A Marketing Lesson From TV's The Apprentice

 Advertising and marketing are creative disciplines.  That's one reason I love being a part of the marketing industry. Finding creative solutions to help clients sell their products and services is a fun way to make a living. Having said that, I must also say that too often I see marketers going too far.

In my opinion it is certainly possible to be too creative for your own good. What exactly do I mean by that? Let me share a very public example to explain.

My example comes from the reality television show, "The Apprentice." Okay, so I admit it, I LOVE that show. I'm not much of a reality TV fan, but there's something about watching these teams compete on business challenges week in and week out that intrigues and entertains me.

Quite often they are given marketing-related tasks on the show. Let’s face it, marketing is one of THE most important jobs you’ll ever have in business. If you can do it well, your business will more than likely do well.  If you can’t market well, your business is in trouble.  

In a recent episode of “The Apprentice” the task was to create a TV commercial for Dove Body Wash. The teams were instructed to come up with an "out of the box" 30-second spot to promote the product. The result? 

Both teams created garbage! I guess some may argue they certainly did think "out of the box," and both teams tried to justify that's what they did, but in the end, they failed miserably at their number one task: to sell the product!

And that's what I think happens to many marketers who try to be too creative. They lose sight of the fact their job is to sell a product or service. To do that effectively, your marketing has to be one word: relevant. 

You can be as clever or creative as you want, but in the end if your marketing is not relevant to the product and to those who are most likely to buy it, you have failed.

Look, I realize we have to be creative to capture our audience's attention. After all we are trying to cut through a sea of marketing clutter. I just wish more marketers tried harder to connect with their audience vs. simply entertain them. 

Heck, I sometimes wonder if marketers even know who their audience is. This definitely came into play in The Apprentice with both teams showing men using Dove Body Wash in their commercials. C'mon, it doesn't take a lot of sense to recognize this product is for women! But because they were so focused on being clever, they lost sight of this very basic fact. 

If I can leave you with one thought it is this: Identify and know your audience and then aim to connect with them and jump into the conversation they are already having in their head about your product or service. 

If you can do this, you will be effective in capturing their attention, AND selling your product or service. 

A Completely New Way To Get Rich Rapidly

 This new way is catching on around the world. People are compounding money rapidly for themselves.

Its called "opportunity investment" and it has nothing to do with the traditional way to invest. Stocks, bonds, shares etc.

This is hands on. The entire premise is based on compounding and becoming the "investor source"

You see when we hand over our funds to "professionals" to invest our capital we dilute our returns dramatically. It makes sense if you think about it. They have no interest or incentive to manufacture returns any better then maybe 10% if you are lucky.

"Opportunity Investment" is a term that describes the process of taking responsibility for your own funds. Thereby becoming your own "investor source" What that means is that you determine by your daily actions and decisions, what your returns will be. I have managed over 2500% per year and it was easy. Starting with just $100 and on a whim, I compounded that in to $1 million dollars within 27 months

I discovered this 5 years ago. There is a book written by a guy who pioneered this formula and lives the results every day. Hayden Muller. The book is called "The inside trade secrets to an ethical opportunity investor"

The idea is to identify "investment objects" that are endowed with "excess intrinsic value" By recognising profit where others do not we put ourselves in the position to access this unseen stored portable value and transform it into profits which we pyramid and compound into a rapid fortune.

Its my opinion that this is not new at all. I believe, this is the narrow path that all "high net worth individuals" discovered for themselves. What is novel and new is the way its packaged as a book and disclosed freely to all who choose to recognise its worth.

I am so impressed with it, as were my associates, that we invested in an online resource to share with the many who already compound their wealth rapidly and certainly day by day. (Theres a link to the site below if you wish to learn more)

Theres revolution in the air. Ordinary people are daring to reach for their first million and taking it. Millions are not content to work their whole lives, then retire then die. They express it by their actions. They are living in large comfortable homes. They are sending their children to good schools, driving nice cars and living the life they choose today not tommorow.

We are part of that paradigm shift and we fan the flames with knowledge. Wealth education need not be complicated. Your wealth education could be alot simpler and direct if you choose it to be. Simpler is always better, and opportunity investment is the bare bones. The structure is robust and direct. Take it and earn like the many who already do.

12 Things Nursing Taught Me About Owning a Business

Have you ever wondered whether you're cut out to be an entrepreneur? Nurses sometimes tell me they aren't sure if their nursing career has prepared them to start and succeed in their own legal nurse consultant practice. Yet even the most routine nursing job is full of life lessons that apply to the business world.

My first job as an intensive care nurse in a major medical center prepared me for business success. Subsequent jobs reinforced those early messages. I invite you to look closely at your own nursing career and discover the lessons that will help you succeed as a legal nurse consultant.

