A man’s daughter told him there were ripe apples on the tree in their yard. He went out with an axe and a bucket, picked the five apples that were ripe, put them in the bucket, and then chopped down the tree, laden with green apples. He wouldn’t wait for them to ripen, and so he missed out on much good fruit.

The Moral to the Story

We need to continually brand ourselves so that when prospective customers “ripen”, you’re their natural choice – top of mind. We want to position ourselves in their mind by creating a category and then owning it.

Getting the Most from Marketing and Advertising

We know that advertising works very much better when you’re well branded. You get a much better ROI for marketing and advertising when people recognize you. How do you know how well you’re branded? I look at my site on Alexa.com, I Google Robin J. Elliott and DollarMakers and I see how many times the phone rings. But the best test is your bottom line, right?

Using Joint Ventures to Brand Easily & Effectively

Branding is essential for business success. But isn’t it very expensive? And with the cost of advertising and the mass of information out there, isn’t it difficult to stand out and be recognized? It is difficult if you use conventional methods. They’re risky and expensive. Hit and miss. That’s why we use Joint Ventures to build our brand effectively.

In order to brand Robin J. Elliott and JVWisdom.com I use the following:

• Blog my website a JV with another website
• Seminars and teleclasses
• Articles in other peoples’ e-zines
• Public speaking
• Keynote speeches
• E-books and audio books

… and on and on – all Joint Ventures.

I also use:

• Contingency Advertising
• Host Beneficiary Relationships
• Bundling

… all Joint Ventures as well. No cost or risk and very little time, with maximum effect and reach. I could go on all day. Bottom line, it works for my bottom line! And my JV Partners benefit just as much. Win/win.

Take a Multifaceted Approach

We discovered a long time ago that branding is a multifaceted thing. Many different baits on many different hooks. Get the public’s attention continually, on many different levels. Reinforce their awareness of you and your business. Donald Trump said that there is no such thing as overexposure. I agree with him.

The Value of Branding Your Business

Branding creates massive equity for you, as long as it translates into business. Branding on its own is ego. We need to convert that branding into after tax profit. Again, multidimensional approaches and income streams can be developed fast and with little cost or time and no risk, using Joint Ventures. When our income is not restricted to our own products and services, we’re doing real business and making real money, real fast.

Have You Been Behaving Like a Baboon?

Most businesses are like African baboons – these furry fellows race through the cornfields, picking corn and stuffing it under their arm. As fast as they stuff the corn under their arm, it falls out the back, but they keep on picking and stuffing! By the time they get to the edge of the cornfield, they are carrying one corncob and they’ve left a trail of corn on the ground. This is how many entrepreneurs handle customers. They’re so busy getting new ones that they neglect and lose their existing customers out the back door. Attrition spirals out of control and yet they continue to spend more money on finding new customers.

Invest in Your People

We know it’s far more affordable to resell existing customers than to get new ones. We know that it’s better to retain our customers and to encourage referrals through added value service than to spend a lot of money finding new customers. So why don’t we act accordingly?

Why don’t we spend 80% of our marketing budget on our EXISTING customers?

Invest in your people and they will bring you a lot of new ones. Building strong relationships with the customers you have will:

• increase loyalty
• reduce attrition
• increase transaction values
• lengthen customer lifespan.

Why not put a program together to REACTIVATE inactive customers?

It’s much easier than trying to buy new ones.

A happy customer is good – an elated customer is better.

By redirecting our marketing dollars to our loyal clients and creating unprecedented added and unexpected value, we can engender massive reciprocity in the form of referrals and goodwill. But only strategists will understand this. Tacticians, those “instant gratification” types, will never understand this. A satisfied customer might stay with you, but an inspired and enthusiastic customer will bring her friends, family and associates. You can buy a lot more new customers than advertising with:

• A surprise party
• An unexpected gift
• A personal phone call
• A complimentary dinner

Use Joint Ventures to add value at no cost to you. Partner with other businesses to increase the value to offer and to differentiate yourself from the competition. Put yourself in your clients’ shoes and take the time to find ways to make their lives easier and more comfortable. Look after what you have and they will look after you.

Sales Tip

Act in your customer’s best interest. Reward referrals generously. Don’t skimp on packaging. Create referral systems that make the customer happy. Protect your customers; they’re hard enough to get and they can be worth their weight in gold.

Management Tip

Teach your team to listen and to go the extra mile. When I go into Safeway and ask where the bathroom is, the employee will walk me to the bathroom. When I go to the competition, the employee points in the direction on the bathroom. Big difference. A nice bag with a pretty bow and a big smile, a follow-up telephone call and even a thank you note can generate a massive return on investment. Get creative and set the example.

This short article is intended to impart and share a Joint Venture Mindset that can liberate us from restrictive assumptions and perceptions.

Chances are You’ve Been Hoodwinked!

