How To Get Focused, Really For Real
Are You Focused Enough To Read This Message?
Memo From: Marlon Sanders
Memo To: You reading my blog right now!
Re: Are you focused enough to read this message?
Hey,
It's Marlon here.
From the survey I did here this week you told me you have too
many options and don't know what to do.
…that you feel overwhelmed. I'm going to give you right here
in this email something that will help you IMMEDIATELY.
So let's talk about the CAUSE of this problem and the cure.
I'm sittin' here at Starbucks. Got a glass 1/3 full of nicely
brewed ice tea. Got my off white Mac laptop plugged in and I'm
sitting at a wooden table. On the wall I got pictures of famous
musicians like Jimmy Hendrix, Johnny Cash, Eric Clapton and good
ol' Hank Williams.
In the case here beside there's a choice of giant chocolate chip
cookies, croissants and bagels.
The music relaxes and makes it easy to FOCUS IN as I write and
really see the possibilities right before me.
I don't know if you know this or not but I spend $35,000 or so
a year just buying information so I know what I know and what I
don't know. Because I feel it's my job to absorb information
so you don't have to.
And that's why I understand the cause of Overwhelm is NOT what
you know or don't know. It's not having a PROCESS to sort out
what's important and what isn't.
See, with everything I buy I have millions of ideas and time to
learn and implement a few. I LOVE learning. It's fun. But like
I remember Gary Halbert saying once, it's the implemention that's
tough.
So the cause of Overwhelm is assigning the SAME priority to
everything and not having a process to sort things out.
So you got all these possibilities rolling around in your head.
That gets really exciting. I mean, even with the Swine freaking
flu going around, even with the stock market sucking wind (except
for last month), even with all the doom and gloom, there really
are so many ways to STILL make good bank in SPITE of it all!
That's what's so cool about what we do.
A laptopn, a seat at Starbucks or a coffee shop, some coffee or
tea and you can pull down $300, $500 or $1,000 while everyone
else chats away their time.
How cool is that? Seriously.
So there's no lack of opportunity. Many years ago Napoleon Hill
said that every adversity carries with it a seed of equivalent
benefit.
===================================================
SHAMELESS PLUG
If'n you wanna get FOCUSED now and make that nasty
overwhelm thing a habit of the past, if you wanna
get focused and have a way to know what to do out
of all your opportunities, I have VIDEOS that show
you step-by-step how to clear the whole mess up.
http://www.marlonsanders.com/overwhelm
They ain't super cheap. But I'll betcha they don't
cost NEARLY as much as being overwhelmed does.
===================================================
The cause, then, is simple: Not having a system or method to
know what to FOCUS on in the moment and what to put on the
backburner. If you assign the same priority to everything THEN
you feel overwhelmed.
But how DO you sort through things and find your priority now?
I'm not gonna give away my secret sauce here. But here's what
I CAN spill that WILL help you IMMEDIATELY.
I spend a whole video on it in The Overwhelm Cure. But let me
give you something right here right now that will PROVE to you
that you can make things clearer and better.
Step One: Write out all the things you feel you “should do.”
I mean ALL of them.
Step Two: Now group these “to do's” by the following categories:
a. Traffic methods to get people to your web site
b. Product methods to find affiliate products to sell or create
your own products. That includes any and all activities
associated with this process like keyword research.
c. Operations things like outsourcing, taxes, and all that stuff.
Step Three: Pick ONE category to work on in the next 2 weeks
Step Four: Within that category pick a set of “to do's” that are
ALL related to ONE thing.
Step Five: Just focus on doing THOSE to do's in the next week or
two to the exclusion of everything else. If you have other
issues that MUST be done, then block off a segment of time for
those.
This is called Timeboxing.
Now, if this is ALL you do you have more clarity than when you
started reading this email.
Why?
Because instead of having a bunch of unrelated to do's you've
added some order to the chaos.
You've PROVEN to yourself you can find yourself getting more
clear in a JIFFY! How long did it take to do the exercise?
Not long, right?
But I bet you're becoming aware of already feeling more clear
about what you want to do in the next week or two.
Now take that outcome and FOCUS IN on it and make it really
crystal clear in your thinking.
Post on my blog and let me know HOW this helped you.
Best wishes,
Marlon Sanders
I liked the reminder about the quote from Gary Halbert saying “It’s the implemention that’s
tough.” I like your tips on deciding what to concentrate on to overcome overwhelm. Thanks for keeping me informed.
Hello Marlon,
For sixteen+ years Tireponyman ™ (ME) has watched you develop your fantastic programs and systems and while this old country boy was successful in making and marketing the horse tire swings. your methods were helpful and used with my marketing. The do work and Tireponyman thanks you for that service.
