Change

Do you like change?
If you are like me, you fight it, deny it, and avoid it.
What I’ve realized is that change is often a good thing.
Do you want to change?

What are the basics of change?
Change is constant, consistent, and coming at you faster and faster.
You can either go with it or get run over by it.

You can respond to change in one of three ways.
You can fight it.
You can accommodate it.
Or you can embrace it and actively create change.

I can think of two change motivators.
1. The fear of loss.
2. The promise of gain.

What are some external forces of change?
1. Pain — crisis.
2. Dissatisfaction with the status quo.
3. Good old-fashioned anger. As the saying goes; winners are losers who just got angry!

The beginnings of change.
Can you? Will you?….
Admit and recognize your need for change.
Be resolute, committed, and accountable to make change.
Be methodical, sequential, and incremental about implementing change. New paragraph.

Can you be an agent of change?
Can you take control and ownership?
Can you be creative and take the initiative?
Can you be the change activist, and the author of your life’s purpose and passion?

Change is the priority.
All the elements necessary are available to you: personal honesty, integrity, and motivation to do the work of change in your life.
Do you have the courage to open the doors of change?

Your Passion Plan

How do you identify your life’s purpose?  How can you identify your passion plan?

Setting the stage for life Renaissance…

Part of setting the stage for a midlife Renaissance is to…
1. Identify what motivates you.
2. Be creative, and dare to dream.
3. Go up to altitude and see your big picture and get an overview of your life.

Some of the tools you can use to reconnect with your passion plan include:
1. Writing down your goals on paper. They need to be specific, measurable, aligned, realistic, and timely.
2.  Accountability; you must be accountable in order to be successful.
3.  Inspiration; you need something larger than yourself to motivate you toward your goals.

One way to get started in your passion plan is to take a retreat, a passion retreat if you will.
Take some time away to relax, reflect, and experience renewal.
Write and keep a log and record your discoveries.

Goal setting is a tool anyone can use.
My father introduced me to Tommy Hopkins and his tools to set up written goals.
After 25 years of goal setting, I’ve experienced some of the rewards of utilizing a set of written goals.

The Yale University study of 1953 showed that the 3% of the class that used written goals possessed 95% of the wealth after 30 years.  What does that mean to us?
Just this, that in order to be successful and to achieve your life’s dreams, you must write down your goals and execute your plan.

Some of the groups that I’ve been part of who utilize goals, and the support of community include;
Toastmasters, Mastermind groups, Alcoholics Anonymous, church communities, and others.
These all play a role in some form of positive accountability and may play well in your passion plan.

Why Cable TV Advertising?

The problem when choosing how to advertise your business lies in fact there are so many choices. The media market is very competitive; print, radio, TV, and others offer a variety of solutions to marketing needs. 

How I get the most bang for the buck?
How do I know if my advertising works, or is wasted money?

The art of sales is conveying a feeling—enthusiasm—with persuasion.
It is addressing needs with viable solutions.

TV makes the most sense when it comes to advertising. TV offers sight, sound, and frequency. Television elicits emotion, is exciting, and is effective in delivering low-cost marketing.  TV is cost-efficient.

Cable TV advertising offers many unique qualities to the television advertiser.
Cable’s target ability of specific demographics sets it apart as an extremely unique medium.
You can target affluent homes, women, men, seniors, and much more.
Cable TV offers market penetration, dozens of networks to choose from, and primarily affordability.

The affordability of cable TV advertising can give you a national network commercial in your local market for less than a cup of Starbucks coffee.
Through targeting demographics and psychographics by picking times, networks, and specific shows, one can truly laser target their market at an affordable rate.

Cable television should be a resource in your marketing plan and part of your media toolbox.
Assuming you have a cable representative who is professional, follows up, and offers outrageous service after the sale, you will have cable TV as part of your media mix for a long time to come.

The Ticket

This is the story of how I got my first, and hopefully last speeding ticket.
The problem behind the receiving of the ticket was the problem of ego, entitlement, and pride.
My driving exhibited selfishness, and entitlement of being above the law, and the arrogance of not abiding by state law.

The permanency of radar.  The CHP radar does not negotiate.  It is a final standard in a court of law and establishes guilt.  Quite readily.

To add insult to injury, I was driving over the speed limit with my 16-year-old daughter who’s watching her father and learning from his example.  When the CHP Officer pulled me over.  It was a real-time lesson in the necessity to obey authority and to face the consequences of my actions.

