Ah… productivity….

Chrome extensions are small apps that you can install in your browser to help you…

…get stuff done…stay focused…keep track of your goals…execute tasks more efficiently…remember your passwords (and credit card numbers for easy online purchasing)And so much more.

In this quick video I share with you the Chrome extensions that I use every day.

You’re filled with hope and know that you can reach your goals, but it seems like everywhere you turn, people are turning you down and referring to your biz as, “One of those things…” ?

But don’t give up!

Don’t. ?

There are people you don’t even know yet that are counting on you to keep going.

People like me.?‍

About 15 years ago, I didn’t know I had an entrepreneurial bone in my body.

I had been downsized and was floundering in a sea of uncertainty because I knew… I just KNEW that I didn’t want to go back to a traditional job.

But I didn’t know what else I COULD do…

Then someone introduced me to the world of home business. My entire paradigm shifted. I saw a way out of sacrificing my entire LIFE for a paycheck.

Someone sharing a direct sales opportunity with me literally saved my life…

It saved me from a life of working for someone else doing something that didn’t fill me up.

It saved me from a life of doing what everyone else wanted me to do, instead of figuring out who I really am, what I love to do, and then having the courage to go out there and DO IT.

My first home business was the first STEP to discovering who I really was, and what I was meant to do.

I wanted to write this note to all of the amazing women (and men) who are out there sharing the message that others can be their own boss and live life on their own terms. You are the “hope dealers” that are saving people and families from a life of unrealized dreams.

Keep going.

You are planting seeds. You’re helping people learn how to break out of their comfort zone. You’re shifting their paradigm of what life COULD be like.

You’re helping people crush their limiting beliefs and dream bigger for themselves and their family.

Don’t ever stop sharing your message. The world NEEDS you to share it loud and proud.

Now a little bit of advice to keep your fire burning bright…

You must do the GROWTH work necessary to reach the goals you’ve set.

You can do it.

The only reason you aren’t where you want to be right now, is that there is growth that’s necessary before you can hit those goals. Don’t begrudge the journey to the top, embrace it. It will make you a stronger, wiser and more compassionate leader.

And when you build your team, encourage them to up their growth game too.

Lead by example.

But remember, friend. Your job is to just plant the seeds. Know that not every seed you plant will bloom on your team.

Plant them anyway. ?

I have become a much better person because of my direct sales experience.

I also found my passion, which is helping entrepreneurs around the world to get the clarity, confidence, and strategy they need to boost their income and level of influence without working longer hours.

I GET TO work from home and inspire entrepreneurs every single day. ?

I even fulfilled my dream of writing a book— now that book is transforming lives around the world.

And 2019 will bring another book. ?

ALL of this happened because someone shared a direct sales opportunity with me 15 years ago.

So thank you. Please keep doing what you’re doing.

I know that things aren’t always easy in direct sales.

Facing rejection after rejection can sting really badly. Losing team members that you worked SO hard to help can make you feel like you’re on a hamster wheel.

But you’re doing very IMPORTANT work friend, so keep moving forward. You are transforming people’s lives.

That’s exactly why I decided that I had to do more to equip amazing entrepreneurs like you to be fearless and keep fighting for your dreams and inspiring others to do the same.

 So I created the Clever Girl Playbook to help you develop the skills you need to become who you were meant to be.

If you’ve gotten this far in the really, really, (sorry it’s so crazy long) post…then I would love nothing more than to link arms with you and help you to become the entrepreneur you were born to be. ?

I hope to see you inside Clever Girl Playbook, but regardless of whether you join us or not, know this…

I believe in you.

You matter.

Thank you for bringing more hope to the world!

XOXO,

Karla

Join us inside Clever Girl Playbook, I know you will ? it!

http://clevergirlplaybook.com/

Last night I started learning how to use it and promptly thought… “Crap, this is going to take me longer than just 15 minutes to understand.” 

So I experienced a little frustration… so what?

Then this morning, I happened to run into a blog post by Seth Godin talking about people that settle for “good enough.”

He writes about people that are “good enough” at their craft or work and get complacent with where they are in life, in their business or in their relationships.

When is it OK to “give up on learning something?” When is good enough, just that… good enough?

