Beach Dreams, Breaking Free & Board Meetings

Summer’s definitely arrived on Shoreham Beach and how do you think I know that?  Apart fromt the lovely weather, with May’s storms out of the way, the Beach Dreams tent has gone up on the Green.  Any long term reader of this ezine will know I wax lyrical about Beach Dreams every year and some may even remember the picture taken from INSIDE my handbag the first year I got my FlipVideo.  Nelson’s “Dad Dancing” video has now had 231 views and is rated 3.5 stars!

The Beach Dreams Festival and particularly The Tent is an institution round here, selling tea and cake to raise funds for the festivities and, after school, it’s always full of kids and visiting foreign students making the most outlanding costumes for the parade.

Everyone who can bake locally, does so, and drops cakes, scones, cheese straws etc in as donations, and the many home-made cake lovers on the Beach make it a point of obligation to support the Festival by dropping in on a regular basis to drink tea and sample the goodies.  Home made cakes remind me of my nanny, with whom I lived for happy years as a child, and I love the whole village feel of Beach Dreams.

Photo by the much travelled Jim Callender – see more of Jim’s photos here

While looking at our Money Gym YouTube channel to get the stats for Nelson’s video I can see, using their new Insight feature, that our MG / YouTube audience is 58% female, between 45-54 (which we knew actually).  I would have thought our audience would have been slightly younger than that, between 35 and 55, thinking about the clients who have had the most success with the Money Gym.

Success is all relative as we know, and this fact was brought up again by one of our Silver Elite clients on a call recently.  She said that she would only want to be mentored in Wealth Creation by someone who had millions in the bank and could prove it.

We gently reminded her that it’s not always about being a millionaire, but about being financially free.  And you don’t need a million to be financially free.  It’s all about not having to go to work (if you don’t want to) or doing work you love AND to spend your days growing your wealth and having fun.

Also, no self-respecting millionaire would keep millions in the bank.  For one thing, it would be losing money, and wouldn’t be safe as the government guarantee only £50,000 per person per bank, but there is also the opportunity cost to be considered.

I’ve been approached by my publishers with a theme for a new book – I was twittering on the topic and they said they had been looking for someone to write a book on just that very thing!  I’ll start a mindmap and see how it grows.  I already have a few ideas for what I would want to cover.

I love to write more than anything else I’ve discovered and I’ve got at least three more books inside me and business partner Judith Morgan says she has one too – her wealth creation journey so far.  Judith is a brilliant, funny, poignant writer and I for one would consider that a rattling good read.  I would just love to buy a house in Greece and one in Shoreham or Brighton perhaps, and just divide my time between attending seminars, travelling between the two houses, seeing the world, writing and hanging out online.

We are having an interim Board Meeting on Monday at a lovely Elizabethan Manor hotel, to discuss further the shape of the Money Gym for 2010.  Yes, I know we just did that, but certain key things are changing and we want to make sure we are all happy with the direction we are heading.  YOu can do that when it’s your own business.  The Money Gym is growing all the time, in all different kinds of ways, and we want to make sure that it continues to serve all our own individual “Primary Aims” for our lives, in E-Myth Terms.

More about that in today’s article.

Last weekend I attended the “Break Free Seminar” with Pat Adams and Mark Anastasi which I thought was totally excellent.  They are both great speakers and delivered excellent content, around using direct mail and the internet to create an information publishing business.  I took at least six page of notes and learned loads of new stuff, so even if you are an experienced business person or marketeer, consider attending their next one in June and you can book your tickets here…..

One seminar I would NOT be missing if it weren’t for a prior engagement, is Alan Forrest Smith’s appearance at the British Library at Rachel Elnaugh’s “Marketing Magicians”  Alan says: “Next Tuesday, June 2nd, I will be one of the keynote speakers for BBC and Dragons Den star Rachel Elnaugh.  Not only am I thrilled to be asked to speak for her at The British Library, I’ll also be presenting with some serious heavyweight entrepreneurs.  This gig is different, it focused on real business people or wanna-be smart, fast track entrepreneurs.  There are around 300 places (BUT I think it’s almost sold out). I am also presenting a stack of new ideas, stories and marketing nuggets that you can walk away with. It’s all here…”

My next speaking gigs?  We have a Money Gym “Let’s Talk Money” day

on June 13th which is packed to the rafters and then I’m speaking at Ambar Hamid’s Wealth Thing event on June 6th and then I’m on again for Triumphant Events, with Dr Topher Morrison on 5th July.

