Procrastination Will Kill You

Honestly, in what area of life will procrastination not kill you? If you wait to take shelter in a storm, procrastination can kill you. If you procrastinate in your romantic life procrastination can kill you, or least leave you alone and bitter. In business procrastination can kill you, bankrupt your business, rob you of your assets and leave you with a list of unpaid bills. Procrastination is not a good thing in practically any context.

This is not to suggest that waiting in of itself is a bad thing. Judiciously waiting to see an outcome and formulate a plan can be a very smart move. However, procrastinating is related to negative qualities like fear, or over-confidence or laziness. There are even companies that sell hypnosis programs on CD to buyers in order to cure the problem of procrastination!

Procrastination is deadly when you have your own home business or web-based business. When you work in a public location with other employees, though you may procrastinate for a while, eventually problems will arise forcing you to take quick action. However, at home it??™s easy to be lulled into a spirit of laziness. You can bet that the brain has a problem reconciling the comfortable spirit of home (the same place you sleep and relax) to the work environment, which is constantly active.

Procrastination can also affect struggling entrepreneurs. It??™s easy to get discouraged or intimidated when you are constantly trying to sell your services or products. These negative qualities can eventually lead to procrastination, and you may find yourself always putting off today??™s assignment for tomorrow??”overbooking the rest of your week, which will cost you time and expense.

In battling the problem of procrastination, remember to apply realistic goals rather than set vague dimensions on what you want to do with your business. Prepare lists and make schedules if this will emphasize to your mind the importance of the day??™s activities. Always have a deadline and if you don??™t have an official deadline then make one for yourself, and punish yourself in some minor way for not meeting that deadline. (No ice cream perhaps?) You can also reward yourself for finishing on time, thus taking on the role of both employee and boss.

Procrastination can also be helped by energy, whether you enjoy an energy drink (a temporary fix) at lunch or are taking steps to live a healthier lifestyle with improved diet and exercise (a long term solution). Don??™t let procrastination kill every aspect of your life! We live in the present and there is always work to be done!

Intense Market Research, Innovative Thinking & Delivering A Value Driven Solution Will Define Your “Product” In The MarketPlace.

Defining your product sounds like such a simple thing, but you’d be surprised at the number of companies that struggle with this concept.

Through several consulting gigs over the years I have come to realize that… While sales revenues, product enhancements, support SLA’s etc appear to be the obvious areas of concern for any company, its the Product Definition and messaging around the products, that any company struggles with the most.

I have come to understand that defining a product involves a combination of several things. While the core idea may have been stemmed from intense market research or innovative thinking of some bright people in the company, the success of the product is eventually determined by just aspect and that is: Value.

What products to create, what to retire, what to enhance etc is a rather large part of running a company. The number of companies that find product definition problematic is staggering.

Unable to understand the nuances involved in creating customer centric solutions, most companies create redundant products thus reacting to vague and poorly understood market trends.

Just because a specific product is the current rage and is being produced by several different companies does not mean that your company should produce the same item, no matter how different.

It remains, at heart, the same item. Product definition should utilize innovative thinking and intensive market research to determine real needs. Only then can a truly great product be produced. Product definition should utilize as many aspects of market research as possible to get a true picture of the needs of customers.

Knowing the true wants and needs of consumers will help you create a truly inspired product that meets those needs, rather than simply following the crowd with another cookie cutter product that offers no individuality. There are plenty of companies that currently do that; don’t let yours be one of them.

Market research during product development is important beyond deciding what type of product you will produce. With the right market research, you can find out what additions, customizations and services your target market will value within your product. This will greatly help you refine your product offering even further, taking it from creative to truly innovative. (Apple’s Mac Book Pro and iPOD)

Your product development and definition should be geared towards producing a solution that is truly novel. This is more than simply responding to requests for new additions to an existing product.

Truly great products are defined by their makers to fill a need, a gap in what is currently offered. See this video by Guy Kawasaki talks about greatness in business
Rarely does this mean simply a different version of an existing product with new bells and whistles attached.

Defining your product through market research should be designed to give you ideas about new products that can help your target market.

your product must be new, innovative and original or you will be lost in the crowd. Too many companies today simply follow the crowd or add on to existing products. True product definition will go far beyond this simple practice, into the realm of real genius.

Celebrating Father’s Day: A Father-In-Law Whose Refused To Take a NO

I am writing today to celebrate the Father’s day. Little late but again..every day is a father’s day and every day is a mother’s day.

..Yet this post is meant for those want to radically change their life in next 180 days.

About 8 months ago my in-laws visited us. During that visit my father-in-law asked me.. Now that he is retired what business could he start that can keep him engaged and yet make some money.

As he was not a technical person or had any knowledge in HTML etc, I suggested he explore BLOGGING.

I gave him an e-book , the same e-book that I had been sharing with everyone. Here is a copy of it just in case you want to check it out.

He got so excited, he started a blog, he figured out the RSS/ATOM stuff himself and soon started posting..

About 20 days into this…he posed a question that fundamentally changed me for good.

The conversation went somewhat like this…

He asked how much one can make just by blogging?

I instantly answered: $50k a month

He said: What $50k a month?

I said: YES..Indeed

(I was little sarcastic)

He said: Do you make $50K a month from your blog?

I said NO ( A SHY NO)

He said WHY?

I changed the topic…

2-days later he said the same thing again….again I ignored.

4-days later he again raised the topic.. and this time he got me..

I promised I will show him a plan on how to make $50K a month online using blogs as medium. Preferably just one blog.

My extensive research showed not many professional bloggers were making $50k a month.

I secluded myself for a week or so and came up my 7-step business plan…

1) My website www.srinisaripalli.com will become my blog

2) I will post 3-times a day with one Avg post 300 words

3) I will write on some five topics or so “Internet marketing, Small Business Success, Self Improvement, Entrepreneurship & Coaching/Consulting”

4) Over the next one year I will create separate individual blogs from each topic above.

5) The blog will have 17 back-end/front-end products.

6) A thousand dollar entry coaching program.

7) Each of those 17 products will have a Continuation Program in the back-end.

180 Days Later..

Three new authority sites in creation..

Self Improvement: www.habitofharmony.com

Internet marketing: www.gorichonline.com

Coaching/Consulting: www.successengineer.com

A Thousand Dollar Coaching Program currently in place (www.KingOfBlogging.com), I am coaching six people in this program. You can read about them on www.successengineer.com. All these six people are going to take the professional blogging world
by storm. Just wait.

I am little behind on my product creation, but working at them. Last month I touched about $8000 income directly resulting from this blog.

This is not to brag but to show you that anyone can do this, it doesn’t take another course, seminar or e-book. A little bit of hard work and perseverance.

Thats it. I need your comments, suggestions on this.. So post.

Oh yes you may ask me why 17 products? why not 10 or 20?

Well there is no numerology behind it.

To mitigate risk, maximize opportunity and extend the staying power the number 17 came from a complex statistical reasoning based on historical and future market conditions that can be influenced with price, promotion and Placement

To Your Continued Success!

Srini Saripalli