The lessons and takeaways are many but all center on the safety of myself and others, the necessity to obey the law, and being conscious of selfish entitlement on the road.  In my own breaking up the speed limit.

In the end, I am thankful, as I’ve learned obedience and safety.
I think the officer, who did cut me a little slack.
I pay the fines and the traffic school totaling over $265.
I explain to my daughter.  That’s how adults take spankings usually through their wallets.

Currently at hopefully in the future, my awareness level on the road will be heightened and the fear of the law will keep me as a safe driver.

Leaving a Legacy of Leadership

I want to leave a legacy!
I want to leave a heritage to my family and friends church and community at large.

My intent here is to have you think about your personal leadership, through which you leave us a legacy to those behind you, as a chance to identify your purpose, position, passion, and posture.

What shapes you?  Intentions?  Motives?  Opinions?  Thoughts?  Responses?  What shapes your words, attitudes, deeds, reactions, and more?

So what is leadership, do you have it?
How do you get it?
What are you leaving behind now?
What do you want to leave behind?
What will change in order for you to do the above?
How do you get there from here?

To impress or to influence…
would you rather impress someone or truly have an influence in their life?  Impressions are on the surface, therefore, are often superficial.
Influence on the other hand, is often real, honest, and requires far more ability.
Influence necessitates communication with people and the cessation of self absorption.

Your life’s lessons…
Many of our life’s lessons are made up of our experiences, relationships, and mistakes.
Have you been honest with your fears, failures, frustrations, and feelings?

The above all shape your life’s message.
That life’s message consists of a spiritual component, your life’s lessons, your life’s passions, and indeed, your life’s mission.

Every leader has three components that defines he or she.  They are position, purpose, and posture.
Let’s talk about your position…
Are you in a position to be credible, vulnerable, real, and genuine?
Are you believable, touchable, straight up, humane, and do you have integrity?

The second component, every leader must have his purpose.
People are the priority.
Are you able to connect with people are you a relationship builder?
Do you serve and meet needs?
Do you truly love other people.
That love will define your purpose and thereby your leadership legacy.

The third element of leadership is your posture.
Do you live in a posture of being open, teachable, and always learning?  Are you able to lose preconceived notions ideas and attitudes?  You walk in the Spirit and live in the art of possibility in your day-to-day living?

One last element is your passion.
Passions define leadership.
What are you passionate about?  Are you a spokesperson for your passions?  What causes, groups of people, or issues do you champion?

Your mission in life.
Do you want to leave a legacy of love for those around you?
Then have quality relationships with people.  Be an example to follow.  Serve others.

Leaving a legacy of leadership also means the facing and overcoming of adversity.  How you deal with adversity defines you…
Are you bitter, or better?
You will need faith to face your challenges.
Then you can come through, as someone who can truly serve others and help them in their time of need.

In conclusion, we all need to…
Find our voice and use it toward our life’s passion’s, purpose, posture, and position to leave a legacy of leadership.
So find your voice and your gifts, and use your voice and your gifts.
Lastly, help others find their voice and their gifts, so they too may leave a lasting legacy of leadership at a heritage of love.

selling part two

relationship driven sales have more to do with the customer needs, wants, and motivation.
A sales consultant is able to customize and Taylor for specific customer needs.
1. It all starts with the customer needs analysis.
This is a questionnaire designed to really get into the nuts and bolts of a clients needs and desires.  Done in an informal style, the CMA is discovery based in discerns needs, trends, wants, desires and offers solutions and opportunities to it both customer and sales person.
It helps you create tailored solutions for customers needs.

2. Creating solutions from your customer questionnaire.
The survey looks for weaknesses and offers strengths.
It can help you highlight your core competencies.
You can propose concrete plans, ideas, and solutions.
You can propose out-of-the-box, customized, tailored solutions, ideas, and compelling offers to your client.

3. Compelling offers.
Compelling offers are not always dollar-based.
After you gather your data, process, and create a customized proposal.
You’re now ready to propose your ideas to your client and asked for their agreement.
Compelling offers are unique, individualized, tailored to the client, and personalized.
They’re like having a personal shopper at Nordstrom’s.

4. Closing the sale.
Closing the sale becomes natural, and a no pressure, exercise.
It’s easy to ask for the sale because of it flows from an assumed culmination of the aforementioned process.
The sale is assumed.  Therefore the closing is low-key, and a natural end to the exercise.

