Marc's Blog

August is the last month of summer. It’s tradition for me to be on vacation during this month and have a stronger work ethic when the vacation concludes. 

 

A Narrowed Focus

During the school year, I have less time to devote towards my business. While I still work as if I’m full-time, I planned in August so the time decrease wouldn’t affect my results.

It’s tempting to pursue a variety of shiny objects and get distracted. This is a big reason why most people don’t achieve success. With this in mind, I have narrowed my focus to five goals for 2018:

1. Get over 1,000 book sales in 2018
2. Surpass 40,000 total podcast downloads
3. 16,000 total email subscribers
4. Attract 25 Group Coaching Clients to my upcoming coaching program
5. Attract 3,000 people to the Breakthrough Success Facebook Group

I have no other business goals this year. Some of the “other” goals I have are all subsets of those five.

For example, one of my initiatives is hosting the Wealthy Author Summit this November. Hosting this virtual summit aids in reaching Goals 1, 3, and most likely 4 as well. Creating more content on my blog and YouTube channel will help me with some or all of the above goals as well. 

 

Making Trade Offs

When you have less time, you need to make trade offs to achieve the same results. I made a notable trade off when I decided to publish fewer blog posts this summer. With the exception of frequent Breakthrough Success episodes and the monthly Performance Reports, there hasn’t been much activity on this blog. 

In reality, it takes a long time to write blog posts. Compare that with the amount of time it takes to speak your content, and that’s why I made the trade off.

I’m fixing that this fall and writing more blog posts, but by pursuing new goals, I need to make more trade offs. 

I’m taking Oprah’s quote to heart: “You can have it all. You just can’t have it all at once.”

 

What’s New

Before we talk about the trade offs, let’s talk about what’s new. 

The newest thing I’m currently working on is a daily podcast. On the podcast, you’ll learn in about 5 minutes each day how you can become a successful author. I will unveil the name and logo of the podcast soon, but you can expect a fall release for the podcast.

This podcast will help me reach 40,000 total episode downloads.

Writing more blog posts is another goal of mine, but I am also going to return to weekly YouTube videos. Right now, my podcast episodes automatically get published as YouTube videos, but I am going to do more videos. 

Not only will I publish them on YouTube, but I’ll start leveraging Facebook Watch as well. I still believe there’s an incredible opportunity there due to Facebook Watch’s relative newness compared to its peers.  

I’m also planning a virtual summit, bundle, and am in the middle of promoting my upcoming book Podcast Domination. 

 

What’s Changing

I’ve alluded to this earlier, but September is the first month when I’ll test releasing 3 episodes per week on Breakthrough Success instead of the usual five. My podcast coach and I are testing this change out to see how it affects total downloads.

The idea behind publishing fewer episodes each week is that it’s less of a commitment for listeners to listen to all of the episodes. Three episodes per week makes it easier for listeners to listen to everything I’ve published without having to play catch up.

Since I recorded in the summer as if I’d still be publishing five episodes each week, I have episodes scheduled into November. 

Now, instead of interviewing more than 10 people on some days, I’ll be interviewing around 10 people each month for the podcast.

Another change is my first virtual summit of under 50 speakers. Wealthy Author Summit will showcase over 30 top authors in fiction and nonfiction who will share how you can write and better monetize your books. Each interview takes approximately 30-45 minutes. Not interviewing 20 people saves me anywhere from 10-15 hours not including pre and post production work. 

Combined with the professional changes are three personal changes. The first change is somewhat a professional change as well. I am not going to stay as on top of the stock market on my own time since I’m a Finance Major. I’ll run across many of the concepts and modern news through those classes that I may have come across on my own. 

I’d sometimes spend hours reading articles about which stocks to invest in, but I’m trimming that down to spend more time on my business. I have several positions in the stock market which is why I stay on top of it, but as previously mentioned, I believe the Finance classes will help me continue to stay on top of my positions.

The other big change I’m making is removing vices from my life. This mainly consists of watching TV and the occasional web surfing. My family and I watched the Monk series this summer. Now that I have less time, I’m only watching TV for 3 hours each week at the very most. Just Supergirl, 60 Minutes, and any Red Sox games I can get in New York (i.e. World Series games…I’m feeling really good about the Red Sox this year. Hopefully this post ages well).

The final change is less pool. I played pool for at least an hour each college day, but I organized my schedule so I get home sooner and don’t play as much. Thursdays are fair game but I’m spending less time on the pool table and more time growing my business. 

 

What Happens Now

Those five goals. That’s what’s always happening for me nowadays. I’ve listed all five goals and some of my key actionable objectives for September. There is an overlap between the goals.

#1: Get over 1,000 book sales in 2018

• Release the audiobook edition of Content Marketing Secrets
• Continue promoting Podcast Domination
• Grow my email list

#2: Surpass 40,000 total podcast downloads

• Create more episodes for my upcoming podcast
• Release the new podcast this month or have it out at the start of October
• Get better at promoting episodes on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest

#3: 16,000 total email subscribers

• Continue checking on Facebook ad
• Complete the prep work for Wealthy Author Summit and the Content Marketing Bundle
• Conduct more joint webinars
• Create more content and landing pages

#4: Attract 25 Group Coaching Clients to my upcoming coaching program

• Create the portal
• Come up with a marketing calendar to promote my new coaching program
• Grow my email list

#5: Attract 3,000 people to the Breakthrough Success Facebook Group

• Provide more value to the group
• Reach out to more people on Facebook
• Get more active in other groups

In Conclusion

These five goals will stay constant for the rest of the year. I will not change my course towards the end of 2018. This is the current course and I’m sticking with it.

What are your thoughts on these goals and my new approach? Do you have any questions for me? Sound off in the comments section below.