15 Year Anniversary “Behind the Scenes” Stories and Special (Part I)

July 21, 2014 by Yanik Silver

This month of July 2014 marks the 15^th year anniversary of being in business on my own.

My father reminded me that this month is also his “Independence day” since that’s the date our family came over to the United States from Russia. (The exact date was July 3, 1976 – pretty cool since it was right before the bi-centennial celebration.)

I thought this would make a really opportune time to share the back story and a couple interesting anecdotes from this journey.

And as a reward, you’ll really get something cool for sticking around. You’ll have a chance to literally pick your own price for some of the best resources & tools that I’ve developed over the last 15 years that have helped so many people. (If you want to skip the walk down memory lane and lessons learned you can fast forward straight to the ‘Pick-your-price’ auction here. But you’ll miss a few funny pics!)

Where it Started…

I still remember the day I left my father’s business 15 years ago to work on my

own. It was by far one of the hardest decisions of my life. You see, I had worked for my dad since I was 12 and he thought I was going to take over the company. I had that same thought as well until I got the “bug”.

In fact, my wife, Missy, reminded me that when she met me, I had only one thought: “how to grow my father’s business”. I would stay late working on new ads and marketing pieces. I was in early, calling my accounts trying to make sales, etc. etc.

Here’s a pic I found of me and the very first team of Med-Electronics:

Looking back, I can see I showed some advertising and marketing promise early-on by creating a private label line of X-ray film called ‘Ultimate’ that we trademarked. It was one of our top sellers for years and years.

However, one of my ‘synchro-destiny’ moments, came when I furnished a surgi-center for one of my doctor clients, Nathan Wei, MD. He’s one of the top osteoporosis doctors in the country and by outfitting his whole office we got to develop a friendship. He shared with me a Jay Abraham cassette (yes, cassette) program. It was all about optimization and using direct response.

It just turned on the lights for me.

I had always been interested in advertising and marketing but this was a whole new level. I would study, read and learn direct response marketing, psychology and copywriting for 2-4 hours per day. It was fascinating to me to see how we could write words and have somebody respond.

I was probably 18 at the time and pretty lucky that I learned early on how powerful this expertise could be. I hated cold-calling and knocking on doors and I figured learning everything I possibly could about copywriting was my ticket out.

As you might imagine – something new is not always greeted with open arms.

I remember handing a new ad I’d written over to my dad for his review. I’d usually get an answer like this in his thick Russian accent, “Who’s going to read all that?”

They did.

And more importantly they bought.

Developing my copywriting skills completely transformed the way we did business from a small, regional supplier to being able to compete nationwide against companies 10x our size. We had figured out exactly how to sell complicated pieces of medical equipment without being face-to-face with the doctors. (BTW – many of the ads I wrote in 1998 and 1999 worked for years and years after I left, responsible for hundreds of thousands of dollars in sales.)

Here’s an example of one of those ads from back in the day:

But with every ad I wrote I was getting more and more aggravated.

Not because the ads weren’t producing sales – they were – but because of the grief and politics I had to deal with. Everybody seemed to be an advertising expert even though they’ve never studied or read anything on the subject.

Friction creates a positive change

Looking back that kind of friction was actually positive since it forced me to move towards creating my own ads for something I owned.

My first product was to help Dermatologists who wanted new cosmetic patients. I picked Derms since I had been directly working with one of my clients, Dr. Finzi, to help them with their marketing and advertising. They were seeing some really good results and I realized I had no leverage just doing more consulting. I thought I could package up everything into a big kit (manual, tapes, reports, diskette, etc) to sell.

I had started learning about the world of information marketing from mentors like Dan Kennedy and Ted Nicholas at the time. I had no idea how far and wide ‘publishing’ could take me.

Side note: The really interesting thing is the Universe always provides you clues to your bigger role. When I was 8 or 9, I created a comic book called ‘Big Nose Fred’ with my best-friend Jamie. It was a very crude, early cursor for what lay ahead. And I was able to find this picture of another comic book I created when I was 12.

The Real Start of My Publishing Business

I ran my first ad in April 1998 in Dermatologic Surgery magazine. I don’t think this is the exact one – but pretty close:

I got 10 responses so I sent them the 20-page sales letter I’d written selling this $900 kit. Not one order.

I waited…

Sent out a 2nd notice to those 10 respondents.

Nothing…

Then I sent a 3rd notice telling them the expiration date to get all the bonuses was only 10 days away. Finally on the very last day of the expiration date I got one order

over the fax machine.

Yipeee!!

I still remember that doctor’s name in Flushing, NY. What an incredible feeling. That was the start of my independence. I realized I now had the power to chart my course as I wanted. That first sale. That’s one of the greatest feelings in the world – when something you’ve created is sold. It took me a little over a year after that first order to realize I needed my own thing.

I wanted my freedom and I finally quit on July 1, 1999.

Maybe it’s the new confidence you get when you realize you’ve created something that people want and are willing to exchange money for. That first sale is usually the hardest (but also the most rewarding).

From there my journey has taken me to all sorts of places.

That initial taste of selling information helped me come up with an idea at 3 o’clock in the morning that turned into our top-selling InstantSales Letters® product. Missy told me to go back to bed since entrepreneurs have ideas almost every waking moment. I literally jumped out of bed to work on the site to register the domain.

I really had no tech skills or anything like that and I definitely overpaid to get my sites up and out. (Right now there are so many incredible tools that make doing business online way cheaper.)

Here are daily deposit screenshots back from 2000…

I started all of this in little 1-bedroom apartment. Yes, I know it sounds like infomercial territory already. Sheesh! It’s pretty funny how these small beginnings lead you to a whole different path.

Actually it was a little while after I launched this first site that Missy got laid off. So it made sense to bring her in and we both worked out of that 1-bedroom apartment. (She worked in the bedroom and I was in the living room.)

The cool thing is after all these years – Instant Sales Letters is still selling (not as well as it used to but still get orders). It was my first product that grossed $1M+ in total, cumulative sales. The average selling price was about $40 and I think it took me 3 years or 3 ½ years to hit that number.