5.  The benefits of the consultant of sales style.
The style offers everyone a partnership approach.
They tell you their needs, and you present solutions in a relaxed easy nonthreatening style that builds relationships quickly.
The style focuses energy and resources and carries with it reasonable expectations of success.

In conclusion, the old versus new schools of sales have fundamental differences and benefits and the new consultant style should certainly be part of one’s sales lexicon.

Basic Sales 101

will tell you a little bit about my background.  Both old and new school sales concepts.  I have a BA degree, strike that I have a bachelors degree from HS you.  I been in radio sales, newspaper sales, sales management, and now in cable TV sales for over 30 years.

A motivation and sale style is based on relationship building.  Being a people person, I’m energized by interaction with people enjoyment of people, service, and helping others has enabled me to hit goals and be a successful salesperson.

Sales as the backbone of the free market enterprise system.  It is the core of commerce.
It is the quintessential win win win scenario.  Everybody wins; you, your family, the customer, your company, your community, the nation, and the world at large.  If this is done correctly.

What is sales?  What is it we do?  What is it we sell?  And what is a sales job?
The definition of sales is the transference of a feeling.  Persuasion requires empathy with others and listening to customers needs.
Believe in yourself, your product, and the process is vital to being a successful salesperson.
Enthusiasm is defined by being filled with the Spirit.

The fundamentals of selling include appearance.
First impressions really do count!
1. Clothing is important. You must wear decent clothing.
2. How you look is also important in sales.
Your hair, makeup, smell, cleanliness,, countenance, they all make a difference.
3. Your speech is also vital.
Is it pleasant, kind, logical, and gracious.
4. Mannerisms and expressions.
Greeting people correctly is vital.
Distractions, weird mannerisms, and just being plain odd will not work.
The you must know what to do and what not to do.
5. Attitude.
Your nature, the core of who you are will show up in sales.  Are you helpful, surfing, listening, empathetic, and truly caring?
You must be able to ask great questions.  Then really listen.

The selling sequence goes something like this:
it is sequential… it has an opening, body, and close.
The opening has to do with asking questions and general schmoozing.
One would probe for dissatisfactions, and for problems for you to present solutions to.
Qualifying, a prospect has to do with looking for buying signals, and probing for buying objections.
The next step in the sequence would be solving the objections.
Can you solve an objection with your product features, advantages, and benefits?
The close of the sale is vital.
You must always ask for the order and get approval to go forward.

The old school method of selling as much to do with being selfish, money based, steered by the salesperson, and isn’t always effective.
It is telling versus selling.  It is usually company where salesperson driven and doesn’t always have the customer’s best interests in mind.

The consultant of sales model is new school, and we will talk about that later.

Do you set goals?

Do you set goals?
Why or why not.

What I’m going to write about today is what a written goal is, how to set goals, tools to use goals, monitoring and reviewing goals, and how to get started.

Why set goals?… Some of the once said “You are totally responsible for the choices you make.”  95% of us do not use goal setting tools.  The Yale study determined that the 3% that did set goals at 95% of the wealth at the end of a 30 year period.

My introduction to goal setting came through, my dad Bob.
He was a sales executive who bought a Tommy Hopkins tape series in which he shared goal setting.
I began setting goals in college, and the results and outcomes have been fabulous.

So, the excuses for failure we use and not setting goals are; we’re too busy, what if we fail?, it’s too hard, it’s too much work, or… what if I succeed?
Sometimes the fear of success is an impediment to progress….some people are so fearful of failure that they can never make themselves actively set and achieve goals.  What holds them back is the possibility that they may not do exactly as planned.  The sad part of this thinking is that even the smallest progress would be movement forward.  With the status quo in the fear setting goals, there’s never forward movement.  That possibility is forfeit in the absence of goals…

How to set goals…
Good goals must be written down, specific, challenging yet achievable, time specific, and measurable.
They need to be reviewed regularly and revised as needed. One can monitor and review goals on a weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual basis.
I review, renew, and rewrite new goals annually.
I take a day to dream and write down on paper. That which I’m striving for.

In conclusion, you got to want it, picture it, plan it, and go do it.
Remove your limitations, fears, and mental constipation that keeps you from your success.
Try it for one year.

Now that you know what good goal setting practices look like, you are ready to set some compelling goals for yourself.  You now know what goals are, the tools to set them, and what makes a real goal. Don’t forget to monitor review and renew on a regular basis.

