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CHAPTER 6 - LIFESTYLE CHANGES THAT MAKE THE DIFFERENCE

We've gone over a great deal of the nuts and bolts of how you can and will get fit for the New Year. Will you be able to STAY fit once you put in all the time and hard and smart work?

The answer to that very important question rests on whether you are able to make the positive lifestyle changes that support the fit new you rather than work against you.

Over the years, I have been able to identify some of the most common lifestyle changes that friends and clients have had to master before they were able to set their new levels of fitness in stone and not relapse back into their old ways. You have a HUGE head start knowing what to look out for as you make your New Year's weight loss goals solid and real.

Avoid the Negative Few Who Would See You Fail.

There's an element of person who feels VERY threatened by those who are able to work at positive self change -and especially at something like weight loss. Rather than asking how you were able to cut fat and trying it themselves they'd rather put temptation after temptation in front of you until you fall off track.

Do they do this consciously? Who knows, but it happens and happens frequently. If staying lean, healthy and fit is important to you a vital lifestyle change is to avoid spending too much time around this type of influence. They will only drag you down.

Get Off the Couch and Have Fun.

Your new body shouldn't just be for show. As you get in better and better shape make sure you have fun using it! This will reinforce the idea that the new you is worth the work and sacrifices. Play that old or new sport you love, going dancing or take the kids for an active day at the beach. All these things should be taking the place of television and video games more and more until NOT being fit becomes unthinkable.

Share What You Know.

A self help genius once said that the best way to keep what you have is to teach it to others. Do you have friends and loved ones who could use a bit of motivation or could benefit from the knowledge you have picked up from this Guide and elsewhere? Why not teach or train them? Who knows in the future this could even turn into a new hobby or a part or full time way to make a living. Stranger things have happened that's for sure.

Don't underestimate the power of these three lifestyle shifts. They may seem minor, but they are anything but. In fact they could be the deciding factor on how you look and feel two, five, ten years from now and beyond.

Being lean, attractive and healthy isn't a set of moves and diet choices. It's a way of life. A way of life that's probably one of the most rewarding things that you could ever dedicate your time and effort to. Give it your all!

CHAPTER 7 - KEEPING YOUR MIND RIGHT - THE INNER GAME OF GETTING FIT

Just about every top athlete would tell you, if you asked, that 90% of the physical game is mental.

Our minds command our bodies ultimately and staying on point with our weight loss goals has MUCH more to do with what's going on inside our heads than not. It’s only the rarest situation where our body will fail us in training and leave us with an injury. Taking the time to train safe largely prevents this.

On the other hand situations where a person trying to lose weight sees their minds fail resulting in skipped workouts or junk food eating binges are much, much more common.

Thankfully, there's a few simple things we can do to develop our "Inner Game" of fitness. These tips can make an ally of our minds rather than an enemy!
Use Positive Visualizations.

Our subconscious mind has great difficulty separating what we image from what has actually occurred or is occurring. This trait can be harmful, but when we harness it and use it to our advantage it can also be pure magic. How can we do this? Sit comfortably with eyes shut. In your mind imagine how you will look lean and fit in the New Year.

After around five minutes move on to yourself performing in the gym powerfully and dynamically. After a few minutes more move back to seeing yourself again lean and fit. In total this can be worked on for ten or fifteen minutes a day as many days as you are able. Watch the wonders ensue.
Practice Affirmations to Build Confidence.

Think of affirmations as an approach to the subconscious audibly like visualizations are visually. They pay off just as much. When both these methods are used they compliment each other perfectly. How do affirmations work? Take a short positive set of statements and repeat it to yourself, out loud in the morning and evening. An example: "I am healthy, fit and happy". Always state things in the present terms with "I am" and your goals stated as if already achieved. Never use "I want" or" I am not". The way the mind works these things don't sink in nearly as well.
When Stressed Breathe DEEPLY.

Breathing influences the mind. When you become stressed about your ability to achieve your New Year's fitness goals, or anything else really, breathe deeply. Here's a traditional "calming" breathing technique used in yoga. It's worked for over a thousand years. Inhale for a count of four. Hold your breath for a count of eight. Exhale for a count of twelve while you imagine your bad thoughts leaving with your breath. Repeat twenty times or until you feel yourself relax.