Entrepreneurs have received many messages in the past that have had the cumulative effect of hoodwinking us. We have put blinders on by accepting certain “Solutions” from the Gurus.

The purpose of an Entrepreneur is to make after tax profit. We use business as the vehicle. But we heard that we need to be “focused” and that we need an “Elevator Speech” and similar concepts that can effectively lock us out of tremendous wealth opportunities.

Just Connect Problem to Solution

When I visit my doctor, does he immediately suggest a special on hip replacements or hair implants? Does he urge me to consider a heart transplant, perhaps, (early bird special) without even examining me? No. He looks for problems and then suggests solutions, and I buy every single time. Does my doctor need to specialize in orthotics to prescribe orthopaedic footwear? No. He refers me to someone who does that. He doesn’t need to be an anaesthetist or a surgeon in order to offer me that service. He examines me, asks me questions, LISTENS, and offers solutions. He doesn’t talk about himself.

Why Networking Meetings Don’t Work

Go to any “Business Networking Meeting” and you’ll find dozens of wanna-be entrepreneurs, usually self employed salespeople, who thrust their business cards at you, talk at you, pitch you, and then leap up to enthusiastically deliver the pre-digested, pre-packaged, boring “elevator speech” that they paid someone who lost their job and now calls themselves a “coach” to create.

Everyone is there to sell, sell, sell.

And while they’re giving their elevator speech, what are the rest of the people at their table doing? They listen long enough to decide whether or not the speaker will buy their product or service and then promptly lose interest. They’re waiting to give THEIR speech. You know this is true. Just look at the audience – they’re bored stiff. Everyone is there to sell, sell, sell.

Perhaps it’s time to reconsider things.

When you go back to your office, you send e mails to all the people you met at the “Networking Meeting”, saying how nice it was to meet them. Most of them don’t even return the e mails. And so it goes. Everyone is out to sell, everyone is only really interested in themselves, and nobody gives a damn about you or your amazing business, flashy brochures or scintillating elevator speech. Perhaps it’s time to reconsider things.

See, it’s not about you at all.

Nobody cares about your packaging, website, qualifications or incredible accomplishments. Most people whom I meet that insist on telling me about all the things they have accomplished, are simply HAS BEEN’S. I don’t care hat you did in the past. I want to know what you will do in the future, because that’s where we’re going to live! People don’t care about your qualifications – they want to know one simple thing: “What can you do for ME?”

How about this elevator speech?

“My name is Robin Elliott. My job is to help you achieve your business goals with no money and no risk. I would like to find ways to apply my rather extensive resources, contacts, skills and connections to your business challenges and help you to achieve your goals – at no charge. To see if you qualify for this service, call me.”

The Right JV Mindset:

I’m like a plumber coming to fix your problems at your home. You don’t care about my background or how many kids I had. You just want your problems solved.

My contacts and Joint Venture Partners are my Tools.

I walk in to a meeting with a toolbox full of really great, professional, honest, competent, experienced and trusted business associates and all their products and services. I don’t care which tools I use – I will always get paid for my services. I don’t have to have a business or products or services of my own in order to solve your business problems because I understand business. I have been doing this for 19 years. I look for the problems, discuss the solutions and introduce you to the person who will apply those solutions to your business. And I will get paid by the people whom I refer to you, while I’m at home with my wife and everyone else is working hard, creating multiple, diverse, passive income streams for me.

Joint Ventures:

• If you know John needs what Paul is offering, you introduce them and get paid. You’re a middleman, a tollbooth, a facilitator. You connect the right people.
• And when a few people have a common goal and wish to share their skills, resources and abilities, you can help them form a syndicate or a team.
• If someone has excess resources, underutilized inventory or assets, you can show them how to optimize their resources through Joint Ventures.
• You can facilitate the sharing of sales staff, employees, distribution, advertising space, retail space, warehousing, transport, skills, reputation, access and databases. And get paid for the value that you create.

Most of the Joint Venture stuff out there is related to internet marketing and affiliate programs. But most businesses are more interested in real time, real money, real people and touch-and-feel business. The internet is great and we all use it, but there needs to be balance.

The KEY

The key to successful Joint Ventures is to find the RIGHT PEOPLE. In fact, if there were twenty good people in a room, and all we did was mastermind, brainstorm and create Joint Ventures for five days without leaving that room, we would all double our wealth.

It’s hard to find good people who will honor their commitments, do what they say, deliver the goods and take responsibility. It’s not easy to find honest people who will pay you and reciprocate.

That why I started the DollarMakers Joint Venture Forum.  www.jvwisdom.com

You talk to yourself at a rate of 600 words a minute. Even when you’re talking to yourself out loud, you’re talking with yourself internally as well. You’re constantly evaluating your circumstances and choices, based on your frame of reference and conditioning.

