By: Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
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One of the most common questions that we all hear on a daily basis is: "What do you do?"

For some, this is an easy question; "I'm a doctor" some may reply; or "I'm a teacher" everyone understands that doctors treat sick people and teachers teach. For others, the questions "what do you do?" is much more abstract and hard to answer.

In the past, I had introduced myself as an "entrepreneur". Some people say that "entrepreneur" is a nice word for "unemployed" or "unemployable". The problem with being an entrepreneur is that is that entrepreneurship is so vast and abstract that most people cannot understand what an entrepreneur does.

When you say "I'm an entrepreneur", the common reaction is a blank stare, and then the following question "so, what do you ACTUALLY do?"

In truth, entrepreneurs are responsible for the entire business, or multiple businesses. They hire, fire, delegate, select projects, start projects, finish projects, manage and even sometimes work in the business. However, the entrepreneur has 1 job that only he or she can perform.

A great businessman once said; "there are only two jobs that you cannot ever pay a person to do"; These are the job of the entrepreneur - everything else can be done by someone else.

The two jobs that cannot be done by anyone other than the entrepreneur are:

1) Think
2) Do things in the right order

In Michael Gerber's bestselling book "The E-Myth", Gerber explains that there are three roles that the entrepreneur must play when he or she starts a business:

1) They must be the Entrepreneur, the visionary who paints the broad strokes and has the energy and drive to start the business.
2) They must be the Manager, the person who oversees the operation and ensures that it functions efficiently and sustainably.
3) They must be the Technician and handle the daily transactional work in the business.

All tasks in an organization can be delegated or hired out to either a manager or employee and many organizations can run very efficiently on mostly Technicians and Managers. However, the Entrepreneur is responsible for all of the strategic thinking in the business and he or she must determine the right order of operations and proceedures.

No matter how good your technicians are or how good your managers and employees are, they can never replace you as an entrepreneur. They rely on you to think and create plans for them to execute.

So many businesses fail because the entrepreneur is negligent to think and appropriately delegate: A ship without a rudder always smashes up on the rocks.

I have broken the above rules many times in the past and have learned my lessons first hand. Today, I make sure that I am the only person in charge of the sacred tasks of the entrepreneur. To break this rule is to expose your venture to disaster.

Thanks for reading,
Stefan Aarnio

Freedomway.ca
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https://twitter.com/stefanaarnio
http://ca.linkedin.com/in/stefanaarnio

Get Stefan Aarnio's book "Money People Deal: The Fastest Way to Real Estate Wealth" at MoneyPeopleDeal.com!

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By: Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
facebook.com/stefanaarnio
https://twitter.com/stefanaarnio
http://ca.linkedin.com/in/stefanaarnio

Get Stefan Aarnio's book "Money People Deal: The Fastest Way to Real Estate Wealth" at MoneyPeopleDeal.com!

Remember: Please share this article if you found it enjoyable!

The brilliant American entrepreneur Bill Bartmann once asked the question: "Where do you go to catch a fish?"

He remarked that most people would say "a lake", "a river", "a stream", "the ocean" etc. and all of these are bodies of water do indeed contain fish.

Most entrepreneurs and real estate investors try to catch fish randomly in the ocean. They spend thousands of dollars on fishing line, casting nets, driving their fishing boats far away from land to catch the proverbial fish in their business - the customer.

The time spent chasing the fish, the money spent on the gas, the risk of bad weather, the cost of the boat and the crew are often too much for an entrepreneur to bear. Many businesses are bogged down with too much overhead because we think that we need to own the boat, spend the money on the gas, own the nets, own the fishing rods, hire a crew and take all the risks of the storm.

Oftentimes, these entrepreneurs will venture into the water and come home empty handed with no fish. The ocean, the lake, and the river all vast bodies of water and the chances of catching fish can be slim.

Catching fish, and catching customers in the traditional sense has a very high risk and a relatively low chance of success.

I once spent $2700 on a magazine advertisement that only produced 1 phone inquiry for a business that I just started. The expense wiped out my business and my boat capsized. The salesperson who sold me the ad told me that it would be a great investment and that I would get lots of customers. The only person who made money on the transaction was the salesperson and the magazine. In my foolishness, I was the fisherman who had bought the expensive boat, bought the nets, bought the lines and hired the crew to catch no fish. I may as well burned my cash because my money was never coming back. I told myself I would never do traditional advertising again.

But how would Bill Bartmann catch a fish? The question he asks has an answer better than all others. While most people say a river, lake, stream or ocean, Bill's answer is smart. If Bill were to catch a fish, he would go to a fish farm.

Some of you reading may say "that's cheating", but I can guarantee that Bill would catch more fish at a fish farm than most would by taking their chances in the ocean.

Of course, going to a fish farm may be associated with a premium, but the premium would be well worth it. The fish at the fish farm are trained to swim to the surface when it's feeding time, they can hear your footsteps at the edge of the tank and are ready for the food you are about to give them. They are fed throughout the day and any amount of fish can be harvested with no risk and all for a small fee.

Outside of fishing, where can an entrepreneur find a proverbial fish farm for customers? Anyone with a list of customers, or a group, or a club, or a media outlet can be a fish farm. Anyone who is a centre of influence can be brought into a  joint venture in which you offer your product or service and pay the influencer a fee on all sales generated.

