There are a lot of people in the advertising industry who hate this.

It’s the same as students who hate tests or athletes who don’t want to look at the scoreboard.

Some people don’t like the accountability of measured results. Many advertising types prefer to talk about vague terms such as “creativity” or “visual impact.” Bring up the subject of results and they often look like scared rabbits. Frankly, I love measured results. It can be tough on the ego at times. But it eliminates a lot of guesswork and helps assure that campaigns are effective. After all, marketing should be a bottom-line activity.

Recently, we conducted some tests using local Facebook ads and I’d like to share the results.

The technique we used is called “split testing.”

Split testing is a powerful strategy for increasing the effectiveness of advertising. Two versions of an ad are created. One half of your target group see one version of an ad, the other half sees the alternate version. By tracking the number of responses you can determine which ad is more effective. You then use the one that generates the best results in your future advertising. Split testing can help compare different selling appeals, prices, and just about any aspect of your product or service.

By using Google or Facebook ads, you can get results quickly and with a minimum amount of money being invested. In this case, the client was a dental practice looking to attract new patients. The service being offered was a teeth-whitening program.

TEST NUMBER ONE

For the first test, identical headlines and body copy were used. What was being tested was the image. In one, we focused on a close up of woman with an attractive smile. The second image was a close up of just a beautiful smile. Which do you think did a better job of attracting people who wanted to whiten their teeth? Here are the two options that were tested:

Result: The ad with the full face pulled 400% better than the ad with just the close-up of the smile.

TEST NUMBER TWO

The next test compared two different headlines. The first used the “A Whiter Smile For Summer” headline. The second used “Whiten Your Smile for $99.” Again, the only difference between the two ads was the headline. Which do you think got better results?

Results: The headline “Whiten Your Smile for $99″ pulled 53% better than the headline, “A Whiter Smile For Summer.” It appears that bringing the specific price up into the headline added a “deal” factor to the ad that made it more compelling. This then became our new winner and the ad to beat. (This is called “the control” in direct response advertising terms.)

TEST NUMBER THREE

For the next test, we compared an image of a pleasant older couple against our control. All other factors were kept the same. Would both a man and woman with great smiles generate more responses than a single woman?

Results: Again, the image with the smiling woman produced better results, yielding a 58% better response rate. At this point we decided we should give the smiling woman a name. We decided on “Melissa.” It was much easier than constantly saying “the pleasant, smiling, blonde woman.”

TEST NUMBER FOUR

Next, Melissa had to defend her top spot against an attractive younger woman. Again, the only difference was the image. All other factors were kept the same.

Results: The new woman did quite well, out pulling all of our other tested ads. However, she was unable to do better than Melissa. Melissa out pulled the challenger by 47%. So, as our “control” Melissa continues to run.

TESTING – THE KEY TO RESULTS

One thing that becomes crystal clear through testing is that different selling messages and images get different results. If you are not tracking your results and testing new appeals, you are not getting the best yield from your marketing.

By using tools such as Google Adwords or Facebook, it is possible to get tangible results in days. They are very fast tools for measuring the effectiveness of different ads. By building on what works best, you can enhance the results your marketing generates (like what Richard did here). The best way to know what works is to test and measure your results. If you haven’t done so already, make testing a key part of your marketing strategy.

We get given so many gifts don’t we? Birthdays, Christmas, Easter, Anniversary’s, Mothers Day and Fathers Day, Kids Days, Family Days, but we too have so many more gifts that remain undelivered and hence unopened. These are the gifts inside of ourselves – our talent, our ability, our “reach”, our innate knowing – all there ripe for the opening.

There are, however, people who have accepted all their gifts – all opened, no more to come. They accepted the gift that life would always be “x” way and they are done, now living according to that gift they unwrapped and accepted.

And then there are others who continue to open a ready supply of gifts…their gifts… and in so doing they remove the wrap, shed layers and create an opportunity for their gift to shine; to be accepted not only by themselves but by others too. These people live according to progress and change and consistently allow an evolution in their life to take place. I am sure in your life you have met people who have said “Oh she is gifted, talented in “x” area” or “He is amazing, so talented and smart”

So what are your gifts? Do you know? I offer to you, that innately you know. The begging question is…are you prepared to ask the required questions to find out? And better yet are you prepared to trust in what you hear come back. Remember the Calumet Copper Mine and the man who listened, heard, trusted, took action and started digging? Well his life was changed forever; never to be what it was again. All because he unwrapped his gift of listening to himself and on that particular day he heard.

So what will your day be like TODAY or tomorrow?

Will you begin to live according to your innate knowing?

I suggest you unwrap yourself, layer by layer and create a new you. Use all of yourself to actualize your world and be guided by the voice inside to discover and utilize once and for all your unwrapped gifts.

If you would like assistance with peeling away your layers to access your gifts then please email Lotika, client concierge for Vital Practice Essentials on lotika@drsarahfarrant.com and we will send you the details on how to get your appointment scheduled! Don’t delay, ACT today!

There always appears to be a number of hats we wear either in life or in business. We make the choices according to what we love to do, read, interact with, teach, and share or what we lacked when growing up. In Edward de Bono’s book the Six Thinking Hats he outlined six different ways to think. In writing his book he has helped individuals think differently and stimulated group discussion. His approach provides an opportunity for groups of people to come together and think more effectively.

