Whether you want to sell your business one day or not, build for success from the very beginning. And success means leverage. In other words, if one-on-one dollars-for-hours transactions is your primary business activity, it’s impossible to grow your business.

To achieve leverage, you must stop selling time and productize your service. Turn your service into something you can deliver without actually doing the work: information products, membership sites, software, etc.

How do you begin?

Dr. Anita Campbell, the founder of Small Business Trends, writes in her “5 Steps to Turning a Service Into a Product - So You Can Sell Your Business” article:

Here are 5 steps to turn services into products:

1. Identify something you can replicate repeatedly (what do you keep doing over and over?)

2.  Document it (steps and processes)

3.  Put limits around your offering (don’t leave it open-ended)

4.  Incorporate technology (automate some steps)

5.  Build an organization (build a team)

Even if you don’t want to create a big business, productizing your services and knowledge will help you achieve a lot more freedom, profits, and fun in your business!

I go into much more detail in my product (coming soon!), but I thought I’d share my process for creating information products fast. I have been called “the product queen” (have about 30+ after 9 years in business), and find that it comes naturally to me. Here’s the process I use:

1) survey (survey your list to find out their biggest problems)

2) discover (identify the biggest problem or need)

3) brainstorm (come up with a list of points to cover in your info-product)

4) organize (create a table of contents or come up with questions if it’s Q&A format)

5) record (get on the phone or microphone and record yourself discussing each point)

6) transcribe (have a transcript completed from your recording)

7) polish (turn it into a “book” or “ebook”)

That’s it!

Every May I get a little anxious…

I think it has to do with my anticipation of the kids being out of school, the heat, and the ants migrating into my kitchen to cool off.

Over the years I learned to prepare for summer time by NOT starting any “heavy” projects and keeping my schedule as open as possible.

I also like to catch up on my reading…In fact, I’ve got an embarrassing confession to make.

You know how you go to events and someone always asks, “How many people have read ‘Think and Grow Rich’ by Napoleon Hill?”

Most people raise their hands…Of course, I raise my hand, too. I have the book and I started reading it…

…about 17 times!

Maybe it’s because English is not my first language, or I simply wasn’t ready for it, but until last week I never ACTUALLY read this classic!

It’s truly amazing! I keep turning back to the first page to check if it really was written in 1937 - it might as well have been written TODAY!

Here are my favorite quotes so far:

“The accumulation of great fortunes calls for power, and power is acquired through highly organized and intelligently directed specialized knowledge, but that knowledge does not necessarily have to be in the possession of the person who accumulates the fortune.”

Get it?

It’s about creating a team!

Another one:

“Riches, when they come in huge quantities, are never the result of hard work!”

YES! I guess that’s where “Work smart, not hard” came from…

On leadership:

“There are two types of people in the world, leaders and followers. Decide at the outset whether you intend to become a leader in your chosen calling or remain a follower.
The difference in compensation is vast.”

Isn’t this what Seth Godin writes about in “Tribes?” Everything truly stems from Napoleon Hill’s masterpiece!

I connect the next one to the major problem in the coaching industry:

“The world does not pay for what people ‘know’. It pays them for what they do, or induce others to do.”

In other words, coach on what you already succeed in, and “riches will follow.” Most coach on what they wish they had themselves, and this lack of authenticity hurts their business.

Is Napoleon Hill really the grandfather of all self-help?

I don’t know for certain…But it does seem like all the books written since then, and all the coaching programs created in the last 20 years, are based on his principles.

I am still chugging along - reading chapter 10 right now…

I even skipped watching my favorite “Friends” episode to read it…and in my world it says a lot

Milana

I finally cracked the code!

After nine years of people telling me that I couldn’t build a million-dollar company working 4-5 hours a day, while raising two small children, I proved them wrong.

(I only wish I would’ve known about this business model sooner and not listened to those who slave over their businesses into the night!)

• Do you feel stuck at your current income level?
• Do you constantly worry about getting things done and keeping your cashflow going?
• Do you feel like the only way to grow your business is to work more hours or to add more clients?

I found an amazing business model that allows you to cut your work time in half and still experience massive growth in your business.

I call it “The BLISS Factor” and this April I’ll be personally coaching a select group of entrepreneurs in creating a high- income business with unlimited growth potential using the same model.

“The BLISS Factor” is designed specifically for coaches, consultants, authors, speakers, trainers, and other expertise- based business owners who are tired of being chained to their business and ready to break free from it, while creating a highly profitable company.

REGISTRATION for this unique and highly experiential 3-day live event will open next Wednesday, February 18 at 1:00 pm EST and will accept people on a “first-come-first-serve basis” (watch for more details soon).

In the mean time, get a copy of “The BLISS Factor” business model outlined in my “Unlock Your Business Growth” toolkit:

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F R E E   T O O L K I T   D O W N L O A D
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“UNLOCK YOUR BUSINESS GROWTH: Do Less, Make More,

and Turn Your Natural Ability Into a Million-Dollar Company”

http://www.TheBlissFactor.com

***Available in PDF and MP3 format***

If you’ve been frustrated with your business lately, feeling tired and discouraged, what I reveal inside this toolkit may transform your business and change your life.

