Trizle

1. You rid 10 same spam emails daily.
2. It takes two minutes.
3. "it's no big deal!" you tell yourself.

That seemingly trivial task destroys you long-term.

• You lose two minutes daily.
• 1 week? That's a quarter of an hour wasted.
• That means you lose ~12 hours per year (1.5 days of work your boot-tay could've saved helping your clients rock the mother $&@%^ wooooorld).

We get so caught up in finding some magic pill to increase our productivity that we don't do what really matters:

1. Focusing on the little things.
2. Making small improvements to save time.
3. Repeating the two above eternally.

What's sucking up your daily schedule?

The two step process:

1. Identifythe daily fat.
2. Cut the fat.

You start saving ridiculous amounts of time by focusing on the little improvements, that over the long-term gives you BIGTIMESAVEDWIN!!!!!

Time Saved

See samples:

• 2 minutes saved daily? 12 hours/year
• 10 minutes? 60 hours
• 30 minutes? 180 hours (1 month of work)
• 1 hour? 360 hours (2 months)
• Etc. Etc. Etc.

Time Win

Little-by-little with continuous improvement on the little things, you start cutting fats all over the place, saving months/days/years to be even more productive.

Examples:

• Unsubscribe SUCK stuff from inbox.
• Say NO! to browsing websites aimlessly.
• Do meetings through email.
• Avoid rush hour.
• Delegate payroll.
• Exercise (and/or eat better) to help you work SUPERFAST, saving you even more time.
• The yaddas.

Sample goals:

• Today: 'I will save 2 daily minutes.'
• Tomorrow: 'I will save 5 daily minutes.'
• End of the week: 'I will save 10 daily minutes.'

The little things.

Why do 978065785609840954 people brave 20 degree weather for some cheap assssssssssss toy every winter?

• 'There's a limited supply for Toy X.'
• 'Therefore, I want it more.'

The scarcer the item, the more you want the item.

1. Google Wave is scarce. Therefore, you want it more.
2. Kobe Beef is scarce. Therefore, you want it more.
3. Your favorite TV show is scarce. Therefore, you want it more.

You + Good Song

Imagine you listening to some dope-*ss song on the radio.

• "OMG! OMG! OMG! Oh, I LOVE this song!"
• "OMG! The melody gets ME every time!"
• "OMG. OMG. OMG. Heart. Melting. OMG."

You fly into the $^@$^@ sky every time you hear the song on the radio.

Yet, what makes it suck?

When you buy the song/album, your listening happiness-goodness subsides:

• "Ahh. I can listen to it later."

You're not as thrilled. You're not as happy.

What happened?

• The song on the radio = scarce supply. ("I can listen to it for the next 3 minutes!")
• The song on your album = abundant supply. ("I can listen to it anytime.")

Make Business Scarce

Increase the value customers have for your products/services/business:

• Limit supplies.
• Make deadlines.
• Create waiting lists.

For instance, take your shop:

1. Slap sign: 'The current waiting list for our services is 1 week.'
2. BAM: You instantly increase your customers' perceived value in your services.
3. Win.

Make things scarce.

1. Get a friend. (or Twitter, etc.)
2. "I will finish X by Wednesday."
3. Tell another friend.

The more friends you tell, the likelier you beat X into submission by _______ day.

The Commitment Psychological Trick

According to the world's greatest psychologist (Robert Cialdini):

1. You're much likelier to make good on a goal if you declare it publicly
2. Consistency keeps our reputation intact (i.e., we like to feel 'always' right)

For instance:

1. Bob declares himself as a Democrat (or Republican). 
2. He's likelier to believe along party lines, regardless of his knowledge about X, if you question him.

We keep a consistent image about ourselves to maintain our 'always right' image.

Declaring your goals publicly, then, drives you to obliterate your goals to maintain your image.

Optimize Your Team

Have your teammates commit to something:

• Schmo: "I will try to finish this by Friday!"
• You: "OH NO NO NO. There's no TRY around here. What will you do?"
• Schmo: "I will finish this by Friday! Yay!"

BAM:

1. The public declaration drives Schmo to finish stuff by Friday.
2. You drastically increase your chances of getting Schmo's completed work.
3. Your business = UP.

Gradually have you and your team declare bigger and better goals.

You'll start finishing more stuff, and produce more for your customers.

Publicize goals.

1. X does something that annoys the !@^%$^*&%^$@^%^ out of you.
2. You play Mr./Mrs. Nice.
3. You mention nothing.

According to Stockholm University's Constanze Leineweber study, men are two to five times as likely to die from heart attacks/disease by stifling their emotions:

• "Men who consistently failed to express their resentment over conflicts with a fellow worker or supervisor were more than twice as likely to have a heart attack or die of heart disease as those who vented their anger."