It has been many years since I read his book but over the past few months I have been doing some piecing together, research if you would like to call it that, well as “researchie” as a philosopher can get, of my own in relation to business being a reflection of our life.

In playing with the seven areas of life I came up with the following table which reflects the seven areas of our business and then more specifically the seven areas of practice. It shows how they so innately MAP together and mirror one another. I have written it purely so business people, like yourself, can see how connected our life is to our business. Oh, and I added some colour in for fun after being reminded of and inspired by Edward de Bono!

If you have any questions then please email them in. This is new and I am putting it together as more comes to light for me through reading, wondering and asking different questions!

Here are the seven (7) areas of life, business and practice and the corresponding colour…

Want to have a little fun with your team? Well here’s an exercise, which will enable your team meetings to come alive …

1. Print off this article
2. Take it to your next team meeting
3. Determine which person suits which hat
4. Some might have two!
5. Measure the size of the person’s head
6. Go and buy some coloured hats…one for each person!

The hats become like the talking hat in Harry Potter one! What fun! But…

If you really do, amongst the fun, look to see the benefit in what I have identified for you here as the seven areas of business and practice you will no doubt be making sure that your Vital MAP – your Master Action Plan (others call it a policies and procedures manual…boring!) covers all of these areas enabling your practice to be connected. Now as chiropractors don’t we love that!

If you would like assistance with instigating or updating your Vital MAP or making changes to your existing one then please email Lotika, client concierge for Vital Practice Essentials on lotika@drsarahfarrant.com and we will send you the details on how to get your appointment scheduled!

It is an interesting story and one that has you left saying “Are You Serious?”

Detroit mother Maryanne Godboldo faces multiple felony charges and was being held on $500,000 bond after a 10-hour standoff with a heavily armed police SWAT team. Godboldo was protecting her 13-year-old daughter from unnecessary medication ordered by the state.

Godboldo’s daughter was born with a defective foot that required amputation of her leg below the knee, which led to Maryanne becoming a stay-at-home mother after her birth, according to Health Impact News Daily.

Despite her health challenges, Arianna swam, sang, danced and played the piano. However, as the home schooled girl approached middle school age, she apparently wanted to start attending public school, and therefore had to “catch up” on immunizations the state insists are required under color of law.

According to her aunt, Penny Godboldo, the girl suffered an adverse reaction to the immunizations. “She began acting out of character, being irritated, having facial grimaces that have been associated with immunizations,” Penny told the Detroit News. Maryanne Godboldo sought help from the Children’s Center, an organization claiming to help families with at-risk children.

Godboldo told relatives the medications ordered by the doctor worsened symptoms, including behavioral problems. When Godboldo refused to give her child the prescribed medication, Child Protective Services (CPS) became involved. CPS obtained a warrant to remove the girl, but Maryanne reportedly refused to surrender the child to the state.

This situation is clearly showing, refusing to medicate your children with Big Pharma’s mind-altering drugs is now being treated as a felony crime.

Here are some additional facts as reported by Mike Adams…

• Maryanne Godboldo is an African American mother of a teenager daughter. She lives in Detroit.

• Child Protective Services (CPS) personnel attempted to kidnap Maryanne’s 13-year-old daughter. They accused her of not giving her child psychiatric medication prescribed by her doctor.

• Maryanne says the medication caused side effects in her daughter and made her condition worse, which is why she refused to give her daughter the medication.

• The medication was Risperdal, an antipsychotic medication approved to treat symptoms of schizophrenia is known for causing serious side effects such as abdominal pain, vomiting, aggression, anxiety, dizziness and lack of coordination. See a complete list of side effects of psychiatric medications from CCHR: (http://www.cchr.org)

• When Maryanne refused to let CPS take her daughter away, CPS personnel then called the police, who then broke down her front door and attempted to raid her home to kidnap her daughter by force.

• The police did NOT have a warrant or any court documents whatsoever granting them any right to enter Maryanne’s home, according to Godboldo’s attorneys.

• Police say that after they smashed in the front door, Maryanne opened fire on them.

• A SWAT team was then called in, carrying semiautomatic rifles and sniper gear. A 12-hour standoff ensued.

• Maryanne eventually surrendered to the SWAT team, and the state took her daughter to a psychiatric hospital

• Maryanne Godboldo now faces multiple felony charges: firing a weapon in a dwelling, felonious assault, resisting and obstructing an officer, and use of a firearm in the commission of a felony.

• Community groups in Detroit are now rallying on behalf of the family there, shouting “Free Arianna”, her daughter.

What you are witnessing here with Maryanne Godboldo is the tyranny of the medical police state and Child Protective Services workers who are now front-line enforcers of Big Pharma’s deadly agenda to drug our children.

That this is happening is not just an assault on Maryann Godboldo, but an assault on our rights and freedoms as sovereign human beings. Do we not have the right to say NO to a medication we don’t want our children to take? Do we not have the right to protect our children? How did medication become something to be enforced with bullets and SWAT teams? And more importantly, how far will this go before it ends?

Thanks to Mike Adams of NaturalNews.com and Kurt Nimmo of Infowars.com for this ezine article.

