I’ve decided that as my business expands and I become involved with more and more groups, e-mail is just not cutting it. I was hoping that Facebook and Twitter would solve the problem, but they’ve been inadequate. Don’t get me wrong; the ability to put out a status message to 600+ people at one time has had its benefits, but you have to be careful not to abuse this level of permission. If you keep putting irrelevant, over-promotional, or uninteresting things into people’s feeds, they’ll hide your posts (or just ignore you). I haven’t found a great solution to this.

When it comes to e-mail, this hasn’t been ideal, either. I’m not going to e-blast everybody every time I have something to share. I’m not going to copy 200 people on an e-mail in the hopes of getting 5 of them to respond. That just doesn’t work either.

I’ve decided to start using blogs in a new way. For example, I’m involved with a training program with Landmark Education, and there are over 800 people in the program with me in North America. I am going to have a lot of things to say to this community over the next year. I was thinking of posting something on this blog, but I was concerned about diluting my core message. This blog is my place to be fully transparent about what I’m up to.

So, I created a new blog just for the training program. I may create other blogs like this for other groups if this goes well.

If you’ve ever read “Good to Great” by Jim Collins, you’re familiar with the idea of a “big, hairy, audacious goal,” or “BHAG” for short. So, I’ve devised six such goals for the next year.

(If you’re in the Landmark Team Management and Leadership Program, these are my Team 2 Games in the World. If you don’t know what I’m referring to, check out http://LandmarkEducation.com/)

Here are my BHAG’s:

1. Creating an entrepreneurial household. This will look like a team of 10-20 entrepreneurs moving into a 3,000 – 5,000 square foot home and renovating it to facilitate 24/7 obsession with collective labors of love. I’m thinking this will include an espresso bar downstairs.

2. A creative sales training retreat. This will be based on training people to use their creative faculties to sell their stuff in a new way that they devise. It might look like, for example, selling insurance policies by singing vintage Zeppelin tunes to a ukulele on a street corner in Manhattan with brochures in the ukulele case.

3.  A #1 best-selling self-published book. This might be my next book (”Get That Book Out of Your Head” – subtitled “…and onto the shelves”). Or, it might be a book that I work with a client to create. In any case, an idea will be born out into the world this year in a big way. I’m also putting out the intention that either I or the author with whom I work will receive an offer to buy the motion picture rights.

4.  A 33% reduction in the number of cars on the road worldwide. Don’t ask me how I’m going to pull this off. I will do it primarily by writing, I think. But part of the plan is to show people the hidden benefits of carpooling (beyond gas/wear and tear savings). I’m referring to the relationships that develop when people spend time together in a car, as opposed to five people making long commutes in five separate cars. This is doable. Just look how many times you see bumper-to-bumper rush hour traffic, with one person in each car. I rest my case.

5. A skill-building video game. This was inspired by “Guitar Hero.” I was thinking, what if somebody made a game like this, which could teach people how to play a real guitar? I’m thinking if I could have my way, I’d make a video game to teach people how to learn foreign languages. But the criteria is that it has to be as addictive and fun as the most mind-numbing shoot-em-up games that people use to rot their brains.

6. Mastery of lucid dreaming. This was inspired by Timothy Ferriss’s blog post, where he discusses how he trained with a professional wrestler in his sleep. I’ve been wanting to do this for years, and haven’t made it a priority. By this time next year, I will be doing it nightly, along with a power team of out-of-the-box thinking entrepreneurs.

If you are interested in being part of any of these things, or know someone who might be, please shoot me an e-mail. Writer at Dave dash (”-”) Baldwin dot c0m.

Seriously. I have a swirl of things going through my head, and I’m terrible with to-do lists. I notice that when I had a boss, I was handed a list of priorities. Today is one of those days.

The book. The newsletter. I could post some more articles on EzineArticles. I could make some follow-up sales calls. I could post on InSide919. I could invent a system for prioritizing what things to do. I could kill my whole day on indecision. Or, I could just pick one thing to do, and then do it.

As you can see, I chose to do a blog post. This won out, for the moment, among all of the choices of things I could spend these five minutes doing. What was my motivation? Gut instinct. When all else fails, I follow the rabbit trail. One idea usually emerges from the mental fog, and I follow the thread to see where it goes.

