I’m a late night gal. Although, I do spark after my java and eggs in the mid AM and then again at 3 and again after tennis around 8 or nine. I suppose the point is we all have peak performance and high think zones. For a week, monitor your best creative juice output. What time is it? Then, if you can, plan your day accordingly.  We should not fight these waves of brilliance, we should leverage them.

If nothing else, have a pad ready at your peak times and make list of ideas for marketing, blog posts, new biz prospects. Do this every day for a week. By Friday, you’ll have a bunch of powerful stuff.

And hopefully you are an entrepreneur and can decide your schedule. And if you are not, you should highly consider the jump. It’s really the most awesome place to be.

Regimes and rituals do help me stay on course. But there are others days, I am a reckless, wild, free bird and fly all over the place and still produce.

Do what works for you. If it’s not working, try something new.

If you have not read Finding Flow, you should. It’s an awesome book. All of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi books are amazing.

For more on marketing, visit our Market your biz blog.

And what would you pay to live 5 more years? These questions and the answers are priceless, especially in  business.

When you think of PRICE what do you think of? Shopping? How much money you’ll have to spend to get something you want? The cost of an iPad, new shoes or a dress?

That’s certainly one form of PRICE but it’s actually so much more.

The video below is not only super cool, but it highlights a compelling pricing twist in consumer minds…

What about The Price of friends? The Price of fame? The Price of Free? Or even The Price of the Future?

Turns out price plays quite a role in daily human choices, but it’s often a radially different cost process than you’d think.

I recently I learned about a new book by NY Times editorial board member, Eduardo Porter, called The Price of Everything: Solving the Mystery of Why We Pay What We Do,  and found it very intriguing.

The premise is very simple: there is a price behind each call that we make, whether we’re deciding to have a baby, drive a car, or buy a book. We often fail to appreciate just how critical prices are as motivating forces shaping our lives. But their power becomes clear when distorted prices steer our decisions the wrong way.

This book is an eye-opener that will make you think. It also will expose you to some realities about PRICE that could shift your perspective in surprising ways.

This book is definitely a recommended read. And if you are interested in winning a free copy of this book, click here (you’ll need to sign up by the 11th) or download a free excerpt.

At this very moment you are putting a price on knowledge by clicking through or blowing it off. What are your thoughts about PRICE and why we pay what we do?

For more on pricing, view: Coupons, Groupon and gambling with a brand.

Gary Vaynerchuk (VAY NER CHUK), the star of Wine Library TV, is Director of Operations at Wine Library in Springfield, NJ. With his unconventional, often irreverent commentary on wine, Gary has attracted a cult-like following of more than 80,000 viewers a day. In the name of “expanding one’s palate”, Gary convinced Conan O’Brien to lick salted rocks and shared samples of dirt and grass with Ellen Degeneres. He routinely pans popular wines (even ones sold by Wine Library). He interrupts his webcasts with rants about his beloved New York Jets. This is not your typical wine expert.

Wine Library grew from a $4 million dollar business to a $45 million business. If that’s not enough to toast about, Gary also authored Crush it!

I read Crush it! after several people recommended that I do so. It is an easy to follow, high-energy guide for entrepreneurs and would-be business owners that will get readers fired up to turn their passion into a profitable venture. He gives step by step instructions on how to harness the power of social media to build your personal brand and your business. He makes the case that everyone needs a personal brand as the business environment has changed. Among other observations, he notes that the day of the traditional bullet point, word document resume is over, and that even if you are not going to venture out on your own, you need to have a strong online brand if you want to get hired. He does a great job of not candy coating the ease at which this feat will be executed. It is hard work.  Crush it! also explains how to turn a passion and/or hobby into a profession. However, he is realistic about what people can expect to earn.  The author doesn’t promise everyone that they will become millionaires, but it is possible to earn as much for yourself (mid 5 figures) as you might toiling away for someone else doing something that you’re not passionate about.

Key takeaways:

1.     Become an expert. Create bonds with other professionals in your field and to share your ideas and expertise on the social networks.