P.S If you’re a chiropractor/health professional reading this then please support the people who are looking for a vital health professional in your area. To register you and your business click here

I was sharing with you I had watched a film called A Knights Tale. And if you haven’t watched it please go check it out from your local DVD shop or online DVD distributor. It is a fabulous movie and we can draw many parallels of William Thatcher’s journey from commoner to nobility with what is currently happening in chiropractic and the movement taking place. It is wonderful to be apart of.

What follows are insights from the movie and how they translate to you, your business, your practice members and the profession.

1. William Thatcher had a vision, he was clear he wanted to be a knight. He believed that he would be. How clear are you on your vision?




2. William Thatcher chose to do something different; to go against convention. It would appear that chiropractic is consistently doing this; going against what the majority say health is. Looking perhaps for acceptance from other professions and at times becoming the chamellion to fit in to a different model. William Thatcher didn’t care he stood true to himself.




3. William Thatcher stood on his dime and didn’t waiver. His belief was so strong, at no time did he wish to give up even when people were telling him he should. He stood tall and believed he would become a knight. He fought for his spot when others told him it couldn’t be done.




4. William Thatcher broke people’s illusions about becoming a knight. People saw only one way to get there. Just like chiropractic there are situations ripe for the taking in teaching people about health and where it comes from. William was masterful in identifying and grabbing the opportunity presented to him. Are you grabbing every opportunity to tell people about chiropractic and the truth about health?




5. William Thatcher spoke a specific language… it’s call a lance…hello! William and the rest of his tribe spoke a very specific language, the language of knight’s. Afterall if he was going to be a knight then he would have to take on all aspects of being a knight. It is the same in chiropractic. If we are choosing to be chiropractors then speaking our own unique language is imperative to the congruency of the message. Are you attuning to the chiropractic language or are you using words that cross three professions – medical, alternative and chiropractic – mixing the message and confusing the people?




6. William Thatcher was born to break the rules. So too is chiropractic, birthed to break the illusions and ruffle some feathers!

If you would like assistance with your language then contact Lotika, Client Concierge for Vital Practice Essentials for your FREE copy of “Building A Vital Vocab”

I came across this piece of writing a while ago now, actually it was whilst I was going through Palmer and I recently found it again. It was written by a lady called Hunter Lovins who founded the Rocky Mountain Insitute in Colorado, USA. It is a story essentially about patch ups. It is my wish for you to share it with your practice members too.

Here is the writing by Hunter Lovins.

“In the early 1950’s, the World Health Organization was faced with the problem of malaria among the Dayak people in Borneo. They had an answer that was short, simple and wrong. Their plan was to spray DDT all over the place and kill the mosquitoes that carried malaria. The mosquito population declined, the incidence of malaria dropped, and the program was declared a success.

They discovered, however, that the roofs of the people’s houses were falling in on their heads. It seems that the DDT had poisoned wasps which fed off thatch eating caterpillars. Without the wasps, the caterpillars proliferated, they ate the thatch, and the roofs fell in.

The World Health Organization found it also had a worse problem because the DDT had built up in the food chain. It got into the insects, which were eaten by little lizard-like creatures called geckos, which were eaten by the cats. The cats died, the rats flourished, and the World Health Organization was faced with an outbreak of sylvatic plague and typhus. A situation the W.H.O. had, itself, created.

They were then obliged to parachute live cats into Borneo to try again to control the rat population.The lesson one should draw is that in many instances, our current problems are caused by prior solutions that were not thought out well enough. All things interact, often in ways we don’t understand. But at the same time, if we understand the interactions better, the solutions we come up with will go further than we might initially have thought. The solutions can then beget even more solutions”

Are you providing the opportunity for your practice members to see the longer term benefits of the chiropractic approach to health and life or are you and your team focused on the short term?

If we take a closer look at the nerve system – the body’s communicating system – we notice a series of intricate and well-designed wires leading in many different directions. To the untrained eye it would seem chaotic, but the body knows what to do every time, one hundred percent of the time, provided there is no interference. There are thousands upon thousands of nerves, all of which come together at the base of the skull to form the spinal cord. There are thirty-three pairs of nerves coming from the cord itself and each branches with other nerves in order to innervate all the cells, tissues, organs and systems of the body. This then creates one hundred percent coordinated function, which further enables the expression of health to take place. If we look closely at the cellular level we see twelve different nerve fibers innervating it. Remember, this is only at the cellular level. Furthermore, there is an average of 100,000 synaptic endings for every nerve fiber. There are, therefore, over 1.2 million nerve endings that are constantly hooking up in various intricate ways to innervate one cell. The body truly is ingenious in design and the more I learn about it the more I am humbled by the intelligence that runs it.

The spinal cord itself is an extremely delicate structure and therefore needs protection. The wisdom of the body decided to encase the most delicate structure of all in a moveable bony structure called the skull. The wisdom – the innate intelligence – didn’t stop at encasing just the brain but also realized the cord and initial part of the nerves needed protection, and so further developed the individual moveable bones (vertebra) of the spinal column.

Now that we know how intricate the system is, you probably have also figured out the importance of keeping the communication system free of interference so that proper functioning and expression of health can take place. Remember, nature needs no help, just no interference.