Starting with that first million-dollar idea in the middle of the night, I’ve bootstrapped 7 other products and services to hit that 7-figure mark from scratch without funding, taking on debt or even having a real business plan.

An Overnight Success Years & Years in the Making

From that initial success and ongoing ones, other people wanted my help. They wanted to know how I did it.

Well, that turned into a whole different ‘career’ working with so many incredible people and helping them take their passions, knowledge, interests, expertise and message out into the world by selling content & information.

A cartoonist made this for me, that summed up what was going on:

I seemed like an overnight success but not too many people saw the years of studying and learning to get there.

And it was this skill that exponentially helped me figure it out. There aren’t too many shortcuts but with the right instruction copywriting can be…

One of the Biggest Foundations for Everything

Looking back, the key component to making these work was always copywriting. That’s the foundation for everything I put out there. Because if you can write words on paper or a computer screen – you could pretty much assure your success.

I had a little agreement with my buddy John Reese. He said if he’d put on a small workshop with what he knew about traffic and web marketing, I’d put together everything I knew about copywriting.

Well John fulfilled on his end and I was on the hook to do mine.

The price to get in to my specialized workshop was just a tad a under $4000.00 per person. I kept the room super small so I could work with each student and make sure there really was a formula I could teach. Frankly, I’d never worked so hard in my life preparing and putting together material for this event. (Just the manuals from the event weighed in at 39 lbs and were 1527 pages thick!)

Not that many people could actually teach exactly what they do – but I can. (Or more accurately could. I don’t think I could even put on that same workshop today because my literally doing a complete brain dump, I didn’t have to hold onto it anymore. I could move on to bigger things.)

I shared every strategy, tactic and tidbit I knew about writing sales copy that works. And at the time I was into ‘Harry Potter’ and I loved the idea of learning copywriting was the same as magic. It was like the alchemy of turning words into revenue.

I was just starting to theme events and I used a ‘magic’ type theme originally. Unfortunately, that ended up getting me in hot water with a trademark dispute. Instead of sending a ‘cease and desist’ or amicably resolving the name, I got a knock at my door with a lawsuit. Not fun!

Long story short, I ended up settling. I actually think I probably would have won but the only person that really wins in disputes like this are the attorneys. I figured I’d rather spend my energy preparing and working on the event than be bogged down with these hassles.

So the new name was the ‘Ultimate Copywriting Workshop’.

Not as catchy or fun as the previous one – but it explained it well.

Frankly, I was a little bummed walking into the live event because a lot of the profit was actually negated by my settlement. But I knew if the content was really awesome – I’d make it back 100x. It was. And I did.

I truly think this is the ultimate resource and from the rave reviews of people that have seen-it-all in the direct response world they would agree. Like this quote from a 15-year veteran, Ted Thomas:

“Although I’ve attended many expensive seminars and workshops in the recent years, yours was the most profitable!…I’ve been involved in copywriting for the last 15 years and I’m a direct mailer, I’ve learned more at this seminar than I have at any other..”

And here’s what one of my biggest mentors, Dan Kennedy, had to say about me when I trained his audience at his last-ever copywriting workshop:

“…He is the most amazing young guy…His websites are highly effective and profitable thanks to sound direct-response strategy and compelling copy ‘tweaked’ for Internet use.”

How Entrepreneurship Can Be The Ultimate Expression of Love

June 27, 2014 by Yanik Silver

Everybody has heard the advice do what you love and the money will follow, right?

Unfortunately it’s not quite true. In fact, I’ve got a $400,000.00 lesson that I’ll share with you later on. However, running your enterprise from the fullest expression of love can and WILL create the meaningful success that matters. Yes, we’re moving into some slightly uncharted waters combining the words ‘love’ and ‘work’ together but stick with me.

What does the ‘fullest expression of love’ look like?

Like anything and everything it always starts with you. Our responsibility is always on our shoulders first. And looking at the Evolved Enterprise diagram the founder (you) is at the center:

That’s because a business is always a reflection of the leader’s evolution.

Sleep walking

The wild thing is even if someone appears to be successful, they still could very well be existing in a slumbering type of halfhearted state. Frankly, I’ve made a lot of money without totally applying myself fully.

And that’s not because I don’t care about my ventures or customers. If you get the mechanics around delivering exceptional value correct – you will be rewarded. But I think you can take it to another level. I’ve seen it over and over again with individuals seeming to have a great business but they are not fulfilled at a deeper level. They think business is just business and don’t consider how it could be their art. And that’s why so many people start looking for creative (or sometimes self destructive) outlets to compensate for not being totally engaged. Then that lack of energy carries over to your team, your work, and your customers. Truly everything.

I know because I’ve seen it first hand…

About 7 years ago, I made a significant transition. I went from ‘just’ being an Internet marketer teaching and helping others sell their knowledge online to my next evolution. I couldn’t see doing what I was doing for another decade or more. This wasn’t a complete 180. There were still so many parts that were fulfilling in what I was doing and that left clues for a bigger, more expanded version of where I thought I’d like to play.

The idea for Maverick was rolling around in my journal for a long time and it really hit on so many things that lit me up; working with innovative entrepreneurs who not only wanted to grow themselves and their business, but also having a genuine impact in the world – while having some fun in the process. Truly changing the way business is played.

Of course, I could have easily decided to continue doing what I’ve always done and let those ‘golden handcuffs’ get tighter and tighter.

To me, it was almost like an awakening in a sense, and everybody goes through it at their own time and in their own way. The best way to think about this was an example my 6-year old daughter, Zoe provided. She really, really wanted a ‘wiggly’ tooth so bad. She kept checking her teeth but nothing was going on. Then finally she lost her first tooth a few months ago and 4 more followed in quick order.

Everything comes at the right time.

We can either resist this ‘cosmic alarm clock’ or lean into and embrace the transition into something bigger and better.