If it's so easy, then why doesn't every entrepreneur skip traditional advertising, forget the fishing boat and run straight to the fish farm? There are two things that hold most people back:

1) Most entrepreneurs and investors don't know about joint ventures or the "fish farm" mentality.
2) Most entrepreneurs are too cheap or greedy to pay the fish farmer his fee to access the fish.

The biggest expenses in life come from the opportunities that are not capitalized. It is time to change the way we think about lead generation, get creative and explore new avenues for growing our businesses!

Action Step: Analyze your ideal customer and begin to search for centres of influence or "fish farms" where these customers congregate. Do some research and figure out how much it would cost per sale to access this new audience.

Thanks for reading!

Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
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Get Stefan Aarnio's book "Money People Deal: The Fastest Way to Real Estate Wealth" at MoneyPeopleDeal.com!

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By: Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
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Everyone loves perfection.

We demand perfection when we go out to a restaurant for dinner. We demand perfection when we go the dentist to get a tooth drilled. We demand perfection when a relative goes into the hospital for surgery.

Of course, perfection has a cost - perfection is not cheap!

For our perfect dinner, we need 5-10 people working in the restaurant dedicating their lives to our dining experience plus all of the suppliers of food, contractors who built the restaurant, interior designers who designed the restaurant and everyone else who indirectly created our experience.

When we see the dentist, he usually has a team of 5+ people working in the office plus nearly a decade of post secondary education to earn the right to work on your teeth.

The surgeon is has a similar team and education to the dentist.

Perfection is something we all want, but is it something we need?

Studies show that Top Achievers, the world's most successful entrepreneurs, actors, sales people, sports stars etc. strive for perfection but choose improvisation over perfection.

Top achievers improvise.

Consider the 80/20 rule, 80% of our results come from 20% of our actions. If we want to achieve the last 20% the "law of diminishing returns" comes into effect. After a certain point, the same actions will yield no further results and the last 20% becomes nearly impossible to reach.

Perfection is an ideal, something that we all strive for, but something that we cannot achieve without an irrational amount of effort. Therefore, top achievers will reach their point of satisfaction, improvise and will move onto the next task. 

You are better to grab the first 20 cents of every dollar than to try to grab 100 cents of every dollar because the last 80 cents are so hard to achieve that the return on time yields no measurable result.

Improvisation is a key skill for success. In his book Lynchpin, Seth Godin talks about the concept of "shipping". When creative, influential people are working on a project, they set a deadline and on that day they "ship" the product whether it is ready or not. The deadline benefits the author twofold:

1) It gets the product out the door in it's first revision, the product is imperfect, but it exists and is ready to go.
2) The product no longer has the risk of never becoming completed

Instead of perfection, we have a shipped product that is ready for use and is ready for improvement.

Microsoft (love them or hate them) has a very practical business model. They always "ship" their software - ready or not, bugs and all. The software that they ship is not always ready, but with patches and revisions, it eventually becomes functional and the company is able to earn revenue and serve it's customers. Bill Gates became the richest man in the world by "shipping" his software like this and improvising rather than seeking perfection.

If software companies would hold onto their software until it's perfect, they would all go out of business before the software is ready. The fact of the matter is that perfection should be reached for, but we cannot wait for the "perfect" product to ship because perfect does not exist.

What is much more practical is to produce a good product and slowly adjust it towards perfection.

Even companies like Blizzard Entertainment, the creators of World of Warcraft, the most profitable video game of all time are known for "taking their time" to produce their product. They will develop a title over 10 years and reach the closest they can to perfection without achieving it. After 10 years of development, they will release the imperfect software and continue to patch it to bring it closer to perfection over a 5-10 year period on the back end.

Are you addicted to perfection? Is your addiction holding you back from achieving your dreams?

For myself, I have renamed my company and brand nearly 6 times this year, I have gone through 6 runs of business cards, I have created and re-created 6+ websites to get the exact message I want. My motto is to "ship" whether or not it's perfect and adjust as necessary. The benefits of shipping when it's functional instead of perfect vastly outweigh the drawbacks. For example, I won the Canadian Real Estate Wealth Magazine's Joint Venture Partner of the Year award for 2012 because I had started blogging on an imperfect blog and gained some visibility.

My business was exactly the same with or without the visibility, I still did 12 deals, however, because I had an imperfect blog with imperfect articles distributed in an imperfect way, I was visible and nominated for the award.

Had I not "shipped" my blog until it was perfect, I would not have won the award. The deals still would have been done, but I would have lost out on $30,000 of press and exposure.

Perfection is a fickle mistress, chase her as an ideal, but do not succumb to her allure. Favour the maiden of improvisation and all will be well.

Thanks for reading,
Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
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By: Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
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https://twitter.com/stefanaarnio
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In Stocks, Insider Trading is illegal. In Real Estate, Insider Trading is essential.

In any market, there are insiders and there are outsiders. When corporate executives on Wall Street buy or sell stocks in their own companies with “insider knowledge”, they go to jail. When a real estate investor gets first chance to purchase a property privately without public knowledge, he gets rich.

Markets like Wall Street are set up like Casinos and TV stations like BNN are funded by Stockbrokers to create excitement and encourage trading. The brokers get paid when trades happen, so they want their audience on BNN to get emotional and make trades. BNN will run stories that pump the emotions of the audience just to make money, the information is not provided to make actual sound decisions.

