The following questionnaire was designed for the purpose of attaining an overall total life fitness. When filling out this questionnaire remember that honesty is of utmost importance. To do an inventory on your present fitness status and to lie about it is to break one of the most significant secrets to overall fitness that is integrity. To take the first step forward on your overall Life Fitness Program, simply answer yes or no to the questions in the questionnaire

Neil Asher’s Physical Fitness:

Do you walk at least one mile or its equivalent once a day? _____

Are you within 10 pounds of your normal and healthy weight? _____

Do you work out enough to work up a sweat at least twice a week ?_____

Do you have consistent moderation in the quantity of your eating?_____

Do you have a consistent rhythm in the timing of your eating?_____

Do you receive adequate hours of sleep each day (six to eight hours)? _____

Do you like your body and are you proud of it?_____

Do you stretch out each of your joints at least twice weekly? _____

Neil Asher’s

Mental Fitness:

Do you look forward to getting up and making the most of your day? _____

Are you excited about new ideas and look forward to learning?_____

Do you read something inspiring and uplifting and about what you love daily?_____

Do you hang out with idea generating people with mind stimulating ideas?_____

If you are down or depressed do you, instead of wallowing in it, make an effort to change your action state and do something productive?_____

If you are scattered and overwhelmed do you stop to prioritize your actions?_____

Do you have a mentor that helps you not reinvent wheels?_____

Do you take a moment to visualize and affirm your desired outcomes daily?_____

Neil Asher’s

Spiritual Fitness:

Do you take a moment for meditative silence daily?_____

Do you stop and count your blessings at least five minutes daily?_____

Do you center yourself and listen to your heart before speaking?_____

Do you open up and share your love with others?_____

Do you write thank you letters?_____

Do you visit parks, museums, art galleries or places of worship regularly?____

Do you believe their is a higher purpose for each of the events in your life?_____

Do you treat others the way you want to be treated?_____

Neil Asher’s

Career Fitness:

Do you love what you do and do what you love?_____

Do you have clearly set and written career goals?_____

Do you have an organized work environment?_____

Do you break large projects into smaller more manageable pieces and work from priorities?_____

Do you practice and polish your skills regularly?_____

Can and do you seek advice when needed?_____

Do you reward yourself for you accomplishments?_____

Can you accept valid and constructive criticism?_____

Neil Asher’s

Family Fitness:

Do you have someone special you romantically love?_____

Do you let your loved ones know how much they mean to you?_____

Do you take time for family gatherings?_____

Do you make an effort to do those extra specials with those you love regularly?____

Do you really listen when your loved ones speak?_____

Can you truly be yourself around your family members?_____

Do you let other family members receive the limelight without jealousy?_____

Are you proud to be in the family you’re in?_____

Neil Asher’s

Social Fitness:

Are you willing to take on leadership?_____

Can you join into a group as a team player easily?_____

Are you outgoing and friendly with a sense of humor ?______

Are you able to listen attentively and follow intructions?_____

Do you get out and meet new people, at least one new person a week?_____

Do you make it a point to help others reach their dreams?_____

Are you supportive of other people’s accomplishments?_____

Do you speak up and influence others with your ideas?_____

Neil Asher’s

Financial Fitness:

Do you feel worthy enough to allow yourself to receive money and wealth?_____

Do you pay yourself and taxes first, not last?_____

Do you have a regular savings program?_____

Do you prioritize your spending?_____

Do you abstain from the overuse of credit cards?_____

Do you pre-plan your shopping and not impulse buy?_____

Do you avoid wiping out your savings just because of minor emergencies?_____

Do you have a separate savings program for vacations?_____

To take the second step forward on your overall Life Fitness Program simply grade yourself on the answeres to the preceding questionare. For each question answered yes give yourself five points. For each question answered no give yourself zero points. Now total up all your points.

Your third and final winners step is to take action. Overall Life Fitness is yours for the taking.