Success Lesson 1 — Find Your Passion and Turn It into a Business
As much as I loved my work with critically ill patients and their families, my inner voice told me I wouldn't be working in a hospital forever. As a young nurse, the vision of myself working in the ICU at age 40, 50 or 60 just wouldn't come into focus.

With only 6 years of nursing experience, I left the hospital and started my legal nurse consultant business. From there, I listened to my inner voice and reconnected with my first passion teaching. At age 8, I spent hours every day teaching an imaginary class. Today I am privileged to teach, coach and mentor nurses to live their career dreams. I turned my passion into a business, and since then I haven't worked a single day.

Listen to your inner voice, and you will find your passion. Many nurses have reconnected to their passion through legal nurse consulting, a choice unknown to them before they took my program.

Success Lesson 2 – You Have the Power to Take Control of Your Career Destiny

Patients heal faster when they take control of their health and practice healthy habits. Even the smallest positive action can give a patient a sense of control and empower the healing process.

I learned this lesson time and again as I struggled to gain control of my own nursing career. Each time I refused to give in to the frustrations of working within the healthcare system and took a positive step on my own, I felt better. With every step I grew, I thrived and I came up with new ideas to further my sense of control and satisfaction.

The same is true about your career. You have the power to practice the healthy habits essential to take control of your career destiny. Educate yourself about the steps to achieving career health, including new career options like legal nurse consulting. Then take action on those steps. You really can take control of your career destiny.

Success Lesson 3 – Don't Give in to Fear

As a nurse, I frequently treated patients who had the same progressive disease, yet experienced dramatically different outcomes. We all have known patients who lived years after their predicted demise and other patients who should have lived but didn't because they gave up or didn't want to live. The fact that so many elderly patients die within months of losing a spouse is a solid example of the mind-body connection. In almost every case, the patients who died too soon had given in to fear.

There's also a mind-business connection that will influence the health of your business. When I give in to fear, I become the biggest obstacle to my success. That was true when I started my business 19 years ago. That is true today.

Fear will paralyze you instantly. Practice mind control and exercise your mind daily for positive thinking. Shake off your lack of confidence and negative thinking. Don't wait for an MI to stop inhaling the toxic smoke of fear. Don't let fear be the reason you don't live your career dreams. Always remember the mind-set of the patients who live and the patients who die.

Success Lesson 4 – Nurses Can Do Anything

As nurses most of us have brought patients back to life. We all can recall at least one miracle story a case where, with our help, a patient survived against all odds.

Whenever I face a business crisis, I remind myself, "I'm a nurse and nurses can do anything." I've repeated this same message for 19 years, and it has helped me overcome every obstacle.

If you can heal sick patients and handle life-threatening emergencies as easily as you make your bed in the morning, you really can do anything – especially something as straightforward as starting a business.

Success Lesson 5 – You Can't Climb Mount Everest without Practicing on the Foothills

I had to have extensive education and training just to qualify for my first nursing job. All the lessons from that job helped prepare me for the next. Each successive nursing position required new and different skills necessitating more training and education.

The same applies to owning a business. Today I handle things easily and successfully that seemed impossible 19 years ago. But that's because I've been in training for what I do now ever since I became a nurse.

If you're frustrated with your nursing career, don't feel like you've thrown your life away. No experience or job is a waste. Everything you have done has trained you to move up to the next level. Above all, don't let the fact that you're not trained to climb Mount Everest stop you from pursuing your dreams of becoming an independent legal nurse consultant. Your nursing training and experience was the first step. Start the next step of your training today, and you will make that climb to start your successful legal nurse consultant business.

Success Lesson 6 – The Nursing Process Is Your Friend

When I left clinical nursing, I thought I could set aside the "nursing process" forever. I couldn't have been more wrong. Business requires that same process of assessment, diagnosis, planning, implementation and evaluation. Every project I take on requires me to assess the possibilities and needs, diagnose the problems, plan how to achieve my goals, implement the plan and evaluate my results.

Your nursing jobs have prepared you well. You can apply the nursing process to any business situation and challenge. You will thank your nursing instructors for this one. Every time you review a medical-related case, interview with an attorney or face a challenge in running your business, you will rely on the process they taught you.

Success Lesson 7 – Act Quickly and Decisively

As an ICU nurse, I learned that seconds made a difference in patient outcome. That's true for nurses in any specialty. I rarely had lots of time to ponder or brood over a clinical decision.

I have applied the same principles of acting quickly and decisively in business, too. Am I always correct? No. Do I make mistakes? Yes. Yet because of my nursing experience, I'm never paralyzed into inaction and I've been able to make the most of numerous opportunities I would have missed without acting quickly.

Don't miss your chance to succeed. Learn to act quickly and decisively, and you will grow your legal nurse consultant business.

