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One Minute Odd Job Tip

From creating wealth or building a business, to raising happy kids or having an amazing marriage, the steps are pretty clear. Set your priorities, develop a plan, get support, and then work your plan over time, and over and over again. Step by step, inch by inch, anything is possible. You can get there!

>>> NEXT WEEK: Three essential truths of a successful life.

Strictly Business:

The Steps to Making Your Dreams Come True

Why do some people seem to reach their goals so easily, moving from one success to another, while other people seem to stay stuck, frustrated in their quest for success? We know the difference is not talent or education, and it certainly isn't "luck", or desire, and it doesn't seem to be personality. What makes the difference?

Many people have said that the difference is having clear, written goals.

I think there are some other steps, as well, but this first one is essential. In working with highly successful people, one of the things that is always true (yes, EVERY time!) is that they make clear, conscious choices.

One of the great truths is that we can have just about anything we want, but it is also true that we cannot have EVERYTHING we want in life. Our lives are filled with more choices than ever before, and yet each day still has only 24 hours, and each week has only 7 days. Highly successful people understand this and choose their priorities very carefully.

Do you?

We live in a time of many distractions, and I believe the first and most essential requirement for success is choosing your priorities. Call them goals, or call them challenges or themes or projects or whatever, but you must choose and you must concentrate and you must sacrifice. There can be no success without first choosing what you want most in life.

Secondly, take time to design a practical, workable plan. Yes, some goals seem to arrive "automatically", but far more often, success requires a well-designed plan. Use a calendar and a budget. Consider your resources, talents, interests and other competing projects, and devise a strategy. Success is not accidental! It is the result of careful planning, executed well.

Third, success always requires action and perseverance. Any success worthy of the name, requires time, effort, skill, and persistence. There will be delays and surprises and frustrations. Of course there will - this is not a movie! Success requires that you work your plan, and stick with it over time.

Fourth, surround yourself with the tools you'll need to achieve your dream. From motivational posters, to expert advice, to the wisdom of good friends, success is not a "do it yourself" operation. Get help! Get support! Get good advice, and consider using a coach.

Finally, never, ever, give up. Last week, I wrote about taking baby steps when you must. It's wonderful when success comes quickly or in big, dramatic victories, but that is rare. More often, success inches forward, and it's only over time that we look back, astonished by how far we've come.

Your success may look a lot like that. From creating wealth or building a business, to raising happy kids or having a remarkable marriage, the steps are pretty clear. Set your priorities, develop a plan, get support, and then work your plan over time, and never give up. Step by step, inch by inch, anything is possible. You can get there!

Some Odd Jobs You May Never Have Considered:

Number 1 — Picking up Trash — (S and B Quadrants¹)

There's a story of a businessman, who started making over $650,000 a year after he quit his full-time job. He did it all with a waste disposal business. And he was actually inspired by his dad, who would pick up rubbish before work each morning. And it only took two months for him to make more money from picking up trash than he was at his full-time job. The truth is, most people just don't want to do this kind or work. Most people don't want to pick up trash all day long. This is really good opportunity. If you're not afraid to do some hard work and get your hands a little bit dirty.

Number 2 — Sofa Cleaner — (S maybe B Quadrant¹)

Have you ever went to somebody's house or maybe even at your own house, and you realize that your sofa just gets progressively more and more dirty? The problem is most cleaning equipment is going to actually stain your sofa. The reality is that cleaning a sofa or upholstered furniture is a very specialized trade. It's actually really difficult to clean it well.

So, why would a person hire a sofa cleaner, they have specialized equipment that can clean sofas without damaging them, and it’s also a cheaper alternative to buying a new sofa, especially if they still like the sofa they have.

Sofa cleaners can charge around $500 to steam clean a sofa or a couch. But at minimum, you would charge 150 to $300 each. And so, at minimum, if you did three per day, you'd be making 450 to $900 per day, that's easily over six figures a year. And if you made $900 a day, that would be over $300,000 a year.

This is a solid business model for a large enough metro area with plenty of homes.

One idea to market a sofa cleaning business is to contact cleaning companies and tell them, hey, if you have any clients that need their beds sofa or carpet cleaned, just send them over to me, and I'll give you a referral fee.

