10 Steps to Christian Success

By Sean R Mize

1) Spend time with Jesus Christ every single day. I cannot stress that enough for the success minded Christian. So often we spend our time working on things that have no bearing on our future christian success (nor any current success value) because we haven’t taken the time to focus and understand what Jesus Christ wants for our lives and our success.

2) Study the Word and discover what the top five (or six) christian success priorities in your life should be. For example, for you it might be: Christ, spouse, children, work, retirement. For another, it might be: Christ, a hobby, work, retirement, missions work. And for yet another: Christ, spouse, work, a hobby, physical fitness. For each of you, christian success priorities might be a little different in the number 4, 5, or (6) spots, but the first two or three are probably Christ and family. Once you know your success priorities, you are ready for step 3)

3) Develop a “progress plan” for each of your areas of top success priority. When you look at your life six months from now, especially in these areas of success priority, you should be further along and better adapted in each of these areas than you are today. Look back six months ago. Have you improved in each of your success priority areas? If not, you need to take action. Now.

4) Find a christian success mentor. This success mentor should be someone who can be concerned primarily for your personal growth in these areas of success priority. This should not be someone who is an “equal” with you—someone who also confides in you. This should be a “one-way” street. They should be able to listen to your success priorities, help you develop a game plan for meeting them, and be able to criticize you when you aren’t doing what you game plan to do. Because of that, they should probably not be someone with whom you are close emotionally, like a best friend or spouse. They should be a more neutral party, perhaps someone from a small group class at church or someone recommended to you by your pastor.

5) Break each of your success priorities down into individual goal steps. These “steps” should be small enough that you can focus on that one step at a time and they shouldn’t be too hard to accomplish individually, and yet when you have completed all of the steps you have gained significant ground in your priority for the given period, e.g. six months.

6) Write down all of your success priorities and your goal steps for accomplishing them. Leave room next to each goal step to write the date you started the goal step and the date you finished it. At the end of the six months (and during it too) you will be able to specifically track your progress.

7) Eliminate unnecessary things in your life which do not help you accomplish your success priorities. Try unplugging the TV three nights a week until your success priorities are accomplished. Have an “email free” day of the week. Take Sunday off from everything. If the telephone is an incessant nuisance, turn it off two nights a week.

Evaluate your rest…are you getting enough sleep? What can you do to get more sleep? What about recreation (non-TV)? Are you walking, hiking, reading, meeting with friends regularly? Are you spending enough time with your family without interruptions by the phone or work? Do what it takes to get rest and recreation and include the family in this step.

9) Evaluate your success regularly. There isn’t much that substitutes for assessing your progress last week and making goals for the coming week. Sure, some weeks you will fall short, but in others you will easily meet your personal success expectations. As you follow these 10 steps, setting success priorities, making goal steps, and following through on all of it will get easier.

10) Just do it! Start somewhere, start today! Don’t just close this page and forget all this! You took the time to read this; if you do nothing with it you will continue to fall short of your own personal expectations.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide’

Download it free here: Secrets of Article Promotion

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Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 9034 articles in print and 14 published ebooks.

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Find Your Voice

The Success Margin

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

I read a lot. Books, newspapers, magazines.

But good, really powerful writing is a rare treat for me. And I’m sure for you as well.

After reading a recent timely but boring and life-less newspaper article, it suddenly hit me like a
ton of bricks!

The “voice” in which copy is written is crucially important. Yet, I’ve never seen anyone discuss it.
And that includes me!

But, isn’t this true? As I gain new insights I share them. And isn’t this part of the reason you’re a subscriber?

I believe a big part of my success is due to creating a “voice” that is unique to me. It differentiates me. And I’ve found an interesting and persuasive voice for numerous clients and mentees.

But I never actually thought about actually teaching anyone else how to do it. Today, dear reader, that is about to change.

To be a powerful and effective communicator, whether in print, on the platform, on TV or radio,
you need to communicate in your own special voice.

You have a bigger challenge than it first appears.

You have to sound like you. Communicate just like you. Be the authentic you. And no one else. But
like all great accomplishments, it’s easier said than done.

Let me be crystal clear. I’m not talking about faking it. Or making up some sort of phony voice.

I am talking about finding that voice already within you. And simply letting it out.

I submit most people, instead of releasing it, resist and fight against showing the world that
emotional inner voice. Rather, they try to be “sophisticated,” whatever that means.

