entrepreneurLet me tell you a story..

Tony had got to the point in his online career where he was working his Internet information business 60+ hours per week and making good money. The problem though, was he had no time to enjoy his money or his online work.

The moment he launched a new product he was already knee deep in his next one. He had no sense of direction, only of acting and reacting on little more than impulse and gut instinct.

And his gut was now telling him he couldn’t keep this up much longer because his health was failing and he was totally exhausted.

Kymi was doing virtual training and consulting. A 40 hour week seemed like a vacation to her since many of her weeks were closer to 80 hours. She would even get up at 3 or 4am in the morning to coach people in other time zones. It was a constant race to try to keep up with her workload and schedule and her health was also starting to fail…

Both were at the end of their tether and felt they were on a virtual treadmill because the online life that had seemed so promising at the start seemed to be turning on them quite badly. They couldn’t understand why they just weren’t enjoying the IM lifestyle as they had been promised.

Many marketers can relate all too well to Tony and Kymi so I want you to do something for me.

Take a look back over the previous month and ask yourself this question:

Are you spending so much time working IN your business that you have literally no time to work ON your business?

If you’re racing from creating one product to the next, doing one product launch after the next, setting up the next JV and the next website and so on and so forth, you’re probably doing okay financially. Not great, but okay.

You’re probably always chasing the next big thing that’ll earn you enough to give you some breathing room. Even then, you won’t get to lounge about too long before it’s time to do it all again. But for now if you keep going the money will continue to come in. The real problem is if you stop and get off the treadmill the money will stop as well and you can’t afford to do that. Am I right?

It sounds totally exhausting just reading about it doesn’t it?

In other words, you are your business. You’ve essentially built a job for yourself and at the end of the day, that’s not bad because at least you’re earning an income. But do you know what’s better? Building a BUSINESS for yourself instead of the other way round.

I bet you’ve got some great ideas on the back burner you KNOW will earn you serious income, but at this moment in time, you’re so busy working in your business, i.e treating your business like a job, you can’t possibly get a start on those ideas mainly because you don’t have the time and you certainly don’t have the energy to even think about starting on them.

But what if you could work less and earn more, whilst continuing to provide great value to your customers and clients? What if you could take a step back and start working ON your business for a change? And what if, in the process, you freed up a major portion of your time to pursue the activities you love?

It is possible, and here’s how:

First, take stock of what you’re doing right now in your day-to-day activities that drain your time and energy. These are things that need to be done, but you hate doing them.

Second, list the things you spend time on that don’t generate you any income.

Third, list the things you do that take a great amount of time but do generate income.

Fourth, and this applies only if you provide services – what services do you supply one-on-one that could be done for a much larger audience? For example, a coach might work one-on-one, but that same coach could also work with a group.

Fifth, make a list of the things you do within your business you LOVE doing. Hopefully these are things that also make income.

Your fifth list is your “genius.” These are (hopefully) the things you were born to do. You’re good at them and you love doing them. You’re not going to touch this list, unless it’s to increase the time you spend on these activities because this is the list you want to eventually concentrate on.

However, the other lists are about to be torn apart. Go back through those lists and for each item, decide if you’re going to ditch it or delegate it. If it’s not necessary to earn income, then obviously you’re going to ditch it. If it’s important for your business’ income but you don’t like doing it, you’re going to delegate it. I can guarantee there are plenty of people out there who will be much better at these tasks than you who will be thrilled to get the work. Try outsourcing to somewhere like the Philippines to find excellent workers who can perform within your budget if it’s tight.

Now search for ways to leverage your already existing content. For example, if you’ve written e-books or courses on a topic, can you turn that content into a home study course or webinar series? If you coach one-on-one, can you use the same coaching materials to coach an entire group at once?

Look for ways to take your current content assets and use them for higher and more profitable purposes. If you work with brick and mortar businesses for instance, stop seeing them one-on-one and start giving group training to show what needs doing to bring their businesses into the world of search and social media.

Whilst talking to 20 business owners one-on-one could take you an entire week, you can talk to twice that number in one afternoon in a classroom setting. Plus you don’t have to worry about closing the deal because those who are interested will be eager to hire you before it’s too late and you’re booked solid.

Bottom Line: Delegate those things that aren’t your genius and leverage your assets so you get far more done in far less time.

You’ll earn more – perhaps exponentially more – and you’ll have more time to enjoy it.

And as a BIG added bonus, if and when the day comes to sell your business you’ll get a much better price for it, because your business will be far more profitable and not nearly so labor intensive for the new owner.

Try it and watch your online business become a pleasure to work with again…


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