When emotions go up, intelligence goes down and the house always wins… and you are not the house.

In my opinion, the Stock market is not designed for you to win. It’s a game played by insiders and institutional investors who control their own information. For the average retail investor, there is very little control in stocks, unless you are an insider.

I prefer to control my investments, control the management and control the outcome of my returns. I also prefer to make purchases as an insider with access to the necessary information to make profitable decisions.

Information is king in the market and he who controls the information, controls the market.

In Real Estate you can become an insider by:

1)   Having a large network of other investors

2)   Having a large network of lawyers

3)   Posting private advertisements for deals

4)   Offering referral programs

5)   Having a large network of Realtors

6)   Public speaking in front of groups of investors

7)   Creating content, blogs and videos for consumption

8)   Having a network of property managers

9)   Having a network of private lenders

10)                   Becoming the biggest, most visible person in the market

The truth is, becoming an insider is quite simple in Real Estate. The best deals always come to those who are 1) The most visible 2) Most connected and 3) The ones who control the information in the market.

When a real estate deal hits the local market with a Realtor, the deal has already been cherry picked by at least 8 sets of eyes. The fewer sets of eyeballs that see the deal before hitting the market, the higher the chances are to profit.

In high school it’s easier to date the girl who is the bookworm than it is to date the prom queen.  The prom queen has so many more sets of eyeballs on her so her value is way over-inflated and there is a line up of guys dying to get a chance with her. Avoid the prom queen at all costs and go for the bookworm. With some lipstick and high-heels she can easily be the prom queen, but with a much lower cost.

This analogy applies directly to Real Estate. By the time a house hits the retail market, multiple Realtors have looked at it, at least one broker, a few secretaries, assistants, everyone in the immediate circle from the seller, all of the realtor’s best clients, all of the broker’s best clients, contractors and then other buyers who get to it first.

By the time the property gets to you, everyone has explored any easy chances for profit and you and you are usually too late to the party. Plus, you now have to pay the price that the seller wanted plus the commissions of 2 realtors and 2 brokers. Negotiating becomes muddled because the realtors always have their own interests above their clients and sometimes the brokers can complicate negotiations as well.

When all of these “professionals” get involved, prices begin to rise and favorable terms disappear. All options for good terms or no money down deals go out the window because the Realtors will kill any chances of a “creative deal”. They want to get paid their commissions immediately and do not care about the price or terms of the deal: They just want the transaction to happen regardless of outcome.

However, when you become an insider, or partner with an insider, you get first access to deals before anyone else gets a chance to look.

The best deals I have done have come from:

1)   Other investors who could not close on private deals

2)   Private ads I have placed

3)   My networks and relationships

Being active in the market, participating in local investor groups, having an online presence, private advertising and public speaking have created an insider position for myself in my market. Being visible and sending a clear message that I am “always looking for deals” has attracted excellent opportunities that are well under market value, under appraised value, 100% vendor financed, or no money down. The average person believes that these deals do not exist or are not possible in their local market. The truth is, these deals are available everywhere, but you need to become an insider or partner with an insider to take advantage of them.

The best deals are made and are not advertised on the market because they never ever make it to market. This rule applies to any market: the best girls to date are not advertised on e-harmony, match.com or at the local bar. To find real value in life and in the market, we must become the insider, become well connected, become visible and control the information around us.

The best deals are reserved for insiders, everyone else can pay full price.

Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
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By: Stefan Aarnio

Freedomway.ca

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For centuries, alchemists searched for the "Philosopher’s Stone"; a magical instrument that could turn lead into gold and they never found it. Every day fools buy lottery tickets hoping to turn “lead into gold”.

 

Explorers searched the globe for centuries looking for the "fountain of youth" only to never find it. Every day women in department stores spend millions of dollars to cling onto their fleeting youth.

 

Every night audiences in the hundreds of thousands stay up late into early morning watching infomercials promising "get rich quick schemes", "get rock hard abs now" and dating programs that promise that the woman of your dreams is "one phone call away".

 

We all want success to be easy.

 

We all want the silver bullet or the magic wand that will make things “easy” and change in an instant.

 

We all want the secret sauce that will make us an overnight success. These days, it takes 10 years to become an “overnight success”.

 

Success is never as easy as it looks!

 

What if we could increase our probability for success by focusing on one certain personality trait?

 

There have been hundreds of studies on success and scientists have found that it has nothing to do with intelligence, talent, luck, resources, contacts or education. However, studies have proven that there is a specific personality trait called "grit" that is directly correlated to success.

 

Grit is a psychological trait that indicates a person's passion for a particular long-term goal. Grit is associated with perseverance, resilience, ambition, need for achievement and tenacity.

 

To make a long explanation short, the grittier a person is, the harder they will fight to succeed.

 

People with high levels of Grit are concerned with winning the marathon, not the sprint. They are long-term thinkers that aim to achieve long-term goals and are less concerned with short-term challenges and failures. A person with a high level of Grit will move from failure to failure and keep their eyes on the prize.