I believe a big reason for stilted writing which is all too common is how the subject is taught in
school. You can please your English teacher and get top grades. All you need to is display an
unemotional yet grammatically correct style.

The resultant writing is dull, lifeless, left-brain copy no one (except your teacher) wants to read.
And even more important to the marketer, no one will be influenced in any way to buy anything.

I’ve also discovered that nearly everyone has more than one “voice” buried within them. Some have a
surprisingly large number of authentic voices. These can be called upon, depending on the
purpose.

If and when you find your strongest, real, authentic voice, your copy will vastly improve.

And I assure you, so will your sales results!

How would I further define your “voice”?

Nothing less than the sum total of your words, expressions, personality and mannerisms that make
you–you.

Look around you carefully at all forms of writing including sales copy. Wouldn’t you agree that most
writers’ work is sadly colorless and devoid of an individual, unique voice?

Proper grammar (which can get you an A grade in English) is not what makes copy interesting.
Readable. Persuasive. Compelling.

My job is to help you become a better writer of sales copy. My goal is to help you get an A not in
English. But in marketing!

I’ve used several voices during my career. In my first business, Peterson’s House of Fudge, my first
voice was as a gourmet chef. A confectionery and ice cream maker with several patented recipes to
my name. At first I began speaking and writing the way the chefs did who worked in my father’s
family restaurant/ice cream parlor business.

Later I started writing books. The first was “How to Form Your Own Corporation Without a Lawyer
for Under $50.” I then got better and more comfortable at letting out my second buried voice.

I released a voice that communicated how I felt.
Pro free market. Pro limited government. Anti- lawyer. Anti-bureaucrat. Aspiring consumer hero.
Contrarian (I concluded that most people were dead wrong about nearly everything. The truth was the
opposite of what I was taught in school and what most people believed to be true).

All the copy written to sell my book, my first two direct response businesses, and 56 books published
for other authors, utilized this new voice.

The first business widely using my contrarian tone was Enterprise Publishing Company. The second
was The Company Corporation. This business, also started in my basement, became the largest
incorporating company in the world.

This new contrarian voice from the depths of my soul has indeed been very, very successful.

One of my major tasks is to actually create a unique and valuable voice (in the authentic voice of the
client) for those with whom I consult and write copy.

How do I find this new voice?

By intently listening to them. And understanding what really makes them tick. And what keeps them
awake at night. I see this research as part of my marketing challenge.

** Here are a few client examples **

– William Fischer, author of the book “How to Fight Cancer and Win.” His inner voice–a caring,
outspoken researcher intent on seeking and publishing the truth about alternative cancer
treatments as opposed to conventional approaches.

– The “Hugging Butcher.” His voice–a lovable Minnesota butcher who the women customers in
particular love. Because of this tendency, I got him to guarantee every customer a free hug. This simple
strategy turned his business, just two weeks away from bankruptcy, into a roaring success. He is now
a retired former butcher.

– Dr. Reinhard Hittich came to my Bermuda seminar in 1998. He is the founder of a fast-
growing direct response supplement company headquartered in the Netherlands. His hidden
voice–a professional, caring nutritional researcher fed up and angry with his former
employer, a pharmaceutical company which just to make profits exploits the consumers with
harmful chemicals. His solution is natural vitamin supplements as an alternative. The result of this
voice? This business has gone from a mid six-figure turnover up to a high eight-figure enterprise
and one of the fastest growing direct response companies in Europe.

Let’s look at a few more of the wonderful and successful voices used by other well-known
entrepreneurs.

– Gary Halbert, my late friend and world-class copywriter. His “voice” exemplified a profane,
crazy, lovable, irreverent person almost irresistible to his particular audience. He had
this unique ability to communicate as though he were in a locker room or bar having a few beers
with his best buddies. His words alone were able to transport you right to that setting.

It’s important, of course, to realize every voice is not for every audience. Many niche audiences
would undoubtedly be turned off by Gary, while his fans loved him.

That’s why every entrepreneur has to seek and find their own niche. And the voice you use helps you
do it very effectively. In fact, you usually can’t do it at all without it.

– Bill Gore. This is another friend of mine who is no longer with us. But his voice is. He actually
invented the revolutionary material now called Gore-Tex. But DuPont, the parent company where
he worked, wasn’t interested in it. They couldn’t see any future! So in his basement he started the
now iconic company, Gore-Tex in Wilmington, Delaware, where I used to live. His “voice” always
used in his communications and advertising was a caring, brilliant, informal, uncle-like figure. Today,
even after employing thousands with factories around the world, the company has never given a
single employee a title, even to this day.