While my priorities deal with my health and corrective eye surgery, diabetes, diet and healthy lifestyle we are seeing some improvement and looking forward to using many of your programs. We are re-launching http://www.cowhorncountry.com with a special page for our affiliate programs. This should be all up and running before my return to Florida to wind up some investments.
Starting from “scratch” again and looking forward to the future with you to see what we can do.
Thank you so very much,
Cecil Whorton aka Tireponyman and Happy Pappy
Share your world #facebook , #BUBBLEWS. #Twitter, #Woodpress, #Youtube
Hey Marlon, It’s funny. I keep forgetting that we were neighbors until last Dec. I lived in Bandera for a short stint and Seguin for a couple of years. Anyway, I know that the advice is right on and I’ve calmed down and gotten rid of all the distractions that were cluttering up all of my email boxes. I’m the “Felix Unger” type and ultra anal about a place for everything and every…I tried to watch that t.v. show “Hoarders” and I couldn’t make it through an episode. So letting all the “e-info” that I was going get to pile up was really double trouble. If I didn’t realize that I was so disorganized and that it was my own fault, I probably would have been content huntin’ and peckin’ for roots and acorns like an old boar hog. Trouble is, I realized it. But things are a bit streamlined now and alot more focused. Thanks for everything and happy Saturday to ya’. Truly, Brian Jeffries
my current top priority = Gratitude, and actually expressing it so the sender knows what I have received..
1 tick on my To Do list /
(welcome 2 actually = also thanks to Paul Myers for connecting me to Marlon)
Thanks, Marlon!
Hi Marlon,
wanted to check out the overwhelm product mentioned in you last email but the link brings me to a page saying "Not Found"/ Here's the link from the email:
http://www.TurboProfits.com/tracking/go.php?c=new…
I also went to your Products page – but that link produced the same result.
Ted,
I just now got our blog back up and really functioning.
Overwhelm is there now but you get a special Offer price
on it if you order it AFTER ordering one of our other
products.
Best wishes,
Marlon
The Overwhelm Cure is the first thing I bought from you, Marlon! It is excellent and worth every penny. I have gone on to buy almost everything you have written. Keep up the great work!
Sue
Thanks Marlon for the information you sent today. It has and will get me back on track again and keep me on track.
Thanks again,
Faye
Hi Marlon,
Once again you deliver. It's so easy to get sidetracked! Thank you for keeping me on the straight and narrow and focusing on keeping it simple.
All the best,
Angela
Hi, Marlon!
You're right, I need to "timebox" the things I want to do and/or needs my attention. Thanks for making me "see" how to do it when I'm so overwhelmed by these things.
I have a feeling you're sincere with what you do in trying to help people like me, so I have just signed in to your mailing list.
Thanks a lot. God bless you.
Sunshine
[Hey sunshine, timeboxing actually works. It's a discipline. But it works. Or, if you're really a.d.d. just try to block whole half or whole days, if your schedule allows that.]
Thanks for answering me and the tip to buy banner ads on google. I am not selling arts and crafts stuff but figure that if people are buying that and much more they will buy my product.
I am going to go for it with this program. I need help to bring my project to fruition and know your my go to man! I think you rock! I will meet you someday!
Thanks again Marlon!:)
[Hi Valerie, if the arts and crafts people are your target audience, it should be easy to reach them through Google as well as an affiliate offer.]
Hey Marlon,
After reading Mr. Schmidts post I feel I must post myself. I have just discovered you! Out of all the information (tons, and tons!) I have looked at I think you have the best to offer.
That's why I am sticking with you. I really feel like you want to teach and help others. Of course I realize you have a business too and I not an unlimited pocket! However with the product ideas that I have I think I can make some money. If people are spending money on arts and crafts etc. etc. then they will buy my product too. I am sure of it!
I have purchased a couplet of things from you like the design dashboard, amazing formula and the push button marketing program. I must say that saved me alot of time, I need to make my learning curve short and sweet! In addition this info also applies to my other business, legal nurse consulting. So it does double duty!
I do have one question though…..the new whiteboard product….can I access that at any time? I believe so and would this info cover the promo dashboard stuff? Thanks in advance for your time.
Regards, Valerie
[Hi Valerie, how are you? Nope. Doesn't cover the Promo Dashboard stuff. That would take 6 weeks since there are 6 rows. I DID do a 6 week coaching program on the Promo Dashboard I think you can find if you click on products on the blog header. Yes, I'm recording the sessions, however, there is a chance a recording won't turn out. That happens sometimes. I'll try to safeguard against it. Valerie, I imagine you can buy banners on arts and crafts sites through Google Ads cheap. Plus, you can get the webmasters to be your affiliate.]