 

To quote Winston Churchill; "success is moving from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm". Churchill understood Grit and he was able to capture the hearts and minds of the British people in World War 2. Throughout nearly the entire war, Britain was the underdog; suffering defeat after defeat from the Nazis. However, Churchill was able to inspire his people to become gritty, dig in and hold on. In the end, the Nazi war machine ran itself to destruction and the British were able to claim victory by sheer tenacity despite being the underdog for nearly the entire war.

 

Many of our parents/grandparents who were who were born in 1920's became extremely gritty due to the fact that at age 10 they were in the great depression, by age 20 they were fighting in a world war. If they were strong enough to survive those two events, they came home, built themselves a house with their bare hands, raised four or more children and worked like a slave until they retired (or died).

 

The World War 2 generation was a very gritty group of people compared to the baby boomers or the echo boomers. The World War 2 generation understood that:

 

1)    Life is not easy

2)    Persistence wins

3)    Hard work is required for success

4)    Giving up is not an option

5)    Life is not always fun, but keep going

 

Today’s young people are not conditioned to be gritty like their grandparents/great-grandparents. Today we live in a world of instant text messaging, facebook, twitter, video games, instant microwave dinners and soccer tournaments where the losers are taken out for ice cream.

 

Gritty people are able to delay gratification and often, this is the #1 key to success. Unfortunately, we are conditioned today to want instant gratification and many of us forget how tough our grandparents had to be to survive and thrive in the last 90 years.

 

If you are a success-minded individual, you should focus on becoming more “gritty”. To do so:

1)    Set long term goals

2)    Train yourself to not be discouraged by failure

3)    Learn to delay gratification

4)    Become passionate about your cause

5)    Never give up

6)    Focus on winning the marathon, not the sprint

7)    Reward yourself for lasting power, do not become a flash in the pan.

 

Consider Aesop’s fable; The Tortoise and the Hare. The Hare is speed, he is flashy, he is loud and in the end he is the loser. The Tortoise is slow, persistent, consistent and gritty.


Be the Tortoise, not the Hare: the future belongs to you.

 

Thanks for reading,

Stefan Aarnio

Freedomway.ca

facebook.com/stefanaarnio

https://twitter.com/stefanaarnio

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By: Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
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In the early 1900’s, an author by the name of Napoleon Hill was commissioned by Andrew Carnegie (The steel magnate) to interview the top 500 richest people in the world and create the common formula for great riches. After many years of hard work, Napoleon Hill published his masterpiece “Think and Grow Rich”. The book contained the formula for great riches and Napoleon Hill became very wealthy himself by teaching people around the globe the secret to creating great wealth.

Throughout history, many people have searched far and wide for the formula for riches. Some people would call it the Philosopher’s stone (the stone that could turn lead to gold) or the fountain of youth.

The truth is, Napoleon Hill’s formula for great riches is all of the above. It can turn lead (or even thin air) into gold and can also preserve youth and beauty if used correctly.

Man has scoured the earth for these arcane abilities and yet, everything a person needs to know about success is in the book “Think and Grow Rich”.

Relatively recently, a Canadian entrepreneur and author by the name of Doug Vermeeren studied the formula for wealth and decided to do a modern study of Napoleon Hill’s work.

Doug interviewed the top 500 achievers in the world including CEO’s of major corporations, sports stars, actors, athletes and many types of people that were excluded from Napoleon Hill’s list (which were mostly industrialists, inventors and entreprneurs).

Throughout Doug’s study, he has been able to add extra insight to Napoleon Hill’s work and in some circles Doug Vermeeren has been given the title of “the modern day Napoleon Hill”.

I recently had the privilege of spending a day with Doug Vermeeren and I was fortunate to have him pass on some knowledge to me.


One concept that Doug shared was “the 3 pillars for achievement”.

Throughout Doug’s studies, he found that there are 3 things that top achievers all have:

THE 3 PILLARS FOR TOP ACHIEVEMENT:

1)   Affectionate Loving Parents

2)   A supportive partner

3)   A deep religious faith

The common denominator between affectionate loving parents, a supportive partner and a deep religious faith is that every one of the “pillars” supports achiever in the mental, physical, emotional and spiritual realms.



In other words, the top achiever is not succeeding alone, but has extra support in all aspects of life. This person has the power of many, but is perceived as succeeding alone.

To paraphrase T Harv Ecker, money is created in the physical realm because it is a “print out” of the mental, emotional and spiritual realms.

Wealth and riches are created inside of us in intangible realms and the results are manifested through physical success. We see the results of the wealth physically, but do not see the mental, physical, emotional changes, shifts and support systems that manifest physical wealth, money and success.

When we examine the three pillars for top achievement, we can easily see why top achievers have a higher probability of success if they possess all three pillars.

AFFECTIONATE LOVING PARENTS: Affectionate loving parents are very important for top achievers because parents form the base of a child’s self esteem. Self-esteem is crucial to becoming a top achiever because it allows a person to take a risk. I call self-esteem “emotional capital” and people with high self-esteem are able to take risks and withdraw from their “emotional bank account”. People with abusive parents or absent parents may have depleted emotional bank accounts and will have a much harder time taking risks. Unconditional love from a parent is very important when taking risks because the risk taker will know that no matter how bad they fail, their parents will always be there to support them emotionally, physically, mentally and spiritually.

