal responsibility and
• resolve to do better by
  • changing their action plan,
  • working harder,
  • honing their skills.

Before you commit time and resources to working with someone, apply this simple formula – it could save you a lot of time and money!

This article is important to those who want to achieve great things.

Any successful athlete will tell you how important momentum is in ther training. Consistency, focus, momentum – you can’t serve two masters,

“because you will love the one and despise the other”.

Compromise and distraction, laziness and pride all decrease momentum. An aircraft requires 95% of it’s power to ascend, but only 65% while cruising.

Build Momentum to Build Real Wealth

Many so-called “entrepreneurs” spend their time swinging between feast and famine, chicken and feathers. They spend their money in the good times and suffer in the bad times, forgetting that business is cyclical.

Joan Welsh said,

“If you’re coasting, you’re either losing momentum or else you’re headed downhill.”

In order to build real wealth and get to a place where you can cruise, you have to build momentum in the right areas.

Business Is A Relationship With Money

Anthony Robbins said,

“The most important thing you can do to achieve your goals is to make sure that as soon as you set them, you immediately begin to create momentum. The most important rules that I ever adopted to help me in achieving my goals were those I learned from a very successful man who taught me to first write down the goal, and then to never leave the site of setting a goal without first taking some form of positive action toward its attainment.”

And you have to keep on taking that positive action. Business is a relationship with money, just like your relationship with your spouse – remember that.

Build A Bullet-Proof Mindset

At any given point in your day, on a regular basis, ask yourself,

“Is what I am doing now taking me towards my goal or away from it? What is the return on investment from this choice?”

It’s sad to see many people join DollarMakers and take off in a flurry of promises and activity, and then to see them quit at the first sign of difficulty. Others get overconfident and sit back, riding on the backs of others, and before they know it, they’re cut loose.

The smart ones build a bullet-proof mindset and are consistent, disciplined, focused, and reliable. They build relationship and momentum, and they get rich.

Time – Your Most Valuable Resource

Michael Korda said,

“One way to keep momentum going is to have constantly greater goals.”

By building relationships with strong entrepreneurs whose goals are aligned with yours and with whom you have “overlap”, you will find yourself staying on track.

Once you lose momentum, it’s hard to build it again, especially since one often loses credibility in the process, and that diminishes trust and closes previously open doors.

Sporadic, emotional bursts of ego-driven activity seldom achieve long-term results. You can’t chase two rabbits or ride two bicycles.

Manage your time carefully – it’s your most valuable resource.

Consistency and Momentum  - The Essential Components of Success.

Set your goals and action plans carefully, remain flexible, continue to add income streams and dollarmakers, and remember who your friends are.

Consistency and momentum are not options – they are essential components of success.

Winners hang in there through the tough times, make the hard choices, apply self-discipline, and get rich.

Few people have guts to tell it the way it is. Robert Kiyosaki, in this incredible video, says things like,

“Four things make 90% of the people poor: taxes, inflation, debt, retirement plans.”

And then he provides solutions. He says,

“America will become a third world nation – rich and poor. That’s it. Tell me something money does not affect. Most guys are just wimps. Pussies. Cowards. They don’t have it. so they should get a job. It takes discipline. Most people would like to have a great body like Charles Atlas, but they’re at Burger King wolfing down a Whopper with fries. I don’t know how you can expect to get anything you want without some degree of long-term commitment. Quitting is the easiest thing to do. That’s why most people don’t make it. Everybody has doubts and fear of failing. But look at Tiger Woods or any great athlete: when the going gets tough, that’s when they turn into geniuses and most people turn into wimps. Get off your butt. If you want to be a mechanic, you go hang out with mechanics. If you want to get rich, hang out with rich people.”

3 Things You Need to Succeess

When it comes down to it, you need three things to succeed in business:

I had a friend who would always leave a dollar bill on the floor of his office and give people time in his office alone.

He told me that he was often amazed at who stuck the bill in their pockets – essentially stealing – and who would put the bill on his desk.

When he applied the same test with the same people, substituting a TEN-dollar bill, the same thieves still stole, and the same honest people still put the bills on his desk.

Being the Best You Can Be at All Times

Successful people know that details are important, and that small actions are clues to big choices.

Quite soon after I married Rika, she was in hospital for an operation, and even while she was still woozy from the anesthetic, she was fixing her hair, wiping her mouth, and arranging her bedclothes.

That tells you a lot about someone – not how they behave under normal circumstances, but how they behave under pressure and the small things they notice and do.

Every Detail Counts as Clues

Jill Brock wore gold shoes to the seminar I presented in Edmonton, because she knows I like gold.

How comfortable would you be with an accountant who arrived late, forgot his files, or didn’t return phone calls promptly?

• Body language,
• punctuality,
• personal grooming and dress,
• spelling mistakes in e-mails,
• website links that don’t work,
• foul language on Facebook

– all clues.

I sent someone an important e-mail to which I received no reply, however I noticed that he took the time to participate in infantile, mindless games and “look alike” sessions on Facebook.

The Little Matters = The Big Matters

Peoples’ choices and actions reveal their values, beliefs, and priorities, and predict how they will behave and what choices they will make when it comes to serious money and events.

Someone who can steal ten dollars from you can also steal a few thousand dollars from you: faithful in little, faithful in much.

If someone lacks the self-respect and self-discipline to honor their word and fulfill their obligations in small matters, they will definitely let you down when it comes to large matters.

Testing and Evaluations

Test in a small way before spending big.

Give people a few small tests and evaluate their performance. Don’t believe a word they say, but believe everything they do.

I once told someone,

“You might not respect time and money, but I do. We can’t work together.”

I saw a young man in the airport the other day kick a dime that was lying on the floor. Even if it was one cent, I would have picked it up. I respect money. This young man probably had his daddy paying for everything, so he had no respect for money.

He will never make money if he doesn’t respect it, and I would never work with someone like that.

Allow Others to EARN Your Trust

Like the words of that old song go,

“And there she was, kissin’ on another man – and now I know what Momma meant, when she said, ‘Son, take time to now her, it’s not an overnight thing. Take time to know her; please, please don’t rush into this thing.’”

People who are faithful in small things reveal their motives and character.

We went deep-sea fishing off Cancun, and I was impressed to see how protective and caring my friend, Doctor Kumar Ramlall was when another of my friends was seasick.

Watch how people treat:

• animals,
• waiters in restaurants,
• security guards,
• their family,
• and other peoples’ possessions.
• If they allow their kids and pets to invade other peoples’ space and break their stuff

- you know you should avoid doing business with them.

Respect and honor are demonstrated in deeds, not words. Allow people to EARN your trust over time.

Many people who overlooked the implications of Obama’s choice of his friend and associates are now kicking themselves.

Whom you consistently spend time with tells me all about you.

Here are some real life illustrations for you:

We were enjoying a BBQ in the back yard of his house outside Johannesburg, when my late friend and army buddy said something that has always stayed with me.

Kobus had been telling me how he got rich. And his statement at the very end of his story is one I will never forget.