It’s better than winning the lottery because YOU did it. You did it YOUR way, like Sinatra. Feel it. Revel in it. Enjoy the moment…

…because that’s all it is…a moment. The moment you “arrive” is when it’s over. That goal you’ve been planning for, striving for, breaking your back for, is gone.

Here’s the good news…

The ultimate day arrives when you actually realize that life is not heading to a final destination, not even death, but a continuous journey. The question becomes, is it an exciting adventure or just another drab day that exists?

What’s been exciting in 2010?

In the past 12 months, I…

* Saw my eldest daughter graduate to middle (junior high) school
* Enjoyed and deepened my walk with God
* Took on a fitness routine I could actually do in 10 min
* Wrote the outline of my first feature film script
* Read more books than I ever have before
* Made new connections both personally and professionally and unexpectedly
* Took on my first $50,000+ client
* Produced my first award-winning film
* Started my first online marketing newsletter (The Golden Bullet)

Those were some of the highlights. What about you? What was exciting in 2010? I would really like to know.

In 2011 I have even more exciting plans…

* Harken and take action on what God is showing me
* Three supercool family vacations this year
* Write the first to final drafts of my action-adventure feature script
* Open my first recording studio
* Take NetSlingers into new markets and expand the brand
* Sculpt my body, while getting to 12% body fat, to increase my strength, and eat a lot!
* Finish reading one book a week
* Learn Spanish in 3 months (taking Tim Ferriss’ challenge)
* Buy a travel business
* Pitch a very cool project to a multiple hit-TV series producer
* Help a client achieve her first $100K weekend
* Help another client achieve his first $1 million (personal) year
* Go on my first official missions trip
* Produce my next film and submit it to key festivals
* Make strategic connections and leverage ALL my plans

If you saw Chris Nolan’s hit movie Inception with Leo DiCaprio (Cobb), Ken Watanabe (Saito), and Joseph G-Levitt (Arthur), there’s a great short scene that goes like this:

Cobb: For this to work, we’d have to buy off the pilots…
Arthur: And we’d have to buy off the flight attendants…
Saito: I bought the airline.
[Everybody turns and stares at him. Saito just shrugs]
Saito: It seemed neater.

I love that. Apart from committing the “perfect crime” (ha!)…what that made me think about was aligning myself with the right people to achieve a simple and greater result, using collaborative resources.

One Year’s Work In A Single Month

Now, that’s a whole other topic, but that is probably my single greatest goal for 2011…to leverage OTHER people’s talent and resources and do in one month what previously took me a typical year.

Tell me what would you like 2011 to look like. Here’s a free tool that can help you plan effectively and take action on your journey. I’ve been using Mark Joyner’s Simpleology for over four years now.

And the results speak for themselves.

WARNING: By stating your 2011 plans below, you will be held accountable, right here. This will be your public declaration and there will be MUCH encouragement and advice offered, not just from me but from all in this community. The more often you can measure your results, the greater your success level. That’s the purpose of this blog. Say (declare) it. Be specific. Give time lines. Follow through or take action. And we’ll follow up.

If your goal is to lose 50 pounds this year, great! How can you lose one pound this week while having fun doing it? Having someone in your corner, whether a close friend, associate, family member or even a virtual friend right here, to hold you to it, is a smart thing.

Let the exciting journey begin!

– Andy

1. KNOWING YOUR TARGET

Several years ago I was listening to Mark Victor Hansen (Chicken Soup for the Soul® fame) being interviewed, before actually meeting him, about privately asking Tony Robbins why is it that his (Mark’s) income was $2 million last year, when his (Tony’s) income was $121 million that same previous year. “What am I missing?” asked Mark.

Before I tell you the answer, I want to point out a couple things… Even though earning up to $2M in a year may sound like music to your ears, it’s all relative, because at the end of the day you have to look at your expenses/taxes vs. gross income and see what you’re left with, your net take-home pay.

i.e. it’s not the income, it’s the profit you’re after.

KEY POINT: How much do you want to HAVE in your personal bank account by what date? Begin with the end in mind.

That means you have to calculate NET profits…how much you get to keep after all expenses. Want to have/attract $100,000 in the next four months?