Granted it’s not always a frictionless transformation. But those thoughts you have of ‘there’s something bigger I could be playing at’ or rationalizing work as just work. Those are all indicators that change is coming. Part of my evolution was truly deciding if I was really committed to what I was building with the Maverick Ecoverse or not. And that commitment was a bit trickier after my personal income took a nosedive sinking about $400,000.00 into the venture before figuring it out.

This is where following what you love becomes a huge double-edged sword by simply and blindly following a passion without an established business model. Plus, if you have a pretty much carte blanche checkbook that doesn’t help either because you continue to throw more and more cash into it instead of thinking of creative solutions. (Yes, this was one of those times I didn’t follow my own advice with Maverick Rule #16 Bootstrap. Having too much capital leads to incredible waste and doing things using conventional means.)

So what happens?

Well you’ll continue getting bonked on the head with increased severity if you don’t figure it out. For me, it took finally selling my Aston Martin to cover payroll in order to make the changes we needed to get profitable. But I’m thankful for those experiences because it forced me to truly decide if the vision for what we were building was worth it or not. And that’s where passion really helps you with perseverance. Of course, you’re going to encounter set-backs and any venture is a zig-zagging process. And it was my love for the bigger mission – and that kept me going to figure out how to make it work.

One of my favorite questions during this period has been, ‘What would you do even if you knew it would fail?’

I believe I heard this from Brene Brown inside her awesome book Daring Greatly. It makes you think if whatever you’re doing is worth your life’s energy or not?

It’s an even better question than one you may have heard before, ‘What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?’ The refined version forces you consider putting in your full heart & soul regardless of the outcome. This is something I’ve been practicing more and more after studying it through one of my favorite recent books The Great Work of Your Life: A Guide for the Journey to Your True Calling by Stephen Cope.

Putting in the work (if it’s from a true place of meaning) is enough reward. Sometimes that concept may be difficult, but if we’re awaiting outside praise or recognition we’re always beholden to it.

So if you can truly awaken from the autopilot nature of where you are – you can start to stir a deeper sense of direction. And that inner guide has the key to what you can be doing to re-invent or re-work your company or yourself.

And at the highest expression is LOVE.

Loving yourself and honoring yourself shows up in many ways. It takes time and it’s an ongoing process. I’ll recommend my friend, Kamal Ravikant’s book, ‘Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It.

It’s a very personal story Kamal took as CEO of a venture-backed company in Silicon Valley and he went from depressed and blackness to fully engaged and living at an optimal level. You’ll have to challenge yourself to do the exercises in here for significant results.

Lately I’m seeing a lot of Maverick members and colleagues in a state of transition. Maybe it’s because I’ve personally gone through this and come out the other side that I’m seeing it more and more. But I’m not so sure that’s why it’s showing up more. It truly feels like accomplished entrepreneurs want to know ‘What’s next?’ And the same thing that got them to where they are now won’t necessarily take them to a higher place. But you can get there by continually expressing your deepest and most honest love for yourself and your gifts. (These are some of my favorite conversations with Maverick1000 members.)

When you’re fully utilizing everything you were designed to do there’s a complete sense of divine inspiration and time stands still. The more you can truly ‘know yourself’ the better you can recognize where your sweet spot is. I’ve taken multiple personal assessment tests and would recommend Wealth Dynamics, StrengthsFinder, Kolbe and even the Enneagram. I don’t know why we’re wired this way, maybe it comes from when you were a kid and brought home your report card with all ‘A’s’ except one ‘C’ and your parents focused on the ‘C’. But for some reason we don’t really focus and develop our strengths that come naturally. Those are the sweet spots that bring more joy and energy into everything we do.

Aligning With Your Shadow

Part of my journey has also been going deeper and exploring my ‘shadow’. This is a Jungian concept for a part that we want to repress and hold back typically from the light. And many times it comes up in all sorts of ways. It could be road rage and yelling at other people in traffic in front of your kids, it could be sexually acting out, it could be continually beating yourself up for not being good enough. One way you can often recognize a shadow is a behavior you see in others that elicits a charged reaction in you that really bothers you.

Essentially, everyone around you can be a mirror for yourself and if there’s something that bothers you – usually it’s because you have this behavior and haven’t acknowledged it. Many times just bringing awareness to your shadow is a fast step forward to integrating it more fully into who you are.

Personally, one of my shadows was recognizing I was not ever giving 100%.

I could see an interesting pattern looking back on my life. For instance in college, I’d go out the night before a big exam, come in late into the lecture hall smelling like bourbon, borrow a pencil and be the first one out. Even with that – I’d still get a solid ‘B’. And with my businesses, I’ve always done well and over-delivered but I’ve never given my everything. If I’m being totally honest, it’s probably because that leaves a little room to justify results if they are not what you hoped for.

As I mentioned before, echoing the Great Work of Your Life book – by putting your full essence behind something, you let go of the outcome because your full effort is reward by itself.

Loving yourself is also about taking care of yourself. One of my very astute friends, Richard Rossi, likes to ask ‘How would you treat a million dollar racehorse?’ Would you feed them junk? Would you let them not get enough rest? Would they get training whenever they felt like it? Or instead, would there be consciousness and intentionality in what you do? Of course there would. And you can probably guess where Richard was going with this – you’re the million-dollar racehorse. Actually I’d bet you’re worth significantly more than a mil.

But how are you treating yourself?

The Daily Return Path to Joy, Happiness and Bliss was part of my experiment to see how I can purposely work on making sure I’m the best I can be each day.

Am I perfect? No, not at all but I know I’m consistently evolving and growing.

Loving yourself fully changes the dynamics of how everyone around you reacts to you too. Because if we’re honoring your authentic vision there’s no time to say ‘Yes’ when you really should be saying ‘No’ to things that don’t support this. So many entrepreneurs I know are wired to be giving but they don’t make space for themselves.

