If you would ask me what is one thing to master… it would be what I'm about to cover in this post. When you get really good at these 3 things you will see success faster and easier.

That doesn't mean you won't have to get good at other things.

However it does mean these are absolutely essential… and your lack of not having them is a BIG factor for not getting the results you really want right now.

This is a follow-up to the wildly successful blog post called, "How To Build A Successful Internet Business In 100 Hours."

If you have not read that, you will want to take a few minutes right now to do so (or re-read it to refresh your memory.)

This post will give you 3 CRUCIAL strategies to ensure the "100 Hour Rule" actually works for you.

Everybody I have taught this to, who started using these 3 strategies, instantly (yes, instantly) started seeing MASSIVE jumps in their productivity and progress they were making (meaning getting the important stuff done and making money).

I consider this a CORE foundational must have if you want to be successful online.

And yes, I'm putting a lot of emphasis on this because I KNOW how vitally important it is… but it lacks the "sizzle"… that's the rub, the stuff that REALLY brings you success is NOT the sizzle, its the fundamentals.

Here are the 3 Crucial Strategies…

1. Break Big Tasks Into Small Bite-Size Steps (Munchies/Action Plan)
2. Create a Weekly Plan To Do Those Bite Size Steps (Weekly Plan)
3. Create Large Blocks Of Time To Big Chunks Of Tasks And Create Momentum (Mini-Blasts)

If you make these 3 activities a HABIT, your online business will never be the same.

You will experience less frustration, less overwhelm, accomplish more in less time, and start seeing results quicker and quicker. You will, faster than ever before, reach the Full Time Online level.

Munchies/Action Plan

Let's say you have the task to set up your first squeeze page you will use to build your email list. You sit down at your computer, look at that task on your to-do list, and immediately you start feeling overwhelmed, that twinge of anxiety builds up in your chest, and you eventually find something else to do — read email, browse online, clean the bathroom toilet — anything to avoid this task!

And it keeps getting carried forward and carried forward on your to-do list, never getting done. Days turn into weeks, turn into months.

The problem is, the task is WAY too big and complicated to take action on it. You are staring at an elephant and trying to figure out how to eat it all in one bite.

The solution.

Take that big task and "munchy" it down into the small bite-size steps to complete it.

First you break it down into the big steps, then break the big steps into the small steps.

Some big steps:

* Create the opt-in offer
* Choose an email hosting solution
* Create your opt-in page and confirmation page
* Add the opt-in form
* Test the process

Then you take the big step, "create the opt-in offer" and break that down into the small steps.

So first you will need to figure out what your optin offer will be, then create an outline for the offer, then create the actual thing you will be giving away for free (your offer), edit it if it is digital content, create the download page for it, upload the page and the content to be downloaded to your site. DONE with that step.

By doing this you are creating to-do items you CAN take action on and accomplish quickly.

You can open up a spreadsheet (or word document, or just write it out on paper) and start typing the Big Steps.

Then for each Big Step, type the little steps.

Now you have your complete Action Plan to accomplish this next project in your business. (Also it gives you a lot of small little steps you can cross off when you complete them… doesn't it feel great crossing off to-do items!)

Weekly Plan

Last year, when I did my end of the year review, I realized if I did this one 15 minute activity each week — that was a HIGHLY productive week. And if I did NOT do this one 15 minute activity — that was a very NON-productive week.

Wouldn't it make since to spend 15 minutes once a week (I do it either Sunday night or first thing Monday morning) doing this activity and virtually guarantee it will be a productive week?

Here is a quick 12 minute training video on Taking Action With The Weekly Plan, as well as the exact templates I use every week, walking you through the process. (This is normally only provided to all of our new customers, but its so important want to give it to you right now too.)

As you will notice in the video, the list of small little to-do's you created above now fit perfectly into your weekly plan.

Again, make this a weekly habit and your results will shoot through the roof.

Mini-Blasts

OK, this one has been the biggest breakthrough for me. And is the last piece of the "Being Super-Productive 101" puzzle. It is also a critical one if you are doing this part-time right now.

Its covered in detail in the 1st chapter of the Nitro Blueprint System manual. And we also cover it at our Everyday Entrepreneur Getting Started Online seminars.

