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WEALTH
"Brother,
Can You Spare a Million?"
According
to Robert Frank, writing in The Wall Street Journal:
"Adding
to the nation's personal-debt load, wealthy people have been
borrowing increasingly against their homes, stocks, and businesses
for [lifestyle luxuries] and investments. The richest 1% of
American households - or those with more than $5.9 million in
net worth - had $346 billion in debt in 2001, up $50 billion
from 1998, according to the most recent data compiled by Arthur
Kennickell, a senior economist with the Federal Reserve.
"While
many of the ultra-rich use debt to amplify investment strategies
or for other financial planning, high-end loans carry risks.
With interest rates rising and markets becoming more risky,
many say the wealthy could be caught in a short-term cash crunch."
Not
your problem, right? Well, make sure debt doesn't become a problem
for you once you've reached multimillionaire status yourself.
Just because you made it doesn't mean you can't lose it if you
make stupid money-management decisions. Rule No. 1: Spend less
than you earn. Always.
HEALTH
Why "Accelerate" Your Exercise Routine?
Yesterday,
I wrote about Dr. Sears' PACE program, which stands for Progressively
Accelerating Cardiovascular Exertion). And it occurred to me
that you might want to know more about what he means when he
uses the term "accelerating."
When
your body is out of condition, it can take several minutes to
get your breathing and heart rate up. Yet, as your condition
improves, your body will respond more quickly. You should train
for this by increasing your pace a little earlier in each progressive
workout.
Why
would you want to do that? In his book "The
Doctor's Heart Cure", Dr. Sears explains:
"Because
this is the natural state of exercise. Whether predator or prey,
in the wild creatures must be able to accelerate to 100% capacity
in a single heartbeat. Humans have lost this ability to accelerate
somewhat recently. This is the very best way to be prepared
for and avoid disaster from the sudden increases in cardiac
demand that cause heart attacks."
A
word of caution, though: No matter what your level of fitness,
it is always important to warm up before you exert yourself
to your maximum capacity.
-
Jon Herring
WISDOM
Focus
on the Means, Not the Ends
A
friend asked Bill Bonner, founder of Agora Publishing and editor
of The Daily
Reckoning, "What is the one piece of advice
you would give your youngest son?" After mulling it over,
he concluded it would be this:
"The
means are the ends.
"The
ends may be wonderful or asinine. You don't know. But when the
means are sordid, the whole project is tainted from the get-go.
"Better
to focus on the means. Work hard. Think clearly. Say 'please'
and 'thank you.' Smell the cork before you drink the wine. Buy
low; sell high. Be humble. Be happy. Who knows, you may even
get the ends you craved.
"The
ends are beyond us. We never know what will happen. Nor do we
know what God's Plan may be - either for us or for the world
itself. All we have is the means. That is all we control. But
if we use the means of civilized people - the economic means
to get what we want - we will not necessarily get what we want,
but at least we will deserve it."
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TODAY'S
MESSAGE
The
Break Dancers' Secret
by
Michael Masterson
I
was in the Big Apple this past weekend, and noticed that break
dancing, as a form of street entertainment, has radically changed.
In
the old days (was it 10 years ago? 15 years?), kids would throw
down an improvised platform of taped-together cardboard and
then show their best stuff to passersby for tips. You know the
routine.
You'd
be drawn in by the crowd of people surrounding the performers.
You'd find a good spot and stand there, mesmerized by the physical
dexterity and creativity of these ghetto choreographers. After
a few minutes, you'd put a dollar in the hat and move away.
Most of the other spectators would start drifting off too, many
of them without leaving any money.
It
was a great deal - this sort of street show. You got to see
the product before deciding whether you wanted it, use as much
of it as you wanted, and pay as much or as little as you chose
(or nothing at all) for the value it gave you.
Bottom
line: These entrepreneurial artists were providing a great deal
of value for a very limited income. The usual payment back then
was not much and it was made by not many.
But
that's changed. At least for the two groups I saw - one at the
foot of Central Park and the other by the side of the arch at
Washington Square. The new performances are bigger, better,
and (judging by what I saw during the collection process) infinitely
more remunerative. (See "Word to the Wise," below.)
In
the old days, the size of the audience was determined by the
size of the cardboard stage. That meant it was relatively small.
(Fifty people would be a lot, because there was only so much
visibility possible.).
The
"new school" street performers create a much bigger
stage by demarking a large area with props and directing passersby
to stay behind imaginary lines. (Both of the performances I
saw last weekend involved audiences of several hundred people.)
The
initial draw is the same - loud music and a gathering crowd.
But the show itself is very different. In the old days, the
show would start almost as soon as the cardboard stage was folded
out on the pavement. The boom box would be switched on and one
of the break dancers would begin. The other dancers would stand
at the perimeter of the stage, passively waiting their turn.
One dancer would follow another. Periodically, several would
dance together. When they had all done their routines, they'd
pass the hat.
Nowadays,
the dancing doesn't begin until well after the crowd has formed.
As soon as the music is turned on, the actors line up and start
to move and clap to the beat. But they do not dance. Instead,
one or two of them begin to shout at the audience. The shouting,
necessary because of the loudness of the music, makes the whole
routine even more compelling to passersby.