A SUPPORTIVE PARTNER: When Warren Buffett was asked to give advice to a graduating class of Ivey League students he bluntly offered one pearl of wisdom: “Marry the right person”. When a top achiever is going to “put it all on the line” and chase their dream, they require their partner/spouse to do one of two things:

a)   Actively pursue the dream with them OR

b)   Passively support their partner emotionally, physically, mentally and most importantly, spiritually

Top achievers will go through hell and back to become the best in their field. There is an unwritten law in the world that states, “When you push on the world, it pushes back” and oftentimes, people who pursue excellence in their field are met with great adversity at every turn. Whether it is jealous peers, rivals or other unsavory people, the road to the top is not easy. Emotional and spiritual support from a primary relationship is absolutely essential for success to take place. Without this key support, a person will easily be crushed when faced with enough pressure and adversity. A supportive spouse will make a top achiever twice as strong and twice as resilient when “the world pushes back”. If you are single, make sure you heed Buffett’s advice and marry the right person.

A DEEP RELIGIOUS FAITH: Faith is a key ingredient to great success and achievement. I have shifted my spiritual belief system many times in my life but have always retained one key factor called “faith”. Faith is an extremely important part of success because faith allows a person to make leaps in logic.

For example, if we want to be the best salesperson in the country, but have only made a handful of sales, logic would tell us that our outcome of becoming the best to be very unlikely. If we listen to logic, we will always give up without trying.

However, if we feel it in our heart, guts, mind, body, and soul that we believe that we will become the best salesperson in the country, then faith will allow us to leap over the logical argument and pursue our vision with burning determination.

Faith is one of the most powerful techniques that top achievers use because it can help us to achieve things that are unbelievable, improbable and super-human. Faith allows us to harness the greater invisible spiritual forces around us that some would call “the power of intention”, “infinite intelligence”, “the universe” or “god” and use these forces to achieve our wildest dreams against all odds.

WARNING: Although faith can be extremely powerful in the positive sense, faith itself is a double-edged sword. Faith allows the user to leap in logic, which can be used in a positive way to achieve greater goals with no prior experience. However, faith can also leap logic in the wrong direction and create a closed off mind that can completely cripple a thinking mind. Use faith wisely and consider the cause and effect of such a wildly powerful tool. As the label often reads on potent substances: read the manual, consult a professional and use with extreme caution.

Although we often see success in it’s physical manifestation, true success is first created in the non-physical realms of the spiritual, mental and emotional. Only once “inner” success has been found can “outer” physical success be manifested through wealth and riches.

Having a strong support system in the intangible realms through loving parents, a supportive spouse and a strong religious faith are the foundation of the structure that is required to reach the stars and become a top achiever.

Take a moment to take an inventory of your life and your support system. Ask yourself “Which parts of this system do I have today?” and “which parts are lacking?” find ways to strengthen your deficiencies and create stronger relationships.

In the end, no one succeeds alone and great relationships can make the difference between wild success and crushing defeat.

Like grass, relationships require watering and maintenance. Take care of your relationships, water them, fertilize them, manicure them and watch them grow. Consistently be mindful of your support network, treat your support network better than gold and your results will be startling.

Thanks for reading,

Stefan Aarnio

Freedomway.ca

facebook.com/stefanaarnio

https://twitter.com/stefanaarnio

http://ca.linkedin.com/in/stefanaarnio

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By Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
facebook.com/stefanaarnio

In nature, male frogs attract female frogs by croaking loudly in mating season.

From the female perspective, a deeper croak equates to a bigger frog. Female frogs want the biggest male possible to mate with to produce the biggest offspring. In mating season, female frogs listen for the deepest, loudest croak they can find.

If you are a big frog with a deep, loud croak, you get access to any female frog in the jungle. However, if you are a small frog with a small croak, attracting a female can be very difficult.

So what is a small frog to do?

Small frogs can be smart frogs.

A small frog, who is a smart frog, will hop into a drain pipe or a large cavernous space. Once he's inside the pipe, he will croak as loud as he can. The cavernous pipe amplifies the sound of his croak and makes him sound deeper and louder.

Suddenly, the small frog sounds like a huge frog and he can attract an endless stream of ready and willing females.

Although life is easier as a big frog, not everyone is a big frog. 

What if you are the small frog in your business? 

What if you are already a big frog and want to be a gargantuan frog?

We can learn a lot about business when we study the mating patterns of frogs.

5 FUNDAMENTALS THAT MAKE HORNY FROGS INTO MARKETING MACHINES:

1) MINDSET - You don't have to be a big frog to win like a big frog. Think big, find ways to get the results that the "big frogs" get while still staying small. Play the game like a professional from day one and practice thinking big.

2) AMPLIFY - Small frogs use leverage to make their croak bigger, deeper and louder. Whether you are a small frog or a big frog, we all need to amplify our message to reach the market. Find your message and amplify it to your audience. Objects always appear larger from far away and use every broadcast channel to your advantage: Radio, TV, social media, email, youtube, google etc. to broadcast your message.

3) ATTRACT - Smart small frogs know that chasing females is a complete waste of time. Instead, they know how to attract and seduce prospects. Why chase? Let business come to you. Set up your branding and marketing so that you have a laser focused message that attracts the right qualified prospects so that you never have to chase again.

4) OVERSELL - A great marketer once told me "always oversell... even if you have the goods, always oversell". Create a frenzy by playing to the emotions of your audience and oversell your inventory. Use scarcity: If you have 3 items to sell, sell 6. Manipulate supply and demand to create a frenzy by overselling.