Have fun, we always do!

Nicola

Want To Work With Nicola?

Do you have a new or established business that would benefit from more sales, more effective marketing – both on OR offline – or new digital products to add to your bottom line profits?  If so, would you like to work with me?

There are several ways you can do that and there’s one for every budget:

1.  Free

Join me on my weekly TV show at http://www.MoneyGym.tv and ask me your burning wealth creation or internet marketing question.  Next show Wednesday 1pm.  Submit your questions in advance here on the blog at http://www.themoneygym.com/blog/2008/11/nicola-money-today/

2.  £330 per year

Join The Money Gym Silver Level – buy the ebook to get a free 30 days trial and you actually save £2.50 / $3.50 http://www.themoneygym.com/book Then come along to our great workshops at a massive discount – I host every one.

3.  £1000 per day OR A Monthly Retainer TBA

CONSULTING:  So many of our clients have asked me if I would consult with them on their overall business’ marketing & sales strategy, I’ve decided to give this a go and see if I like it.  Think of me as a non-executive Sales & Marketing director, sitting on your board.  I can visit your business or work remotely, and can be at the end of the phone, email or skype for advice at any time.   Email me about your business at nicola [at ] themoneygym.com

BRANDING:  I am the official “Wealth Coach in Residence” for Visa International Plc and Pampers Nappies iVillage.   They pay me to appear on their website (and a bit more to be exclusive to their company within their niche), to interact with their forum users and to speak to journalists about wealth creation and comment on topical issues, on their behalf.  If you would like to discuss how I could bring value to your website, just email me to discuss it further.  nicola [at ] themoneygym.com

4.  £2000 per 12 hours over three months

COACHING – INTERNET MARKETING ONLY – Yes I know I keep saying that I’m going to stop doing this, but I enjoy it so much!  And I’m saving up for something very special so I’ll go another three months at least.  I offer coaching, by telephone, using GoToMeeting (I can see your screen and you can see mine) and email, on internet marketing particularly. Check out how I like to work here http://bit.ly/internetmentoring and then email me your ideas to nicola [at ] themoneygym.com

I can add Tuesdays to the Thursdays offered on the site.

This fee is equivalent to your selling 84 ebooks at £25 and that’s much more likely with my help / mentoring / coaching.

5.  £5754 per year

Join the Money Gym Gold programme
http://www.themoneygym.com/gold

I’m very active on this, our top level programme.  Even though you would be assigned your own personal coach, for your inspiration/accountability calls, I join in and coach our Gold members via private webinar and email – either in the group on the Mastermind Google Group or privately by email.

Your choice!

Let’s make 2009 a brilliant year for your business together!

Warm regards

Nicola

Nicola Cairncross Author, Speaker & Founder of The Money Gym

Business & Money – You Have Your Say!

Business & Money – inextricably linked according to our latest Money Gym survey. 50% of you who responded want a successful business with over 27% of you wanting to run a successful business that you can work on, and travel with, anywhere in the world.

Trailing in way behind was “a million pound property portfolio” desired by just 13.5% of you, with only another 13.5% of you wanting to be debt free. I’ll tackle those two topics later in the week, but I bet the property portfolio would have been higher this time last year!

What is a successful business?

Everyone has a different definition and I think it depends what kind of a life you want. If you want a nice easy quiet life, with lots of time for leisure activities and hobbies, then a nice home-based or lifestyle business would be good for you.  You might want to look at a network marketing opportunity like Avon, Telecom Plus, Virgin Vie or Success University.

Or even something more down to earth and local like a babysitting business, gardening or something where you buy into an existing successful system, like Judith’s Cleaning Biz opportunity.  My friend Kim – a great hairdresser – has made a great business working from home 3 days a week, in her lovely salon, entirely depending on word of mouth referrals and able to pick her kids up from school and knock off early if she wants to.

If you want a bit more excitement then you might want to build a global business with lots of staff and a high-flying lifestyle.  If you want high-flying but no team, then a consultancy business might be for you.

By any definition, a successful business is one that covers all its overheads, pays its taxes, makes enough profit to create a long term financial cushion to be able to ride out peaks and troughs in the market or economy, and pay you a handsome salary AND dividends on top!

When I was in my 20’s and 30’s, I would have defined a successful business as one that paid me enough to pay my household bills, without having to work away from home.  My expectations have been raised quite dramatically since then!  As have my outgoings.  But also my income luckily.