I really don't know the answers to those questions, but it makes me think about where in my life I might be settling for “good enough” and not pushing myself to get through those first frustrating moments, days, weeks or months to reach a new “better.”

I've never seen myself as a quitter, but I have quit along the way on learning something, so I guess that makes me a “selective quitter.”

I'm a big believer in “good enough.”

In order to take massive action in my business, I almost always settle for good enough.

If I waited until I got something perfect, Don and I would probably still be looking for change in the couch and eating macaroni and cheese.

Most importantly, I have been willing to be “dumb on the way to being smart.”

Still am.

(I still really don't know much about my iPhone)

__________________________________

The First Fifteen Minutes- Seth Godin

Learning something new is frustrating. It involves being dumb on the way to being smart.

Once we get good enough (at our tools, at our work) it's easier and easier to skip learning how to do the next thing, because, hey, those fifteen minutes are a hassle.

Learning to use the new fax machine, or a different interface on the voice mail or even, yikes, a new version of Photoshop. (I confess that I dropped off the Photoshop train a half dozen versions ago, much to my chagrin.)

And so we get in the habit of giving a half effort, not really reading the instructions, shrugging our shoulders and moving on. The professional in us that was always eager to find tools that added leverage becomes the complacent coaster, defending what's on the table as ‘good enough'.

The problem with evaluating the first fifteen minutes of frustration is that we easily forget about the 5,000 minutes of leverage that frustration earns us if we stick it out.

Yes, Isaac Asimov typed all 400 of his books on a manual typewriter. But I'm glad Cory Doctorow has a laptop.

xo,​K

Here's the Unboxing Video for SMOVE

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( ???… ???? ???'? ?????????!)

Here's a quick tutorial on how to get ????? ??????? ????? to show up in your posts!

The website/link I mention in the video is: https://KarlaSilver.com/FacebookFonts

REGISTER HERE FOR THE UPCOMING MASTERCLASS

“How To Create A Powerful Plan To Make 2019 Your Best Year Yet”

Becoming more efficient – Theming your days

Becoming more efficient, getting more done, accomplishing tasks and projects that will actually move the needle for your business: now that feels great!

I want to help you not only experience that feeling once but learn how to leverage simple techniques and tactics in your own business so that feeling becomes a regular one for you.

Theming your days

About a year ago I implemented a simple technique that has helped me become more efficient, get more done and make more money in my business, and I’m writing this post to share how you can implement the same technique in your business.

It’s called theming your days.

Establish your themes

First part is simple: what themes are required in your business (and all the other areas of your life) in order to make it run? Or, in other words, what do you do on a regular basis that actually creates your business?

Some examples might be:

• Creating video
• Writing blog posts
• Emailing a weekly newsletter to my list
• Hosting webinars
• Hosting a Facebook group
• Email
• Social Media
• Lead generation

…you get the idea.

Now pick 4 to 5 themes that are recurring for you and that, together, create your business.

Schedule it

Once you have your themes, create a schedule around them, giving each day of your “work week” a theme.

Here’s what this might look like:

PHOTO

You’ll notice that the greater part of each of my days has a theme:

Sunday’s theme: Plan

Sundays are my day to review, adjust and plan.  I take a look at where I am relative to my weekly goals (for all areas of my life that I’m working on at the time), make adjustments and plan my next week with the goal of executing on my game changer as fast as possible so that I can take the next most significant step in my business.

Monday’s theme: Write

Monday’s are my writing days, so whether it’s a blog post, an email newsletter, or a training that I’m working on, Monday is when I’m going to be focusing in on that single theme and getting everything I need for that week (or the next) completed.

Tuesday’s theme: Content Creation

Tuesdays are my content creation days.  This is the day of the week when I’m focusing on creating the content for my courses.

Whether it’s Clever Girl Playbook, the Top Producer Academy, Facebook LIVES, marketing videos, videos for my network marketing business, Tuesday is the day that I focus on these projects

Possible Themes

You know your business.  You know your life.

Here are a few ideas that will help you execute on themes.

Business
Marketing
Learning
Content Creation
Blog

Personal
Random Act of Kindness Day
Make my husband happy day
Self-care
Spiritual
Parenting

I think you get it.