(The study said woman cope better than men, so the Leineweber's team couldn't conclude anything.)

BAM:

1. Vent frustrations.
2. Live better.

Express yo-self.

1. Lure customers in with freakish deals (a.k.a. doorbusters/loss-leaders).
2. Expose them to more profitable/better offerings that rival their target buys.
3. Strengthen business with more profits.

For instance:

1. "Item X for $50!"
2. Customer sees Item Y, which is better/nicer/more-profitable.
3. Customer chooses Item Y instead.

The ideal result is the company sells more profitable items than the unprofitable ones.

What Smarter Companies Do First

Speculating that the above will happen = gambling (results in a net profit growth of zero if done over the long-term).

BOO.

The financially-smarter companies would do this instead:

1. First, test an intended campaign with a sample group -- e.g., 1000 prospects -- with (a) the freakish-unprofitable deal, and (b) a profitable deal.
2. See what buys result from the test.
3. If the test results in ideal profits, promote and run with the campaign on Black Friday (or some other large scale campaign).

That is:

• 'We're okay with losing $ on Item A.'
• 'The marketing of Item A however will bring in more customers, which allows us to expose more prospects to the better/stronger/more-profitable rival, Item B'

And If All Else Fails

The shady trick:

1. Stock a super limited supply of Item X.
2. Promote the %$^@ out of it to attract large numbers.
3. When the first 0.01% buys Item X, the store will expose the other 99.99% to the profitable Item Y instead.

(More numbers. More pitches. More sales.)

The Cumulative Results.

"We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures."

- Thornton Wilder

1. You go to bed.
2. You can't sleep until X hours later.
3. You wake up with 5 hours of sleep.

You're tired/groggy/unproductive for the rest of the day.

You continue with the process for X weeks/months/years.

Why Do You Suck at Sleeping?

Take Bob.

1. Bob chill-axes during the day.
2. He doesn't push himself.
3. He doesn't sweat/work-out/push-himself.

He spends his day relaxing/resting/chill-axing (because dude says he's tooooooooooo tired "cuz I couldn't sleep last night!") -- so at night, he can't sleep because he's already too rested.

Read that moforo%$^^^%$^ again:

• He's too rested.
• He's too rested.
• He's too rested.

When you're too rested, you convert your resting time for sleep to your waking life.

As a result:

• Bob's never fully rested.
• Bob doesn't fully energize himself to completely annihilate his tasks.

Instead, groggy Bob starts perpetuating the cycle of S.U.C.K.:

1. too-rested-so-can't-sleep
2. tired-during-the-day-so-can't-DO
3. too-rested-so-can't-sleep
4. tired-during-the-day-so-can't-DO
5. etc., etc., etc., etc.

The cycle of monster destruction makes Bob tired all-the-^^@^^@-time.

How Do You Sleep Better?

During your waking days:

• Push yourself.
• Strain yourself.
• Exhaust yourself.

For instance:

• Getting in a full day of work productively completing ridiculous tasks will tire your waking days; therefore, you channel your rest to sleep like a freak.
• Strenuously running X miles exhausts your energies during the day, letting you sleep GOOD.

Flash Back

...to the last time you took an outdoor vacation:

• "I slept so well last night because I was tired from too much skiing!"
• "I slept so well last night because yesterday's hike exhasted me!"

Or, the time you worked productively GOOD:

• "I slept so well last night because of the yesterday's 9876987956875969 presentations we did!"

Work Yourself

Forcing yourself to work/tire/exhaust during the day?

1. Get more things done
2. Sleep better.
3. Rest better.
4. Increase energy.
5. Repeat energized cycle.

You start pushing yourself out of the too-rested-phase, and hop on the cycle of productive goodness.

Work.

Which types of sellers make you buy?

• Choice A: the confident one
• Choice B: the expert one

"I'd buy from the expert! OH YEAH I WOULD!" you might scream.

But, a study by a Carnegie Mellon University researcher shows you'll probably do the opposite:

1. Confident people influence prospects more than experts do.
2. Therefore, people buy more from confident people.

What does that mean?

1. You're probably buying things because Person X's confidence tricks you.
2. Therefore, you're draining cash on the wrong investments.

For example:

Take Business Owner Teddy

Business Owner Teddy needs to hire a team member.

• Slick Willy comes in for an interview.
• He's cool; he's confident; he's charismatic.
• His answers are superficially weeeeeeeak; but, Slick Willy's confidence masks his true skills.