One of my most recent practices to create space for myself has been meditating. So far I’m at 20 minutes per day in the morning. I know quite a few entrepreneurs who meditate and it’s becoming bigger and bigger. In fact, it came up in a big way as I was prepping to interview hip-hop mogul, Russell Simmons for a private Q&A with Russell and a Yoga session for Maverick members.

Russell Simmons sharing success practices on the mat

Going through his latest book, Success through Stillness, the entire work is really devoted to meditation, yoga and a deeper stillness applied to business. I decided to make a commitment right there to try it in my life.

His deep conviction for these pieces helped take his game to a whole new level and really impressed me. (The funny thing is Russell will candidly admit he only started going to yoga to check out hot ladies!) Also, I’d been paying attention to more and more research about the scientific benefits of meditation – so I decided to go for it. I can’t say it’s been a light switch type moment where my world has completely changed, but it’s a practice and one that I look forward to now each day. In these moments of stillness, I feel like I get centered on what’s important and what’s not.

I see working on your own evolution as holographic for your business since we know everything really stems from you as the leader. Meaning a change to ‘you’ creates a change in your business too. It really does work that way.

And it’s this full expression of love that shows up in different facets of your company, team and customers.

Company:

By law, a corporation is its own entity, right? So as an entity (AKA a ‘body’), the analogy would continue that there is a ‘Soul’ inside. It might sound really odd but I think that’s true. Your business can stand for something more and just like we evolve, your business’ purpose can evolve too.

A venture could be created with the purpose of simply maximizing bottom line profit, or it could be upped one level by having a distinctive mission or big ‘Why’. (Though I truly believe they are not mutually exclusive. In the Evolved Enterprise framework your bottom line is actually enhanced by a bigger mission.)

An conscious business is a catalyst to enhance every area of the business starting internally with culture…

Culture:

Regardless if you set an intentional culture or not, there’s always a culture internally within your company.

Your employees could be showing up just for their paycheck at the lowest level of engagement, coming together for the culture one level up or because they truly believe they’re playing a part in something bigger.

And what if your goal as the leader was to help everyone on your team become the fullest expression of themselves? Same as your personal evolution, right? Your company becomes the container and catalyst for growth, learning and complete expression of their gifts & talents. Not everyone is wired to do their own thing but when you can give your team a ‘sandbox’ to build their dreams, they win and you win. Zappos is a well-praised poster child (for good reason) lately for taking their culture of happiness seriously. Just one of the perks there is having a ‘dream manager’ who helps their team figure out their dreams (i.e. owning a house, etc.) and making it happen. That’s huge. Starbucks has just raised their commitment to their team members by reimbursing them for online education.

On our team we start with strengths testing and then through some trial and error help members experiment and move into roles best suited for them. We’re not perfect at this but we’re continually growing. And you can see changes in engagement when people feel they could bring their full selves to work. It makes a big difference.

I’m really proud of this note I got from a Maverick Team Green member just the other day:

“I just want to say thank you for listening to my ideas and giving me the space to grow them. I have never experienced this type of freedom in my job and cannot even begin to express how much it means to me. I am very passionate about working towards positive change in our world. There is nothing I aspire to more than to be in a place where I can really help people. So once again, thank you for giving me the opportunity to realize my dreams. I love Maverick – the team and the members.”

Let’s look at a few other facets…

Sales:

If I’m just selling something without a bigger meaning, I’m simply selling to sell no matter what. But raising the intention up a level is a consultative sale. But still on a whole different level is falling in love with your prospect. And if you’re in love with them that means you could do what’s in your customer’s true best interest. Which sometimes means no sale – but other times it means you must do everything in your power to get them to buy because you know the positive results they’ll have.

If you love your prospect, you would be doing them a disservice to not get them to purchase, right? It’s a subtle but dramatic difference. And if there’s true love with the product or service that also creates a higher-level engagement with your customers/members/clients.

Customers:

On the lowest level of our triangle people are simply getting a need met. Your product or service is their solution so it’s transactional. At the next level there is a community being built with a true identity tied in. (I shared an entire segment on Community Code 2.0: Building Beloved Brand Builders at the last Underground® event.) And finally at the highest level of expanded love, your customers see it as their responsibility to actually ‘convert’ others. Yes, almost evangelical.

Don’t get me wrong about everything I’ve just covered. I think business is already a value driver and server or else it would be out of business, but by truly adding a genuine element of love it could be so much more. It can move from transactional, to transformational or even transcending business as usual. It could be an Evolved Enterprise.

What do you think? What have you seen that reflects a fuller expression of something bigger through business?

Evolved Enterprise

March 12, 2014 by Yanik Silver

At the Underground® I was super excited to share 2 brand new presentations. The first on Community Code 2.0: Creating Tribes of Beloved Brand Builders and my closing keynote on Evolved Enterprise™. It was truly an honor to receive a standing ovation for the material. I’m really excited to explore this further and make it one of my next books. (I even had attendees coming up afterwards saying they almost cried watching this presentation, and that’s never happened before!)

I believe there is a shift going on, and I predict that businesses without a core IMPACT will be at a competitive disadvantage in 4-7 years (or less).

I’m calling it Evolved Enterprise™ and it’s the notion that business in the 21^st century can be leveraged as a multiplier for good…co-creating something great. The Evolved Enterprise™ serves all stakeholders delivering an exceptional customer experience, team alignment, cause-related impact, greater meaning and even increased profits!

I think the message is so important I’m posting the whole presentation here along with a quick recap and some doodles…

The Evolved Enterprise™ is a way to go from simply a transactional business to a transformational one and even a transcending business.

It’s about creating a venture that authentically comes straight from your true essence, wrapped around a meaningful Cause (your WHY or impact) and then develops the Community, Culture and Creation itself.

And the most interesting part is all of this is actually good for business in all ways. Take a look at this graph showing companies featured in the Firms of Endearment book vs. the S&P 500:

That’s pretty solid, right?

There’s new research I see consistently about customers having a preference to buy a product that creates an impact in some way. Check out the presentation for lots of examples of you can re-invent business as usual. Please leave a comment with your thoughts or share the message if you feel moved by it.