Don’t make themes around the following topics.  They should be done EVERY day in your business:

• Sales
• Lead Generation
• Prospecting

Do the work

Two major reasons why theming your days works – why you’re able to be more efficient, get more done, and make more money in your business – are:

1. You no longer wake up asking yourself, “What should I work on today?“
2. You don’t have to readjust and refocus 3 to 4 times throughout the day as you jump from one unrelated task to the next.

But theming your days is only going to help you be more efficient, get more done, and make more money in your business if you actually do the work.

Theming isn’t a way for you to be able to just say you’re going to do something.

Theming isn’t meant to be used in order to draw up a bunch of plans and then not take the first step towards implementing them.

Theming isn’t about sitting and thinking about how you don’t really feel like doing it…

Just Do The Work.

Get yourself in your theme zone, because guess what?… You don’t have to get out of that zone when you’re working within a theme for an entire day!

What about daily or unexpected tasks?

Of course, there are always going to be those daily tasks or “unexpected” things that come up in any given day – tasks that need to be taken care of right away that you didn’t necessarily plan for.

Some of your daily tasks might include:

• Email
• Customer service
• Community engagement (social media)
• Team building
• PROSPECTING
• Lead generation
• Getting new business builders started

And some unexpected tasks might include:

• Uh… your LIFE???

The daily tasks will remain daily, but with theming, you have to become very disciplined as to not crush the time you’ve promised to your daily theme. This might mean using an online timer to remind you that 1.5 hours on Facebook isn’t necessarily going to ensure great community engagement 

As for the unexpected tasks, once you’re in a solid rhythm with your themes, you’ll start to find that those come up less and less frequently.

How so?

Because when you actually stick to your schedule and do what you have planned, you won’t find yourself up against the wall to publish that next Facebook LIVE episode, blog post, or email newsletter like you used to.

As for the unexpected tasks that will inevitably come up: set aside a break in your day, or perhaps as you’re wrapping up your day, to tend to any loose ends you’ve encountered throughout the day.

Remember: the power of theming is that you’re not skipping from one task to a totally unrelated one – don’t let unexpected tasks break your theme focus. You’ll get it done, it just might not be for another couple of hours

Are you in?

I’m not just writing about stuff that “might work” here.

So whether you love planning and processes or not, I think we can agree that you do love building and growing your business.

So, are you in?

It's  been popular now for a couple of years to “pick” a word… one word… to be your word for the year.

I'm finally going to do it.

But why?

Most people make New Year's resolutions that they don't keep, right?  There are a ton of reasons why picking an undesirable habit and looking to “fix” it every January doesn't work.  

What if you could ditch all the complicated and hard-to-keep resolutions and just focus on ONE positive thing.  Like a word.

Change, any change, doesn't come from anything other than focusing on something that you want and choosing a word replaces the broken promises you make to yourself every year with a VISION that you can easily focus on.

When you choose a single word, you have a clarity and focus. You are moving toward the future rather than swearing off the past.

And I like that.  It's POSITIVE rather than NEGATIVE.

So how do you do it?

This is the hardest part for me!  There are a gajillion words that I love and aspire to, so picking is hard for me.  Other people know right away what their word is, but not me.

(Short pity party)

Ok… I found a cool process to find your word on myintent.org.

FIND YOUR WORD

Finding your WORD is a simple, fun, and empowering exercise.In a world inundated with distractions, it’s powerful to have a daily reminder of what you want to actively focus on, or manifest, every day.The WORD you choose will evolve over time, it’s what you want to remind yourself for this chapter of your life, it may be a few weeks or months.

Download Over 100 Word Ideas Here

We've done the work for you!

START WITH A QUESTION 

Choose one or two of the following questions and jot down the first words that come to mind:

• What’s a goal of yours?
• What brings you joy?
• Is there something that you want to let go of?
• Is there something you want to improve upon?
• What energizes you or makes you feel like your true-self?

               DEVELOP 

What’s holding you back from achieving the answers in Step 1?  What WORD, as a daily reminder, would help you achieve what you seek from Step 1?For example, if you want to start your own business but have some doubts you’d like to overcome, you could choose a word such as BELIEVE, COURAGE, or IGNITE. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, you may choose a reminder like BREATHE, STRENGTH, or FAITH.

