How many of these did you get? Some of these may seem obvious. Others may not. I encourage you to think about them in light of what you've just read. There are nuances there that will help you to make them more useful in actual practice. It's worth the effort, I assure you. Lesson: I don't care how good you are, you can't do everything well. Focus on what you are good at, and either hire people to do the rest or do without until you learn. Lesson: Always be open to hearing about joint ventures. They often have pleasant surprises hidden in them that you weren't expecting. If I hadn't been willing to discuss this with Mark's staff, I'd have missed out on a very fun (and quite profitable) deal. Lesson: When you think of something that can help someone, tell them. It costs you nothing, and you never know where it will lead. Lesson: Deals don't happen in a vacuum. How you treat people has as much to do with them wanting to do business with you as what you can offer. When you're talking about someone who doesn't need you, it often has more to do with it. In short, your reputation precedes you. Even if you don't know you have the reputation. What kind of reputation are you building? Lesson: It's much easier to trust someone if they go out of their way to help you when there's nothing extra in it for them. Being helpful isn't just a "feel good" thing (although it does) - it's good business. People can tell when you're being helpful because it's good business and when you're being helpful because you're helpful. Don't fake it. Just do it. By the way, it's okay to be helpful just because it's good business. Just say so if that's what you're doing. Serious businesspeople respect that kind of honesty. Lesson: Brainstorming is the cause of more deals than any other single factor. Brainstorming requires that you interact with humans, on a human level. If you're online to avoid human contact --- get offline until you know better! Lesson: Know your stuff. Most experienced people turn down 90% or more of the deals that are offered to them. You need to know what you CAN do, what you WANT to do, and what you HAVE TIME to do. And you need to know what the deal is worth. Lesson: You know the old cliche: People do business with people they know, like, and trust. They have a much better chance to get to know you and like you if they can TALK to you. Email can't take the place of actual real-time voice conversation. Use Your Phone! Lesson: Before agreeing to changes in your commitments, think about whether or not you can fulfill them. Changes are an inescapable part of most deals. Being flexible is critical. But it's more critical to be dependable. Lesson: Never agree to anything verbally that you wouldn't sign your name to. To honest people a handshake is more important than a written contract. To quote a friend quoting a friend, "If dealing with honourable people, a contact is unnecessary. If dealing with dishonourable people, a contract is useless." Lesson: Friends are more important than deals. There are a million deals out there. Do you have a million friends? If you think about this example, you'll see that there's no conflict between the two. In fact, quite the contrary. Lesson: Don't BS people. With the experienced folks, you'll lose. They don't expect perfection or "All Knowing Scope." They remember Harry Callahan's admonition: "A man's gotta know his limitations." Lesson: If you're too close to the deal, admit it. Get help. It happens to every single person at many points during their life. An outside perspective can be the difference between wild success and mediocre results. Lesson: Being interested does not make someone a prospect. To be a prospect, they must also have the ability to pay for the product and to benefit from it. Design your offer and your marketing approach around your real prospects. Lesson: Be aware of the potential market for your offer. If it's too small, a little imagination and some work can expand that market and dramatically increase the profit potential in the deal. Lesson: If the offer is right, the deal is sweeter for everyone involved. Make it the best offer you can. That's your foundation. Lesson: When proposing a joint venture, make sure there's so much value in it for your potential partners that they'd be silly to say no. Know what they want, and find as many ways to give it to them as you can. Do that, and you almost can't fail. Lesson: Be flexible. Schedule your contacts with your partners whenever you need to in order to get as comprehensive a plan as possible. Rushing things through to get the deal going is a major cause of the failure of most deals. Rushing doesn't mean doing it fast, by the way. It means paying more attention to speed than to important details. It's possible to get both, if you are willing to do the work. Lesson: Protect your friends, protect your customers and protect your partners. Always. Loyalty is a hard to find trait these days. Don't neglect it or abuse it. Lesson: Expect that people will try and screw you. They may not always be aware that they're doing it, and they may lie to try and convince you that it wasn't their intention. It doesn't matter why they're doing it. If your goal is to protect the people involved, you don't need to know their motives. Only the outcome (or potential outcome) of their actions. Lesson: Expect that people will tell you when someone is doing something they shouldn't. You'll be surprised at the number of people who will watch out for you if you have a reputation for honest dealings. It's refreshing, believe me. Don't forget to thank them. Lesson: Be prepared for some things to work much better than you thought they would, and others to flop that you thought were "sure things." There are simply too many variables to predict everything right beforehand. This is especially true of unusual or complex deals, or deals with bigger price tags. Learn from the unusual responses, but don't get too concerned about them. Adjust as you go. Again, flexibility is critical. Lesson: I suspect that the biggest lesson in this is that it's quite possible to make huge sales figures, relatively speaking, with any well-constructed offer that's backed by a carefully thought out plan for marketing it. At this point, we're fast pushing the $1,000,000 point in sales. We should be there by the end of this week. The next issue will cover how we went from $300,000 to $600,000, and some surprising things that flopped completely along the way. Stay tuned! Paul If you're not already subscribed to TalkBiz News, and would like to subscribe (and be notified when the next installments of story are released), put your email address in the box below, and click the button marked "The Rest of the Story!" Note: If you're already subscribed to TalkBiz News, you'll be notified when the new segments are ready. In the meantime, if you haven't checked out Mark's "Farewell Package," click here to get the details. This will make a lot more sense if you've seen the package.