5) DON'T PLAY FAIR - Exploit your unfair advantage over your competition and play the game on your terms, not theirs. Find out what your "secret sauce" is and pour it on everything. Make the game unfair so that the odds of success are stacked in your favour and set yourself apart from your competitors. Make your products and services the only choice in the market by differentiating yourself with an unfair advantage.

In business and in the jungle, it's always survival of the fittest. However, whether you are the fittest or not is completely irrelevant when you play the game like a horny frog. Have the mindset of a big frog, amplify your message, attract your audience, oversell, and never play fair.

Find ways to apply these principals in your business and begin dominating your market. Whether you are a small frog or big frog, find a pipe to croak in and watch your prospects line up for a chance to work with you.

Thanks for reading,
Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
facebook.com/stefanaarnio
https://twitter.com/stefanaarnio
http://ca.linkedin.com/in/stefanaarnio

P.S. Please share this article if you found it helpful!

By: Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
facebook.com/stefanaarnio

Remember: Please share this article if you find it helpful!

"The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind—creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. These people—artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big picture thinkers—will now reap society’s richest rewards and share its greatest joys." - Dan Pink

The few who can see the entire chess board and call the shots are the most influential, make the most money, have the lowest risk and have the highest degree of control.

If you were a chess piece, would you be a pawn, bishop, rook, queen, or king?

If I had to choose a chess piece to become, I would want to be the grandmaster. The grandmaster can see up to 25 moves ahead. He can see the entire chess board from every angle and has total control of as many aspects of the game as possible.

If a pawn is a "small thinker", the "grandmaster" is a "big thinker".

The problem that many people have is that we are so busy focusing on one position on the chess board that we fail to see the the bigger picture.

In reality, our position is relative to every other position on the board and we need to see 8-25 moves ahead.

In reality, most people are fixated on our current position and can only see 1-2 moves ahead.

The difference between the Grandmaster and the Pawn is that the Grandmaster is a conceptual thinker who can see the big picture. The pawn is a tactical thinker who can only see the small picture.

JT Foxx breaks down a conceptual thinker into 4 major disciplines.

To become a conceptual, big picture thinker, we must master the four following areas:

1. Strategic Thinking - The biggest difference between a Big Picture thinker and a Small Picture thinker is Strategy vs. Tactics. Strategy focuses on the long term effects and "why" behind the actions. Tactics focuses on execution of actions. A tactical thinker is more interested in the "how" and the "what" of a strategy. Focus on the "Why", let your team execute the "how" and "what".
2. Time Management - Time and energy are the only two limiting factors in this physical world. Every single person has the same 24 hours to spend in the day and the difference between a Big Thinker and a Small Thinker is that the Big Thinker is able to effectively budget and manage their time. They are able to delegate and achieve tasks on schedule and are disciplined with distractions. Time management is the one skill that everyone needs to study, but it is a topic that no one wants to study. The study of time management is completely unglamorous, but it is essential to become a Big Picture thinker.
3. Focus - Big picture thinkers are able to focus on the mission and the vision. Their focus is so strong that they block out any distractions and are able to stay on course. A ship sailing at sea will only reach it's destination if it is precisely navigated. If the navigator is off by even 1 degree, the ship will have a chance of missing it's destination by hundreds of miles and has a risk of smashing up on the rocks. The bigger the ship, the more precise the navigation needs to be. Focus is the key element that is required for far reaching strategies that stretch 25 moves into the future.
4. Branding - How are you able to distinguish yourself as a Grand Master. Many people try to be the Grandmaster, but are branded like Pawns. If you are going to be a conceptual Big Picture thinker and control the chess board, you must brand yourself as the Grand Master. What this means in practical terms is that you must brand yourself as the expert, the leader and the boss. You must be the head of your organization and brand yourself so that you attract the best customers and the best talent to run your organization. A properly branded company will always outsell it's no-name competition and the same goes for people. Make it a top priority to create laser focused branding that sends the perfect message to each person you are communicating to.

Some people would argue that the information age is over and that the "conceptual age" has begun. In the conceptual age, the future does not belong to the people who master information, but rather, people who master "conceptual thinking".

In the conceptual age, creative right-brained people win over analytical and technical left-brained people because virtually every technical task can be outsourced to a machine or to cheap off shore labor. 

To gain a competitive advantage in this new age you must become a Big Picture thinker: It's time to start thinking like a Grandmaster and stop thinking like a Pawn. 

Thanks for reading,
Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca
facebook.com/stefanaarnio

P.S. Please share this article if you found it helpful!

By Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca

Remember: Please share this article if you found it helpful!

Anyone who has ever become successful in reaching their dreams has always had a series or roadblocks to overcome.

Whether you are a Real Estate investor who has dreams of building an empire, a Entrepreneur with the next great idea or an Artist with the next great vision, we all have a series of challenges to face before we can become successful.

One common challenge that everyone has to face when chasing our dreams is that somewhere along the way, we require capital.

This is true for absolutely everyone. Whether you are the Real Estate investor requiring capital for buildings, the Entrepreneur requiring capital for a venture or the Artist requiring capital for an Art-form. The requirement is universal and every business/successful person requires funding at some point in his or her path to success.