The time was the 1800s. The industrial revolution was well underway. Factories were ablaze with smoking chimney stacks and people were certainly optimistic about their futures. In Davenport, Iowa, a little town on the Mississippi, boats were delivering cargo and picking up material to take elsewhere. In this bustling town a discovery was about to emerge, a discovery that would change the direction of health care in the immediate present and foreseeable future. A discovery so great that people’s lives would change as a result. Some would embrace and integrate this new understanding whilst others would be challenged and threatened and as a result try and stop the spread of this vital truth.

A young gentleman by the name of Daniel David Palmer (later to become known as “D.D”) had an office in the Ryan building in downtown Davenport. He was working as a magnetic healer at the time and was about to discover one of the world’s best-kept secrets. The building’s janitor shared with D.D. he had been deaf for 17 years and when D.D. offered to check the young janitor, he found a displaced vertebra. D.D. offered to adjust the displaced vertebra and with Harvey Lilliard’s permission he set about doing just that. After the adjustment, Harvey Lilliard shared with D.D. that he could hear once again the sound of the horse and cart over the cobbled roads. Within a week, as story goes, Harvey had his hearing restored. Although the act of replacing displaced vertebra into their proper position had been practiced across the globe for hundreds and hundreds of years, it was D. D. Palmer who was the first person to write about the connection between nerve system interference and the functioning of the body.

Chiropractors are taught that the nerve system is the master system of the body. It innervates all the cells, tissues, organs, and systems. This philosophy has not changed today.

The vitalistic (chiropractic) and the mechanistic (medicinal) approach to health became more prominent in the 1800s and these two approaches became the dominating health professions. But it was in 1895 when Chiropractic arrived on the health scene with a very different message.

Stay tuned for part 2…

Are you wanting to put more profit in your pocket? If so, what steps or strategies do you have in place to make sure it happens? One of the ways to get there is by playing a different game. What do I mean by that?

Well let me explain a little more…

Back in 2000 myself, Randall and my mum and dad went to Las Vegas for a week. We had a ball and all agreed it was the best holiday we had all had together. As we walked through the plethora of casinos I was mesmerised by the people playing poker. Now I am not a casino player but I watched and learned some valuable business lessons during this time. …

• I watched people approach various tables and selectively choose which one to stop at.
• I watched people observe other players, see in what position those players were in and if the person thought what they brought to the game was unique enough and could win, they played.
• People had enough bank roll for the risks they were taking.
• The player with the most stamina and focus usually won.
• The player surrounded themselves with talented players.
• If it wasn’t going their way, they played a different game!

Do these ring a bell for your business?

There really are so many “places” where you can focus your business – women, pregnant women, mothers, children, sports, elderly, business men, teenagers. It really is endless. The important point however is to establish a focus that is right for YOU and play the game you want to play. And if it’s not working then it is okay to play differently, to be adaptable. Establish the rules and the focus for yourself. We can really learn so much about business from watching the players at casinos.

The idea is to make sure in whatever game you are playing…

• you bring all of yourself to that game and establish yourself as distinctly different,
• you have enough business cash reserve to play well,
• you remain focused and keep the bright shiny objects at bay,
• you make sure the talented players are on your team in a mentoring capacity or a team player capacity and,
• you establish an exit plan if you want to play a different game.

The main reason businesses go under is because of an inability to adapt and quickly respond to change!

Remember our friend Einstein said insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. So, if you’re paralysed with doing the same thing over and over again and you’re expecting a different result each time, then isn’t it time to play a different game? To get clear and focused somewhere else? If you do, no doubt you will put more profit in your pocket!

Your business and the growth of your business has a cap on it according to how vast your personal growth is and the steps you are taking to expand it. I mentioned two books I had recently devoured and emphasised that they have one thing in common – customer service.

I know you are probably going customer service I know all there is to know about that…you just make sure people are polite, humble and grateful whilst giving them what they want…right? Well not really. That certainly is part of it but not the big part of it. For me there is something alluring about being involved either creatively or via ownership in something where the sole purpose is to create an experience and an emotional journey for people. In previous Vital Communications articles I’ve mentioned for instance the Disney Experience and how there are vast differences between Disneyland and Disneyworld. Walt certainly built an experience that elicits an emotional journey for people at Disneyworld. But lets look at another example, an example that had this company create their own experience for people and not mechanistically go by what everyone else was doing.

When Southwest Airlines first started, they did not see their customer scope, their customer experience as limited to just existing airline travelers, which was at the time what all the other airlines where doing and continue to do. Instead, they chose to provide service to all the people who traveled by Greyhound bus or by train. They literally deisgned their business around this one focused difference, using smaller airport locations outside of major cities avoiding the standard “hub” approach of most major airlines. They also offered shorter flights at cheap prices and fun flights and made it easy for customers to change flights without paying huge penalties. And part of their service was to turn their planes around at airports as fast as possible. They succeed because they decide to play a different hand, different than all the other airlines are playing. It’s a great example isn’t it.

Customer service is not a department, it’s your entire company, your entire business. It infillrates everything and helps form your business experience. It just so happens your business experience is happening concurrently with your customer service experience and in the end shapes your company.