Hi Marlon,
Great! You actually answered my post. I said that I thought you were a phoney but you just proved again that you are not. You have shown that you are trying to be helpful and that to me is real. I know that you have been around that is obvious. Any way I do work whenever I can get work it just is so sparce and few and far between. I have applications in all over the place and will mow lawns. I am not lazy just have very limited income and in the nagative 90 persent of the time for about 3 years now. Not complaining just explaining. Thanks for the tips and encouragement. I will put them into action.
Best regards,
John Schmidt
P.S. I apologize for the phoney statement.
[John, apology not needed. Do you have computer skills? If you do, look on elance.com, getafreelancer.com and other sites for jobs you can bid on using your Internet marketing skills. If you aren't perusing CraigsList daily for jobs, I would.]
Hi Marlon,
I looked at your stuff for a year now and just thought you were a loudmouth trying to phoney your way through. Well I read some infomation you sent recently and as a result have changed my mind. One thing I have found is that no one gives away anything like tips or any thing else. They want to sell you what they have and then get you half way down the road and leave you there. I had my share of that. So I quit buying things and wonderful empty promises.
I have been at this internet business for three years and have not sold anything yet. I have learned things along the way but not enough. Your info email gave some tips like changing the permalinks. Wow! I did not know about that. I immediately changed my permalinks as you instructed. OK I know that is just a small point for others but a big point for me. I want to thank you. You had also instructed about TweetMeme and I did that too. Then i got to thinking mabey there is someone with a real concern for struglers in this internet world. Anyway you are real and i put you on the good guy list. My construction busness went totally south and used up all my savings to try to stay afloat.
Finally had to take Bankrupcy, behind 5 payments on my house, had my gas, water, and electricity cut off. I work 50 hours a week trying to get this internet going and have not got there yet. Anyway that is why i appreciate the tips you have shared. I would like to get in on your new launch but simply do not have the money. Mabey some day.
Best regards,
John Schmidt
[John, if you don't have a job, you need one. Really, get back up on your feet financially. You can even go to elance.com and sell the internet marketing skills you've learned. Now, use free Camstudio (search Google) to create your own video product with 4-6 videos in it. Create the best sales letter you can with what you've learned. Put a blurb in your signature for forums and post 3X per day in 5 forums. That should get money coming in. But do that AND a job. Mike Filsaime managed the sales team for the nations largest Toyota dealer, drove 2 hours to work and back and still found the time to build his Internet business. It CAN be done because Mike and others have done it. I offer you the encouragement that you can do this. You might look into running WSO's on the Warrior's forums. It's not unusual for folks to do pretty well there. The thing is, you need a base of stable income. Then start creating and selling your OWN products. Plain and simple. On the phoney thing, just ask around in forums. You know, I was making a living as a copywriter before my Internet business. I've been in this Game a long time my friend.]
Marlon,
Thnaks – your 5 steps are inspiring and brilliant. I just printed them out and pasted to the wall next to my monitor – I will look at this every day!
Hey Marlon, thanks for the pep talk it really is information overload I think and is very distracting. I need to focus on one project at a time and complete them before trying to start another there is just so much to do and really can't afford to outsource things right now. As for videos I have access to tons of them right now in my back office but thanks for the email just the same. Talk to ya later, JD
Dear Marlon, I received your email on June 16, 2009. The situation you described was very similar to my problems. Although I cannot buy yet your videos, but for sure when I am ready I'll buy them.
For now, "the spill" is just enough.
Thanks again.
dear marlon:
getting focused and taking the right actions is often very difficult with the current info deluge! thank you so much for your great tips and fantastic help!
kind regards,
tom
[Tom, I appreciate you taking the time to say it's helping.]
[email protected]
You are very informative and interesting but are sending waaaaayyyyyy to many E-Mails. Please unsubscibe,
Thank You
[Hi, to unsubscribe from email lists you just click the unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email.]
Wow, Marlon,
Your never cease to deliver more than expected – always sprinkled with the hope and encouragement that we all need.
While I was reading your post, I got to visualizing each of us when we're in the confusion state as being akin to an octopus…
…each day getting pulled in at least eight different directions by really strong ideas or "shoulds & oughts" that tug us in various ways with varying degrees of importance begging to be added to our must-do lists.
Each one is equally strong and enticing or something that feels super-urgent… pretty soon, we just get overwhelmed and our head droops down and we get nothing done… except for perhaps lamenting the loss of still another day.