Unfortunately for many people, raising capital is a "black box of voodoo" that many do not understand. Some of us are held back by limiting beliefs that "we do not deserve" to have capital or that we need to be born with it to be successful.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Raising capital is a science and an art form. It obeys the law of certainty much like everything else in this world.

If certain things are done in certain ways, certain results are certain to occur.

With that being said, here are 5 Secrets to Raising Capital shared with me by the very-successful capital-raiser JT Foxx:

1. Dress to impress: We only have one chance at making a first impression. The timeframe for establishing a good impression is a very short window between 3 and 30 seconds. As social animals, we are constantly looking for reasons NOT to do business with other people and we will scrutinize every minor detail to disqualify a newcomer. Some key details for dress are: the quality of suit, polished shoes, quality of business cards. Anyone who is idealistic enough to think that these things don't count is delusional. Even legends like Steve Jobs, Richard Branson and Hugh Hefner had to wear suits early in their careers. Dressing to impress is an easy way to ensure success.
2. Pay attention to your branding: Effective branding is extremely important for anyone who wants to raise capital. However, branding is so much more than just a name, a colour and a logo. Branding is a feeling and an emotion surrounded by you and your company. What feeling does an audience get from you? Some easy ways to find out if you have effective branding or not are; Do you show up effectively in Google? Do you have pictures of yourself with successful people? Branding is what separates the top from the bottom in any business and it ensures a potential investor that you are not a fly by night operation.
3. Know your numbers and be conservative: If in doubt, always be conservative. The worst mistake so many people make is that we try make our deal look better than it really is. A savvy investor will always poke holes in your strategy and call you on a plan that is too optimistic. If you appear to be misrepresenting something then you will scare away your investor and their money. Provide a "best case", "realistic case", "worst case" and "nightmare case" scenario. If your investor is ok with the "nightmare case", then you know that you have a deal.
4. Back end is more important than the front end: Congratulations! You raised the Capital! Now what...? In a perfect world, raising the Capital is easy. What is much more important, however, is how you manage the "back end" of the deal. How good are you at "taking care" of the investor's money? Savvy investors are very hesitant to part with their money and you need to show them some accurate monthly reports with precise information. One of the worst things you can say to an investor is "I run the business and I do my own books." Investors want to see audited financials by a certified account. If you can provide this information you show that you are a professional, understand what they need to feel secure and have built a competent team.
5. Make it about more than the numbers: Relationships are always the most important thing in business. When you pitch a deal or yourself based on the numbers, you are selling yourself short. If you are placing all of your value on the numbers alone, you are in big trouble. Don't be known as "the 12% guy", because later when the "13% guy" comes along, you will be finished. Instead, focus your presentation on your relationships, philosophy and results. Sell the vision of the big picture to your investors and have strong, realistic numbers. If you can provide all of the above, then investors will be calling you looking for a good place to put their money.

Raising capital is a skill that very few people have mastered. It's a skill that revolves around sales, marketing, branding, relationships and understanding the numbers. If you can focus on the 5 fundamentals above, then raising the capital required to build your dream will always be easily found.

Thanks for reading,
Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca

P.S. Please share this article if you found it helpful!

By Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca

Remember: 
Please share this article if you found it insightful.

"The grass is always greener on the other side, until we get to the other side and realize that the other side requires watering and maintenance too" - Dr. Nido Qubein

Focus brings clarity to the mind.

Focus brings success.

Focus brings happiness.

Happiness in life is determined by what we focus on and choose to think about. If we are focused on our passions, obsess over them and think about them all day long, we live very happy and productive lives.

However, the enemy of focus is options.

Have you ever noticed that some of the least happy people are the ones with the most options?

The media is littered with rich and famous celebrities who have all of the options in the world: They can live where they want, spend their time how they want, eat what they want, drive what they want, have the house that they want, and have the means to completely design a perfect life and yet, many people who "have it all" are miserable and pursue hard drugs to escape reality at all costs.

These people have too many options and when the mind has too many options, focus erodes along with sanity and happiness.

In my own life, I have had periods where I had "too many options" and was on top of the world. Surprisingly, too many options also bred discontent, unhappiness and even mild depression and anxiety.

When we think we have too many options, we always ask "what if I had gone the other direction?", "what if had chosen differently", "what if I had dated that other girl"...

Eventually the mind tears itself apart, focus decays and we are left in a sea of "what if's" with no commitment or focus to any one thing.

On the flip side, there are people in the world who have the "luxury of no options".

We see people in marriages who have "no option" to get divorced and they work on their problems until they find happiness in the relationship.

We see people in businesses who have "no option" to quit  and these people always reach success because failure is not an option.

We see people in life who have "no option" of an alternate path and they become the most wildly successful people in their fields because they have the "luxury of no options".

All of these people have the highest levels of focus and absolutely zero chance of defeat.

When Julius Caesar landed on the shores of Britain to wage war with the British Tribes, he ordered his men to "burn the boats". His troops would either be victorious in battle, or they would all die in battle - no one goes home through failure. Caesar gave his men "the luxury of no options" and he was victorious in his campaign.