    IDENTIFY YOUR WORD 

You may have come up with a few words, and that’s ok, but what is the one WORD that is the most important, the priority, to begin working on today?

Declare out loud “My WORD is ___________!”

I'd love to know what your word is!

Comment below and share what you picked!

Who’s in the mood for a riddle? What takes time to build but only an instant to damage? 

Oh, and it’s super critical to your business to the point where if you haven’t built it with clients, prospects and distributors, well, let’s just say you won’t have a business. Can you guess?

It’s TRUST.

Regardless of what you’re selling, trust is essential if you want happy, repeat customers and motivated distributors. And, it’s crucial if you want to lead a successful business.

It doesn’t matter if you’re committed to relationship marketing or are sticking with those icky traditional methods (um, seriously, why are you still sticking with those awful traditional methods): if you want people to buy or do business with you, you have to earn their trust.

The tricky part about trust is that it takes time.

In this day and age, where we’re all running to the next thing at warp speed, we feel we just don’t have time.

We want to make those six-digit figures within five minutes of starting the business.

Then, we grow impatient and frustrated when our family, friends, neighbors, the parents at our kids’ school aren’t chomping at the bit to buy from us or join our team. WTH? What gives?

The #1 Mistake Business People Make When Building Trust

Rushing the relationship is the number one way to turn off a potential customer or prospect. It’s just like dating–you typically don’t go shopping for wedding dresses and china patterns on a first date.

You get to know the other person better and figure out if they jive with your personality and quirks. 

Although there may situations where spontaneity pays off, for the most part, you may date someone for months or years before you fully commit to marriage.

The same is true for business. Even your loved ones may not commit to buying anything from you until they trust you within that capacity.

The exception is your mom; your mom will buy absolutely anything you’re selling, whether they’ll use it or not, and will rave about how amazing it is, no matter what.

For the rest of your family, friends, and acquaintances, you gotta put in the legwork.

Trust is a two-way street. As your connections begin to trust you as a business person, and the products and services you’re shilling you’ll also get to know them and find new ways to serve them better.

They’ll see you as more than a person pedaling a product; you’re a trusted advisor who’s looking out for their best interest.

In turn, they’ll become more than clients, they become strong advocates for your business and may even believe so much in you and the product that they want to get in on it themselves.

4 Ways to Build Trust With Your Favorite People

Chemistry is that connection you share with people.

You know when you meet someone and you just hit it off?

You obviously have it with your spouse or partner, but you can also have it with another parent in your son’s class who enjoys a dirty joke or a 5 o’clock margarita as much as you, or with the neighbor who you share gardening tips with over the fence or the other participant at book club who is as stoked as you that this month’s selection is true crime noir.

With all these folks you felt a kind of spark that told you that you’re part of the same tribe. You can relate to one another. At a time when technology has opened the whole world to us, but we can still feel alone, the spark we feel is reassuring.

So, what is it about you and your personality that people can relate to? Is it a sunny and friendly disposition or the talent of saying just the right thing at the right time to make someone feel like a 1000 watt light bulb?

Is it a slightly off-kilter sense of humor or the empathy to tune into another’s emotional state and provide comfort?

Identify what it is and try to use it whenever you can on the people you already know as well as the ones you meet each day. This will help you expand your social circle and build your customer and prospect lists.

Character is who you are.

Very wise and important people have a lot to say about character.

Abraham Lincoln said, “Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.”

Lord Chesterfield said, “Be your character what it will, it will be known, and nobody will take it upon your word.”

Henry David Thoreau said, “You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one.”

However, the most relevant quote about character, especially as it relates to sales, comes from Dear Abby herself.

 “The best index to a person’s character is how he treats people who can’t do him any good, and how he treats people who can’t fight back.”

Abigail Van Buren

You see, most salespeople act all nicey-nicey to their clients when they want to make a sale, but ignore them the rest of the time. They’ll be the nicest person in the world to a customer who’s buying something from them, but if they don’t buy right away, they may write the person off.