– Haband Pants. A mail order marketer. The brilliant voice of this company used in their copy
is in the personal style of a father and his son. They gossip. They complain about each other.
They bitch. They tell corny jokes. They even get away with commenting about life all the while
they extol the virtues of their clothing.

Even the very largest corporations often assure their advertising consistently reflects one
individual’s voice.

Most of the time the “voice” is the founder’s.

Years ago I had occasion to meet Sam Walton, founder of Wal-Mart, in Washington, D.C. He was
the richest man in the U.S. at the time.

Mr. Walton was fascinating. He was a humble, plainspoken man. He drove a 25-year-old pickup
truck and lived in a house he purchased 30 years before for $24,000. He wore a $10 red and white
checked wool shirt. His advertising and also employee communications were just like him.
Plain, simple, and direct. This style continues today.

– Another good example of a strong, unique “voice” responsible for a huge part of its
incredible success is the case of Perdue Chicken.

This 750 million dollar Delaware company was founded by Frank Perdue. In his inimitable voice,
Frank produced radio and TV commercials advertising his chicken. The U.S.P. he developed
and is still being used today is: “It takes a tough man to grow a tender chicken.”

I recommend you find and develop a unique “voice” in which to write copy and express
yourself. A good place to first start is to practice writing some headlines and copy with that voice
within you that is undoubtedly yearning to be released. Work on expressing yourself freely.
Emotionally. With abandon.

Try writing copy as though you were answering this question. “If I had the guts to write about the
virtues of my product and my company without worrying what anyone, especially my peers,
relatives and even my English teacher thought, what would I say?”

Once you answer this question, I’d wager a lot of money that your performance, response and success
level will vastly improve once you find and release that magical inner voice within you and which is
unique in all the world.

I’d love to hear from you about your new “voice” and what it has meant to you.

Your correspondent,

Ted Nicholas

© Copyright MMVIII Ted Nicholas

“This article appears courtesy of THE SUCCESS MARGIN, the Internet’s most valuable success and
marketing e-zine.

For a complimentarysubscription, visit http://www.tednicholas.com/

With Kindle, the Best Sellers Don’t Need to Sell

Here’s a riddle: How do you make your book a best seller on the Kindle?

Answer: Give copies away.

That’s right. More than half of the “best-selling” e-books on the Kindle, Amazon.com’s e-reader, are available at no charge.

Although some of the titles are digital versions of books in the public domain — like Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” — many are by authors still trying to make a living from their work.

Earlier this week, for example, the No. 1 and 2 spots on Kindle’s best-seller list were taken by “Cape Refuge” and “Southern Storm,” both novels by Terri Blackstock, a writer of Christian thrillers. The Kindle price: $0. Until the end of the month, Ms. Blackstock’s publisher, Zondervan, a division of HarperCollins Publishers, is offering readers the opportunity to download the books free to the Kindle or to the Kindle apps on their iPhone or in Windows.

Publishers including Harlequin, Random House and Scholastic are offering free versions of digital books to Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other e-retailers, as well as on author Web sites, as a way of allowing readers to try out the work of unfamiliar writers. The hope is that customers who like what they read will go on to obtain another title for money.

“Giving people a sample is a great way to hook people and encourage them to buy more,” said Suzanne Murphy, group publisher of Scholastic Trade Publishing, which offered free downloads of “Suite Scarlett,” a young-adult novel by Maureen Johnson, for three weeks in the hopes of building buzz for the next book in the series, “Scarlett Fever,” out in hardcover on Feb. 1. The book went as high as No. 3 on Amazon’s Kindle best-seller list.

The digital giveaways come as publishers are panicking about price pressure on e-books in general. Amazon and other online retailers have set $9.99 as the putative e-book price for new releases and best sellers, and publishers worry that such pricing ultimately creates expectations among consumers that new books are no longer worth, say, $25 (the average list price of a new hardcover), or even $13 (a standard list price for trade paperbacks).

Some publishers have tried to take control of pricing by delaying the publication of certain e-books for several months after the books are made available in hardcover.

Executives at some houses said that given such actions, offering free content amounts to industry hypocrisy.

“At a time when we are resisting the $9.99 price of e-books,” said David Young, chief executive of Hachette Book Group, the publisher of James Patterson and Stephenie Meyer, “it is illogical to give books away for free.”