New Year’s World Resolutions

January 16, 2014 by Yanik Silver

I don’t know if you make New Year’s resolutions or not but I’ve never really done it. I believe you don’t need to wait for a calendar to turn over in order to change your actions. You can do it daily. (Check out the “Return Path to Joy, Happiness and Bliss” here – along with a v2.0 of a daily worksheet you can use.)

Instead of a New Year’s resolution, I jotted this down in my journal at 12:02 AM, Jan 1, 2014:

What if instead of New Year’s resolutions we started thinking about ‘New World Resolutions’?

What would you contribute to have an impact on creating a whole New Earth? How would you contribute your unique piece to the collective?

Whatever your answer is – the best part is you could never break your resolution because it’s a lifelong journey and encompasses your entire life’s mission. I’ve been thinking quite a bit about this and one of my favorite books last year was The Great Work of Your Life: A Guide for the Journey to Your True Calling by Stephen Cope. (Read it!)

It’s not exactly a business book but really important.

Written by the Director of the Institute for Extraordinary Living at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health. It’s a book that uses the 2,000 year old Bhagavad Gita teachings to help you ascertain your true path or Dharma. The Gita is not so much about ‘being’ – which is incredibly valuable – but about ‘doing’. Expressing your authentic being through your doing.

Part of the message of this book is doing the work that you put your full heart and soul into. And if you do that you don’t need to worry about the success or failure of the outcome. It’s about finding your unique contribution and living it. I’ve repeatability underlined this book and put lots of notes in the margins.

As you might be able to read in my journal – I wrote…

“Mine is co-creating business models, catalyzing and connecting entrepreneurs to solve the biggest social issues and global causes. 100 by the year 2100.”

Not quite a full sentence – so let me see if I can polish it a bit…

“I connect and catalyze Maverick entrepreneurs and visionary leaders to co-create innovative business models and new ideas to solve 100 of the world’s most meaningful issues by the year 2100.”

That’s a pretty tall order but one that I’m willing to put forth my resources, energy and talents toward. Something I think everything I do can line up against.

Why?

It’s not just an altruistic feel-good goal but a legitimate (and even potentially more profitable) business model I’m calling Evolved Enterprise™

I believe, business in the 21^st century can be leveraged as a multiplier for good…co-creating something great. The Evolved Enterprise™ serves all stakeholders delivering an exceptional customer experience people want to help spread, greater team alignment, more direct cause-related impact, a deeper sense of coming from the founder heart and, most interestingly, additional increased profits.

I would envision there being different levels or stages of an Evolved Enterprise™ based on how fully you integrate a deeper meaning and consciousness into what you’re doing.

You can start more transactional perhaps and then work your way up to a more integrated transformational level or even transcendent level, way beyond a “typical” business. And the best part about this from a practical level is you actually can increase profits and create big wins for everyone involved.

For instance, on a transactional tie-in with a cause, I’ve seen split tests where our Maverick members have actually increased their conversion rates by having one page mention a cause they donated to and another page not say anything. The conversion went up 10% – and that’s on a $2,000 product.

In Jamaica, for our annual Maverick M3 Summit, we had a member report that they had a 17% upsell increase by changing their script to mention $1 from the product went to a charity. And across thousands and thousands of phone calls this adds up tremendously (theirs is one of the biggest call centers for DRTV). The best part is it’s big win/win – for the charity involved for increased funding and a win for their business too. The Evolved Enterprise™ can be more transactional, transformational or even transcend business.

I love seeing things like this work but I’m also immensely interested in “changing the course of the river” and not just pushing more water down the river, as a friend told me. How do we truly innovate to make sure the change is ‘baked-in’ into the business model.

One of the more well-known examples is TOMS shoes. Blake Mycoksie founder of TOMS shoes, really made the ‘buy one – give one’ model well known. You buy one pair of shoes and one pair of shoes goes to a child in need. It’s tangible and easy to understand with a direct impact by-product of buying something you want anyway. I see this as one of the most innovative impact models and it’s powerful. TOMS just reported they’ve given away over 10,000,000 shoes now. That means, obviously, they’ve also sold 10,000,000 pairs of shoes.

The “buy one – give one” model has been rocket fuel for their success and created super fans out their customers, team and suppliers. They were able to get unique partnerships and massive word-of-mouth because of their unique impact tie-in. Just imagine the difference between their model if TOMS said ‘we give a % of our profits to children’s charities’. (BTW – Blake has a good book out called “Start Something That Matters” that’s worth picking up.)

Here’s another interesting one…

Let’s take Sevenly.org. Not as many people are familiar with them as TOMS. They started off just a few years back doing limited edition t-shirts with $7 going to 1 cause they picked each week. Fast forward just a few years and they’ve hit $3,000,000+ in donations. Add that up and that’s a lot of products they’ve sold with $7 being donated.

I truly believe that businesses will be at a competitive disadvantage in the next 5-7 years without some sort of impact related cause to their venture and that’s how I plan to be all-in.

Giving 100%

In my journal entry I also wrote “Give 100%. Fulfilling your destiny of greatness”

The 100% part stems from something I’m not that keen to admit but I don’t think I’ve ever truly given 100%. I can see an interesting pattern looking back on my life. For instance in college, I’d go out the night before a big exam, come in late into the lecture hall, borrow a pencil and be the first one out. Even with that – I’d still get a solid ‘B’. And with my businesses, I’ve always done well and over-delivered but I’ve never given my everything. If I’m being totally honest, it’s probably because that leaves a little room to justify results if they are not what you hoped for. But screw that. That’s really not good enough anymore.

As I mentioned before, echoing the Great Work of Your Life book – by putting your full essence behind something, you let go of the outcome because your full effort is reward by itself.

I saw Marc Ecko, the founder of the billion dollar+ fashion and lifestyle brand Ecko Unlmtd, speak a few weeks ago at a CADRE DC event. His new book Unlabel: Selling You Without Selling Out is about building an authentic brand from the guts out to the skin. He told us that it didn’t matter what anybody said about the book or the reviews or how many it sold, because he had written it for his kids and he ‘won’ once the last word was written. (I was taking to Marc the other day and we’re going to be doing a teleseminar for you guys.)