Here's the quick summary.

There are 3 ways to approach your business.

1. The Slow And Steady
2. The Massive Action
3. And the Mini-Blast

Slow and steady is what most people do… and it dooms you to failure.

The reason why is because you are making small incremental progress over a long period of time. That means you are not creating any momentum in your business… everything just seems to drag on and take forever. And distractions and obstacles are popping up constantly and zapping you of your time and energy.

And you are not seeing or recognizing the progress you are really making. So instead of being encouraged and excited about your wins and progress, you are discouraged and view your so called lack of progress as a negative. It now becomes negative de-motivation.

Eventually you either give up or move onto the next shiny object to repeat the pattern over again.

Obviously not a good scenario, but one that is probably all too familiar with yourself.

Massive Action is awesome, however maybe 1% to at most 5% of the population is really hard-wired for the Massive Action approach.

That is where you "lock yourself" up for however long it takes, 2 weeks, a month, 90 days and focus almost exclusively on your business.

I had a friend who was hard wired like this. When he decided he was going to do this online business thing, he made the "3 People Negotiations" with his family, friends and himself and took massive action.

It took him 90 days to create a product, learn all the tech stuff to get a site up and order processing in place, create a sales letter and launch his business. The result, he made over $100,000 his first 4 months.

Only problem, I couldn't do that and most people can't do that either. We would burn ourselves out and go crazy after a week or two! Again doomed to failure.

That brings us to the good ole' Mini Blast.

That takes the best of both of the previous approaches without the negatives. And gives you a solution that works for the rest of us.

The Mini-Blast is where you set aside a block of time and ONLY work on your most important, result producing activities in your business. And you remove all distractions — no email, no phone calls, no TV, no crying kids, just you and your computer.

This may be 3 hours one night after work, or 1 whole day over the weekend, or 8 hours over an entire afternoon and evening, or you take off a day of work and spend 3 straight days.

Whatever it is, the keys are:
1) an extended period of consecutive time
2) ONLY focused on your most important, result producing activities (or solving your biggest challenges, such as tech issues)
3) with no distractions, you are only focused on your online business and your Action Plan

You will end up accomplishing more in that mini-blast than days or even weeks via the slow and steady approach.

You will also have created a lot of momentum in your business.

And you will have seen a lot of progress which gives you a lot of inner motivation and is very energizing.

Then, in between your mini-blasts you go back to the slow and steady approach to keep moving forward, making progress and ride the momentum you created until your next mini-blast.

On the graph, the red line is your slow and steady only line, the green line is your mini-blast approach line. You get a big jump with the mini blast, then keep moving forward with slow and steady, then another big jump.

There are some other important factors, like making the "3 Time Negotiations," that we will cover in future blog posts. So be sure to subscribe to the blog update email list and RSS feed so you see them when they come out.

Next week (on Tuesday April 28th) I will be doing a completely free and in-depth webcast training focused entirely on something we have been doing here at Nitro. I have seen the writing on the wall that an area of online business we ALL rely on is about to experience a radical (and costly change).

And we have been proactively making important changes in our business so we are not member's of the online road kill (but instead profit immensely over the coming months and years)… and I want to let you in on it too.

Keep an eye out for emails over the next few days on how to register for this webcast.

In the meantime, please post your questions and comments below about the topic of these 3 Taking Action Strategies so I can incorporate them into future blog posts and trainings.

-Kevin

P.S. Follow me on Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/kevinnitro to get quick updates, insights and tips on business and life.

No Tags

Everybody has a story of their first "big break" that pulled them into success online.

Maybe you're still looking for your first big break online too.

I'll share with you my story to help you get to your big breakthrough this year.

It was 1998.

I had a niche site and an email newsletter with 1,500 people.

I was making anywhere from $500 to $1,000 a month promoting affiliate products.

And the one that worked best for me, I would keep emailing the owner of the site with suggestions. My thought, if he did the things I told him, the site would convert more sales and I would make more commissions.

He would always reply back, "Kevin, these are awesome ideas, but you don't understand… I'm so busy with my other business I don't have time to spend on this site anymore."

After several months of this, he replied back, Kevin, what if you implement these for me and we split the profits?"