Similarly, a spokesman for Penguin Group USA said: “Penguin has not and does not give away books for free. We feel that the value of the book is too important to do that.”

But some publishers regard free digital books as purely promotional, in the same vein as the free galleys they distribute to booksellers and reviewers to create attention and word-of-mouth buzz for an author.

“Most people purchase stuff because somebody has recommended the title,” said Steve Sammons, executive vice president for consumer engagement at Zondervan.

Neither Amazon nor other e-book retailers make any money on these giveaways either. But it is a way of luring customers to their e-reading devices.

Free e-books are also a way of distinguishing a less-well-known author from the marketing juggernauts of the most popular books.

“You have to show people things because there’s a lot of competition,” said Ms. Johnson, the author of “Suite Scarlett” and seven other books. “If they go into a store, they are going to see 4,000 books with Robert Pattinson’s face on it,” she added, referring to movie-tie-in versions of Ms. Meyer’s “Twilight” series. “Then my book will be buried under them.”

And if a free e-book rises to the top of the Kindle best-seller list — or Barnes & Noble’s ranked list of free e-books — it automatically gives an author more visibility.

“When you push to No. 1 of any best-seller list, that in itself seems to beget publicity,” said Brandilyn Collins, who writes suspense novels with Christian themes and whose novels “Exposure” and “Dark Pursuit” were No. 1 and 2 on the Kindle best-seller list earlier this month and remain in the Top 10 (and are still available free).

Most of the giveaways are of older titles by an author, with the idea that reading them will convert new fans who will go on to buy more recently released books. Even if only a small percentage of those who download a free book end up buying another one, “that’s all found money,” said Steve Oates, vice president for marketing at Bethany House Publishers, a unit of Baker Publishing Group, whose authors Beverly Lewis and Tracie Peterson had free titles on the Kindle best-seller list this week.

Samhain Publishing, a publisher of romance and erotica, has offered a free e-book title every two weeks for more than a year. Christina Brashear, its publisher, said that the giveaways have led to a noticeable bump in sales.

In October, the most recent month for which she has statistics, Ms. Brashear said Samhain offered free digital versions of “Giving Chase,” a romance novel by Lauren Dane, leading to 26,897 downloads.

But paid purchases of some of Ms. Dane’s other novels jumped exponentially. Her earlier novel “Chased,” which sold 97 copies in September, sold 2,666 digital units in October, and another of her previous books, “Taking Chase,” which sold 119 copies in September, sold 3,279 in the month in which a free download was available.

With e-books still representing about 5 percent of the total book market, data on the effect of digital giveaways is still inconclusive. Brian O’Leary, a principal at Magellan Media Consulting Partners, which advises publishers, said that while it appeared that free downloads led to an uptick in actual book buying, there was a risk that free reading could eventually “supplant paid reading.”

Indeed, said Brian Murray, chief executive of HarperCollins, “free is not a business model.”

Authors are torn between wanting to experiment with new formats and wanting to protect their income. Charlie Huston, the author of the Henry Thompson crime trilogy and a series of books about Joe Pitt, a vampire detective, said that “the part of me that grew up in a union household” still feels as if he were occasionally undermining himself by sanctioning digital giveaways by his publisher, Random House.

But, he said, “I guess my attitude right now is that I can be afraid of what’s coming or I can try and aggressively embrace it in some form.”

And in some cases, the free e-books work. Pamela Deron, a 29-year-old administrative assistant in Florida, said she downloaded a free edition of “Already Dead,” the first in the Joe Pitt series, onto her Kindle this month.

“There are so many authors out there that fall into obscurity,” Ms. Deron wrote in an e-mail message. “Simply no one knows of them, and some readers are hesitant buying an author they never heard of. Free books allow you to experience the writer as a whole, not just a small tidbit.”

She added: “Fifty dollars later, I have the entire Joe Pitt series.”

Amazon vs. Apple = Happy Days for Writers?

Posted By Roger L Simon On January 20, 2010 @ 11:54 pm

URL to article: http://pajamasmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2010/01/20/amazon-vs-apple-happy-days-for-writers/

URLs in this post:

[1] Amazon : http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10437897-1.html

Write Like Ernest Hemingway

Throughout his career Hemingway experimented with style and, like any professional writer, constantly learned new techniques. For example, his later writing has a more ornate sentence structure and delves more deeply into character than his early work. Despite these additional discoveries and experiments, however, the core Hemingway style persisted in most of his prose and today it is recognizable worldwide. When he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954 it was “for his mastery of the art of narrative, most recently demonstrated in The Old Man and the Sea, and for the influence that he has exerted on contemporary style.”