Looking at my unique abilities, resources, network, “R&D”, etc. everything’s been leading up to connecting the dots. Everything from business models I’ve studied, my connections, the reputation I’ve built, my previous successes, past relationships, current distribution channels – truly everything.

And this Evolved Enterprise™ overlaid on the “100 by 2100 project” is MY path.

Of course, there are plenty of question marks bouncing around my head still like how I’d measure the impact on the 100 global issues, what that success looks like, etc. How that fits across what I’m doing everywhere, etc.

But I’m sure the right people will come into my life to help at the right time.

I believe in the interconnected destiny of greatness through the unique collisions of big ideas and incredible individuals, together we can co-create something meaningful. I can’t wait to see how the journey unfolds and hope you’ll be part of it. Drop me a comment with some thoughts and ideas to get the conversation rolling…

66 Must-read books for Impactful Entrepreneurs

December 30, 2013 by Yanik Silver

The other day, Maverick1000 members were asking about book recommendations on our private forum. I typically read 1-2 books per week (minimum) so this forced me to sort out some top recommendations by category.

I’ve always believed your life is changed by the books you read, experiences you create and the people you meet.

Think of this as the start of your Maverick MBA with 6 of the most important categories for evolved enterprises and impactful entrepreneurs in the 21^st century.

1) Success Thinking/Foundation

2) Marketing & Sales

3) Strategic Thinking & Innovation

4) Operations/Systems

5) 21st Century Orgs & Modern Entrepreneurship

6) Action & Productivity

* * *

I. Success Thinking/Foundation:

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

Not really a business book but probably one of the biggest influences for top CEOs and entrepreneurs who have cited this numerous times. I’ve read this several times and even threw out calling our daughter Dagny – but Missy didn’t go for that. I loved Atlas Shrugged for instilling the philosophy that productive value should be compensated and revered instead of these individuals being coerced into self-sacrifice because of their talent and other’s “needs”. It really cemented the argument in my mind that the more laissez-faire approach to governing is ultimately best for a free marketplace and productive society. Yes, this is a thick read but well worth it.

Winning Through Intimidation by Robert Ringer

I know the title of this book is a bit off putting and that’s probably why Robert renamed the latest edition. I love the way Ringer objectively looks at other people’s success advice in here. For instance, the advice of “work hard and you’ll succeed”. He asked himself what “working hard” really means since one person’s definition of working hard is a 18-hour shift while someone else might have a totally different notion. Ringer threw out typical advice like this to work on his own theories for figuring out success. Plus, there is one chapter in here “the Leapfrog theory” that is essential reading. It explodes the myth of “working your way to the top”. Basically this is a waste of time to keep the status quo. You can leapfrog over any competitors by proclaiming yourself at their same level – but you’ve got to be able to back it up with the goods. For some reason people are always waiting to be anointed the “expert” – it doesn’t happen. And Ringer’s book is packed with even more hard-hitting realities for street-smart entrepreneurs.

Lead the Field By Earl Nightingale

I can’t even begin to count the times I’ve listened to these programs. Earl was really the first person who game me ‘permission’ to think and behave differently. He talks about how the top 5% of achievers don’t do the things ordinary people do and that’s why they are extraordinary. Or they are willing to do the things the other 95% aren’t willing to do (like read/listen for hours per day honing my expertise)

Rich Dad’s Cashflow Quadrant by Robert Kiyosaki

A lot of people might say “Rich Dad/Poor Dad” is more influential but I would argue this second book in the series really hits the concepts explained there harder. If you’re looking for a book to shake you or someone who needs it out of the typical 9-to-5 mindset – this will do it. The Cashflow Quadrant is all about creating enough passive income to pay for your needs and truly creating financial independence. It’s a simple concept explained by Kiyosaki’s drawing depicted on the cover. On the left-hand side are the people who trade time for money. That’s the “E” or employee quadrant and the “S” or Small business quadrant. Then on the right-hand side are the people creating passive wealth by being “I” – Investors or “B” Business owners (who work on in their business not in it). While Kiyosaki’s books are pretty short on specific details – I think the philosophy and mindset is way more powerful and important.

THE LAW OF SUCCESS IN SIXTEEN LESSONS by Napoleon Hill

I like this even better than the more popular Think and Grow Rich because you get the full lessons Napoleon Hill uncovered with interviews spanning 20 years with the biggest tycoons and empire builders of his time.

59 Seconds: Think a Little Change a Lot by Richard Wiseman

The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success: A Practical Guide to the Fulfillment of Your Dreams by Deepak Chopra

The Practice of Happiness by John Kehoe

John is not super well known but this is a great book to get you attuned to some of the most important elements in a joyful life.

Daring Greatly by Brene Brown

Wow! This is a powerhouse of a book dealing with shame and vulnerability, something every leader needs to hear and work with.

Choose Yourself by James Altucher

James is one of the most transparent and wonderfully vulnerable people I have met (and read). James has made and lost millions and he provides a valuable paradigm for anyone to get their thinking straight.

Make it Big: 49 Secrets for Building a Life of Extreme Success by Frank McKinney

Frank McKinney builds mega multi-million dollar mansions on spec (meaning – no buyer before he builds). This is his first book that really shares his all encompassing philosophy for living a full life in every sense. I’ve spent extended amounts of time with Frank in Haiti helping build self-sustaining villages and Frank has immense integrity in everything he does leading from these principles.

The Great Work of Your Life by Stephen Cope

My #1 book of the last year. It’s a little (okay a lot) different than any business book because it’s about your Dharma. A Buddhist concept essentially meaning your path or truth. If you’re considering what you really should be doing with your life and how to integrate your deepest purpose and meaning into everything you do – this is the book to read. Mine is massively highlighted with notes all over.

Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends on It by Kamal Ravikant

I love, love, love this book! Written by a CEO of a venture backed company in Silicon Valley, it’s a totally transformative book to go from depressed and dark periods of burn out to full engaged and living at your optimal level. Try the exercises in here for big results.

II. Marketing & Sales

Influence: The psychology of persuasion by Robert Cialdini, PhD

I’ve read it at least 9 times and it will truly help you understand the psychological triggers to a sale. Very powerful stuff. Written by a self-proclaimed “sucker” and professor of psychology to help consumers avoid being taken “in” by marketers – this instantly became a classic for us marketers to apply each of the psychological tactics to success. This truly is a power that should only be harnessed for good. If I was to start at zero again and if you stripped away all the knowledge from every book I’ve read – I would start by reading this one and get it all back!

How to Make Millions with Your Ideas: An Entrepreneur’s Guide by Dan Kennedy

Yes, even though this was published in 1996 and some of the new-fangled technology sections like broadcast fax are out-of-date – this is a top ten for sure! I’ve spent probably $150k or more with Dan and every product or resource I buy from him gives me back at least a 10-to-1 return. This is one of my favorite Dan books (along with #7 on the list) but you really can’t go wrong buying any of his books. When I first stumbled onto Dan I was so excited because he finally provided more of the true ‘nuts & bolts’ I was looking for. Sure, he’s grumpy and not the most sociable guy – but his information is priceless no matter what type of business you are in

Brains on Fire: Igniting Powerful, Sustainable, Word of Mouth Movements by Robbin Phillips, Greg Cordell, Geno Church and Spike Jones

One of my favorite newer books on creating an identity and community for the customers you serve.

Primal Branding: Create Zealots for Your Brand, Your Company, and Your Future by Patrick Hanlon

Getting Everything You Can Out of All You’ve Got: 21 Ways You Can Out-Think, Out-Perform, and Out-Earn the Competition by Jay Abraham

I like his Mr. X book a lot more, but it’s not as widely available. Jay is the very first direct marketing expert I ever encountered when I was 17 and his fundamental thinking for leverage and uncovering hidden assets is unparalleled.

Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples

An absolute classic for any direct marketer or anyone that doesn’t want to waste a dime on untrackable ads. Devour this one and also look for Caples’ other books that are out of print. A true professional who generously published his directly-traceable results for everybody to benefit from. Many people might think there’s nothing to be gained from a book written decades ago – WRONG! Everything Caples reveals applies online in spades.

Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins

Yes another “old time” marketing book but the gems in here are absolutely brilliant if applied today. Remember, human nature does not change – just the ways to activate our buying does. This is a short read and available online for free in many places since it’s in the public domain. Hopkins was one of the true advertising pioneers and this little guide really distills the essence of why you cannot use conjecture or opinion but actual tested, scientific methods to discover what your customers/prospects want.

Magic Words that Bring You Riches by Ted Nicholas

There are 3 main people I’d give credit for opening my eyes to the enormous power of direct response marketing and helping me achieve financial independence before I was 31. And one of those is definitely Ted Nicholas. I cannot begin to tell you how many dozens of times I listened and read Ted’s material over and over again. He’s one of my all-time marketing heroes. Ted took the guts of his $197/year newsletter on direct marketing and distilled it into this single book. When I checked this morning there were a few used copies available on Amazon but you can now find it as an ebook or real book on TedNicholas.com.

Pow! Right Between the Eyes: Profiting from the Power of Surprise by Andy Nulman

IF you want to create some memorable that your customers MUST talk about – this book gives you the formula. Warning: The only problem with surprise elements is you must be constantly re-inventing.

The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes

Chet a proven blueprint for creating a sales and marketing machine in your business.

Double Double by Cameron Herold

Cameron built 1-800-Got Junk from $3M – $100M+ as the COO. This is the process.

Predictable Revenue: Turn Your Business into a Sales Machine with the $100 Million Best Practices of Salesforce.com by Aaron Ross

Aaron Ross presents his ‘cold calling 2.0’ strategy for creating predictable and scaleable selling. This is the personal account of creating a $100M pipeline for Salesforce and multiplying yourself and your team.

The Ultimate Sales letter by Dan Kennedy

Easiest to follow formula for creating sales copy (letters) that work.

Advertising Secret of the Written Word – Joe Sugarman

I love Joe Sugarman’s material. He’s the first person that used 800#s to market products and he’s responsible for blockbusters like ‘Blu Blockers’. Joe is first and foremost a copywriter and you’ll get some of his best thinking on this valuable subject.

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath

Pitch Anything by Oren Klaff

A great book about creating the right ‘frame’ for having others qualify themselves and turn the tables on selling.

III. Thinking/Innovation:

Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim

Blue Ocean is a pretty easy concept to understand but difficult to implement. It can lead to some big innovations and really owning a category that you invent – but it’s imperative to combine with something like Little Bets (below).

The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures by Dan Roam

Even if you don’t think you’re an artist in the least, this book is a really powerful application of using simple pictures to sell.

The Mind Map Book: How to Use Radiant Thinking to Maximize Your Brain’s Untapped Potential by Tony Buzan and Barry Buzan

A good primer on using Mindmaps. One of my favorite tools for creating new ideas.

Making Ideas Happen: Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality by Scott Belsky

Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge from Small Discoveries by Peter Sims

Different: Escaping the Competitive Herd by Youngme Moon

Written by one of the most popular Harvard Business School professors, Different is exactly that. It’s a good take on how to create a competitive advantage in the marketplace by being different. Most businesses talk about being ‘different’ but so many fall into the trap becoming mediocre because they look at their competitors and try to copy some of their strengths. This only leads to being average across a bunch of different aspects instead of being unique in just 1 or 2 differentiable points. This book is a fairly easy read and not a dull, boring college textbook. And as one reviewer on Amazon said, just skip the Harvard MBA and get this book!

IV. Operations:

Work the System: The Simple Mechanics of Making More and Working Less by Sam Carpenter

Excellent book by Maverick member, Sam Carpenter detailing how he went from nearly bankrupt and totally having a business out-of-control to a smoothly run ‘machine’.