So here are some questions to answer about you and your team…

1. Are you creating an evolving company or a revolving company? Historically companies that get into trouble are the ones that cannot adapt to change and respond quickly enough. Can you respond?
2. Are you willing to make short term sacrifices (including revenue and profit) for long term gain whilst protecting your company culture and experience?
3. What is your company culture?
4. What is your company experience?
5. Are you trusting your employees to provide great customer service or are you mechanically telling them what to do, including providing scripts?
6. Are there customers who are rude to your employees? If so have you let those customers move on?
7. Are you letting your employees think out side of the box?
8. Are you allowing your employees to do whatever it takes to keep a client however unusual or bizzare the situation?

I had an experience just a day ago actually where American Airlines lost my luggage. I went to the baggage area and reported my suitcase lost and ran into a problem – I was leaving the next day to return home and they were saying I wouldn’t receive it in time. To cut a long story short they were unwilling, because of company policy restrictions, to do whatever it took to think outside of the box so I could leave as a satisfied AA client. I ended up telling them how to think outside of the box, do this first, call here next, ask this question. I was a little irritated lets say! Eventually I got my luggage back but only because I, the customer, persisted. Shouldn’t it be the other way, enabling the cusomter to be at ease with the situation AND having a company policy that empowers emplyees to do whatever it takes – however creative or bizzare – to keep the client. After all it costs more to get a new client that it does to keep an existing one!

Did you know thousands of people walked over the Calumet Copper Mine in Michigan without ever discovering it? Literally thousands of people. Then one day, just one man, on his own, got busy picking away at the earth and found it. Was he lucky? Well those in a mechanistic world would think so. But what he did that day over everybody else that had walked that same path was to stop and take ACTION. He listened to his inner voice, lifted his pick and started.

I wonder how many times you’ve stepped over opportunities because your will was paralysed, or you assumed you were unable, or you didn’t have the finances, or you spent too much time procrastinating about the procrastination. Is that you? Are you passing up your piece of the ACTION for a life of frustration, floundering and financial disasters?

The number one quality of a person in ACTION is ATTRACTION…the last 6 letters spell it out!

Simply put when we are in ACTION we are attractive. Doors open where we previously thought they were shut and people pop out of the “wood work” to assist us in keeping the momentum going. There is a general ease that starts to happen as the momentum is building. Leonardo Da Vinci sums it up well…

“It has long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to do things.”
- Leonardo Da Vinci

Here are just three tips to get you from INACTION to ACTION and all the way to ATTRACTION…

1) Make a choice. Life is not happening to you. You are the captain of your own ship; you get to set the sail.

2) Watch out for the mechanistic “What If’s” they certainly play with your mind and can keep you in a procrastinated state.

3) De-clutter your practice, business, study, house, bedroom and pantry cupboards. Stop carrying the extra burden around!

You know YOU ARE standing on your own Calumet Mine right now, without knowing it, without realizing it, in whatever position you are filling. Dig down and see what is under the surface of your position…you just might be surprised that your own mine exists!

The question is… Are you ready to take the ACTION to see?

There really are many ways to live your life but there are few that will contest that there are many ways to run your business. In fact there are true and tested ways that, if soundly followed, will enable you to establish a profitable business and contribute handsomely to the life of your dreams. But you have to be prepared to look inside – yourself and your business. And, there are many ways to do this. Just look at the number of books on the business shelves at Borders, Barnes and Noble and other such stores. But, there are business principles that I will share with you here that don’t cost the earth, in fact cost nothing, and by merely implementing them and following through with them will enable you to build a profitable business.

Here are seven points to have in place and remember all of these COST YOU NOTHING!

1) Begin preparing and planning for your business growth. Business planning isn’t a single event in the life of your business. It doesn’t matter what stage your business has reached in its growth cycle – whether it is growing as planned, is having problems, or even moving away from its core business – you must regularly revisit, review and refine all the processes involved in creating and carrying out your business plan. A business plan is the formal structure upon which to build your business. It enables you to:

• Document each stage of your businesses growth.

• Make periodic assessments of each area of your business.

• Make a smooth transition at each stage of growth.

2) Create a structure where each team member knows what area of the business they are responsible for. Agreements are made as to the process to be adopted and the timetable to complete the plan.

3) Know your business. What business are you really in? Lots of people say they are chiropractors and I get that I am one too. But let’s take this one step further. A mentor of mine said to me everyone is in the business of marketing! He would say chiropractors are marketers they are just marketing using the chiropractic message or the health message. So know your business and know what line of business you are in. It makes all the difference to become and remain the master of your ship.

4) Collect information and gather data. Your practice members or clients are of huge value to you. When you start to realize the cost of gaining a new client you will soon begin to realize the true value of the people you already have. Find out as much about them as you can – where do they predominately live, income level, disposable income level, number of children, employed or business owner, religion. All this data makes for great opportunities in the market place when you know who your ideal client is. This one is highlighted…KNOW YOUR IDEAL CLIENT!

5) Analyze your facts. Look at your businesses patterns. Just like we look for patterns and changes in people as they progress through care and create the opportunities to change their life so too do we do this in our business. Look for the patterns in the monthly reports you run so you can maximize your opportunities!

6) Plan your future.

• Create a Vision – where you want your business to be then

• Look at the Mission the steps to how the vision will be achieved.

• Next set the monthly Objectives for instance number of new practice members

• Create broad statements or Strategies as to how the objectives will be met.