Teddy -- swayed by his confidence -- hires Willy over timid Billy (who he saw as one socially awkward mofro).

Billy?

That socially awkward Billy, however, might just:

• suck at interviews
• focused his skills on doing -- not talking (having better skills as a result)

Teddy, blinded by perception, hires Slick Willy -- who:

1. can't get stuff done
2. always asks 'for another week'
3. and somehow, keeps talking his way out of things

Cash drainage.

Growth drainage.

Business Owner Billy experiences The Suck.

BOOOO. DON'T SUCK

When you have a sales pitch:

• Do not let confidence fool you.
• Do not let timidity fool you.

Here's one tip:

1. Avoid in-person/over-the-phone sales pitches as-much-as-%^@^$^^^^-possible.
2. Instead, let peeps do their pitches over email/paper.

That leaves you with a more objective outlook among your pitches.

(And if you hafta, schedule the in-person stuff in the final rounds.)

Therefore, you make a wiser choice on choosing the better/best investments to rock your company.

• Save money: check.
• Invest wiser: check.
• Get better vendors/suppliers/employees/etc.: check.

No slick.

Wall Street analysts measure companies relative to the market.

• If companies perform better than the market = WIN.
• If companies perform lousier than the market = FAIL.

CEOs, hedge fund managers, mutual funds live and die by how their performances compare to the market's (which the S&P 500 typically tracks).

WHAT THE ^^@!%^^@ DOES THAT MEAN?

Take bananas:

• You grew 10 bananas last year.

Did you do well?

Compare the 10 bananas that you grew last year to what the market (e.g., your compeititors) could do:

• If the market could only only grow 5 bananas = YOU SEX-TACULAR.
• If the market could grow 50 bananas = YOU SUCK FAIL SUCK QUIT NOW.

Why do economies keep growing?

Economies keep growing because we grow our capacities to grow more-and-more-and-more bananas each and every year.

For example, based on every $1 invested:

• Year 1: We can grow 1 banana!
• Year 2: We can grow 2 bananas!
• Year 3: We can grow 5 bananas!
• Year 4: We can grow 11 bananas!
• Year 5: We can grow 20 bananas!
• etc.

Improving technology, greater knowledge, and the increasing efficiency to grow those bananas, lead to peeps growing their capacities to produce more-and-more-and-more bananas.

For instance:

• "Cletus! Come here! This web thing will let our customers order instantaneously instead of calling our shops!"
• "CLETUS! Come here! We can keep use email newsletters to send customer notices in batches instead of calling each customer one-by-one-by-one!"
• "CLETUS JERMAINE! Come here! We can reduce our inventory levels by practicing what Toyota calls the kanban philosophy!"

Adapt Endlessly

A constantly growing economy means (unfortunately for you, but fortunately for the greater world):

1. You better increase how efficient you produce your wares.
2. ...because the rest of the economy is working faster-and-faster-and-faster every year to produce more-and-more-and-more for customers.
3. ...and if you stay idle, others will undercut your profit margins -- eventually rendering you obsolete.

For example, take Company X.

1930s America. Company X seeks no improvement to work faster:

• 1930: Company X produces 1 banana for every $1 invested (the rest of the world produces 0.3 bananas for every $1 invested).
• 1933: Company X produces 1 banana for every $1 invested (the rest of the world produces 1 banana for every $1 invested). UH OH
• 1936: Company X produces 1 banana for every $1 invested (the rest of the world produces 3 bananas for every $1 invested). OH NOES
• 1939: Company X produces 1 banana for every $1 invested (the rest of the world produces 10 bananas for every $1 invested). OH NOES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111111111111one

Company X dies a horrible tragedy as they fail to find more efficient ways to produce their products for their customers; meanwhile, the rest of the market does, and gives their customers more bananas for their $.

[Sidenote: The best way to be (a) unemployed in X years and/or (b) take a huge hit to your salary/earnings? Keep your skills stagnant; the rest of the market -- exploiting the advances of a more efficient economy -- will surpass you.]

So, how do you stay in business + rock?

Simply this:

1. Seek ways to perform better/smarter/faster than the rest of the world.
2. Repeat ^1 until the end of time.

That is, keep seeking ways to grow more bananas for every $1 invested than what the world can do with that dollar.

Be more efficient than the market (i.e., work faster, produce more, use less) = WIN.

More output.

Talk about politics or religion.

1. You think A.
2. Bob thinks B.

You think Bob's wrong.

Bob thinks you're wrong.

You lose Bob as a customer; Bob loses your great services.

Stay inclusive to build a long-term company.

Welcome everybody.