This blog post is embarrassingly incoherent.  However, I’m going to publish it. I have a policy of100% transparency on my blog, and a zero-editing policy as well. (I do fix spelling and grammar errors, but that’s it).

I think that’s about all I have to say on the subject.

Short blog posts are good.

No one will read a novel.

This post is finished.

I have to tell you this – yesterday was a Facebook history moment for me. I asked for feedback on my third book title, and so far, I’ve had 29 comments on this post!

My original status post read, “Dave Baldwin is designing his third book, which will be about generating sales through the writing of a book. He needs a sexy title. He’s thinking the title needs God in it also – in a way that demonstrates his unconventional religious views. Thoughts?”

I got some interesting nuggets that would not have occurred to me:

• “God’s Salesman Training School”
• “God’s Business Plan: Your Success!”
• “The Word (that sells) is God”
• “God says ‘Buy This Book’”
• “Sales as Divine Service”

It appears that the word “sex” always triggers interesting things. Some of the more risque responses I got:

• “The Sex God tells all”
•  ”God doesn’t buy your B.S.”
• “God WANTS you to make money! Dirty, Sexy Money.”
• “Divine Orgasm”

I’m so happy about this, that I’ve decided I need to use Facebook more often! In fact, I will be incorporating this process into my book: part of the strategy for getting a book done, and getting it sold after it’s written, is to create buzz and anticipation up front. I think this is a good start.

In other news, those of who you read my post entitled “Shameless Promotion of Others” awhile back may have wondered why I discontinued the practice. My undiagnosed ADHD is mainly to blame. I come up with more ideas than I could ever implement. I’m tempted here to insert a cheesy cliche like “Hey, look, a bird!” But in all seriousness, I’ve decided to revisit this strategy. I can always get people to read their own name in print. Now, the challenge is learning how to add value to it beyond pure vanity.

For starters, I haven’t exactly been doing a bang-up job of promoting Dave Wheeler of Meridian Residential. He’s my assigned marketing partner for the month at Wake Business Leaders, a Raleigh business networking group I’ve belonged to for just over a year. We’ve just started doing something new in the group; every month, each member is assigned to one other member, and we’re supposed to put our creativity to the test finding ways to drive business to that person. My hang-up with Dave: he seems like a good guy and I would be comfortable using him as a mortgage lender, but I’m not in a natural position to refer leads to him. In the spirit of being a Golden Goose, though, I’ve realized that I need to be more proactive about referrals. I’ve put out a question on Inside919 about this; feel free to chime in.

Last but not least, I’ve been shooting e-mails back and forth with Crystal Simpson, a talented couture bag designer and marketing consultant from Loral Langemeier’s Cash Machine workshop in Atlanta. Crystal and I are going to be at the same Big Table training program in November, and we’re in a masterminding group together right now. I’ve taken a look at Crystal’s custom bags and it’s easy to see that she is a talented artist with marketing savvy. This is one example of the Golden Goose concept: if I can consistently drive business to people like Crystal, business will come back to me, and I won’t have to sell them. That’s my selfish.

The reason why I’m mentioning her in this blog post: this is the kind of relationship that fits perfectly into my Introverted Entrepreneur sales plan. Masterminding is a powerful way to get to know the nuts and bolts of somebody else’s business, and build up trust at the same time. What we’ve been talking about in our mastermind group: how can all of us help each other develop our business models in a way that leads quickly to cash deals? My challenge with Crystal: how do I find somebody who is developing a product line like what’s she’s done? I’m sure that Crystal could help a small business owner in that position tremendously.

So that’s my news for today.

I decided, during an impromptu one-on-one today, that I was going to steal my friend’s idea. Check out his web site, DestinationWakeForest.com. He said to me that he was thinking of using his blog as the place to be fully transparent. I thought, “why not do that, too?” So, here I am. The cards are about to be laid out on the table.

I had put together a seminar for writers who wanted to write their books. After selling a grand total of three tickets and only collecting payment on two of them, I decided that there wasn’t enough time to sell the remaining seats. The seminar was scheduled for October. I’m now thinking that I led with too high a price tag. At $449, people seemed hesitant to jump on board. I think that what was needed was a more consistent funnel of lower-priced sales to lead in. So, I’ll be putting together some cheap or free writing seminars in the near future.