7) Give ownership. Ensure your team members have a feeling of ownership. Consistently update and/or change the area of “ownership” as the positions on the team change and new people come into the business or existing members change positions.

To balance this all out I want you to also see what some of the pitfalls are and how these can lead to setting yourself up to fail:

• Your plans are always short term.

• You want to create a profitable business but you’re not prepared to DO WHATEVER it takes to get there.

• There is no inbuilt accountability for yourself or your team.

• Team members are not in the loop.

• There is no vision.

• You’re unable to read a report.

• You are blind to the weaknesses in your business.

• You don’t monitor, update or implement existing or new information.

• Your agreements are not implemented.

So I will pose this question to you again… “Are You Prepared To Look Inside Yourself, To Create A Business That Is Profitable So You Can Live The Life of Your Dreams? And are you willing to do what it takes to get there?

As I draw to the end of the year I ask myself… how wide was my reach this year? Did I do all that I could with all that I had and was given?

And what about you, do you think you did all that you could with what you had or were given? And if you did what got you there? Did you have a map or was life blindly taking you in a direction you wanted to go, satisfied with the landing place?

I’ve been reading a book lately called The War of Art by Steven Pressfield, a fabulous book and an easy read. I do recommend it for a stocking stuffer! It reminds me of the pops up we have – you know the ones – “you’re no good, do you really want to do that or better yet the pop ups that have you sit procrastinating about your procrastination problem”. Yes I can see the smile on your face and the nodding of your head.

We all have these little pieces of resistance that pop up. And resistance is what Pressfield calls the fear that paralyses us like a kangaroo in headlights for either a short time or sometimes for the whole of our life time and prevents us from putting our blessing out to the world. One of the resistances he so eloquently reminds me of is on page 37 where he speaks of Socrates. He says Socarates demonstrated long ago that the truly free individual is free only to the extent of his own self-mastery. I wanted to share this piece this month given that 2011 is just around the corner and the question begs to be asked…How wide are you planning to reach?

This is “The Golden Book” on the right there. I took a picture of it when I found it knowing it was something I wanted to share with you all. Things like this are gems aren’t they? I remember doing the Dale Carnegie course back in the 80’s…obviously I knew at one level my life would unfold on a stage! This little book is 4 (small) pages, written in 1936, given to me by my dad and is straight to the point. I image business people carried it around in their hip pocket reminding them of the principles and sayings.

I’m going to share with you the points taken from “How To Win Friends And Influence People” as they are outlined exactly in Dale Carnegie’s “The Golden book”…enjoy.

Become a Friendlier Person

• Don’t criticize, condemn or complain.
• Give honest, sincere appreciation.
• Arouse in the other person an eager want.
• Become genuinely interested in other people.
• Smile.
• Remember that a person’s name is to him or her the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
• Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
• Talk in terms of the other persons interests.
• Make the other person feel important – and do it sincerely.

Win People to Your Way of Thinking

• The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it (not sure if BJ would agree with this he always said “conflict clarifies!”).
• Show respect for the other person’s opinions. Never tell a person he or she is wrong.
• If you are wrong, admit it quickly and empathically.
• Begin in a friendly way.
• Get the other person saying “yes, yes” immediately (ummm…the “yes yes” agreement!).
• Let the other person do a great deal of the talking.
• Let the other person feel that the idea is his or hers.
• Try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view (we know trying is an illusion…you either do it or you don’t as my dad taught me!).
• Be sympathetic with the other person’s ideas and desires.
• Appeal to the nobler motives.
• Dramatize your ideas (I see chiropractors doing this!).
• Throw down a challenge (I can also see chiropractors doing this!).

Be a Leader

• Begin with praise and honest appreciation.
• Call attention to people’s mistakes indirectly.
• Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person.
• Ask questions instead of giving direct orders.
• Let the other person save face.
• Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement. Be “hearty in your approbation and lavish in your praise.”
• Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to.
• Use encouragement. Make the fault seem easy to correct.
• Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest.

Copyright© Dale Carnegie 1936

After a series of adjustments, Ben’s cranium started to balance itself. His neck movements started to become larger and overall the boy came alive. Sue and Mark took Ben back to the pediatrician. While Sue was sitting in the waiting room, she couldn’t help but notice another mother sitting there with her child who was already in a helmet. Sue found she couldn’t stop herself from sharing the information with the mother about her experience of regular adjustments and the impact it had made to Ben’s life and their own life in such a short time. Sue sat there sharing everything with this lady until the pediatrician came out to call the next patient. The pediatrician couldn’t help but also notice the changes in Ben’s cranium. He was astonished at the results in such a short period of time.

B.J. Palmer said “you never know how far reaching something you may think, say or do today that will affect the lives of millions tomorrow”. Sue affected the life of the lady in the waiting room by sharing her story and Chiropractic affected the lives of Sue, Mark, and Ben. Nature truly needs no help, just no interference.

Truth

• Nature needs no help, just no interference.
• Let’s not interfere with what is a natural process.
• Do you help the grass to grow? Do you help the sun to rise?
• Babies know what to do every time, all the time, in just the right sequence at just the right time in order to create limitless potential for themselves provided there is no interference.

Questions

• Are you or is somebody you know pregnant? If so, find a chiropractor in your area and begin creating the opportunity for your body and baby to function differently – physically, chemically, and emotionally. Give your child the best possible start to life.