2.     Be true to your DNA and know that you can’t be all things to all people, but that’s OK. You will still appeal to an audience, your audience…as long as you are authentic.  Gary uses himself as an example. He knows that his outspoken, loud style does not appeal to all wine lovers (he has a popular vlog about wine and video wine library). We couldn’t agree more. We wrote about being who you are recently. You should also choose the online forum that is best suited to your personality: blog, vlog, podcast, etc.

3.     Even introverts can be charismatic. He believes that when people are passionate about something, their genuine excitement about the subject comes through and they become charismatic.

4.     You can monetize ANY passion, Gary uses someone who expounds on worms as fish bait as an example. But, passion alone is not enough. You will have to work hard (he mentions a 3AM bedtime for people starting their online biz after their day job and he says there will be no time for much of anything other than meals, family time and work).

5.     This endeavor is going to take a while to take off. He tells his audience not to expect huge results in less than 12 months, but that probably won’t matter since you will love what you are doing so much.

6.     Even with all the content out on the web, it is STILL possible to differentiate yourself and become number one in your space. Gary writes,  “to everyone who is freaking out because they fear the noise and distraction of all the additional content on the Internet, you can relax. Quality is a tremendous filter. Cream also rises, my friends, no matter how many cups of coffee you pour.”

I have a pile of business books that I have been meaning to read, and I am now determined to finish them by the end of the year. I had a great excuse last week when my power went out. I ran my laptop until the battery died. When it did, I decided not to relocate to a place where I could power up and sat down to read instead.

Tribes
I started with Seth Godin’s Tribes. It is a collection, I believe, of blog posts on leadership. If you are an entrepreneur, or if you work for a company and have the desire to champion a cause, this book will help ignite that fire.  A few key takeaways for me were:

1.     The definitions of a tribe and its dynamics.  “A tribe is a group of people, connected to one another, connected to a leader and connected to an idea. A group needs only two things to be a tribe: a shared interest and a way to communicate. Tribes need leadership. Sometimes one person leads, sometimes more.  You can’t have a tribe without a leader–and you can’t be a leader without a tribe.”

2.     A tribe is formed when someone sees a group that is asking to be led. For example, “Fox News didn’t persuade millions of people to become conservative; they just assembled the tribe and led them where they were already headed.” Capitalize on a non-obvious moment/opportunity; get there first.

3.     A manager is not a leader. A manager operates within the status quo of the “factory.” The leader sees an opportunity to do things differently (and better) and sees a group that is willing to move toward that change. The leader doesn’t wait to be asked to lead, he or she just does it.

4.     The internet provides unprecedented opportunities for leaders and tribes to connect. One person with a YouTube.com account can impact the world in 24 hours with the right video. The power quotient has shifted.  Just look at the power of blogging, anyone can broadcast their thoughts or ideas and lead or form a tribe.

5.     Necessary ingredients for a tribe leader. Genuine passion and charisma – if you don’t have that, people will see through you and a tribe won’t follow. Authentic generosity – a true leader doesn’t need credit for his or her ideas, he or she is happy for them to be spread. The ability to use criticism to improve, curiosity, heresy (vs status quo), faith, remarkability, fearlessness, leadership/empowerment, passion and reinvention.

6.     Recipe for starting a micromovement: a manifesto, connectablity and tracking progress.  Making money can’t be the ultimate goal of the micromovement, that will guarantee its failure.

7.     Persuasion: don’t start with opposition, seek the uncommitted passionates.

8.     Elements of leadership: challenge status quo, create culture, be charismatic, communicate vision, connect.

9.     Do not get stuck in the way things were or are, get busy turning things into what they could be.

10.  Change isn’t made by asking permission. Change is made by asking for forgiveness later.

11.  True leaders understand that change is not only omnipresent, but the key to success.

12.  Great leaders listen to tribe members. However, truly great leaders can listen to the other opinion, still do what they had intended and retain loyal tribe followers.  He used Ronald Regan as an example of a leader with this quality.

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