Not without a lot of pain though, due to having NO CLUE about what a successful business looks like, acts like or needed from me.  About 100 books, and at least FIVE business mentors later, I might be getting there.

I think it also depends on your level of corporate or business experience when you start, where you set your expectations, and whether you have read any of the great wealth creation or business books like “Rich Dad Poor Dad” by Robert Kiyosaki or “E-Myth Revisited” by Michael Gerber which are certainly eye-openers.

Working with Judith Morgan, serial successful entrepreneur, and hanging out online with gurus and business coaches like Rich Schefren has changed the way I think about business for ever, too.

There is no right way or wrong way to think about what a successful business means for you, but do try and define it. If you begin with the end in mind, you will find it a lot easier to put the plan in place to achieve that success for you.

Here’s a recording of our weekly live TV show where my guest Sarah (who’s in the startup phase of her business) discuss the challenges and why she’s even bothering!

Businesses seem to go through phases…in the early days it’s all about attracting clients or customers and so many don’t get past that hurdle.

When we then surveyed our mailing list about what was stopping them creating a successful business some interesting answers came up….

Read more..

Ask Nicola! Your Burning Wealth Creation Questions Answered

I recently added a page to the blog where you can ask me any question about wealth creation you like.  Brave?  Too generous?  Asking for trouble?  No………

I did this because I want to make the blog more interactive and also, to stimulate articles that arise from real questions.  This can only help our search engine ranking when Google comes by to crawl and then PageRank the new blog!

John was first up and I want to thank you John for your bravery!  It was a lovely question to answer, as you will see…

” Hi Nicola, Here’s my burning question…..I am a man. 50 years old. Anyway, I would like to ask for your advice regarding my route to the wealth highway.

My financial position is thus. Home owner with no mortgage. Our home is worth around £155,000 in today’s market. My wife owns a 1 bedroom house with her sister a 50/50 share mortgage  around £70,000 and valued at say £90,000. The property is let and only just pays for itself.

My wife and I both work with approx take home pay per month of £2250. I require around £100 a week to live on and my wife requires all of her income to live, so I can save around £750 per month.

I have a credit card of around £2000, savings of £3000 and my wife has a loan of £3000. I hate my job and would love to be free of it.

My interest is web design and am becoming quite good. Hopefully this is where I can shine but I need more free time for this to happen. I am knackered at the end of the day.

I realise that my wife and I are in a good position regarding our own home and we could maybe do something with the equity, I don’t know.

What would you do, Nicola?”

NICOLA’S REPLY:

“Hi there John…congratulations on being our first “Ask Nicola” burning questioner! And what a lovely one to start with……the quick answer is that you are financially free already, you just don’t know it!

I’m going to mainly deal with your own situation here as your wife and you seem to keep your finances quite seperate…is that right?  Do come back to me if you wanted a response bases on your joint finances….

You say that you would like to do more web design, and with some good marketing online, and networking locally, and I know that you could make a very good living at this.  Local business people are AT LAST waking up to the power of the web in generating leads for their business, and how efficient and cheap that can be compared with the traditional methods, like advertising.  They are happy to pay £500 – £1000 for a blog type site (great for SEO), and around £2000 – £3000 for a blog type site, with ecommerce / mailiing list capabilities.

You could educate yourself about internet marketing, including traffic generation, social networking and web 2.0, as well as web design (our about to be relaunched Internet Marketing Home Study System will soon be available via our very affordable Silver membership) and then you would REALLY be in demand.  I would envisage that, within a year, you would be outsourcing most of the work!

However, the issue seems to be time and energy, as your day job takes both.  Have you considered taking some of the equity in your house, and investing it in your new business, using it to

a) pay yourself a salary of £500 a month (£100 per week x 52 divided by 12)

b) pay for some teaching to bring your internet marketing / seo skills up to scratch – Money Gym Silver would cover that as it gives access to the MG Internet Home Study System (soon to be totally upgraded to cover Social Networking and Membership Sites)

c) pay for a year’s worth of mentoring – our Money Gym Gold programme would be ideal for this and I would suggest you have a look at our coaches, and see which one you think would best be able to hold your hand through the year, to set up and build your business.

I would think pulling out £20,000 would not only cover the expenses as above, but also pay the payments on the money you would be borrowing so your outgoings would not go up at all.  If you apply before you hand your notice in, you should have no trouble getting a mortgage of 12% loan to value.