I promised you there would be more on last week’s post this week and here it is…

After three weeks, the intricacies of the construction call for an overseeing system to govern the ongoing development. It is at this stage that we see the formation of the brain and the nerve system to help coordinate this development and shall do so for the rest of our lives, provided there is no interference. The nerve system controls all the functions of the cells, tissues, organs and systems of the body within the embryonic stage through to the adult stage in the physical lifetime. The nerve system is responsible for the homeostasis mechanism which, enables us to adapt to an ever-changing external environment based on our perceptions. Now, a system like this needs no help, just no interference!

The skeleton begins to form at around week five and six and is designed to do so until you are fully formed. Ever noticed that we all have two ears which are situated either side of our head? Or that our eyes are situated just under our forehead in the orbital cavity and below our eyebrows? What enables this to happen? The internal wisdom of the body – the innateness of design, if you will – creates this without us consciously thinking about it. At only eleven weeks all the system of the body are in working order with the muscles and nerves working together to create the first movements and the entire system fits into the size of our little finger. Ain’t that grand! Only five weeks later the baby is identifiable as a human being, with eyelids, ears, nose, mouth, fingernails, feet, and organs. All these are coordinated to enable growth and development under the watchful eye of the intelligence of life within, coupled with the governing system: the nerve system.

At around 18 weeks it is possible to clearly see the child sucking its thumb. We now know one of the benefits to this is the preparation for breast feeding upon birth. It also helps regulate the sacral occipital motion and the pumping of the cerebrospinal fluid around the body delivering nutrients to the nerve system and taking toxins away….and next week I shall add some more to the growth and life of the unborn child. Stay tuned to this blog post!

It’s interesting to note that the power that made your body has the ability to heal your body. Imagine the difference if everybody in the world adopted this knowledge and lived by it – wouldn’t the world’s diseased conditions and illness rates be very different? No longer would we be putting synthetic formulas or tablets into the body thinking that this would improve health. It is most harmful to our longevity on this planet.

I have chosen to be part of a profession, which has a philosophy that is a way of life; a philosophy that teaches that health is expressed from the inside out. Our ability to heal ourselves and express health is an innate knowing far greater than our educated minds. It also suggests we were born with a limitless potential to express health. Regaining, maintaining, growing and educating ourselves in health is our responsibility. Based on our knowledge and understanding, we make choices for ourselves which in turn create our reality. What is important is to respect the life and intelligence within our body and know how amazing it is.

For the sheer purpose of increasing our awareness and our of respect for the internal intelligence that keeps us functioning every day of our life, let me illustrate the intricate order of events that take place in the design of making who we are as the physical being.

Upon ejaculation, the sperm knows what to do – not just once, but time and time again. They swim and swim and swim, competing against each other for the right to penetrate the ovum wall. Provided there is no interference, the sperm find their way to the egg every time. Upon fertilization there is now ALL the necessary cells to form a human being. Remarkable. Proteins, DNA codes, organs and nerves are ready to work harmoniously together to form a human being, and provided there is no interference this shall be complete at the end of nine months.

Read on to find out what the past few months have been like for myself, my husband and our three young children…

Back in March this year I said to my husband…

Something is going to happen in July/August
I don’t know what it is but it’s going to change our lives, the lives of our children and children around the world.

On July 22nd, three days before my birthday, my life changed.

I was at home on the phone and in walked our nanny. She’d arrived home with two of our three children. Our eldest was at home with me, lying asleep in our bed, with a health expression he had created for himself a few days prior. I was on the phone interviewing a new person for a different position in my company.

I sensed that something was up; not quite right. I got up and walked towards her muting the phone I called “is everything okay?”

It was like a tiger being let out of a cage…

I walked closer to our bedroom where she was standing and our eldest was lying. I noticed she’d pulled the doona off him waking him up. She began yelling “I can’t believe he has flannelette pajamas on and water bottles in the bed with him and he is as hot as anything” I relied saying he is in my bed and the water bottles were for me from the night before and they are cold. She proceeded to the freezer to get out something frozen to place on his fore head. He looked at me with a confused, puzzled look having never at the age of 8 had anything like this before. I stood in the kitchen frozen, paralyzed, wondering what was going on.

She turned on me again and pointed at my middle boy who stood over near the couch looking at me with confused eyes as well and she yelled “do you know he has a temperature?”

“And?” I said

“His temperature is 38.7C” (101.66F)

“And?” I said

“Well that is dangerously high and he could have a fit.”

“What’s your point?” I said

She continued finishing with the one line I knew was about to change my world…

“I have no choice but to…

To find out what happened next go to Vital Moms

There is always balance in any situation – the good and the bad. This situation sparked such a HUGE flame under me and it’s the reason why I’m so proud to bring you Vital Moms – the #1 place for VITAL answers when your family is faced with tough health choices.

It has finally arrived and now ready for launch. What I have been working on behind the scenes for the past 2 months has finally come to fruition and I’m excited to be sharing it with you.

People have the right to choose out of the three separate and distinct health approaches available (I’ve shared these in previous ezine issues) is right for themselves and their children.

This is where Vital Moms comes in.