At
first, the shouting consists of directions - where to stand,
where not to stand, how to make room for the smaller members
of the audience, etc. This modifies into gentle, humorous banter
with individual spectators. Now the crowd is laughing. (And
the scene is even more compelling to prospective watchers.)
The lead actors begin to play with the audience, asking them
to clap, asking them to shout, involving them in the theatrics
of what is fast becoming a fully fledged theatrical performance,
including gags, stunts, insults, compliments, challenges, rebuffs,
pranks, jokes - you name it.
In
a nutshell, the entire first half of the performance is aimed
at audience involvement.
This
is a very curious thing, because the show is still fundamentally
a performance of break dancing. But there is less of it. About
half as much. Yet, as I said before, the money that's made is
much more than it used to be.
So
they're making more by giving their audience less?
Yes
and no. They're giving you less of what you think you want:
spectacular, acrobatic feats of skill. But more of what you
really need: the feeling of being connected, of being part of
a larger group - all of you involved in something good and "cool"
and fun.
As
a result (and I can't say for certain, since these guys don't
keep cash receipts), I'd have to guess that they are making
two to 10 times more per hour than they were making in the old
days.
And
this doesn't surprise me, because it is simply another good
example of one of the most fundamental and powerful of all business-building
principles: The more you involve your customer in the creation,
production, and consumption of your product, the better he will
like it and the more he will buy from you.
If
you want to double, triple - even quintuple - your profits,
there is no better way to do it than by involving your customers
in your business. I'm not talking about asking them to stock
the shelves or answer phones. I'm talking about getting them
emotionally tied into the success of it.
This
is not an idea you haven't heard before. But I wonder if you
really understand how powerful a tool it can become.
I
saw this principle articulated beautifully by Jay Abraham many
years ago in the investment-newsletter business. Back then,
the idea of the newsletter business was to sell one newsletter
to a subscriber for $100... and then sell him another for the
same price... and maybe even a third.
Jay
knew instinctively that this was the wrong model. In the first
project I worked with him on, he created a marketing package
that sold a whole stack of newsletters and other informational
products for the unheard of price of something like $500. The
value of what we gave people was good - $5,000 worth of reports
for only $500. But it wasn't the value that cemented the sale.
It was the involvement.
You
see, Jay went to great lengths in the promotional copy to explain
exactly why we wanted to make this offer, what exactly had happened
with our business to warrant the need, precisely how we were
able to give them so much for so little, and exactly what we
were going to spend the money on when we got it.
The
idea itself seemed radical back then. Almost foolish. Yet it
worked. Gangbusters.
Jay's
copy worked because in letting our customers know exactly why
we were creating this special offer and showing them exactly
how we were going to use the money, we managed to bring them
into our world - much like the break dancers now involve passersby
in their world.
How
does this apply to your business? Unless you are 100% sure that
your customers are thoroughly involved, it might pay to have
a brainstorming session with some of your top people and come
up with some ideas.
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TODAY'S
ACTION PLAN
How
well do you involve your customers in your business? Here are
just some of the questions you can ask yourself and your people
to stimulate your thinking:
-
Do we have an interactive aspect to our business - a place
where our customers can meet our employees and discuss our
products?
-
Do we have an interactive website that invites our customers
(and prospects) to come into our virtual business and get
to know us better?
-
Do we have an outgoing e-service that tells our customers
how we are improving the company, what new benefits we are
going to be offering them, how their lives are likely to
be improved by us in the future?
-
Have we found ways to involve our customers by using all
or most of the major media? Are we interacting with them
online? Through the mail? By phone? And in person?
-
Do we allow our customers to see how our business runs so
that they feel they're a part of it?
LIVING
RICH
A 7-Day Travel "Adventure" That Could Change Your
Life
Our
friends at Agora Travel are heading back to the Bay Islands
of Honduras in June, and you might be interested in joining
them. If you've ever been there, you know how glorious these
Caribbean islands are. High green hills, lush with hardwood
trees and palms... warm, shimmering turquoise waters... gardens
filled with bougainvillea and hibiscus... passion fruit vines
tumbling over porch railings... and wide ribbons of white sand
clinging to the coast in protected coves. Truly a paradise on
earth.
Whether
you're trolling for a safe place outside the stock market to
grow and safeguard your retirement nest egg... or a full-time
escape to a safe haven where you can live comfortably and affordably...
or a place to call home just a few weeks or months a year (and
where you could earn rental income when you're not there)...
these islands might make sense for you.
I
encourage you to join Agora Travel in June and see the Bay Islands
of Honduras for yourself. For details, call them at 1-800-926-6575
or 561-243-6276 or read more here: http://www.agoratravel.com/bayislands/d/
WORD
TO THE WISE
"Remunerative"
(rih-MYOO-nur-uh-tiv) is another way of saying "profitable."
It comes from the Latin "remunerari" ("to reward").
Example
(as I used it in Today's Message): "The new [break-dancing]
performances are bigger, better, and (judging by what I saw
during the collection process) infinitely more remunerative."