Too busy failing to actually succeed!

What was my first thought?

I was too busy with all the things I was working on (that weren't making me any money) to actually jump at an opportunity that would make me more than I ever had online.

Hopefully you don't make that mistake like I almost did!

Fortunately I got over that stupid thinking and got on the phone with Joshua.

He started telling me about his other company, that was doing 8 figures a year and growing quickly.

How he would create a marketing campaign and within the first 24 hours have thousands of new customers.

Selling things like cell phones, software, online games, niche ebooks, lead generation and more.

And how he was about ready to shut the site I was an affiliate for down because he didn't have time to mess with it because it was only doing $3,000 a month.

But he would give me a chance.

He was going to let me implement my ideas and we would split the revenue.

Fortunately I said yes because my life instantly started to change.

Within months I increased the sales at the site by 500% and for the first time, really saw the power of the Internet. And I was constantly soaking in all the knowledge Joshua would throw my way.

And to this day, he has been a great mentor and now also a close trusted friend. Just last year he invited me to his house to celebrate his birthday, his wife's birthday and their anniversary (they all happen at the same.)

To sum it up…

The guy is a genius when it comes to online business. He sees trends and GETS online marketing at a level I've rarely seen before.

A Big Break For You.

Virtually the entire time I've known Joshua, he was always the guy behind the HUGE online successes. He would be the one that REALLY made things happen but you would never know about.

And he rarely shared his knowledge outside of his close friends like myself.

Fortunately, at the strong encouragement from all the people he has privately helped (myself included) he is deciding to share his wisdom with you.

http://www.NitroMarketing.com/yourbigbreak

I can't recommend enough taking advantage of this opportunity to learn from one of the true masters of getting real results online.

He gave me my first big break online. And now he can give you your first big break online as well.

-Kevin

No Tags

Who: Jennifer McLean Website: www.healingwiththemasters.com www.healingrelease.com

"From Pinching Pennies to Fill the Gas Tank to Pulling In Six Figures a Month (all in a year and a half)"

After twenty-three years in marketing, she was toast.

Burned out.

Jennifer McLean was tired of working so much — to make other people millions of dollars. So she did what any reasonable marketing professional would do: she quit her comfortable 6-figure salary… to go sell insurance.

Two weeks later she realized there was no way on earth that was going to work for her.

With bills to pay and an area of expertise to tap, she decided to go into freelance marketing. It was like trudging uphill with a 500-pound weight on her back. She was still so burned out that putting her energy into this new venture was just about impossible — and it floundered.

Enter Dr. Joe Vitale. (Well, on CD at least.)

Jennifer listened to some of Joe's CD's and her mind started sparking with ideas, and what began as a very humbling chain of misfires started changing into a way to live her passion. She began building an online business as an affiliate marketer, promoting someone else's product.

Screech. Crash. Major déjà vu.

She was STILL essentially in the role of doing marketing for a client. It felt the same, and once again, she had no passion for what she was doing. Her real passion, being an energetic healer, was still not quite within reach. She knew she was onto something — but this wasn't quite it.

Then she connected with Ellen Britt, who was beginning a coaching program around a teleseminar marketing model based on the Nitro Blueprint System. Jennifer said, "Sign me up."

Before long, she realized she could apply internet marketing tactics to her passion, and create a business where "Every dime in my bank account is a direct result of being of service to someone else."

The coaching program wasn't even finished before Jennifer had taken action. She was blogging, working on her mindset, connecting with potential JV partners, and creating content she could multipurpose into different formats.

Ho'oponopono.

Jennifer's first product came out of doing an eight-week presentation on an energetic healing process called Ho'oponopono, which she recorded and formatted into an eight CD set. Working with her own product and some solid JV projects, she began building an email list, and went to work on what turned out to be the turning point in her business — a teleseminar called Healing with the Masters, which brought her shoulder to shoulder with the leaders in the human potential
movement.

"They might say no."

She realized they might say no going into each phone call with these giants in her field, but knew she only needed to find twelve who would agree to be interviewed by her for her teleseminar series. Of course, Jennifer had an ace up her sleeve as she asked, and it came in the form of a 50% commission on upgrading the free participants to purchasing the series, the participants are offered this as a one-time offer after they register for the free teleseminar.