If your total points range from 0 to70, your total Life Fitness status is very poor. If so, you need a jumpstart and an immediate overhaul before you end up totally out of shape. Start reviewing the preceding questionnaire and begin taking immediate action today on its many implied fitness tips. Begin doing one at a time. Work on as many of these tips as you comfortably can. Push yourself though. You may need a mentor or coach, and if so, call on one. You will be amazed at how rapidly your overall life fitness can be upgraded with some extra attention.

If your total points range from 75 to 140, your total Life Fitness status is fair. If so, you could benefit from reviewing the preceding questionnaire and incorporating many more of the tips to overall fitness it neil asher provides.

If your total points range from 145 to 210, your total Life Fitness status is good. You are definitely above average, but you could still benefit even more by reviewing the preceding questionnaire and incorporating as many of its implied fitness tips as possible. This good status is an easy status to become complacent in, so don’t just let yourself plateau at being good, go for excellence. It may take some extra work, but you’re worth it.

If your total points range from 215 to 280, congratulate yourself, for your total Life Fitness status is excellent. You are quickly approaching an overall Life Fitness. You are either presently a leader or a leader in the making; a role model for others to follow. You have an integrity that makes you a winner. Your personal power and fitness will be an inspiration. You have become your own coach of your own inner winning team. All that is left for you to do is to simply polish up those last few fitness tips so your overall fitness can keep on shining.

If you’d like to find out more about having a life coach or becoming a life coach copy and paste this URL into your web browser:

Neil Asher

Neil Asher - Blue Sky Thinking

Today I thought I’d share one of the biggest lessons i ever got, it’s quite simple really BUT it’s O so powerful.

any advertising or marketing you do be sure to test the results of it.

I can tell you this – it doesn’t matter whether you are a life coach, a small business owner or corporate executive – it doesn’t matter whether you sell to businesses or consumers if you’ll thoroughly study and consider the information and ideas presented in these emails and take appropriate follow-up actions to switch the emphasis of your marketing into methods that bring direct response and are results measurable you will improve the profit of your business.

And I want you to remember this – any media sales person, any ad agency person, any consultant, anyone in your own firm who is anti-direct response does not have your best interest at heart. The person who opposes having the results measured accurately already knows that the results are inadequate.

I hope you didn’t find my promise sneaky or perhaps a bit deceptive, but it is perhaps the best and most profitable advice anyone can ever deliver to you.

so Neil Asher how to do this?

well in the New Insights marketing manual i (Neil Asher) devote a full chapter to this very important subject but here’s the nuts and bolts of it for you now:

Testing means evaluating what works, then putting financial parameters to the measurements. The fundamental objective for marketing in any business is to provide the basis to:

??? Generate leads.

??? Maximize the conversion rate into buying customers/clients.

??? Increase the number of transactions per customer per year.

??? Increase the average dollar sale per transaction.

??? Improve revenue margins to result in maximum profits for the business.

The next step is to do the testing and measuring of marketing information as a matter of process. With this information, you’ll have the power to make effective decisions including which marketing campaigns to accelerate, which to cancel, which to improve and how much should be spent to maximize the bottom line.

The testing and measuring information allows for the business leverage of limited resources. For example, the leads generated might be high but the conversion rate is low, or the other way around, and this will indicate which area needs to be improved. Or perhaps both leads and conversion rates are high, but average dollar sale is low because the sale mix is weighted to low-priced items rather than high-priced items. Once you really know which areas need improvement, you can begin to make informed marketing decisions.

Here are three steps for successfully figuring out what works and what doesn’t work:

Neil Asher steps to success

1. Start asking people where they heard about your business. You must start asking every lead where they found out about you. If you don’t start asking, you will continue to operate in the dark. You may keep running an ad or a promotion that never brings in sales, or you may kill an ad or promotion that in fact is a good one.