Consider you’ll need to earn more than double that amount in that time frame, especially if you’re working with affiliates or joint venture partners. Possible? Of course it is…

Because once you have a clear target, then your mind will open up, hunt down, compute, never rest until you get the answers you seek. You’ve heard the biblical verse, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

That is talking about two things:

1) Knowing what you want in the first place – have a clear target/goal. Otherwise, how will you know what to ask, seek, and knock for, right?

2) It also calls for relentless, persistent, action-taking on your part. And when you own a precise target/goal that’s firmly planted in your mind, or posted on your wall, or forever visible on your desktop, you have no choice but to consistently ask, seek, knock, use your power of desire and passion to see it through. That’s motivated action that pulls you to success. Hence, attraction.

2. NOTHING HAPPENS UNTIL SOMETHING MOVES

That title is originally a quote from the brilliant mind of Albert Einstein, then became a book from best-selling author/speaker, Robert Ringer, ACTION! Nothing Happens Until Something Moves.

I bought this book but have to confess I’ve only read the introduction so far. In fact, I keep this book highly visible on one of my bookshelves, placed like a best-selling book should…front cover facing outward.

The title and cover alone remind me every day of what’s most important to my success…ACTION. The main reason I like action-adventure movies so much is because of what it stands for: taking action.

Because without action, nothing happens.

Mentor to many of the biggest Internet gurus online today, Stephen Pierce, has a twist on this. He says: Nothing moves without a sale. I have to agree. Here’s what else I found to bring this idea home…

“Never leave the site of a [newly formed] goal, without first taking action on it.”
- Jim Rohn

Shakespeare wrote: Action is eloquence.

“An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory,” wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Let me be clear… along with action, especially unfamiliar ones, you WILL experience frustration, as with anything new. You must possess an attitude of ‘must’ no matter what. How do you do that? By having a compelling, reason-why-I’m-excited-to-get-up every morning, monster of a hairy goal/target, which is a dream with a deadline.

Begin with the end in mind.

WHEN are you going to achieve ‘that’? Put a date to it. Make it real. Post a monthly desktop calendar on your wall, three months out, with a red-circled date of what you intend to accomplish by when.

You will SEE it every day in your fun work space. And you’ll be reminded of why you’re doing this each day.

Make it a BHAG! Big Hairy Audacious Goal. It must MOVE you, EXCITE you, MOTIVATE you. That’s your call to action.

3. MENTORING

Now, back to the answer Tony Robbins gave Mark Victor Hansen on why his income was capped at only $2M per year.

Tony asks, “The five closest people you spend the most time with, how much do they earn every year?”

“About $1M to $2M a year,” says Mark.

“THAT’S your problem!” says Tony.

If you simply look at the people whom you spend the most time, you can predict your income for the rest of your life pretty accurately. Scary isn’t it? Actually, it’s much more like an epiphany!

To be more specific from the last post, mental and environmental change play a key role here. The fastest way to achieve success in any area of life is to start hanging around, then partner up with those who are already getting the results you seek…those currently playing at a higher level.

This is what I’ve intuitively done over the course of my life. From real estate development to publishing to international finance to Hollywood to Internet marketing and back into Hollywood again, where I want to be because of the greater impact I can have.

Noel Coward (legendary English writer, actor, composer b. 1899) mentored David Lean (Lawrence of Arabia), and gave him his start. Roger Corman (King of over 400 ‘B’ movies) mentored Martin Scorsese and Francis Coppola. Martin introduced Steven Spielberg and Francis to Robert DeNiro, then Francis turned around and mentored his friend George Lucas who mentored director Ron Howard. It’s what Spielberg called “a time-honored tradition and creative renewal” in Hollywood.

This applies to ANY business. Ask, seek, knock, choose the right mentors. You have the power to make your way prosperous. If you don’t have the resources (money) to get started, you need to be resourceful. Be their apprentice, partner, joint venturer, affiliate, whatever form it takes.

If you do NOTHING ELSE for the rest of your days, except follow this ONE blog post, you’ll be way ahead of the crowd, and on the path to great success much faster than most.

Let me know what you got from this by commenting below…

- Andy

“My biggest concern is trying to get a ton of free traffic. I choose to go
with free traffic techniques because, naturally, it’s more cost-effective for
your business.”