It worked so well that her list swelled to 7,000 subscribers. The second teleseminar series brought in nearly 12,000 more subscribers. Within one year, her list had more than 33,000 subscribers. Just by being herself, she created enormous loyalty in her audience — and her speakers. Rather than feeling threatened, or like a competitor to her guests, she was a gracious host, delighting in cutting their substantial affiliate checks.

It was time for another book.

Jennifer notes that, "All books are marketing vehicles. They elevate your credibility and exponentially boost your status… and a best-selling book is even more powerful."

The "Big Book of You" sold out quickly, and Jennifer's audience appreciate her
as much as any of the big name speakers in the series.

Jennifer's Timeline:

2006 - started learning about online marketing, applying what she learned… but failed.

October 07 - bought Joe Vitale CD's and started getting ideas and making $100 a month on a good month.

January 08 - Started coaching with Ellen Britt. Discovered the teleseminar model.

February 08 - Started building her teleseminar series.

April 08 - Held her first Healing with the Masters teleseminar, making $10,000 - $20,000 a month.

Summer 08 - Held another teleseminar Vibrational Healing and a 5 week program on the nature of healing.

Fall 08 - Held her third Healing with the Masters teleseminar, making $30,000 a month.

November 08 - Sold out the initial run on her "Big Book of You" and created Big Book of You Teleseminar.

Feb 09 - Held an offline workshop generated from her list Healing Life, Healing Business.

March 09 - Held her fourth Healing with the Masters teleseminar, passing the six figures a month level!

(Each of these teleseminars have also become products she continues to sell.)

Jennifer's advice to you as you're getting started:

• Pay your affiliates well. They are your advertising arm, and the easier and more motivating you make it for them to promote you, the better they'll do. You only pay them if they get results, and they'll get better results if the reward is high.
• You're likely to feel afraid - but moving through and past the fear is rewarding. Don't get freaked out when you don't make money right away. Some strategies take time, and the individual pieces may not seem to be profitable - but it's important not to get ahead of yourself or to quit when they don't seem to pay off immediately.
• Be friends with the influencers. If you can be yourself, and come from a place of contribution, befriending other people in your industry (rather than feeling threatened by them), you never know what could come from those connections. Jennifer ended up writing a chapter of Dr. Joe Vitale's book "The Key" largely because of her at-your-service attitude as she befriended him.
• Don't try to make your dream pay your mortgage right away. The world of internet marketing tends to be filled with a lot of hype. The promise of making $30k a month with no effort is enough to lure otherwise sensible entrepreneurs into a very stressful, expectation-filled pressure-cooker.

  There are smart ways to make the transition from employee to internet entrepreneur - but you want to do it in your own time and following your own passion.

• Don't expect this to be a life of leisure - but know that making millions for yourself instead of for your boss feels great. While Jennifer's working about as much as she did when she was in corporate America (nearly 70 hours a week some weeks), it's a night and day difference doing it for a business of her own. She can work from anywhere in the world, and is constantly grateful for the opportunity to help others.

What's ahead?

"The sky's the limit," she says.

Jennifer's hired some staff to help handle different parts of the business that are not her passion. She's planning a membership site launching in May, a publishing arm of her business, and more affiliate and JV programs featuring products she believes will help transform people's lives. Down the road, a European expansion may even be in the works.

==========

What would it mean to you, to have your own successful full-time online business THIS year?

Yes, to have a business that keeps growing every month, allowing you to work from home, doing what you love? (Just like Jennifer.)

There are 3 final spots open in our May "Go Full Time Online" workshop. During these 4 days you will work, hands-on with our team, to create your full-time online business before you leave. I personally guarantee it will create a DRAMATIC leap forward in your business.

If you want to have a full-time online business THIS YEAR, the best decision you can make is coming to Go Full Time Online.

Be one of thefinal 3 people (before they are gone forever) when you register today and decide you ARE going full-time online this year.

No Tags

What goal or dream do you have that you keep carrying forward, year after year?

And each year it becomes even more intimidating and insurmountable!

I had one for 10 LONG years, a goal that was REALLY important to me, but I conjured up grand illusions of why it was not possible.