Because customers usually come from many sources, formal or informal, it is impossible to judge the extent to which each marketing strategy is generating sales on its own unless you build measuring into the process.

Perhaps you got more customers from referrals in a particular week, or there may have been a festival in town with a tie-in promotion. Every time a person contacts your business as a potential buyer, ask them, “By the way, may I ask where you heard about my business?” People will not have any problem telling you. And, after the lead is converted into a customer, you can correlate the purchase with the successful marketing tool to identify the most effective ways to generate customers.

Start right now to ask your leads where they heard about your business; then you can really begin to make effective marketing decisions.

2. Cancel, modify or increase. The first thing to do is see what is not working. If the marketing tactic is getting a low response, cancel it immediately.

Now you have two options: Channel the marketing funds elsewhere or improve the program to ensure you get a response that exceeds the break-even point.

If you choose to improve your advertising program, there are a couple of steps you can take to make the task simpler. First, go back over your past ads and evaluate which ones you think were effective in generating leads and conversion to customers. Pull out the best couple and determine what gave them their edge. Second, look at what your competitors are doing. Do they have an ad they consistently continue to run? What can you learn from it? Then create an ad to be tested and measured.

Go through this process with each marketing tactic you use ??” cancel, examine, modify, test and measure. Remember, the true test of a marketing strategy is whether it pays for itself. If you run an ad and it costs you ??1,000 and generates a contribution profit margin of ??1,300, then it is a good ad and you should continue to increase its use until its contribution profit margin drops to ??1,000 by measuring the results to a financial break-even.

Also, examine each of the successful marketing tactics and evaluate why they are producing positive results. See if you can identify the one most important customer-oriented feature about each.

Now determine ways to use each marketing tactic that is working on a larger scale. If it is fliers, the answer is simple: Drop twice as many fliers to your target audience. That should bring twice the sales. If it’s an ad, give it expanded reach or increase the ad size for greater visual impact. Do the same thing on a larger scale and keep measuring the leads generated from the revised or increased tactics.

3. Check the conversion rate from leads to customers. Conversion is the number of leads/inquiries that become sales. Unfortunately, frequent analyses of businesses will show that it is not the quality of the execution of the marketing tactics that is the key determinant of sales effectiveness, but the results are often controlled by inadequate sales techniques. There are many businesses that have ample leads, but they lack effective skills to convert them into sales.

Again, it is testing and measuring that will provide the real information to know what’s working and what’s not. As surprising as it may seem, very few small businesses actually know their conversion rates, but they will always give you an estimate. These estimates are consistently about twice what the conversion rate turns out to be when measured. Business owners tend to show great disappointment when their estimated 50 percent conversion rate turns out actually to be 25 percent. They see this as a poor reflection on their sales performance rather than an opportunity for faster growth. Just think how difficult it would be to double your conversion rate from 50 percent compared with 25 percent.

In most analyses of small businesses, improving the conversion rate provides the quickest and lowest-cost effort to increase business revenues. You just have to give the new potential customer a reason to buy from your business.

Price is not the only reason a customer buys products or services from your business; what if the sales people showed a personal interest in your customers’ needs? What if they were a little bit friendlier? What if they used more effective sales scripts? What if they were willing to back up the product with a guarantee? What if they offered free delivery?

It’s a matter of knowing the needs and helping a customer make the decision to buy your product. All of these ideas can be tested and measured to see what will improve the conversion rate from your current standard.

Neil Asher

So what are the keys to successful testing and measuring? Be vigilant, disciplined and consistent. You cannot test and measure half the time; you must do it every hour of every day.

It is not a difficult task when you build testing and measuring into the operating procedures that specifically relate to the nature of your business. Enforce the process to record every lead/customer interaction with your business and make sure that every employee complies.

Stress the importance of this process for the financial growth of your business. Experience indicates that only two out of 10 marketing campaigns for small businesses will generate a positive contribution to the bottom line. It is crucial to quickly know which campaigns are generating your business success.

with much warmth

Neil Asher

Are you busy building a web site?