Sure, they may contact them at some point in the future, but most likely, they won’t unless they have to. How rotten is that?

The worst part is, their customers can sense what’s up; after all, the salesperson only comes a-knocking when they need to meet their monthly sales quota.

No one wants to feel used and disregarded once the purchase goes through.

Your character is shaped by many things. Although it’s influenced by your values and beliefs, the central core is your actions.

You may be able to recite the inspirational quotes from history’s greatest thinkers–from Cicero to Mr. Rogers–but if your actions don’t back it up, people won’t believe you and it won’t become part of your character.

Take a moment to think about what makes up your character. When people hear your name, what are the first adjectives you want them to think of?

Once you have a list of words, ask your most trusted friend or family member what words they think of when they think of you (Or, ask your mom; moms usually give the straight answer, whether you want to hear it or not).

Does your list of words and their's overlap, or are they vastly different? If they’re similar, you’re on the right track; what you say and do are the same.

If they’re totally different, think about why? Then be more intentional to ensure your words and actions align.

Competence is when you’re good at what you do and people know it.

Now, when you first start out, this may be the area that needs the most work. Sure, you may be familiar with your products and services, but you likely only experienced them from one perspective–your own.

As you gain more experience in your business, you’ll begin to learn about others’ experiences with the product and service and will then be able to offer new customers and prospects more insight.

Until then, lean into the expertise of your team; after all, they’re there to help you!

You must become an expert in your field and know all there is to know about it.

For example, if you’re selling nutritional products, learn all you can about health, nutrition and wellness. Read every article and book you can get your hot little hands on. Go to seminars, watch documentaries and videos, and listen to podcasts.

You want to eat, sleep and breathe it! And, most importantly, use the products yourself as often as you can.

Take photos of yourself using the product in your daily life and post them to social media.

Are you drinking a shake after spin class? Snap a photo. Taking a supplement to beat that 3 pm slump?

Snap a photo.

This will help build credibility and trust while you become more competent.

If your product is beauty-related, learn all you can about the beauty industry and the most common skin complaints people have, including acne, aging, scars, increased pigmentation, etc.

Learn all about these common issues and how your product or service helps address these needs.

This will boost your competence in the minds of your connections; when they think of you, you want them to see you as an expert in your field.

Consistency is doing your activities on a regular basis so your customers not only expect it from you, they begin to rely on it.

For the vast majority of people, consistency is super hard.

You get busy and mean to do your activities regularly, but then your son gets sick and your daughter tells you that you have to bake three dozen gluten-free cupcakes for the school bake sale tomorrow, and your husband or partner calls to say they’re stuck in a last-minute meeting that is taking forever.

Put simply, life happens and it becomes near impossible to be as consistent as you wish to be.

However, if you want to build a lasting business, it’s vital to be intentional about your activities and become consistent.

After all, you want your customers, prospects, and distributors to be able to rely on you; to know that your word is gold and you’ll follow through.

Just like character, people won’t believe you until they see you in action.

You may be thinking, “hey now, I resent your implication. I’m super consistent” but are you really?

Look at your calendar over the last week–how many days did you contact your people to make their days?

How many days did you follow up with prospects?

How many days did you reach out to your distributors to check in and offer encouragement?

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This post originally appeared here: https://teamzy.com/4-ways-to-build-trust-with-your-people/ written by Eric Johnson.

You might know this already, but I’m an introvert.

Yes…

A painful introvert.

(That explains the biggest reason why I’ve never done the “friends and family” thing.)

So… how did I get to be one of the top 50 Internet Marketers in the Direct Sales industry (BusinessforHome.org)?

I buckled down and educated myself. Duh.

I didn’t have any special “luck,” or “aptitude.”  I didn’t have special access to an internet guru, or some amazing upline that showed me everything to do…

Nothing.

Except this: I knew I needed to educate myself.

So, I decided that I would spend part of every Sunday doing just that.

One month of Sundays, I focused on online classified advertising.  I learned what worked and what didn’t, and then spent the next few months of Sundays implementing what I had figured out.  (I still generate most of my leads this way, and it still works, btw.)

Then I focused on Google AdWords.  Learning AdWords took a whole lotta Sundays, but eventually I got good enough at that as well.