Success Lesson 8 – What You Focus on Is Where You Achieve Results

In nursing I was often overwhelmed by short staffing, heavy caseloads and lack of support from hospital administration. I soon learned to triage and focus on what I needed to do to heal patients in this less-than-ideal environment. Nursing taught me that where I focus my time is where I achieve results.

That skill comes in handy in business. It's as important to triage and prioritize your actions in business as it is when working with patients. Every day I'm confronted with dozens of challenges, five things that must be done at once, and 20 new creative ideas for my business, but I rarely panic. The organizational and multi-tasking skills I learned as a nurse have served me well.

When you start your legal nurse consultant business, you will not receive any extra hours in the day. In fact, the days will feel shorter. Even the general public knows that working conditions for RNs are worse than ever. Your ability to focus on what's really important under these conditions is the perfect preparation for your successful legal nurse consultant practice.

Success Lesson 9 – This Is Just Business, It's Not Breast Cancer

Ministering to patients and family members helped me put life with all its problems and challenges into perspective. Today when I overreact to a problem or feel I'm in crisis, I think of sick and dying patients. I think, "Now fighting for your life is a REAL problem."

In business I've had lots of ups and downs. When the down moments come, I remind myself, "This is business – not breast cancer." This helps me focus positively on solving the problem rather than embarking on a pity party. I've thrown plenty of those "parties", and they never helped me solve a single business problem.

As you grow your legal nurse consultant business, it helps to ask "So what if this month is not as successful as I planned?" or "So what if my best attorney-client retires?" and to remember its just business, not breast cancer.

Success Lesson 10 – Illness Can Wake You Up

As a nurse I treated many patients who only began to live after they almost died. We've all had patients who said they are glad they got sick, because while they were well, they weren't living the life they wanted. The health crisis forced them to wake up, reassess their lives, decide what was truly important to them, and go for it.

Not every day is a healthy business day. Some days I wake up to a disease challenge in my business. Surprisingly, it's the business ills and mistakes that often awaken me to creative ways of injecting my business with new life.

If your career is facing a health crisis, this is your opportunity to wake up and change things for the better. Legal nurse consulting is one way to restore the health of your career.

Success Lesson 11 – Business Is Personal

Even though technical skills are vital for an ICU nurse, the relationships with patients and their families were what mattered most to me. Those relationships paid off one day when I made a mistake. Because of our relationship, the patient requested that I continue being his nurse despite my error.

Legal nurse consulting is a service business where you will apply the same relationship principles you learned in nursing to your attorney-clients and prospects. Provide quality service and excellent work product that no other legal nurse consultant can replicate, and soon you'll feel like you're in a short-staffing situation all over again.

Success Lesson 12 – Healthy Patients Take Care of Themselves

We've all worked with healthy and unhealthy patients and we've seen the effects of poor health habits on the human body. The health of a pregnant woman is often dramatically reflected in the health of her offspring.

To run a successful company you must enjoy an optimal state of health. Give yourself permission to take care of yourself. I love my business, but I love myself more. After all, without a healthy me, I couldn't muster the energy to give 110% to my clients and employees every day.

Every lesson I learned from nursing, I apply to my business today. You've already learned similar lessons yourself. You don't need another hospital job to help you succeed in business. Take a moment to revel in all nursing has taught you. These lessons will multiply your success when you transfer them to your new legal nurse consulting practice.

12 Reasons To Use A Franchise Consultant

 A potential business owner that has an interest in purchasing and running a franchise would benefit from the services of a franchise consultant. A franchise consultant can provide expertise and guidance throughout the entire process. Listed below are 12 reasons that it is advantageous to use this service.

1. The service is free to the franchisee, with the franchiser covering the consulting fees.

2. The service is personal and confidential.

3. The consultant guides the potential franchisee through the entire process of deciding whether to become a franchisee, and how to go about it.

4. A detailed profile including an evaluation of the potential owner's experience, interests, and goals is complied in order to match the new franchisee with the most suitable opportunity.

5. Education is provided on the various types of ownership and investment options.

6. Investigation into the most suitable opportunities that are available is done by the consultant.

7. Initiation of contact with company representatives is part of the service.

8. The consultant helps to verify each company's success and track record.

9. The potential business owner saves time and money by having the experts perform research on various opportunities.

10. The consultant acts as the one-stop shop, answering questions and referring the potential owner to other resources as necessary, such as financial or legal advisors.

11. The consultant works with all types of franchises, including full-time, part-time, new units, and re-sale franchises.

12. Complications and confusion are virtually eliminated by having an expert perform these services.

Overall, a franchise consultant will help you determine if franchising is right for you and if so, what type of franchise opportunities you are most likely to succeed in.