Vital Moms is dedicated to protecting, educating and supporting parents/moms and professionals in the alternate (vitalistic) health choices they make. When my right to choose was threatened because of one persons differing belief I took a vital stand, raised my voice and said that’s not okay!

If you are willing to stand beside me then here’s what I would LOVE YOU to do…

• Go to www.vitalmoms.com and read Dr Sarah’s story in more detail
• Register to receive the Vital Moms resource (top right of the page)
• Go to the Health Professionals page and read how vital moms can benefit you and sign up to receive the vital education for your practice members and clients
• Tell your practice members and clients about Vital Moms and encourage them to register
• Pop Vital Moms in your practice newsletter, and
• Send tweets and FB messages about it.

Lets protect our right to choose and lets protect the right of the people you serve to choose.

Read more here @ Vital Moms

The answer is…SYSTEMS! I know I have spoken about systems before (because I am a vitalistic systems junkie) but I wanted to bring it up again in a slightly different way which may make all the difference to you my valued reader. And if this article can have you take stock of the importance of systems which will then contribute to your practice and business success then I will be plesaed with myself for pounding the point!

Most people attempt to achieve success by repeating accidents, one offs that have no system to it. We all learnt from Einsteins definition of insanity which is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result is not the way to achieve health nor is it the way to appraoch your business. If you are doing the same thing over and over then think again, do something different , get a mentor or close your doors. The key here is to do something diffferent to what everybody else is doing. For example some of the “repeated accidents” might include random acts of internal and external marketing, getting erratic results, demand one day and no demand the next. To escape this you must have consistent, reliable, predictable SYSTEMS that efficiently, effectively and affordably provide vast quantities of quality people through your door.

By definition a system is an organised, reliable and consistent and therefore capable of delivering consistently predictable results. This means you are NOT advertising or doing prospecting work wondering what the results may be; you know in advance. That means you go to bed EVERY night KNOWING, within a small range of variance, what tomorrow will bring. And here is the beauty…a system works for you. It is designed to replace a certain amount of manual labor.

Have this as one of your practice success purposes…

to design, engineer and implement systems that work for you

If I asked you what line of business Fred Smith is in you’d say (more than likely) “sending parcels” and Micheal Dell you’d say “computers” and if it was Ray Kroc you’d probably say “hamburgers” or “fast food”. If you get a chance to read about their lives I suggest you do. You soon start to realise very quickly that they are ALL in the business of SYSTEMS…and we are too.

“Creativity is over-rated. Most business success comes from doing boring, diligent work. from developing a system that produces consistent results and sticking to it”
- Ray Kroc, Founder MacDonalds

Smith, Dell and Kroc all work intimately with systems. As chiropractors of course we do too – both within the body and in our practices!

There are three models of health care available today: the medical paradigm, the complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) paradigm, and the real alterNATE!

The medical/mechanistic paradigm is one we all know too well. It is an “outside-in” approach to apparently regaining some form of “health”. In correspondence to The British Medical Journal* , Ron Law noted that preventable medical errors in hospitals are responsible for 11% of all deaths in Australia and New Zealand. Adding deaths from properly researched, properly registered, properly prescribed and properly used drugs to the preventable deaths results in a figure that covers 19% of all deaths. This is almost 1 out of every 5 deaths.

The National Health and Medical Research Council (run by the Australian Government) states that we spend 8-10% of the Gross National Product on health care. Yet 60% of Australians were sick within the last 2 weeks, 60% of Australians take drugs for a chronic health problem, 50% of adolescents are taking painkillers and 40% of 15 year olds suffer some kind of chronic disease.**

Why does society perpetuating the myth that health is found in a pill?

This allopathic/mechanistic model demonstrates a disease-centered focus. A person “gets” a disease and of course something from outside the body heals it, takes it away. You are seen as “unlucky” to have had disease strike you and are viewed as disadvantaged. The “doctor,” under this model, is seen to be powerful with the patient as the passive participant. It’s interesting that the allopathic model is concerned with treating the disease and not the cause. Medicine truly is disease care.

The complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) paradigm is very similar to the allopathic model. The key difference is that professions sitting in this paradigm are doing the same as the allopathic model but they do it with herbs, oils, candles, massage and so forth. I’m not saying people are unable to help themselves by using these methods, however I am saying that this is still working and providing care in a treatment paradigm based on the language they are using and the approach they are taking. This of course perpetuate the myth of disease being bad and needing to be removed or stopped.

The aterNATE paradigm is where vitalism truly sits. A profession which takes a stance on vitalism and embraces its understanding is the Chiropractic profession. It is not a substitute for medicine ― far from it. The chiropractic profession, under the guidance of vitalistic philosophy looks for the cause of the symptomatic expression, rather than treating the disease. The profession puts emphasis on the occurrence of an internal disruption, an imbalanced perspective and/or a neurological compromise when people have changes or departures from their once-ideal expression of health.

Chiropractic is a philosophy, art, and science which concerns itself with the relationship between structure and function. When these are in balance, we see an evolution take place alongside a restoration in health and a preserving of life. Chiropractic truly is health care.

*Ron Law, Executive Director of the National Nutritional Foods Association (NNFA), in New Zealand Ministry of Health Working Group advising on medical error, listed these findings in an email response to the British Medical Journal. (November 11, 2000; 321:1178A)

** www.nhmrc.gov.au