Set specific, measurable expectations before proceeding.
It’s a simple concept. It’s easy to follow. So, why this post?
Because it’s exceedingly rare in practice. Oh… and it could mean the difference between success and failure.
People tend to follow the path of least resistance. Me included. Yet, with some quick adjustments, we could be making progress in leaps and bounds, instead of spits and sputters. All you have to do is clarify your expectations before doing something.
This is basically the Law of Attraction on a smaller, but exceptionally important scale.
An example of what I’m talking about…
You just got a great course on Internet Marketing. It has all the promise of taking you away from your day job and allowing you to earn a living from your home office. The first thing you do is open it up, and read interesting sections as you find them. You’re motivated and feeling good. Unfortunately, you do the same thing the next day. Maybe feeling a little less motivated and frustrated that your “study” hasn’t produced any results. This continues, with a few false starts at using the information, until you finally feel that you were ripped off, and cheated by the author.
Truth is, the product may actually contain all the promises that were made on the sales letter. It may truly unlock the “secrets” to wealth and happiness for you and your family. The problem is that you wanted a magic bullet and didn’t have a plan for success.
If your expectations for the course are something like “Learn how to make a fortune online”, then you are sure to fail. It’s like hailing a cab and asking the driver to take you home. Unless you tell him exactly where you live, you won’t get there. Vague goals and directions just don’t work.
On the other hand, if you set precise goals before you first begin the course, you may just hit pay dirt. What if you set your intention to make your first $100 online within a month using the information in the course. Then for each lesson you take notes, and act on the material presented. You set up your blog, website or email autoresponder. If you have questions, you find examples of the techniques in action (from the author perhaps), and dig for the answers. Trust me, you’ll learn a lot more from taking action on something than just reading about it.
After a week you’ll have made considerable progress, and not only feel motivated, but will have actually accomplished much more than ever before. If you can get to $100, you can get to $200, and as you reach each target it will become easier.
Making a bunch of mini expectations/goals has an exponential effect on your overall progress.
You can visualize this in many ways. For instance, take a staircase. If you want to get to the second floor, you’ll need to use it. One or two steps at a time. You couldn’t jump straight to any other floor above you. Your expectation is to move gradually up the stairs until you arrive at the top. If you try to jump in one bound and just “arrive”, you won’t make it.
One more very important point. The order in which you do something is as important as the setting your goals, and direction. You simply can’t start with the chapter on building traffic to your site if you haven’t even built your site yet. You must do things in an order that has a chance of working. Can you climb the stairs by starting on the 10th step, then the 3rd and then the 15th? No, you start at the bottom, and work your way up in an order that makes sense.
Where else does this work? Everywhere!
- When surfing the net (uhhh… I mean when doing “research” on the net–you know…)
- When attending a seminar (don’t let it be mindless entertainment)
- When dating (don’t skip ahead to the marriage proposal!)
- When taking a trip (don’t get lost)
- When performing a function at work
- When Training your pet
- When learning a musical instrument
- <your goals here>
Terry Dean’s post on 8 Steps to Create Your Internet Business is an excellent example of this concept, and was the largely responsible for the idea behind this post.
Now, how will you put this to use? What mind games can you come up with to help? Please share in the comments below.
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I live in Reno, NV with my wife Careen, and the ever so talented kitty named Milo. Programmer by trade, web surfer and learner for fun, I have a ton of interests, and you'll hear about each of them in time!
Thank you for your excellent post. You are right, there are thousands of posts and books promising to make quick big money on the web, but if you don’t have a plan or vision, they will never materialize. Also drive and determination to succeed are quite important.
In any business you should set one large ultimate goal but then also set many smaller ones that will help you in your journey to getting to where you want to be. Because then when you accomplish the smaller goals your morale will stay up compared to stressing yourself with not reaching the peak quick enough. Hope that makes sense to you all but it works for me in my business.
When it comes to internet marketing you must always put realistic goals in place and then work on building on those. I cant tell you how many people I have met at seminars and think they will get rich over night on the internet, those stories are far and few between, while you can make a lot of money online it takes knowledge, dedication and commitment.
This reminds a great deal of what I read in Napoleon Hill’s Think And Grow Rich a few years ago. Setting goals, both short and long term, while following those goals is the secret to success!
Of course this DOES require work on the part of the goal-setter. Sage advice you’re giving here.
so true about the expectations. We really build high expectations in any race of life and get hurt ourselves that results in low confidence for future. As an example i feel it when i travel long – around 1000 KMs, while i hate driving. While i keep in mind reaching to my destination, it always hurts me after 1 or 2 hours while if i break my journey to station to station (as mini goals), i really feel excited after each achievement.
Hey Tim
Many people are affected by this kind of motivational frustration. I think we really just have to stay confident that our efforts will pay off whilst keeping an eye on our effectiveness to make sure that we arn’t actually wasting time. Easier said than done of course
Thank you for the great article. Expectations are a great measurement in determining a single person’s success. If you feel down and out about yourself, then that is most likely how you will end up.. Good stuff here.
So true. This especially happens and happens a lot in online work world. and there are reasons. The expectations raised by sales page… “Start earning 1K/week with 24 hrs” kind of ads. Perhaps thats the reason majority of people leave in between.
Hi Tim,
I have to agree with your comments about exaggerated bouts of perfectionism! Your comments about finding a balance and learning as you go cover both bases – from the point of view of the perfectionist, they get into action, from the perspective of the “just do it” person, they have the opportunity to include planning and analysis into their work. I’ve enjoyed reading your writings.
Kind regards, Dan
Hi James and Luke,
Thanks for stopping by. I really like most of Dr Robert Anthony’s products myself, especially Beyond Positive Thinking (I like the audio version which was narrated by Joe Vitale).
It certainly helps to have crystal clear direction before starting, but I find that this can lead to exaggerated bouts of perfectionism. This then leads to lack of action.
So, at least for me, taking a step in the right direction and adjusting course as I go, is far better than trying to get every detail in place ahead of time.
I wanted to blend the idea that making small changes to how you approach a project can add up to big results. It’s a lot like making a small change to a headline, which ends in a 1% increase in response. That 1% doesn’t sound like much, until you realize that it could double or triple profits, depending on how the baseline headline performed.
-Tim
This is all too true. And I am just the sort of person to do things backwards and half-thought-up, too. Sometimes however, instinct takes over and I wind up doing it correctly. I should work on streamlining this for greater efficiency.
Hi Tim,
What an interesting post. It reminds me of a book I read called “Beyond Positive Thinking” by Dr. Robert Anthony — I think was the author.
But he talks about being absolutely crystal clear BEFORE taking action.
Because if you don’t have a clear idea of what you want, your actions will reflect that confusion and you will become even more muddled as a result.
In short, action without direction could be detrimental.
Thanks for blending the mindset issues with the marketing issues!
James Lee