Can you relate !?

This January, as I set my 2009 year plan, I decided to do something different.

The result…

I achieved that goal with one 15 minute phone call!!

And it ended up even better than I imagined.

After that call, I was overwhelmed with an immense amount of gratitude, fulfillment, and a core shattering realization of "success with ease".

Here's the story… and a VERY powerful "lessons learned" you can use right now today for your own goals. I call it the 3-Step "Success With Ease"
Formula.

It was 1991… the last week of my freshman year in high school.

We were sitting in the tiny high Webster City High School auditorium as they announced the seniors who won college scholarships.

Then they came to the "big poppa" scholarship, the AJ Julian. It was for $4,000. A small fortune to a kid going to college.

As they announced the winner and he walked up on stage, my friend since the 1st grade sitting next to me, Tony Neuroth, elbowed me and said, "Kevin, in 4 years that will be you."

If you knew me back then, you would know how crazy that sounded! I was a quiet, incredibly shy, awkward kid. Not the type that won awards.

However in that moment that I call an "Everyday Influencer" moment, Tony gave me a belief of "what if it was possible???"

If you know my story (you can hear it at the beginning of our most recent "Go Full Time Online" webcast), my family did not have the money to pay for college. And I knew the only way I would make it to college was earn my way through scholarships like the AJ Julian and financial aid.

And throughout high school I worked hard to receive straight A's with my eye on making it to college.

However as my senior year progressed, it became apparent I would need to spend my first 2 years going to the local community college because we just couldn't afford the college I really wanted to attend, Buena Vista University.

Then magic happened.

At the awards ceremony, they not only called my name for the "big poppa" AJ Julian, but also a half dozen other scholarships. I ended up earning over $8,000 in scholarships in 2 short hours.

Those scholarships, along with my financial aid package from Buena Vista, made it possible for me to go straight to my #1 college my first year.

Which also meant I was able to take part in a brand new freshman honors program the college started and I was accepted into for high achieving students. That included having the Dean of School of Business as my personal advisor, as well as spending 1 month out of the semester traveling for school.

I spent my freshman year in Florida, including the opportunity to learn from executives at John Templeton Investments, not to mention spending a weekend of leisure at the Florida Keys were we all caught giant Barracudas (mine is now hanging above the bar in my house!)

Then a month traveling Europe, meeting the people behind the upcoming launch of the European Union (this was in 1997). And doing a January internship in California (a dream come true when it was 10 degrees below zero back on campus!) and an internship in Dallas, TX with the local Development Office for Subway (I even got to meet Jarrod!) which is how I ended up in Dallas.

That's when the 10 year goal started.

When I graduated in 1999, I knew 2 things.

1) I was going to do whatever it took to be a successful entrepreneur, both financially and also in the contribution I gave back in this world.

2) I wanted to give back to my high school, and future kids just like me, by starting up a scholarship fund. (And of course it was going to be bigger than any of the current scholarships!)

And that goal sat on my goal list and was always posted up on my vision board, year after year after year.

In my mind, I thought it would take a 6-figure endowment, a big fancy trust, an overwhelming amount of paperwork, a crushing amount of hassle, did I mention the thought of a quarter million dollar endowment, and quite possibly I would have to also walk over broken glass while being punched in the nose by Mike Tyson to make it happen.

Do we make the journey so difficult we never set off on the journey? … Or do we make the journey so difficult we are an even greater hero in reaching the destination?

The SHIFT

This January, as I was sitting at my vacation lakehouse, reviewing the past year and setting my goals and plans for the new year. I realized something that REALLY bothered me.

This goal, of setting up a scholarship fund at my high school, had been on my goal/dream list for 10 freakin years. It had slipped into the realm of a "wish" rather than a "goal".

And I shifted my mindset…

First I realized after 10 years I had NEVER even taken the first step to make it happen.

A goal without action really is just an empty wish.

Second, I realized I had taken this goal and devised in my mind an extremely complicated plan to achieve it rather than looking for the simple solution.

Simple = Boring But Doable, while…

Complicated = Fascinating But Impossible

I first wrote down the first step to make it happen… call the high school and talk to somebody to find out the process to set up a new scholarship. I could do that!