The third book needs to get done yesterday. In my first book, Pied Piper Entrepreneurship, I wrote out my goals, which included putting out 4 books by February 2010. I have finished 2 books now (including the first one). The third one will be letting God out of the box, and will also be fully authentic about the irreverent image of God that I worship. (Let’s just say that any strict fundamentalists will strongly disagree with my viewpoint). I may also be taking a political position in this book, I think, but I haven’t figured out how to do these things in a way that don’t needlessly alienate my audience. The theme will be writing the world into existence with words, specific to business.

The newsletter is going to be an example of why newsletters don’t have to be terrible. It is going to involve discussing cross-promotion of other businesses, for one thing. It will, of course, be cross-promoting other business owners as well. I expect to have the first issue out within 2 weeks. Suggestions welcome. If I implement your idea, I’ll give you a free copy of either one of my e-books.

So that’s about it. I realized that coming up with things to write about is a lot easier when I don’t worry about looking good, so you can expect to be hearing from me more often!

I could come up with plenty more cliches. Here’s one: “A rising tide raises all ships.”

If you’re an entrepreneur, then surely you’ve noticed the impact that your emotions can potentially have on your paycheck. There are days when you just don’t feel like doing anything. I’m in that boat too. And I’ve decided not to fight it any more.

There are some times, during the day, when I have a huge window of opportunity to get some serious work done, and I just don’t do it because I’m just not motivated. Then, my motivation level spikes just before bedtime, so that I can force myself to sleep and wake up with an adrenaline hangover the next morning, to start the cycle all over again.

Well, I say I’ve had enough. I’m an entrepreneur and I write my own working schedule. From now on, that schedule will reflect who I really am.

I suggest you do the same.

Okay, it’s not a dilemma. It’s sheer ugly procrastination. And I don’t know why. I would really love to get my newsletter out yesterday. Yet, this is not happening. I would love to have an easy funnel into which I can drop business cards. However, I’ve not made the time to do this. Having hired a VA, time is no longer an excuse.

What I haven’t decided: how to scope out the framework. I’ve already decided there will be two articles per month. One about my strategy, the things I did this month, and the things I’ll do next month (plus a recap of what worked and didn’t work from last month). The second article will be about somebody else. I would like the second article to be written by a guest author, but I may have to do the writing in the initial stages. I’m not sure how that will go.

Anyhow, I thought I’d just mention this in a blog post in the hopes that making the knowledge public would slightly motivate me to start moving more quickly. It may work. We’ll see.

I’ve hired a virtual assistant to help out with my selling process and a few other things. As a result, some areas of my business are starting to show signs of life again. Namely, my blog. This is the kind of thing that was just never going to get done amid the swirl of other things to do.

I haven’t quite gotten to the point where I can hire a sales force yet, mainly because my pricing structure isn’t quite solidified enough to do it. But I am starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel. Hiring out some of my admin tasks and paperwork has taken some weight off of my shoulders so that I now have more time to focus on the things that matter.

Also, I found that hiring someone forced me to sit down and write out instructions describing how I do what I do. That has been quite insightful. I notice how many things that I just keep up in my head. Getting them on paper has shown me that it’s really not as complicated as I make it out to be.

“God” is a politically incorrect term these days, of course, but that hasn’t been the main thing stopping me from mentioning it in my blog posts. I have no problem offending people; I have several references I can provide that will back my story. Rather, I’ve been somewhat concerned about conveying inaccurate messages about my personal brand. I’ve held back from mentioning God in the context of my business for fear of coming across as someone pushing a religious agenda, or, God forbid, a cult follower.

I have decided that for me to not mention God in my business is equally inauthentic, and conveys an equally inaccurate impression about my personal branding. I won’t go into detail here, but I just want to mention and acknowledge that the spiritual realm has been integral and instrumental in the development of the Introverted Entrepreneur brand, and in my writing.

I should also mention that I have a highly unconventional view of the word “God” and what it means. This is partly because I was an atheist until 2007, right before I became an entrepreneur. The two are not coincidental. Before seeking out God, I didn’t have the guts to go into business for myself. I needed to see proof that it was going to work.

That’s really about it for now.