Get A Grip: An Entrepreneurial Fable…Your Journey to Get Real, Get Simple, and Get Results by Gino Wickman and Mike Paton

One of my favorite books that has a lot of actual application to help you work on what’s most important and get all your team members in alignment with your vision.

Mastering the Rockefeller Habits by Verne Harnish

Make The Noise Go Away: The Power Of An Effective Second-In-Command by Larry G. Linn

A short but profound book on grooming a “2nd in command”.

V: 21st Century Organizations & Modern Entrepreneurship:

Screw Business as Usual by Richard Branson

Richard is my biggest business hero and I’ve been privileged to spend several weeks with him on his private island. This is his manifesto for a new way of doing business and I really think there’s a tipping point that’s been reached. It’s an idea to look at new models for entrepreneurs.

4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss

Tim and I met over our love of marketing and living life to the fullest. There’s a reason this book has literally taken on a life of its own and achieved best-seller status so quickly. To me, it’s because the concepts in here are so compelling. I’ve given away a ton of copies of this book and a lot of people have actually gotten pissed at me for giving to them. One of my hockey teammates said that to me again a few nights ago. He’s gets really mad when he looks at it on the nightstand because he’s not living his life the way it could be using the ideas in this book. This book is designed to get you to stop and think if you are really putting the right things in the right priority. Tim has a concept of the “New Rich” and that’s people who have time to do the things they want & they’re passionate on. There’s some exciting concepts about life design, dumping the email habit, outsourcing and creating online “muses” that pay for it all. Tim started a revolution with this book and it’s still pertinent.

Start Something that Matters by Blake Mycocskie

I love what Blake has been able to do with TOMS shoes and his buy-one, give-one program is truly a remarkable and impactful business model.

Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh

Tony is incredible with what he’s been able to do with Zappos and now the Downtown Project. If you want to consider how happiness is integrated into your profitability for 21^st century organizations, this is your book.

Unique Ability: Creating the Life You Want by Catherine Nomura, Julia Waller, Shannon Waller

This is my absolute favorite book about simply focusing on what your unique abilities are and then bringing in others who are strong in areas that are not unique abilities. Now “Unique Ability” is different than simply finding your strengths like the book “Now Discover Your Strengths” (which is also quite good for their online test). Unique ability is not only about something that is a strength for you but something you love and that gives you more energy when you do it! Critical difference. You could have a strength but you don’t necessarily want to keep doing that activity. This book walks you the process of discovering your own unique abilities. Highly recommended. (At some point I’ll do a post just on this concept and share with you my own ‘unique ability’ statement I’ve come up with from this.) This book is put out by Dan Sullivan’s company “Strategic Coach” and they have an excellent group of other ‘knowledge’ products. If you can find it the CD set “Pure Genius” is remarkable.

The Business of Happiness by Ted Leonsis

Former Underground® keynote presenter, Ted Leonsis shares his 6 secrets for building a business that increases your happiness.

Conscious Capitalism: Liberating the Heroic Spirit of Business by John Mackey, Rajendra Sisodia and Bill George

All part of the ‘tipping point’ going on with business serving a higher purpose. I really like the idea of an evolving consciousness for business serving all stakeholders (customers, employees, suppliers, investors, etc).

A Lapsed Anarchist’s Approach to Building a Great Business by Ari Weinzwieg

Huge thumbs up for me on this book! You must get this one from Ari’s training site (ZingTrain.com) and you’ll be absolutely impressed. One of the key books I always recommend.

PEAK by Chip Conley

One of my favorite books about creating a higher PEAK state for everybody in your organization based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses… by Eric Ries

Ries has quite a following in Silicon Valley and for good reason. This book lays out an excellent methodology for ‘testing’ new business ideas and getting traction fast.

Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers by Alexander Osterwalder

A really nice visual way of looking at and thinking through your business model.

The Startup Owner’s Manual: The Step-By-Step Guide for Building a Great Company by Steve Blank and Bob Dorf

A really nice step-by-step guide to go from idea to roll out.

Business Stripped Bare by Sir Richard Branson

The best ‘nuts and bolts’ out of any Branson book I’ve read. Plus, I love seeing some of his journal entries on the inside cover.

Ready, Fire, Aim by Michael Masterson by Mark Ford

Reality is Broken by Jane McGonigal

One of the best books to get you thinking about using ‘gamification’ (the hot term) to help everything in your organization.

Tribal Leadership: Leveraging Natural Groups to Build a Thriving Organization by Dave Logan, John King and Halee Fischer-Wright

How to Get Rich by Felix Dennis

A totally tell-it-like-it-is recap from the founder of Maxim magazine.

Maverick Startup by Yanik Silver 😉

Yes, I’m biased but still makes the list.

VI: Action/Productivity:

The War of Art by Steven Pressfield

The best book out there about the difference between a professional and an amateur to beat down procrastination.

No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs by Dan Kennedy

Yes, Kennedy makes the list again. Let’s face it, for entrepreneurs we’ve got no greater asset than our time. And even if you’ve read a 100 other time management books I guarantee you’ll get something out of this one. Here’s Dan’s unique & ruthless approach to time management that might give some people pause. I don’t follow all of Dan’s advice here because I’m a little too nice at times but reading this book will really let you understand that you create the rules at all times. You decide how you want customers to work with you, people to contact you, etc. Fact is, if you don’t set the rules – then someone else will for you by default.

10 Natural Laws of Successful Time and Life Management by Hyrum Smith

This book has probably had one of the most profound effects on my inner values starting in 1998 when I got introduced to Hyrum’s company, now-called “Franklin Covey”. This book really made me examine what my value was and most importantly in what order should those values be. I look at them nearly every day when I get up to make sure my decisions are on track with my inner compass. This isn’t a half-hour read and then you’ve ‘got it’. I spent some time really considering what type of values and life legacy I’d like to leave. Excellent exercises