Would you say brochures are the answer?

What about business cards? or maybe advertising?

Many coaches try this route in the beginning, they only grow their practice very, very slowly. They do what all the marketing books say. But why isn’t their business booming?

I’m going to give you the answer right here in this article.

The Vicious Cycle

99% of coaches lack confidence. And rightly so! It can be very daunting to put on the hat of ‘coach’ and offer to change people’s lives.

Building a web site or designing a brochure are great down the track. But while you’re still scared to coach – you’ll subconsciously find a way of turning away clients.

Here’s the vicious cycle: Having little or no clients which means no experience, which leads to a reluctance to extend the invitation for trial sessions, which leads to no clients, which leads to no experience, and so on.

The Secret

The answer is quite simple – forget the money, forget your pride, and get your experience up – no matter what it takes. And the fastest way to do that? “Coach 50 Clients!”.

Free, paid, 1 session, 1 week, 3 months – I don’t care. Just get those initial sessions.

That’s why at New Insights we get you to target your clients, coach other coaches and build your confidence. That’s why our coaches make it work.

Each client, fee or no fee, 3 months or 30 minutes, is “gold” to you. And I’ll tell you why…

What Every Client (or Practice Client) Gives You

• the feeling you are really a coach, not a fraud
• a practice that looks busier
• the potential for more referrals
• free training
• more and more confidence with each client
• possible revenue, either right away or down the track
• a testimonial

Starting Out!

It’s O.K. to be nervous when you are starting out, but do those sessions anyway. The next ones will seem easier. So, coach a lot!

Even if you are doing sessions for free, you will be gaining the confidence and practice to allow yourself to start charging for your work. You will see how you are helping others. You will be able to convince yourself of the importance of coaching in people’s lives.

Conclusion

In the beginning, don’t distract yourself from coaching with longer-term marketing methods. Could you be trying to avoid coaching by working on your business cards or web site? Work through your confidence issues and explore coaching with your current network.

Once you have about 10 clients you can work with your mentor coach to find more sustainable marketing methods. By this time, your practice will begin to grow naturally in the number of clients, how long they stay and your income.

with much warmth

Neil Asher 

Are You In Crisis - Neil Asher

When was the last time you experienced a crisis?

Did it seem like it was the end of the world? Did you feel helpless, frustrated, burned-out or just down and depressed? Did you say to yourself, “This is the last straw. I am sick and tired of being sick and tired of being sick and tired of being sick and tired. This has got to stop. I can’t go another day like this.” If this has been you recently, then you better keep reading.

Everyone experiences moments where outer circumstances appear to be an overwhelming crisis. To many these circumstances dominate and rule their lives. To some these crises leave lasting scars unless they are recognized as truly being blessings. When the worst crisis becomes your greatest blessing, you heal. Nature does not deliver crisis without opportunity or misfortune without blessing.

Some people have crises that drag out for years. Others seem to nip their crises in the bud almost immediately. It’s not the outer circumstances that necessarily create the crises. While they may elicit the crises, it is a person???s reaction that actually turns circumstances into crises.

The length of time it takes for you to recognize your outer crisis as a blessing correlates with your degree of wisdom. Pure wisdom is the instantaneous knowing that each crisis in life is indeed a blessing. Some misfortunes don’t reveal their blessing easily, while others are recognized immediately. Hidden within all misfortunes are the seeds of an equal but opposite fortune.

In the mid 1980s, hundreds of thousands of people were let go or laid off from their jobs. Some of these people were left without income, some without other career opportunities and some, ultimately, without their families. At first sight, this may have been perceived as a crisis, however, today many of those same people have undergone an in-depth soul-searching and reevaluation of their lives, only to discover that they genuinely had a dream in their hearts to be, do and have something more than what they were previously experiencing and accepting. Other people have tapped into a more profound purpose for their life than what they were allowing, and are now making their meaningful dreams come true. They are now doing exactly what they always loved to do but never had the guts to do until the crisis occured.