Great question.

I agree that free traffic is a great thing to get really good at creating.
In fact, netSlingers has been built on free traffic.

There are really only TWO categories to get free traffic. Would you like to
know what they are?

1. Work for it.
2. Borrow it.

The latter is what’s responsible for us building a real online business. And
the former is generating more and more revenue for us, as we go along. But
here’s what I mean about first working for it.

• If you have a blog, that’s working for free traffic
• If you write articles and submit them to PR wires or article sites, that’s free traffic

If you don’t have a blog, you should. I recommend WordPress because, #1 it’s
free, #2 it’s used by all the top marketers out there (for a reason), and #3 it
gives you the ability to get socialized with all the networks out there like DIGG, Delicious, Reddit, Smarking, etc. Why is that important?

This whole “Web 2.0″, which I think is a terrible term, is just simply
connecting with other people more personally — opening up a dialogue in
essence. That means TARGETED, RELEVANT, and INTERESTED traffic.

WordPress gives you more flexibility (and personalization) on your own terms.
If you’d like to learn the EASY way to do it, use this resource:
WordPress Made Easy!

If you prefer NOT to spend the time setting up a WordPress blog, I can refer
you to someone who can do it for you very quickly and cost effectively. Just
drop me an email and let me know.

Alternatively, you can also start a free blog at blogger.com in three easy
steps. The ONLY caution here, is that once you have it going and built-up in
content, you can’t take it with you. It stays and is hosted on THEIR server,
along with other certain restrictions.

* * *

Articles are another great way to drive free traffic. I’ve built lasting
relationships because of article marketing. And when I say “article
marketing,” all I’m really saying is the process of submitting short articles
that YOU write, that teach the reader something of value. And you post it
to several sites that want articles (or content).

* * *

Now, BORROWING traffic is a really big and fast way to drive targeted
traffic to your websites, literally, overnight.

This is called a joint venture — also known as a strategic alliance.

A joint venture is simply this: When two or more people/companies work
(venture) together (jointly) for one another’s mutual benefit.

It’s powerful. It’s quick. It not only drives tons of traffic, but you
can hit several birds with one stone here. What do I mean?

Apart from driving traffic, you can:

1. Build a killer list at lightning speed.
2. Create an instant product.
3. Make a pile of cash quickly.
4. Build lasting relationships for ongoing profit.
5. And so much more.

However, it would take me at least two hours to get you started
on doing your very first joint venture, which I’ve done for others.

Next week, I’ll be talking a lot more about it. So, watch your email.

Tomorrow, I’ll be going over another question that was submitted,
and answer it right here. So stay tuned!

- Andy

If you’d like to leave your question or have any comments about
this blog post, I’ve set-up a special netSlingers HOTLINE for you, if you
don’t like to write. Call anytime: (214) 615-6505 ext. 8698

It was a pleasure to get to know this creative
esoteric man known as Declan, who couldn’t
“sell” worth a damn until he made an important
decision.

And that was to get out of his own way!

Here’s something he said that made a lot of sense
when it comes to marketing online:

“There is no right or wrong way, only right or left.”

Declan Dunn knows the art of the “Dunn Deal.” What
he was pointing out with that statement is you can
only know what works by asking (your audience)
and testing.

Listen to what Declan has to say about approaching
a potential joint venture partner…

When I first met Listbuilding author, Glen Hopkins, he was very
generous in offering an ear and insight into growing my business,
without even knowing who I am.

That first conversation lasted all of 30 seconds.

Then over the course of the next two days, we didn’t get a chance
to really hook up, but we kept running into each other.

It wasn’t until I cornered him and asked him to participate in this
quick video minute that we REALLY started to talk.

Here’s the thing:

In the video, he talks about building a relationship over time,
which I wholeheartedly agree, THEN…

…look to do some business in the future, once the relationship develops.

Sound advice right?

Funny thing is, IMMEDIATELY after this video was shot, we talked
about our personal areas of expertise, and realized that we can
certainly help each other, not in six months from now but that
very moment!

That’s what you’d call lightning striking.

You just never know when or where it could happen,
but it DOES happen on occasion.

Listen to Glen’s sound advice, and stay tuned for Thursday’s event…