Don’t let any “gurus” out there tell you that you need to put more hours in, do more public speaking, attend networking events, work harder etc. You can create an amazing company on YOUR terms, and I show you exactly how to do this inside.

Be sure to watch the video on the page above! I share two specific mindshifts I had to make before I could implement “The BLISS Factor” business model and create a business full of complete personal freedom of time and money: http://www.TheBlissFactor.com

Last week I ran a survey asking you about your biggest challenge in running and growing your business.

I LOVE surveys because they’re very eye-opening! Here is a quick glance at the results:

Of the 346 people who responded:

• 67.7% - Make less than $50K a year
• $19.3% - Make between $50K and $100K a year
• 13.1% - Make $100K a year and up

Business owners with a lower income level said they have trouble:

- Identifying their specialty and niche market

- Getting customers and clients

Business owners with a higher income level shared that they are struggling with:

- Getting things done

- Creating efficient business systems

While there are many differences between “beginners” and “advanced” business owners, I noticed one common thread. OVERWHELM - not enough time to implement all ideas; too many great opportunities and constant feeling of missing out on them.

I find this absolutely fascinating! No matter where you are in your business, overwhelm can easily take over your business and life.

I found several very powerful ways to get things done and drive my business forward without experiencing the overwhelm most entrepreneurs complain of.

Here they are:

1. Single-minded focus on my biggest most important projects. These are the projects that make the biggest impact on my bottom line.
2. Having a system and a criteria for saying “no” to projects, people, and ideas. You can’t do it all and if you try to, you’ll end up getting poor results.
3. Using a “filter” when receiving product offers. Not everything is right for me and my business. I always keep my business goals and natural abilities in mind when investing into a product or signing up with a mentor.
4. Make a deliberate decision to exclude certain marketing tactics and vehicles for the sake of focus.  There are thousands of ways to attract prospects and convert them into clients, choose top 5-7 and focus your promotional strategy around them.
5. Work from a plan! Start with a 12-month timeline then fill in the blank; then transfer your action plan into your calendar - this has tripled my productivity and saved a ton of time!
6. Focus on doing less, but doing it better. Unless your goal is to constantly keep yourself busy, doing less actually produces much higher results.

I love this David Allen’s book. In fact, I devoured it about three years ago, looking for tips on productivity, efficiency, time management, and basically anything that would help me fit more work into less time.

But recently I’ve been thinking about what “getting things done” really stands for.  It teaches you how to be productive and organized, and do more in less time.  If you master the concepts in the “Getting Things Done” book, you’ll be able to tackle a large number of projects and to-do’s faster than anyone else. Great skills, right?

The problem is that it essentially teaches you how to become a taskmaster. Work, work, work…complete, complete, complete…organize a gazillion little things you need to accomplish into a system…implement all of your ideas faster, and so on.

So, you end up focusing on completing as many tasks as possible and that’s how you measure a successful day, week, or month.

I believe that it’s a dangerous place to be for entrepreneurs. Vision and focus - these are the two things entrepreneurs must operate from. Today I can accomplish in one hour something that will make a huge difference, while three years ago I focused on checking as many things off my to-do list as possible.

How do you operate? How do you measure success every day? Remember, your work never gets done - entrepreneurs create their own work - therefore choose to focus on ONE thing that makes all the difference in your business.

George McFly from “Back to the Future” said, “If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything!”

Well, what if I don’t want to put my mind to it? What if someone else can put their mind to it much faster, easier, better, and they’ll actually enjoy every minute of it?  Why do it yourself when someone else can do it for you? Most importantly, are you really going to do it, or just whine about not having enough time to do it?

I identified seven types of activities your team must be able to handle. I am not saying you should have seven people on your team. Nor am I telling you to hire your entire team at once. I am simply suggesting that all of these activities must be taken care of at some point in every business. Either you are doing these yourself, or they’re not being done at all, which most likely has a limiting impact on your cashflow and revenue.

Here they are:

1. Administrative (customer service, web site maintenance etc.)
2. Creative (design, writing, editing etc.)
3. Marketing (PR, internet marketing, social media etc.)
4. Sales (in-house, affiliate, strategic alliances, etc.)
5. Service delivery (coaching, consulting, training etc.)
6. Technical (computers, network, web hosting, programming, e-commerce etc.)
7. Professional contractors (accounting, legal, event planning etc.)

There are two more types of activities I thought I’d mention – these may not seem essential to your business success and profitability, but I can tell you they’ve made a huge difference in my life:

8. Mentoring (business coach or mentor)

9. Personal (house cleaning, chef, consierge, shopper, image consultant etc.)

No, this is not about being lazy or outsourcing your whole life…It’s about creating a business where work becomes optional.

I just returned from a 3-day private beach house retreat with 10 other women, and the experience was truly amazing! The biggest thing I got out of leading it is that people don’t want “another program” - they really want to just have someone look at their business and help them strategize and make the best decisions about their next direction.