Today the same is happening again, the creative process of destruction and creation ensures that all live their purpose or are sent on a new track.

Crisis is ultimately blessings. They are the flip side of the coin of life. Many people have been temporarily devastated by broken relationships only to discover at some later time that their supposed misfortune was a blessing. Their very loss was their ultimate gain.

Whenever a door shuts, a window opens.

The longer you live, the more this seemingly paradoxical relation becomes evident and the more you see the correlation between past crises and future blessings. Through time and experience, your reactions subside and more patient actions result.

Since blessings are seeded in crisis and it seems quite easy to be thankful for blessings, why not move wisely ahead and assume that any perceived crisis is a blessing? Be thankful for its strengthening qualities. Why not act thankfully instead of reacting pitifully?

As long as outer circumstances run your life, you can expect a life filled with crises. But as soon as you take charge of your reactions and change them into thankful actions, your life will begin to flow.

Be thankful. You won’t be confronted with a crisis you can’t handle.

Be thankful. The next time you’re confronted with what appears to be a crisis, just ask yourself, “What is the hidden blessing?”

The deeper you look, the easier you will find it. When you do, you can say “good-bye” to its corresponding frustration, anger and depression.

No tree stood strong without the wind. No group stood strong without its heretic.

No person can be strong without a challenge. So be thankful for yours.

with much warmth

Neil Asher

Do you ever worry about not being able to get clients? Well — how do the successful coaches with thriving businesses do it?

Neil Asher - how to get your inner game set for attracting clients

Doing the inner work

…(You need to) do your personal inner work. Know what you want to create (the kind of coaching practice, the size, etc.) and more importantly WHY you want to create it. Invest the time to explore your motivation deeply.

Because if your motivation is to prove you are good enough, or to run away from failure, or to get people to love and approve of you, or to exploit people, or any of many negative motivations, it won’t work. Often these motivations are deeply buried and we don’t realize they are at play.

When you find the joy of service and align yourself with a motivation to contribute, things will turn around. Once you feel confident that your motivation is clean, you need to confront your willingness to give yourself this dream career.

This may sound like a no-brainer, but for most people it’s the biggest challenge. They limp along at a handful of clients, because they honestly feel deep down that to be paid really well for inspiring conversations and having lots of free time is too good to be true. They aren’t willing to receive it.

Getting Clients: Magic

I am not joking when I say magic was my primary enrollment method. In fact, it was really important to me that I create my practice magically, meaning that I visualized it, I programmed for it, I spent time regularly in meditation imagining my full practice and seeing myself happily coaching a full practice.

I want to be clear I am not talking about a child’s magic that is about wishful thinking and looking the other way. I’m talking about the true, adult magic of consciously creating reality.

Scheduling clients before getting clients
I made a schedule of where my client appointments were going to be and I absolutely allowed myself to desire it, imagine and expect it to happen. Then I would delight as the phone rang and people called and I would set up sample sessions.

Getting excited
I got so excited about the opportunities for growth for the people who called. I think I held an authentic space of possibility in such a way that they could more clearly see who they were becoming. Then I imagined people saying yes to coaching, and they did.

Sample sessions
…Once you’ve done the introspection, give lots and lots of sample sessions. You never enroll clients from talking about coaching, only from boldly giving yourself to the client in a sample session. Let yourself love. Let yourself care. They will either want it or they won’t. Don’t obsess on the ones who don’t. Just keep giving.

Referrals
Once I started getting clients, then they referred other people. Also, even though I don’t recommend coaching friends and family, I did give them sample sessions so they would know more first-hand what I was doing and they were more likely to refer people.

with much warmth

Neil Asher

Neil Asher - I love Junk Mail!