Do You Like Your Pain, Are You Ready for Change?

April 2, 2004.
I was standing in my kitchen staring down at the parquet floor; it was a late evening. The sun was setting in the west. I hated my life!
I had lost purpose, passion, meaning, and I’d lost my way.
I’m Scott Hammond, the father of nine.
I’m going to share the process I went through to identify my personal dysfunction, get connected with my life purpose and meaning, and translated those passions to get back on track.
I’ll share the evolution of how I got back on track and how you can, too.

In my journey, I’ve known three types of people…
1. Wally the walking dead… well, he represents the defeated life. He is hopeless, lifeless, listless, and dullness marks his every moment.
Wally is hollow, empty, and lives a routine driven life.
He has given up, given in, and quit life.

2. Wendy the walking wounded… Wendy represents the victim’s life.
Hurt, tragedy, pain, and loss are marks if her life. She is self absorbed, full of self-pity, anger, and frustration. She lives the coping lifestyle; dependent, codependent, and she plays the enabler.

3. Donald the walking wonderful….he lives the empty life of denial. He is the overachiever, type A+, competitor, super dad, super boss, and super guy in general.
He looks good on the outside, but he’s empty on the inside.

The question is this, who do you relate to the most when things are going well and what don’t you like about what you see?

What you find a satisfying in life?
Sometimes we don’t like our pain, dysfunction, and we want to change her priorities. So let me ask you a question…

Pretend with me for a moment you’re up 50,000 feet in a jet airliner and the captain comes on and says, “Ladies and gentlemen. We have a problem… you have 30 seconds to dictate a message to a loved one, your meaning of life and what you find important. It will be saved in our blackbox for posterity. Ready… began now…”
So, who did you write? What did you say? Are you living it? If not, why not?

What do you find satisfying?
What is really important? And what is a waste? Are you now doing what you find satisfying? If not, why not?

We can identify our passion. The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.
What fills you up?
What gives you meaning?
What does it for you?
Is it God, people, creation, coffee?

We become lost, busy, confused.
We live in the fog of war, and we fail to identify what’s truly important to us. We need to go to 50,000 feet and take a look at our lives.
It’s easy to get off track, living life, paying bills, raising a family.

That which fills me up helps me to help and serve others. You cannot pour from an empty jar.

So what is that one thing for you? And how does it feel to not be doing it? What is getting in your way? Why are you not effective in this area? Are you busy, lazy, or procrastinating?

When I realized I didn’t like the pain and my path to dysfunction, and I could change, I did! You can too!
We all can!

We can all identify and partake of that which gives us life.
But we need to be attentive to personal responsibility, positive attitude, accountability, and taking control to live an intentional life.
We need a plan of action, goals, animation in life to live it on purpose.

Once we connect with our passion, priorities, and purpose we will be happier, more joyful, and fulfilled.
You can leave a heritage, and a legacy for those you love.
You can make a difference and live life on purpose!

The power of your spoken words

If the pen is mightier than the sword, and the power of the tongue is mightier than a nuclear weapon.
I want to talk today about the power of spoken words, power for good or evil, controlling your tongue, and being perfect in your speech.
I’ll start with the story of my former boss, Ron, who was the publisher of a small shopper in Eureka, California.
As part of his sales training, he taught us about the appreciation of the power of your spoken words.
He felt the words were very powerful one spoken with conviction, true belief, sincerity, and genuineness.
People will remember the things you spoke in that context. I remember him saying.

Words have the power for good.
Words have the power for blessing, building others up, empathy, healing, compliments, and truly showing love.
Can you think of an example of some really good use of your words?

Words have the power for evil.
Words have the power for discouragement, tearing down, nagging, cutting, anger, and depression.
Can you think of some examples of some really good, evil regarding the use of your words?

Life is a choice. And we need to control our tongues.
You are your words. Self-control and discipline are a key necessity as your mouth expresses the fruit or nature of your heart. Life and death are in the power of the tongue.
This is where true integrity begins and ends.

Toastmasters has become extremely helpful to me. In both composing my thoughts and expressing my words.
It’s offered personal and professional growth, as I’ve learned to speak on the spot and control the delivery and nature of my speech.

So words have power. Power for good or for evil.
Train your tongue and exercise self-controlled discipline. Prepare your speech, think before you speak speaking well is a learned art and can be at least improved upon, but probably never mastered.