LESSON #1: If you have a goal, or a project you want to complete, but find yourself stuck or not moving forward. Write down next to the goal the first step for you to take.

I've been using that one technique the past 3 months with AMAZING results, especially when I find myself stuck.

Then, I asked myself what's the simplest way to achieve this goal.

The answer — I don't have to set up a quarter million dollar endowment. I can instead just write a check for that year's scholarship and accomplish the same goal. And I could write that check that same day, there was no reason for it not to happen.

LESSON #2: Start using the "Success With Ease" approach. For every goal or dream you have. There are 2 routes you can take. The long, hard, complicated, almost impossible route. And the short, simple, easy and virtually guaranteed route.

From now on, borrow this saying we use here at Nitro "simple instead of complicated". Find the simple route instead of creating the fascinating complicated route. (You can always make it more complicated later.)

Next, I set a deadline and wrote it on my 2009 personal goal list. "Call the high school and start the process to set up a scholarship."

Then, as my friend Yanik Silver taught me, to make a goal come true make a public commitment so others hold you accountable. (Otherwise known as public peer pressure!)

At my January Vistage meeting, as we were reviewing our business and personal goals, I told them I would talk with the high school and find out the process before the end of the first quarter of the year.

So, obviously, on March 30th, one day before the end of the first quarter, I HAD to get into action! I got online, looked up the phone number and made the call.

LESSON #3: Assign a date to complete that first step… and then make a public commitment to employ the POWERFUL form of accountability - peer pressure!

The Rest Of The Story

I made that call on Monday, March 30th.

And in 15 minutes Kathy and Joyce quickly and ruthlessly CRUSHED my dreams of a long, hard, complicated, virtually impossible route to achieve my goal.

Instead, here's all I need to do.

Write a check, mail it to the school in April, and one deserving high school student will receive help going to college this year.

And what about that virtually impossible endowment?

All I have to do is write a check and the school, along with a scholarship committee of local bankers, handles the rest.

That's Success With Ease!

When I hung up the phone, I was overwhelmed with emotion.

In the big picture, I've given back much greater amounts of money to people and causes over the years. From giving my car to a single mother who did not have one, to large sums of money to the charities and causes that are important to me.

However the check I wrote this week was the most fulfilling giving I've done to date.

First, immense gratitude for all I have achieved in my life and the ability to give back and help others.

Second, and even bigger, the fulfillment of achieving a goal that I've had for 10 LONG years… a goal, just a couple months ago, that I probably didn't even really
believe would ever come true.

Third, and this is probably what's causing me to get teared up as I type this, the realization - through experiencing it first hand - of creating Success With Ease. And what that will mean for me over the coming months and years as I create greater and greater success, with ease, in all areas of my life and for others.

Your "homework" for today!

Apply these lessons to YOUR life, right now, while you are still thinking about it.

And share them by posting a comment below.

1) What is one goal or dream, that's been staring at you for TOO long?
And what is the first and *easy* step you can take action and it moves you forward?

2) What's the easier/simpler solution instead of the complicated solution that's been holding you back?

Just asking that question may reveal the easy/simple solution. Or you may need to give yourself time to let it come to you. Or you may need to ask other's for advice.

Whatever you do, trust that there IS an easier solution… and most likely just taking that first step will help you realize what the simple solution is.

3) Set a timeframe to take action and complete that first step (or more) and make a public commitment to others who will hold you accountable.

Posting it publicly as a comment below is the first way you can do that. I also encourage you to tell people you know as well.

Bonus 4th Question!!

I want to pass some of the wisdom I've gained over the years to the winner of the Wilke Family Scholarship For Empowered Youths.

What advice do you wish you heard as a High School graduate?

I'll be sure to make a future blog post that shares the letter I write for this future world changer.

To YOUR Success With Ease!
-Kevin

P.S. Did you notice I used the "Success With Ease" process in this very blog post?

I told you, and the 10's of thousands of people who are reading this blog post, within 60 days I'll be starting the "Everyday Influencer" movement. (public commitment)

My first step… posting online the simple 3-step process of instantly being an Everyday Influencer and inviting you to experience that immense personal satisfaction and fulfillment it will bring you.

No Tags