I’ve discussed direct marketing and gave you five different ways that it can be utilized including (but certainly not limited to) advertising in media, electronic media (Radio, TV, etc.), the internet, mail, telemarketing, and door to door selling.

Of all these direct marketing methods I’m most partial to direct mail. I like direct mail for many different reasons including:

#1: There are lots of options regarding formatting costs.

#2: You get things directly into the hands of the prospect.

#3: At least for a brief moment you have the person’s undivided attention.

#4: It is completely results measurable.

#5: It can be combined with other marketing methods. And

#6: You can learn to do your own copy and graphic work.

There are several different ways you can use direct mail too, including acquiring or attracting new customers as a pre-approach prior to a telephone or personal call and to communicate with existing customers.

I suggest you immediately begin opening and reading all of your so-called ‘junk mail’ and building files for each the categories of uses I mentioned. Keep the pieces that strike you as interesting and effective.

Personally…I love junk mail!

Thousands of companies spending millions of dollars to educate me about savvy marketing techniques that I can adapt to my businesses. The big companies that do a lot of direct mail marketing are very sophisticated in their methods.

They employ the very best writers and consultants, people who often command anywhere from ??10,000 to ??25,000 just to write a sales letter. These guys are sharp. You can learn from their work. These companies test, test, test and test some more.

So your junk mail is bringing you the end results of collaboration between the brightest direct marketing minds and the costliest marketing research in the country. I’ll dare you throw it in the wastebasket.

with much warmth

Neil Asher

True Love - Neil Asher

Neil Asher - are you in a relationship?

I am, I have a very different view of relationships to most people and today I’d like to share with you some of my beliefs about relationships and what the purpose of them is.

The purpose of all relationships is to dissolve the barriers that keep us from recognizing the love that already is and expressing the love we ultimately are.

We each have a hierarchy of values; from the things we think are extremely important, all the way down to the things we think don’t matter. Your values dictate your destiny. Anything that supports your highest values you call “good” and are attracted to; anything that challenges them you call “bad” and are repelled by.

Your values are based on the perception that something is missing, that a void exists. But the Law of Conservation says that nothing is missing, it’s just in a form you haven’t recognized. You think you’re missing it; therefore, you seek it, and anything you think supports that search you call good and anything that challenges it you call bad.

Our values determine the way in which we conduct our relationships.

There are three ways to conduct a relationship, and each one has an entirely different outcome.

A careless relationship is one in which you project and focus on your own values without considering your partner at all.

A careful relationship is when you think in terms of your partners values without considering you own.this one is called “walking on eggshells”. Both are one-sided approaches that ignore the other person and create tension in the relationship.

But a caring relationship is one where you communicate your values in terms of theirs. You think of both sides simultaneously, expressing your love for yourself and each other. The definition of caring is knowing someone well enough to know their values and caring enough to express your values in terms of theirs. Whenever something supports your values, you take away the rules, and when something challenges your values, you set rules. Nations do it, companies do it and you do it in relationships. You set up rules when your values feel threatened.

Often when we’re in a relationship, we unwisely think the other person is supposed to be like us but if any two people are exactly the same, one of them is unnecessary. The purpose of a relationship is to teach us to love the parts we’ve disowned. Each person has their own set of values and no two people have the same set.

Each person expresses love through his or her own values. When we honor our partners value system, we realize that we’re surrounded by love in forms we don’t even recognize. The power to transform your life is in your heart. You only need the courage to open it.

with much warmth

Neil Asher

Then you are hit with realization that paperwork, finances, marketing and all that business stuff is eating away at your time. And much of it you don’t even like to do. Your own business starts to become just another job– with more responsibility.

The answer is ‘systems’. You want to set up systems so your business practically runs itself. You can think of a system as a recipe for a part of your business.

Part of being your own boss is the flexibility of working when you choose and traveling when you want. When you are doing everything yourself and doing it the hard way, you lose this flexibility. You become tied to your job 24-7. Put systems in place so you don’t always have to be there.