The Spartan warriors of ancient Greece had a similar mentality. Death before dishonour was a mantra that accurately describes the Spartan war machine and they are known throughout history as the most battle hardened, persistent, fearsome, victorious, disciplined warriors of all time. The Spartans created a culture based around "the luxury of no options" and this culture created a brand of warrior that is still studied in modern military schools and will continue to be famous for ages to come.

When we look at the most successful business people, a common element for Entrepreneurs is that they find themselves in a "no options" situation early in life. Usually successful Entrepreneurs have parents who are either dead or incompetent and they have to take over the family business at a very young age. This was true for Fred Trump (Donald Trump's father), Robert Kiyosaki's "Rich Dad" and a modern examples would be Curtis Jackson (50 Cent).

Other entrepreneurs who find "the luxury of no options" choose a path in life at a young age and give themselves no way to retreat.

I was reviewing the "30 richest drummers in the world" list and two names that stuck out at me were Tre Cool of Greenday with a net worth of $45 million dollars and Dave Grohl of Nirvana/Foo Fighters with a net worth of $225 million.

Both Dave Grohl and Tre Cool dropped out of school at age 16 to play punk music. They had "the luxury of no options", burned the boats and had no way of reversing their choice.

The "luxury of no options" brings clarity and focus to the mind which is an extremely powerful tool because the mind will always find a way to achieve any vision that it is focused upon. 

Where most high school drop-outs are perceived as derelict losers who wander through life, three of the greatest entrepreneurs of the information age were all drop outs: Steve Jobs (Co-Founder of Apple), Bill Gates (Founder of Microsoft) and Mark Zuckerburg (Facebook Founder).

These men all made a choice in university to burn the boats and choose the "luxury of no options".

In my own life, the happiest, most exciting, most relevant moments of my life have all been moments where I had put myself into a "no options" situation.

I was forced to leave the corporate world (something that many people struggle with) because if I didn't quit my job, then I would be bankrupt in 3 months. Even while earning a nice comfortable salary at my job, I would still be bankrupt if I stayed. With "the luxury of no options", I quit my job, woke up every day with the intentions of finishing my failing real estate development. I was 110% focused on finishing the development at all costs and did not leave the job site daily until it was too dark to work. 

Life becomes very simple and fulfilling when there are no options. Every morning, the only thing I thought about was finishing the development. Every afternoon, the only thing I thought about was the development and every evening, the only thing i thought about was the development.

I had become immersed in my work, my focus became crystal clear, failure was not an option and I was happier than ever before. What is more interesting is that my chance of failure dramatically dropped to zero. There was literally no chance for the project to fail once I had found "the luxury of no options".

My contractor's truck was broken, so we couldn't haul materials. I loaded up my small 4 door sedan with doors, toilets and vanities (none of which fit in a small car) and drove around town to 6 different suppliers to get the necessary supplies to the job site. My general contractor, who had mentally given up on finishing the project, was amazed that I was hauling large building supplies in a small sedan and not a truck. I drove my small car with doors, lumber and vanities sticking out the passenger windows and the trunk. I had to take back roads so that the police wouldn't pull me over. My general contractor had given up, but I had "the luxury of no options."

We had no labour to paint the building, so I put on my painter clothes and painted every day myself while also hiring  anyone I could find on Kijiji to paint. I also attracted friends and family help with the labour because I had found "the luxury of no options" and everyone could see the high stakes and the importance of my success.

Somehow, the project was completed and successful within 45 days of quitting my job (I had 90 days to complete it). With the experience, I had learned some of the most valuable lessons of my life so far: 

• When a person has their back to the wall and has no options, the failure rate for that person dramatically drops (almost to zero) and the success rate dramatically increases (almost to 100%).
  
• When a person has no options their focus level sky-rockets. They become obsessed with succeeding. All distractions and procrastination are silenced.
• Every obstacle becomes a non-issue because the motivation level of a person with no options is inhumanly strong.
• A person with no options can achieve super-human feats that the average person with "options" will marvel at.

As a real estate investor, I frequently see part time corporate people who want to make a "smooth" transition into full-time real estate investing. For many people, quitting the corporate world and taking full control of one's time is major desire. However, this desire is often not strong enough to actually put together a concrete plan and stick to it.

For myself, my passion and desire was so strong that I put myself in a situation where I found "the luxury of no options" by accident and became successful by default. Failure was not an option for me because I literally had no options - it was live or die.

I feel the pain of the people who badly desire full control of their time and want to leave the corporate world in a "smooth" way. But after studying success, I'm not sure if there really is a possibility of a fast and smooth transition.

I'm fully convinced that there is a slow and smooth way, but I'm not sure if that method will satisfy the soul's hunger for freedom.

To paraphrase the words of Robert Kiyosaki; We can only choose one of two things in life; security or freedom. Those who choose security, end up with maximum security which is maximum security prison. Those of us who choose freedom, end up with maximum freedom, which is zero security.

For the men and women who find themselves with "the luxury of no options", they only have one choice and that is freedom at all costs. Any security they once had has been obliterated and there is only one chance for survival. 

Freedom is the only choice for these people and they pursue it with a life or death vigour that is absolutely unstoppable.

What would you give up to have "the luxury of no options"?

Have you ever found yourself in a "No options" situation? What was the outcome?

Do you value security or freedom? Which are you currently pursuing?

Thanks for reading,
Stefan Aarnio
Freedomway.ca

P.S. Please share this article if you found it insightful.