Count me in as one more Marlon Fan who truly appreciates you because you GIVE something back to us in every email or blog post, and more importantly, you aren't continually barraging us with yet another 'must-have item' that would only serve to add to the confusion and lack of focus.
Thank you again and again,
Donna
[Donna, I'm ALL FOR selling stuff. But gosh dog, at a certain point you gotta be selling yourself and THAT has to be your dominant focus….not what you're buying. The point of this game is to SELL more than you BUY. And a lot of folks got that in reverse.]
Hi there Marlon,
Have followed you for years, especially since seeing you live in London at Frank Garon's seminar's. Very entertaining!
Very sound advice re "overwhelm" Marlon!
We're all guilty sometimes of just starting at the top of our to-do list and not assessing the priorities….
Easy too to read emails as soon as we log on and get distracted (plus end up buying yet more "stuff" 😉 )
I find tackling the key tasks of the day first for, say, 4-5 hours in total gets a lot done.
Then, I take time to check my emails, see what I need to respond to, what I can outsource, etc.
Your advice is always first-class at cuttign through the "noise" and deluge of information that's out there.
Keep on 'truckin'!
All the best,
Vinden Grace
Marlon, This timebox method is amazing – I've just started my blog and have hundered things that i wanna do… but fon't really get far.. I'll follow your advice and hopefull It'll change things
and yeah – hope you enjoyed ur brewed iced tea at starbucks..:)
Marlon, thanks for the info on getting focused. I am going to writea liost of "to dos" and work on one at a time.
Thanks for this.
Jo
Hey Marlon, thanks for taking the grey area out of all the "stuff" on the internet for me, your ideas are stellar.Take care
Marlon,
Re: Your affiliate program…
I can't give you my ss#. I just can't.
There are too many bad people out there.
I feel it's crazy for anyone to give out their ss#. Now, knowing this, how can you help me?
[Hi Thomas, it's only required by the U.S. Gov't IF your commissions are OVER $600 AND you are a legal citizen of the U.S. If you meet those 2 qualifications then the law of the United States requires me to report the sales and issue you a tax form so you can pay taxes on your sales commissions. If you are NOT a citizen of the U.S. You just put in random numbers.]
Hey Marlon,
Man you're good. I knew it way back when I heard you being interviewed in a teleseminar series I got as a bonus a while ago. I want you to be my mentor. I've benn trying to make money online now for a couple years and I can't seem to keep it together. I get distracted easily. I get tons of e-mail every day saying, buy this new product, buy that one, this will work. I buy it and try it for a couple weeks and see another one and buy that one. I guess i need to slow down and just stay focused and have a system like you say. Thanks for the wake up call.
By the way folks, if anyone is interested in looking at a digital camera with built-in printer I did a review on it at: polaroidpogoreview.blogspot.com
Take Care,
Steve
Marlon,
When I read your email today, I had to laugh…not at you, but at myself.
Once I read it, I instantly realized that I am overwhelmed, and more importantly, why. I was amused to realize that I have become overly 'focused' on all the communication, 'noise', and action going back and forth on various social media sites instead of focusing on my own business.
It is important to make business contacts and keep up with what is going on online. However, the bottom line is that focusing on that can easily distract anyone from doing what they need to do to develop, implement, and market their business effectively.
As you say, not having a system or method to know what to focus on and how to prioritize causes overwhelm (and a major lack of income!). Also, the Halbert comment about "…it's the implementation that's tough" really rang true for me.
Your timely emails and common sense advice always brings me back to the reality that I need to focus and work hard to develop and implement the systems and methods you teach that will help me grow and sustain my business for the long term.
I am off to make my lists, focus, pick one and timebox. Dashboards, here I come! 🙂
Thank you for continually sending out great practical, timely and helpful information to keep us on track. Also, thank you for the virtual "slap on the wrist" and jolt back to reality! I needed that!
– Sheri
This has been very helpful in terms of providing me with some clarity. A system for sorting myself out.
My problem is the number of emails I receive daily and downloading everything.(I must stop doing that).
Thanks Marlon for your guidance.
This article is just coming in at the right time. It's sure the square peg in the right hole.
Marlon, you've never disappointed.
Keep it up.
Regards.
Chidera Anele
+2348023189838
[email protected]
Hi Marlon,
don't know how much of a coincidence it is that your email hit the nail on the head but it could very well do the trick following those steps. Your offer was very hard to resist I know you do not take it personal. I have no doubt your Overwhelm stuff would work for me the price is right but there is the overwhelm. All this foundation and even some framing and I am still stuck.
Marlon, this is what makes you stand out from the other big guys. This actually relates and solves "real world" problems. No empty promises, just the goods! Thanks,Dan