Choosing a New Program

Many of the confusions we jump to are automatic; conditioned responses based on past experiences which were often painful. So, many of the choices that we make are guaranteed to keep us in a negative loop, unless we consciously and actively stop the downward cycle and interrupt the negative pattern. Here’s a proven and simple way to do just that.

Asking Better Questions

Have you noticed that you always answer your own questions, and that the question determines the answer? And that we act on those answers?

• If you ask yourself, “Why am I so stupid?” You’ll get an answer that confirms that you are stupid, by telling you why you are stupid.
• If you ask, “Why do I have to work so hard?” you’ll trigger the same, negative response to confirm and support a negative belief or paradigm.
• “Why can’t I get out of debt?” will elicit an automatic, programmed response that will keep you in debt.

Break Free with This Recipe

The way to break free and escape this trap is to consciously and purposefully construct and ask questions that are designed to break the mold of pessimism and failure in any area of your life. In order to break disempowering habits, one fast way is to constantly ask yourself the right questions.

Write down the questions and be sure to ask yourself these questions (out loud, if possible) at least seven times every day. Try these for a start:

1. How can I double my income?
2. What is great about my life?
3. What do I like, respect and admire about the person I just met?
4. How can I add more value to the products and services I sell?
5. What am I grateful for?
6. How can I do more in less time?
7. What am I happy about? What is great about this situation?
8. Why do I have so much energy and joy?
9. How can I joint venture with others to make my dreams come true in a fraction of the time?
10. What can I do to increase the happiness and comfort of those I work with / my vendors / my family?
11. What did I learn today that will help me for the rest of my life?
12. Why am I such a great person? Why do people like and respect me?

Tips to Manage Your Mind

Tailor your questions to overcome mental and emotional challenges in your life. Focus on good things, solutions and events that you’re grateful for. Focus on what you want, not on what you don’t want. Create vivid mental pictures of your goals. Manage your mind and thoughts and everything else in your life will improve. Most of all, mix with Eagles instead of turkeys – Eagles will help you, support you and encourage you. Want to know where to find them?  Check out the  DollarMakers Joint Venture Forum at www.jvwisdom.com.

We tend to compare ourselves DOWNWARD, which is very disempowering.

• Do you say, “I’m not as fat as my friends, so its OK”? Or, “At least we have less debt than Monica and Manny”?
• Do you justify your lack of success and performance, initiative and progress by comparing yourself with less successful people?

This is a recipe for disaster.

• “Well, we’re better off than when we lived in the car and ate out of dumpsters - at least now we get hand-outs from the Food Bank!”

No. That’s not going to make your dreams come true. We all get stuck in this trap of “Negative Comparison”, a term I have just concocted.

Why not compare yourself with more successful people in order to motivate yourself? Sure, it’s less comfortable, but it works!

Try Comparing UP Instead

If you make ten sales a month, instead of feeling jolly because last month you made 7 sales, why not ask yourself,

“What will it take for me to do better than the best salesperson in the team?”

Even if the best salesman is doing 20 sales per month.

Compare UP. Challenge yourself. Push yourself. The amount of money we earn is usually within 10% of the earnings of the people we spend the most time with. Why not spend more time with winners? Find someone who is even more successful than you are and learn from them. That’s why I started the DollarMakers Joint Venture Forum - a place to meet with and work with real Eagles.

When you’re ready to start doing Joint Ventures, you should look at opportunities that fit the following criteria:

1. No Cost & Risk

There should be no cost or risk to you and it should not involve a lot of time, and definitely no selling.

2. Worth Your Time & Effort

The deals should be able to create enough money per deal to be worth your time and effort.

3. Pick Excellent Partners

You should only work with people you like and trust, who take action and are reliable. Don’t deal with whiners, losers or flakes.

4. Quick Turn-around Time

Look at the turn-around time. If you’re bringing leads to realtors or financial planners (insurance salespeople), for example, their deals generally take a long time and often fall apart, whereas certain deals are time sensitive (like a seminar) and people have to make fast decision, so the deal happens or it doesn’t in a shorter period of time. We want high-return, no risk (to EITHER party), little time invested, no money invested, and a quick turn-around time.

5. Multiple Complementary Income Sources

Structure your multiple income sources to complement each other. Instead of a “feast or famine” scenario, have different businesses with different busy cycles in the hopper, so that you get an even flow of income. Also look for synergies between the different demographics and buyer needs so that the same customer can buy from more than one income source.

6. Put it in writing!

Put the deal in writing - who does what, how they do it, when they do it, how payment takes place, the exact amounts or percentages paid, when payment takes place, etc., the more detail the better so that there are no misunderstandings later on. Do you get paid on the first transaction or on ongoing transactions?