Don't be surprised if you feel yourself developing more mental focus and energy through out the day as you do the calming breath more frequently. These positive side effects come with the territory.

There's an inner and outer game to most things worth doing in life fat loss and fitness included. Now you're armed with the skill to become a champion of your New Year's weight loss inner game will you use it? I hope so, because this is one game that s definitely worth winning.

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Building A Funnel

Much like a bottleneck, a funnel begins with a wide end and then narrows in a triangular shape to a small opening. Funnels are needed when filtering uncooperative materials, in order to make them cooperate accordingly.

In terms of funneling customers, the goal is often to sort out the unpredictable individuals in order to find those who are searching for your product or type of information.

Essentially, you will want to guide visitors through the site in order for them to end at a signup or checkout point, inviting them into your community.

Imagine the large end of the funnel as the initial goal of “Inviting Visitors.” These may be fans or they may be those who have literally stumbled upon the site by accident for the first time. Either way, the goal is to build a relationship with those who should belong to your group.

With this in mind, the next step would be to "Activate Members,” which consists of building a relationship with a customer or potential customer. The third step would be to “Retain the Customer.”
Three-Step Breakdown

Imagine the three steps as the beginnings of a relationship. The first step (Inviting Visitors) results from a type of activation upon their part. Imagine this is an attractive individual flirting from across the table. Much like a wink, new users must join an email list, create an account, or purchase goods on the site.

The next step (Activate Members) will then require that person to continue to use the product, much like being a romantic relationship where dates are the standard. This could include individuals who read and share emails or continue to purchase products on a regular basis. These users (Retain the Customer) most resemble getting married.

Understanding Successful Rates

It can be discouraging to have a scenario where thousands of individuals are visiting the site while only a handful of customers are actually making purchases.

In this scenario, it’s important to understand which conversation rates signify normal success. Honestly, the deeper into the funnel, the less traffic exists. Mathematically, imagine 100,000 visitors resulting in 1,000 members, which would be a 1 percent conversion.

Of those 1,000, let’s only 600 stick around, which would be a 60 percent conversion. While the numbers are helpful to determining individual growth, they are almost impossible to compare to one another.
Knowing the Variables

The first thing to consider would be whether or not your overall traffic specifically identifies with a product. If the product in question is an ebook about woodworking but the articles are about welding, many visitors will quickly move on to something else.

Much of this depends on the relationship of products available as well as the headlines of feature articles. With that in mind, there are specifics types of traffic sources that can convert members at higher rates than others.

Sometimes, this will be current trending topics or any of other countless examples.

In another scenario, consider your specific activation goal. Trying to get an email is much easier than trying to make a sale. Asking for smaller favors results in larger results. This is also true of high membership fees.

When considering retention rates, it’s also important to consider others within the same market. Certain products will feature more repeat users than others.

For example, high-end hand-crafted pieces of furniture may not have repeat customers while a fruit-of-the-month club will invite shoppers to purchase goods each month.

Determining Success

Once a growth hacker understands the variables, there are additional facts to keep in mind when tracking and expanding growth. The first rule is that numbers should always be improving.

Much like an athlete, there is never a reason to slow down or lose a step in a monthly training regime. In terms of analytics, visitors should grow each month on a steady incline. This has nothing to do with unknowns because growth should happen like clockwork despite any adventures in trial and error.

After setting up steady growth, consider tracking growth with a fellow hacker. Find somewhere with a product in a similar field that doesn’t specifically compete with your product and work together to find the most successful rates of growth.

Check one another’s numbers in order for both of your organizations to succeed. These examples may work better for area-based businesses such as a coffee shop in New York and another in Los Angeles. Another example may be two online companies who sell winter gear, where one sells hats and the other scarves. These methods truly help determine realistic conversion rates.

Finally, make sure that you are reading the data correctly. For example, if number of visitors increase but retention drops, take this into account correctly, rather than only looking at the drop of retention.

