If external forces appear to have destroyed your business, remember this simple anti-marketing principle:
Your only competition is your former self.
In The Anti-Marketing Manifesto (coming fall 2020) I wrote:
“Your biggest threat in business isn’t anything outside of you. Your biggest threat (and perhaps enemy) is the person you see in the mirror and whether she (or he) will consistently do the right work to grow your profits in a sustainable, healthy, enjoyable way.”
How true does that feel in the current environment?
I wrote that paragraph a year ago, before the Covid plan was carried out.
I was talking about the concept of taking responsibility for your own success years before the extreme totalitarian stuff started rearing its ugly head.
How inspiring (or scary) is it to think that your success actually comes from inside of you, first and foremost—even NOW, during everything that’s happening in the world?
Very few people want to believe that right now. They think others have the power to dictate their success. Or they think other people need to change first, before their business can thrive.
“People who self-sabotage often blame external factors or competitors for their failure. They blame the marketplace, the latest trends, the global economy, politics, astrology, and anything else you can think of. They believe these external threats can wipe them out. Fact is, none of those things has anything to do with their ability to make a choice.”
Note the phrase: “make a choice.”
This is where your power is.
You intuitively know what the best choices are for you personally. If they’re good for you, they’re also good for the world.
The world wants you to think you don’t have any power. But you do. (Even something like sending a heart-felt email to your list is a powerful act.)
Every business owner has the power to make excellent choices, in which they’re constantly out-smarting and out-growing their former self.
There was recently a mass delusion in which almost everyone forgot this simple truth.
For months, people stopped looking inward…and started over-obsessing on outward/external things.
“Your biggest concern should be you—your vices, your bad habits, your demons, your excuses, your poor attitude (if you have one), your negative beliefs, any crap that you tolerate, and your day-to-day choices.”
Life and external circumstances simply reveal those things to you, in a distorted format.
Turn off the news. And tune into yourself.
Inspiration can come through you.
What is it telling you is a healthy way to grow your business?
Learn more about this topic by watching the video:
Michelle Lopez Boggs is a copywriter, copywriting mentor, and author of "The Anti-Marketing Manifesto: How to Sell Without Being a Sellout." She's helped her clients sell millions of dollars' worth of products and services online by using the MEI(S) principle — motivate, educate, and inspire, and sell. 