7. Get Educated!

Attend the DollarMakers Joint Venture Forum Member meetings and conference calls and attend Bootcamps so that you stay connected and keep on learning. Remember, if there’s no risk to either party and a deal doesn’t work out, nobody gets hurt, so don’t be afraid to fail. Also, some people will not want to Joint Venture with you. Don’t take it personally; they simply don’t understand value yet.

8. Come Prepared

Create an action plan and be prepared to do some research on people whom you intend to approach. For example, what are their profit margins, underutilized resources and needs? What kind of reputation do they have? Google them, check the Better Business Bureau, run a credit check, ask around.

9. Maintain Your Confidence & Strength

Be upbeat and optimistic when approaching potential Joint Venture partners, but never be desperate. You don’t need them. Be prepared to walk away from any deal at any time.

10. Think Big & Take Action

Finally, business is a numbers game. The more people you talk with, the more you try, the more you fail,  the bigger you think, the better. Joint Ventures is the fastest, best and most fun way to make an unlimited amount of money with no risk, little time and no money, that I have ever seen. Make it happen!

I know it’s hard for some of us to ask, especially self-sufficient, proud, responsible, disciplined and hard working entrepreneurs. We don’t want to take advantage, we’re afraid of being made a fool of, afraid of rejection, and so on. But the fact is, things only happen when we make them happen. And that usually involves asking people to do something.

The Beggar Who Understood Averages

I talked with a beggar on the street once. I was interested to know if he felt bad when people didn’t give him money. He answered, “No, siree! I don’t feel bad if they ignore me or don’t give me money – THEY feel bad! I just keep on askin’, askin’, askin’, and the Law of Averages kicks in. I can predict pretty accurately how much money I will make on any given day, as long as I keep askin’. And the more I ask, the more I git!” Salespeople know this – it’s a Numbers Game – ratios are real. Statistics are real. It’s a game. Ask ten people and you might get something. Ask a thousand people and you most certainly will!

How many opportunities have we lost in life, simply because we didn’t ask? What’s the worst that can happen? They can say, “No.”

Invite Others to Participate

Together, we can do amazing things – but we need to invite others to participate in our Joint Venture programs in order to achieve the maximum results, and that involves asking. And it’s absolutely amazing what people will do, if you simply ask them to!

How to Get More

Set up your Joint Ventures in such a way that YOU ask many people and that you have a system to ask many more. And the more you ask for, the more you’re likely to get. Be confident, plan your strategy well and ASK. By all means ask. Ask many people. Ask for more. “You have not, because you ask not”, is true.

The best part of Joint Ventures, as well as the easiest and most lucrative, is “Piggybacking”.

When I was 11 years old, my favorite game at school was similar to piggybacking. Small guys like me would ride on the backs of big, strong guys and we would try to pull our opponents over. They key to winning was strong arms and a strong “Horse”. I had strong arms and I always chose a strong horse, so I usually won.

A Strong Recommendation

In business, the book, “Horse Sense” by Al Ries and Jack Trout applies the same concept. This book was personally recommended to me by a multimillionaire client of mine, many years ago. I read the book three times.

A Lucrative Piggybacking Example

I recently talked with a man who has 1,200 people in his database. I suggested he offer them Membership in my DollarMakers Joint Venture Forum at a great discount. By sending out two e-mails and one voice broadcast and adding value, for which I would pay, and by mentioning the opportunity in his e-zine, we estimated that he would have at least 120 join (10%). That would earn him significant money, at no cost or risk to him. That’s piggybacking – and it’s that simple.

The same can be done with shared advertising, mailings, e-mails, e-zines, direct mail, seminars and business opportunities. Riding on the back of existing distribution, reputation, reach, access and exposure is very effective.

Consider the Power of Partnering

• Don’t buy a 747 to fly to LA – simply rent a seat.
• Don’t own the overhead or create a competency; borrow it.

Consider the power of partnering: everyone wins by sharing underutilized resources and Hidden Assets. And here’s the Good News – you don’t need to own the resource, be it a database, distribution route or relationship – you simply make the connection – it’s called “Triangulation”. No risk or cost, no downside, lots of fun and lots of money. You don’t need a business to set this up. Link me up with someone else and take a piece of the action. Link Bob up with Sally and get paid on all ensuing business over the next two years, why not?

The key to successful piggybacking…

is a strong horse and a strong rider – both parties should be ethical, generous, smart, professional and proactive. That’s the hard part. I know people whose databases I wouldn’t touch with a 20 foot pole. Be selective; be VERY selective.

Talk with Members of the DollarMakers Joint Venture Forum and if you want to make a lot of money easily, remember that all it takes is a bit of thought. It’s not hard work and there’s no risk if you’re dealing with the right people.

The Bottom Line

Bundle a product or service with one that is already selling well or add a product or service to an existing database or distribution route – that’s piggybacking, and it can create increasing, multiple streams of passive income for you.