And I could go on and on.

However, I made some massive mistakes along the way.  These things nearly killed my business.

Before I tell you about the ones that almost took me out of the game, I want to share some of the traps I missed along the way.

I don’t want you to fall into these traps!

The things that I did RIGHT.

1.       Allocated time to learn.  If it's not planned for and ON your calendar, it probably won't happen.  We live in a world of distraction, and it will always win unless you are focused.

2.       Established a habit. It became my habit to always spend some time on Sundays to learn something.

3.       Set my own expectations correctly.  I didn’t expect to get to know a subject in a day.  I didn’t expect results to happen quickly either.  I expected to master a subject, so I did.

4.       I wasn’t afraid to make mistakes.​​​​​​​

5.       I IMPLEMENTED. I’m going to share the traps I fell into… big time.

Here’s the biggest one…

Learning too many things all at the same time.

This was a huge mistake I made, and is the #1 MISTAKE I see other marketers make.

Our minds can only really focus on one thing at a time, and when we’re trying to learn too many things all at once, overwhelm, decision fatigue and frustration settle in.

And worst of all, context switching (switching from one task to another) sucks our time dry.  As it turns out multi-tasking is a learning killer.

The key to success is to master and implement one thing at a time.

I see too many people buying course after course and then making my second mistake…

Because I was trying to learn so much all at the same time, I didn’t have time to implement everything that I was learning.

What a waste of time, energy, money and opportunity.

I can’t even calculate all the opportunity that I missed by not strategically planning what I needed to learn and breaking it down into manageable pieces and then…

Allocating my time accordingly.

Our time is soooo valuable.  I get so many questions about how to effectively get stuff done AND build a profitable business.

Don't waste your time scrolling on social media, doing too many things at once, watching TV (yeah, I said it) or worrying about what other people think.

I heard this somewhere… what people think is none of your business.

xoxoxo,Karla

So… you've generated leads! YAY!

It's a big deal, so celebrate it!

But your job isn't over there, right?  Now it's time to nurture and convert those leads into sales and business builders.

I recorded a quick video on how you can build rapport with your prospects… FAST.

[video_page_section type=”youtube” position=”default” color=”#2c3e50″ btn=”light” heading=”” subheading=”” cta=”” video_width=”1080″ hide_related=”true” hide_logo=”true” hide_controls=”false” hide_title=”true” hide_fullscreen=”false”]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQTfnj5i-_E[/video_page_section]

I think you will LOVE these tips!

I love, love, love ClickFunnels and I love spreading the love.

However, for many new entrepreneurs, getting started with ClickFunnels is pretty steep, money-wise.

When you go to their sign up page, there are two options:

1. A startup account for $97 per month, and
2. An enterprise solution for $297/month (this is the plan that I use)

However, there is a “secret” personal plan, where you can get it for as low as $37/mo

It’s the easiest way and which allows you to create funnels and setup pages based on your need.

First step Sign up Clickfunnels account for FREE here.

or use the link below to create your 14 days free trial 

https://karlasilver.com/clickfunnels

It shows $97 per month, but don’t worry, you will not need to pay that much after applying this trick.

So let's move on…

Second Step- Cancel your Clickfunnels account (don't worry!)

Go to account > account billing -> cancel my account 

You should see something like this image below.

We are not really “canceling” our account (or it will make no sense for us to create one.)

Click “cancel my subscription.”  

Then it will show you 3 different offers:

• $37 per month Personal Plan – you can build up to 5 funnels, 20 pages, 5 thousand visits
• $67 per month Bootstrap Plan – you can build up to 5 10 funnels, 50 pages, 10 thousand visits
• $9 per month Pause – they just reserve your subdomains, pages, and funnels, but you can’t edit anything or adding anything

Now you don’t have to pay $97 or even $297, but can start from as low as $37 per month and without limitation like shared funnels

A Little Warning: This Trick Could Expire Anytime.

Now that you have learned how to get Clickfunnels with huge discount!

A warning for you: Since this “trick” takes advantage of a loophole on ClickFunnels' part, it might already be gone.

So… go here now and get ‘er done!

xo,

Karla