The main goal of tracking this data is to create conversion rates in various key points within the funnel. These various stages will work together over time to create a greater impact on the business as a whole.

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Interior Decorating Services

If your interior design is the talk of all your friends, or you're known for your good taste in decorations, interior decoration might be the right angle for you. It's not easy, but you don't need professional certifications to get started - all you need is a good aesthetic eye, an ability to stay current on fashions and an intuitive sense of style.

Interior decorating is all about attention to detail. Once you've started your business, you'll develop a sixth sense for what "belongs" in a room and what changes need to be made to improve its beauty. You can learn best practices, past designing trends and industry standards by getting a degree at a school like Devry, but this is only a requirement if you want to go to work at a design firm; many interior decorators are completely untrained.

Interior decorating requires almost no startup capital, other than basic organizational and office supplies (and some highly fashionable clothing -you've got to look the part!) However, it can be difficult to build up a portfolio without any experience, so you may need to offer your services at a highly discounted rate to friends and family before you attempt to build a relationship with building contractors.

Jewelry Making

There are as many ways to start a jewelry making business as there are different kinds of jewelry. Whether you make hand woven hemp and bead necklaces to sell at the local market, or open up a metal shop and start working with precious materials like gold and silver, your options are endless. Depending on your own passion and your level of skill, you can make jewelry from glass, plastic, beads, feathers, bone and wood, just to name a few.

There is usually stiff competition at local markets for jewelry sales, so you'll need to work hard to differentiate yourself. It's more than just making sketches of your ideas - you need an in depth knowledge of styles, trends and materials. Most of the really unique, high-value jewelry that comes out of home-based businesses tends to be hybrid jewelry, in which several different materials are combined into a simple, but elegant piece. In order to make designs that wow your customers, you'll need to understand how to solder, shape and cast metal, set gems and other decorative pieces, and how to create jewelry that works with different bodies and body types.

There are degrees and certificates available in jewelry design that will teach you historical methods, such as wax design and casting, and current methods, such as using software to design pieces. Most local community colleges offer entry-level courses that will teach you the basics. This is one of the more cost-intensive home-based businesses to start but as an artistic endeavor, it's also one of the most rewarding.

Landscaping Services

If you were born with a "green thumb" and an overactive imagination, you don't need a college degree to get started with this job (although it certainly can't hurt you.) The bulk of landscaping services come from folks who are looking to have their yards fixed up, their lawns mowed, their leaves cleaned up and more. Many people with gardens also contract landscapers for debris removal and help with planting, cleanup and pest control, and there are business opportunities available in tree care, as well. Outside of plants, you might build retaining walls, irrigation, fencing and more. There is a lot to do in landscaping services!

Landscaping is hard, physical work, and it requires being outside in weather that's often terrible. But it's a rewarding business that can quickly grow once you've got regular customers that trust you and begin recommending you to their friends. To begin, get to know the horticulture of your local area - what kinds of different plants are trees are commonly planted? And remember that landscaping services will be very different depending on where you live. You're going to spend a lot more time maintaining small lawns in California, you'll be working with large trees in the South, and if you're in the Pacific Northwest, you'll be called on to help with gardening and urban farms.

If you want a professional degree, you can also consider becoming a landscape architect. These programs are available at most major four-year universities.

Marketing Copy Services

Copywriting differs greatly from creative writing, in that there is much less art in it and much more craft. Rather than trying to write something beautiful or engaging, a marketing copywriter attempts to get people excited about purchasing a good or service that your client is trying to sell.

Copywriting is one of those elusive skillsets that is easy to be competent at but incredibly difficult to become great at. It takes a lot of experience and education to get going, but it's a rewarding, fun job once you've invested the necessary time in getting it up and going.

If you don't have a Bachelor's Degree in either English or Marketing (it's best to have a major in one and a minor in the other) you'll need to go to a local community college or an online university and take some classes there. Copywriting has very specific formats, and businesses have very specific expectations that you'll need to meet in order to be successful. However, once you know what you're doing, it's relatively easy to find clients who need advertising copy (the Internet has caused a boom in demand for marketing copy) for their web pages, brochures, catalogs, e-mail marketing campaigns, advertisements and more.