An Example
As an illustration, say you had a chili making business in your backyard. Taking orders was wasting a lot of your time. So, you decide to systemize it. You create an order taking process- what you say, forms to use, how payment is taken, and so on. Once you have a good system in place you can hire a high school student to take orders for you, teaching him or her the system. It’s easy for them to remember because you wrote it all down and put it in your Systems Manual!

So which part of your business takes up a lot of your time? Write down the process for handling that area. Refine it. Improve it. Then put it in your Systems Manual, and find someone who can learn to do it well, at the lowest possible price.

Checklists
One way to systemize is to use checklists. When you create a system, remember it by writing it down or typing it up. You could have a checklist for proofing your web site, checking your newsletter or submitting articles.

Checklists are also great for routines. You can write down what you want to do every day, every week, each month and every year for your business.

Here is an example for a coaching business. Suppose you wrote a list of what you’ll do every week…

Weekly Coaching Checklist

Billing

Write follow-up letters

Write one article

Get completely caught up on e-mails

Contact 3 former clients

Have lunch with a colleague

Do a weekly review

Make sure calls are set up for clients

Set up 5 exploratory sessions

Contact one radio station to suggest an interview

Software
A lot of software exists now to help systemize your business, from accounting to promoting your web site to working your affiliate program (automatic sales force) to compiling your e-books. For example…

Out Source…
If a part of your business is difficult for you, too time consuming or you really don’t like doing it, hire it out. Find a virtual assistant to do customer service, go through your e-mail, research, or organize your travel plans. My assistant Carmel has eased up my workload tremendously. Your accountant can handle your finances. The kid next door can stuff envelopes, or even clean your house! Now you can concentrate on your business.

Note: Of course you may not be able to afford all this at once. That’s where profit comes in. You want to generate a small profit in the business. Then use some of that to invest in a system. Then grow the profit a little more, and use some of that to invest in another system.

Where can you systemize?

Here are some examples to get you thinking…

• Taking phone calls
• Billing
• Tracking your time
• Using autoresponders for e-mail you send frequently  (I use www.totalbusinesscart.com)
• Cleaning your office/house
• Paperwork and filing
• Online tracking system for your web site
• Marketing
• Book keeping
• Product delivery
• New client or customer welcome packs
• Client Follow-up
• Get started on creating systems for your business today!

with much warmth

Neil Asher

My current coaches are as follows:

Dr John F Demartini
A venture capitalist who last year made over £147 million
A Retired CEO who has built 8 multi million dollar businesses

I believe this track is appropriate for high flyers – those going for big achievements.

If you truly believe coaching is valuable, it’s just common sense to have your own coach. Choose the right coach for you, and it will definitely fast track your practice.

I want to share a few tips to help you choose the right coach for you. After all, it can be a sizeable investment….let’s make it pay off!

You’re after a coach who has something you want. Are they a well paid professional speaker? Do they have forty clients? Are they in the corporate market? Do they LOVE their life? Are they working in your dream niche? Do they own a seaside home? Ar they hugely visible in the media? Are they a master at helping coaches become hugely succesful

Dream the kind of practice you want, and find someone who has it.

Ideally, you’re also looking for someone with experience in getting new coaches started. They may have what you want, but there’s no guarantee they can impart/teach what they know.

Anything from £200 to £500 p.m. is reasonable providing they can demonstrate results and have testimonials.

Searching
You can do a search for “mentor coach” at any internet search engine e.g. http://www.google.com You might try the coach referral service at New Insights - which allows you to limit your search to the coaches who offer mentor coaching (note – this does not mean they have experience in this). You can search for a New Insights Master Coach at our web site.

Questions to Ask
Most coaches are willing to answer some of your questions, and even do a free trial session before you sign on. Some good questions to ask are:

• How long have you been coaching?
• What training have you had?
• How many coaches have you/are you currently mentoring?
• What kind of results have your mentorees had?
• Can you provide email addresses of a couple of coaches you’ve worked with?
• Could you please provide details of your practice? (Fees, # clients, different revenue streams)
• What do you love about your practice?
• What’s great about your life?