Number 3 — Mailbox Installation and Repair — (S maybe B Quadrant¹)

I’ve driven by neighbors with damaged mailboxes for years. Those people probably wish that they could do something about the ugly damaged mailbox, but it’s just at the bottom of the list of priorities in their life. This translated to opportunity for an industrious person.

You could come in and either repair the mailbox or if the damage is too bad, you would go ahead and replace it. Now, you can make a bunch of money just replacing mailboxes, or you can upsell them to getting fancy mailboxes.

You could also help people upgrade their mailbox to a unique or fancy mailbox versus a normal one.

On average, one mailbox costs about 60 to $380 to repair. Now, this one does take some time to get started. I would think you could go through your town and look for mailboxes that have been damaged. And then, maybe just knock on the people's doors and ask them if they need your services.

Number 4 — Cell Phone Repair — (S maybe B Quadrant¹)

If you're a little bit Tech savvy, and that is going to be mobile phone repair. And this one is so lucrative that there's a story on CNBC make it of a guy, who started a multimillion-dollar company, out of his college dorm room. His business was a phone repair business.

If you think about it, this is a problem that so many people have, you might be looking at your phone right now it's got a cracked screen, or maybe your phone is way slower than it used to be. Or maybe your phone's battery stops working. Or maybe your phone starts to overheat, or maybe it just won't turn on or there's just something wrong with it. All of these issues are a pain to the user and most people don’t know what to do about it and wish there was a solution.

Like I said, it does take a little bit of Tech savvy, but it's not that hard to figure out, how to fix them. Like anything, if you do some research you can find information on how to do these things, and there could be a tremendous opportunity here.

This Weeks Quotes:

In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous.

—Aristotle

Like anyone else, there are days I feel beautiful and days I don't, and when I don't, I do something about it.

—Cheryl Tiegs

Eccentricity is not, as dull people would have us believe, a form of madness. It is often a kind of innocent pride, and the man of genius and the aristocrat are frequently regarded as eccentrics because genius and aristocrat are entirely unafraid of and uninfluenced by the opinions and vagaries of the crowd.

—Edith Sitwell

That's the funny thing about havin' a kid. They come with their own set of problems; make everything else you were worried about seem kinda silly.

—Greg Garcia

If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts.

—Albert Einstein

A Book for Success — This week I’m going to talk about an old classic that is a fundamental book that has molded generations of people in ethics and morals. The book is To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. It’s not a long book and it, of course, has many entertaining parts. But as it’s root is the story of the battle between right and popular. Right winning out even in the face of great odds. After you read the book, do what you can to find the movie.

Humor —

I took the shell off of my racing snail, thinking it would make him faster.

But if anything, it made him more sluggish.

What do you get from a pampered cow?

Spoiled milk.

What’s the best thing about Switzerland?

I don’t know, but the flag is a big plus.

How many tickles does it take to get an octopus to laugh?

Ten tickles

My teachers told me I’d never amount to much since I procrastinate so much.

I told them, “Just you wait!”

Some Random Final Thoughts—

In most cases a small business need not put "all their eggs in one basket" and sell only one service or provide only one (or a few) products. In fact, the huge advantage of a small business is it's ability to provide personal service, custom solutions, and innovation, far easier, faster and cheaper than a large company.

In a small business, the owner can respond personally and find the perfect solution for a customer with an unusual request or a special need. Never under-estimate that tremendous advantage!

The grain of truth in the "you must specialize" motto is that to grow your business you MUST focus on what you do best. Some products or services, or some aspects of the business simply "suit" or fascinate you more than others.

Talents show up in different ways. Even things like the location of your business, or the gender, age and training of your staff will create certain strengths, while also creating a parallel set of weaknesses.

To build your business, focus on what you do best. Specialize and advertise the things you enjoy most, or that you feel passionate about. Make a virtue of your natural advantages and specialize in those things.

¹ Cashflow Quadrant references the book, Cashflow Quadrants, by Robert Kiyosaki. In a nutshell, there are four sources of income — “E” Employee, “S” Self-Employed, “B” Business and “I” Investor. We reference these quadrants at the beginning of each of the jobs we talk about in Odd Job Tips Newsletter. To see more about this concept, please refer to this issue of this newsletter.

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