Your other alternative – if you don’t want to use your equity, is to use your £750 a month savings, to build a “Freedom Fund” to cover your first year in business, and in Money Gym Silver membership, we give you a blueprint on how to do that, step by step.

HOWEVER, if I were you, I would be pulling out all the equity available, and as well as investing in my new business, as above, I would be buying as many one bedroom buy to let flats (existing housing stock NOT new builds) as humanly possible.

This would ensure that you never had to work again, if you didn’t want to!  You could keep leveraging the growth in your property portfolio, again and again, tax free, to grow your portfolio further and to live off.

Again, this is something our experienced property investing Money Gym coaches could hold your hand through, via the Money Gym Gold programme as they are all very sound on this topic!!

Now, you know what you can do (and what I would do) the only question is “what’s going to stop you doing it?”

Keep in touch John and let me know how you get on?

Warm regards, Nicola”

JOHN REPLIED:

“Hi Nicola, Thank you so much for replying to my question and so quick. Your suggestions have given me food for thought and I guess you have confirmed what I have known for quite some time. It’s time to make strategic change in my life. So what an I waiting for………………just do it.  Thanks again Nicola, John”

If you would like your question answered online, with your personal details removed so nobody knows who you are, just visit

http://www.asknicolacairncross.com

Joint Ventures RIP! Long Live Strategic Partnerships

This week has been an interesting one in the world of both business success and internet marketing.  The excellent Stompernet faculty has opened it’s long closed doors to a limited number of new students and what is rapidly growing into the “must join” membership site / online university has been following the classic “product launch formula” method of giving away great content before selling anyone anything. 

Attraction marketing at it’s finest.

One of the things that Stompernet have been giving away, is lots and lots of free videos on improving your rankings in the Search Engines.  Check out those and their fantastic new and totally free tool to find out what Google sees when it visits your site here >>>

Another is Brad Fallon, founder of Stompernet, together with one of my mentors Rich Schefren, discussing on some great videos on why you should stop thinking in terms of quick and dirty Joint Ventures (where you just mail for them and they mail for you) and start thinking in terms of value-adding strategic partnerships.

Think about who you could work with on a long term basis, that you

1.  Like – this is very important
2.  Respect – you have to feel happy recommending them and their company
3.  Know have unique content that you don’t have that your subscribers / members would enjoy/benefit from

We have long been a fan of this in The Money Gym, with our existing alliances with those who we consider to be the best in their field, such as our “Money Gym Presents….Our Favourite Experts” workshop presenters, but specifically Passive Investments, Tamkin Riaz, Marcus De Maria, Alan Forrrest Smith and now Tim Brocklehurst, Brett McFall, Claire Raikes, and Dave Lee, The Cashflow Investor (see Wealth Highway article today).

But it’s all been a bit informal and I’m starting to think about making it more formalised and also more reciprocal in some cases.

Read more..

Wealth Creating Patiently

TESTIMONIAL

As we were working with Nicola on an internet mentoring basis, how fortunate were we to be able to pick Nicola’s brain about money issues surrounding our upcoming move to the UK! Now as you all know, Nicola is not shy about sharing her passion and expertise about how buying properties as investments can create financial freedom. We had just never thought about applying it to ourselves! That is, not until a conversation with Nicola when she heard our angst about the move and money, well, that learning opportunity turned our heads around in about 5 minutes! With her “quick grab the calculator and let’s do the numbers” attitude we realized that not only could our move be successful but that our financial future could be much more secure than we had ever dreamed. One of the things we love about Nicola is that she has the patience of a saint! She’ll explain it not once, not twice, but as many times as we needed till we got it and believed it. Nicola made it simple to understand…literally a no brainer! So now, not only are we eager and excited to move to the U.K. for a new lifestyle and new business opportunities, we can’t wait to get started on our “property career” as well. Talking with Nicola about money issues, property opportunities, and goodness knows what more in the future has opened up an entirely new, and much larger, financial frontier for us. Dr. Toby Silverton & Dr. Bev McLagan, www.biggerthanbalanceblog.typepad.com “Helping successful, overstretched women go from Burnout>Balance>Bliss”

Are you ready to take action?

If you would like to explore how 1:2:1 wealth coaching
can help you maximise your potential AND your assets
then just come over to our website and have a look around

Don’t let 2008 be the year that you didn’t take action
let it be the year that you look back on and say WOW WOW WOW

http://www.TheMoneyGym.com/Gold