Check Them Out
Lastly, you want to feel comfortable with this person. Interviewing or trialing one to three coaches should be sufficient. They no longer have to be in your country – just make sure if they’re overseas that they are willing to cover the cost of phone calls, or factor this into your monthly fee. Be aware they may not be willing to do a free session with you if you are doing this with a number of coaches. (I know I don’t like to – I prefer people do their research on the net first, even talk to other coaches first, and ask me for a chat only once they’re pretty sure they want to work with me).

Investment
If you’re concerned about the investment, consider what your return on that monthly investment might be. In most cases, you only need 2-4 paying clients to cover the cost of your mentor coach. And if your coach can’t increase help you increase your client list by MORE than 2-4, something’s missing! It can be very empowering to hire a mentor coach, and set a goal of bringing in enough coaching income to cover the cost of your own coach by a particular date.

Remember, you don’t need a mentor coach. No-one NEEDS a coach. It’s just a faster, more fun, and often cost-effective road with one.

Enjoy!

with much warmth

Neil Asher

Today I want to switch gears a bit and talk about thinking. More specifically, thinking to succeed.

There’s an excellent scene in an old motivational film by Doctor Eden Rowell titled, ‘You Pack Your Own Chute,” that illustrates the problem with most thinking and the way you have to think to succeed. Doctor Rowell draws a 1 and an ‘X’ in the sand and challenges a friend to turn it into a six with one line. He tries several possibilities, putting a one behind the ‘X.’ Finally she draws an ‘S’ in front making the drawing into the word ‘six.’

Her friend protests saying that she indicated it had to be done with a line but an ‘S’ is nothing more than a curved line it’s just that we think of a line as being straight. We need to be able to step outside the confines of conventional, habitual thinking.

A classic example of the problem, of course, is the railroad industry. They mistakenly thought they were in the railroad industry instead of seeing themselves in the transportation industry Neil asher.

What business are you in? As your business grows and prospers you’ll probably redefine that business many times. McDonald’s, for example, began as a hamburger stand. Today among other things McDonald’s is a huge and powerful commercial real estate company investing and building a property empower with franchisee’s leases as funding.

Continual frequent rethinking of what your business is, should be, can be and will be is a great success strategy. Regardless of the redefinition though the most important strategy of all is playing simple excellence. The book ‘In Search of Excellence,’ has been very good for business. It has caused many companies and business people to do better thinking about the quality of what they do and produce.

As I travel, fly airlines, stay in hotels, rent cars, eat in restaurants, deal with many different people supplying the different companies I have interests in, I’m most often disappointed by the lack of excellence and the lack of concern for excellence apparent in most businesses. But thrilled by the occasional examples of real commitment to quality.

Fortunately the British consumer and the business client is, I think, growing gradually more demanding and those firms that invest as much time, effort and money in fostering quality and products and customer service as they do in advertising, are going to see real dividends from their decisions.

In my opinion the way for a hotel chain to become number one is to cut their ad budget and invest in better people and more training for their front desk staffs. A car dealer could prosper by making their service departments better rather than getting a better ad agency. The excellence movement sparked by that book is a good positive, productive encouraging one. I think every business person should read ‘In Search of Excellence,’ ‘Passion for Excellence,’ and other books about quality and think of quality as a marketing strategy.

With my kidz 5 a day business I strive for customer service above and beyond what people expect, it costs a little more to provide but the payoff is twofold:

1. My customers love it and enthusiasticlly recomend us, we love neil asher!

2. We feel better as a result of this, I think this is a very over looked part of giving great service, your team will do better if they feel they are helping and making a difference. It’s an intangible thing but I believe a very important one.

with much warmth

Neil Asher