Here’s one photo we took inside the beach house’s living room:

Business Transformation Retreat with Milana Leshinsky, Myrtle Beach SC, December 3-5 2008, beach house headquarters, day 3...

I’ve been fascinated by the idea of having a lifestyle business and being a lifestyle entrepreneur…until I started doing more research and finding out that many people put a different meaning into these words than I do.

“Lifestyle entrepreneurs are people who go into business primarily for lifestyle reasons, as opposed to a desire for financial wealth. They become business owners so they can do the kind of work they want, work the hours they want, live where they want, and spend time with people they like and admire. Lifestyle entrepreneurs judge their success by how much they enjoy their work and their lives as a whole, rather than by their status or their net worth.” (The Sabbatical Coach)

Ok, you can choose where you live and what you do, but unless you also focus on building wealth, you may not be a lifestyle entrepreneur for long.

Harv Eker, the author of the “Secrets of the Millionaire Mind” told a story in his book about a guy who approached him after one of his seminars and said, “Money isn’t everything in life…” Harv looked at him and said, “You’re broke, right?” Basically, if something isn’t important to you, you’re simply not going to focus on getting it. Harv was right - the guy was broke.

I believe that you can be a Lifestyle Entrepreneur AND be very wealthy - if you operate with that goal in mind, and without sacrificing your lifestyle goals.

Here’s what Mike Taber, a software development firm owner, writes:

Something that many people overlook is the money aspect of being an entrepreneur. Just because I’m a Lifestyle Entrepreneur, that doesn’t mean that I don’t want to make money. Far from it. I want to be financially successful just as much as the next guy, but I also want to be in control of my future.”

November afternoon in the back yard with my daughter

Well said. The only problem is that he still needs to work to support his lifestyle. Whether he can do it from Rome, Italy, or in some exotic island in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, he would still need to be  plugged in (both literally and metaphorically) to his business.

By the way, travel is just one way to enjoy a lifestyle… My personal favorite time spent is right in my back yard

But what if your goal was to NOT have to work because you need money? What if you work only because you love what you do and do it only when you feel like it? How would you operate differently in your life and business? Would you focus on different strategies?

I am not just talking about creating passive income, although that’s an essential component of TRUE Lifestyle Entrepreneurship. I am talking about the whole mentality and the decision making behind creating a business where you DON’T HAVE TO work.

I am half-way there, so let me share with you some of the things that have allowed me to get to this point:

1. Multiple streams of income - I’ve never relied on just one income source in my business. For most people it’s clients (coaching, consulting, speaking, training, etc.). I wanted to stop worrying about losing a client every month, so I created at least a dozen of different income streams. (see Multiple Income Streams ideas on the right sidebar).

2. Continuity income - I started out with a simple $17.95  a month membership site, and developed several other continuity income streams over the last few years. It accomplishes many other goals in your business in addition to giving you a predictable monthly income (e.g. deeper customer relationships, constant visibility in your market, etc.).

3. Creating a team - having a “dream team” has been one of the biggest factors that allow me to operate the way I do. Many people don’t like to delegate or, God forbid, hire other people to do what they could do themselves, but having a team is what truly going to set you free as an entrepreneur!

4. Creating systems - automating and documenting as many things and processes in your business as you possibly can, so anyone else could step into your shoes and run your business. Michael Gerber refers to it as creating a franchisable business. Imagine that you’ll have to create 100 businesses just like yours around the world. How would you operate differently?

These four things have allowed me to feel like a lifestyle entrepreneur, keeping my meaning of these words in mind.

What have YOU done to become a TRUE lifestyle entrepreneur?

Really! I want to know!

Today I started writing my book…without actually typing a word.

Writing or typing is great, but for me it’s much easier to “speak” my book instead. So over the next 4-6 weeks I’ll be “recording my book” in a series of interviews with Nancy Gerber, who is a master at extracting your unique story and expertise from your brain.

So many business owners chase the money only to realize that it’s the life and the lifestyle they were after! Only recently I learned how truly unique I was. Taking Monday afternoon off just to watch my favorite movie, not running to answer the phone every time it rings,  being able to visit my family in the middle of the week, sharing my business with my kids and changing my family for generations to come…

Most entrepreneurs couldn’t ever imagine doing this! They’re too busy working and keeping up with the day-to-day activities!

My motto is “The Work is Optional!”

This book is going to show you how I’ve achieved this personal freedom through business, and how to create a business that works without you.

The toughest part was to come up with the title. I knew that this was more than just the title - it was also supposed to define my new direction and my new brand. So for the last 6-8 weeks I’ve been “bugging” my friends, mastermind buddies, my coach, and even my family running different names and titles by them.

What happens when you do that is that you start questioning everything!  You wait for the approval of your idea until your initial excitement dies out and you’re moving on to the next idea.

Here’s how I knew that I had THE title: I felt a jolt in my body when I said it to someone else, and when she stopped and turned to me, the look on her face told me everything. This was IT. I came home, bought the domain name, and am ready to roll!

My target date for completing the book is June, 2009, although I hope to have it done sooner.