SENTENCE LENGTH

True, Hemingway wrote short sentences. And true, he is known for simplified, direct prose.10 But what most writers don’t realize is that he worked hard for these effects and that there was a reason for them. Primary among those reasons was the issue of clarity. When he wrote for newspapers, clarity was the objective. Even today newspapers are known for their clear, direct style. Hemingway wrote sentences that were straightforward and clear so that readers could understand the points he made even if they were skimming quickly through his articles.11 You can achieve a similar clarity by writing shorter, more direct sentences. This is especially helpful to keep in mind when rewriting your work. Don’t hesitate to break up long complex thoughts into bite-size morsels for added readability. But clarity was not the only reason for Hemingway’s brevity.
Another reason for short sentences is dramatic effect. In “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” (1936) when the protagonist is nearing death because of a gangrenous leg, Hemingway writes: “All right. Now he would not care for death. One thing he had always dreaded was the pain.” Here the short sentences have a cumulative effect, pounding home the idea that the hero is nearing death. Try to achieve a similar effect in your writing by stringing together a series of short sentences when you want to stress a point or add dramatic punch to your prose.

Still another use for short sentences is to add variety and music to your writing. Hemingway often mixes longer and shorter sentences for a euphonious effect. In The Old Man and the Sea (1952), for instance, he tells us the thoughts of the old fisherman: “Then he was sorry for the great fish that had nothing to eat and his determination to kill him never relaxed in his sorrow for him. How many people will he feed? he thought.” The first sentence contains two conflicting thoughts: the old man’s sorrow for the fish and, in contrast with this, his continued determination to kill it. The next sentence suggests the old man’s motivation for fishing, namely to get food. The change in sentence length lends a musical quality to the writing and adds pleasing variety.

SENTENCE SPEED

One of Hemingway’s most recognizable stylistic traits is a fast sentence speed. A writer’s sentence speed refers to how quickly his sentences can be read, either aloud or silently. It’s as if Hemingway’s prose flies along at a rapid clip while the writing of other authors putters slowly in comparison. If you want to write like Hemingway, imitate this signature stylistic move. You’ll be writing in the fast lane.

How does Hemingway manage to speed up his sentences? He uses two methods, the first of which involves choosing shorter words for simpler diction. We’ll deal with that in a moment. The second method is to omit commas.
Joseph Conrad used to retire to a room to write every day and he would have his wife lock him in so that he could concentrate. When he emerged for lunch one afternoon his wife asked what he had done. “I took out a comma,” he said. After lunch she locked him in again and when he emerged for dinner she asked what he had done. He told her, “I put back the comma.”13 If Joseph Conrad struggled for an entire day over the placement of one comma, might it be worth your while to devote a few minutes to this mark of punctuation? Undoubtedly it would be time well spent. Hemingway waged a war against commas, and although he used them in his work he often achieved his greatest technical innovations by omitting them in compound sentences. A compound sentence contains two or more independent clauses. The clauses are usually joined by a comma and a coordinating conjunction, such as and or but. By far the most common coordinating conjunction is the word and.

Consider the sentence: “Often Miss Stein would have no guests, and she was always very friendly, and for a long time she was affectionate.” It is composed of three independent clauses: Often Miss Stein would have no guests. She was always very friendly. For a long time she was affectionate. But the sentence plods along at a slow pace. The three commas slow it down and give it a choppy feel. Here’s how Hemingway actually wrote the sentence in chapter three of A Moveable Feast (1964): “Often Miss Stein would have no guests and she was always very friendly and for a long time she was affectionate.” Punctuated like this it zips along.

Let’s look at another example, from The Sun Also Rises (1926). The narrator is hoping to see the bulls at Pamplona. Joining a crowd of spectators he rushes ahead with them to the bullring. At this point Hemingway speeds up the pace: “I heard the rocket and I knew I could not get into the ring in time to see the bulls come in, so I shoved through the crowd to the fence.” The absence of a comma before the word and increases the tempo, conveying some of the feeling of being in the crowd.
Omitting commas can be a tricky business because such omissions can sometimes make sentences confusing, so this is a technique you don’t want to overuse. But when you come to a section of your story where the action needs to move at a quicker pace, you may wish to try Hemingway’s trick of speeding up the sentences. You’ll leave other writers in the dust.

Learn more about Write Like the Masters