Although not passive income, my Wife retired three years ago from a 6 figure corporate senior level position to buy and sell vintage and antique items. I know it sounds like a spam e-Mail you have probably received in the past but she has developed a very fulfilling and lucrative low stress business. There are myriads of items you can purchase for under $5 and sell for anywhere from $25-$100. And when you develop a good eye you can find items that you picked up for a few bucks and sell for thousands. I would be happy to give you an in depth head start and pitfalls to avoid if you schedule a call but the websites that we found to move the most volume for the least amount of time and money is eBay and Facebook. Etsy can generate more value than others however on Etsy you really need to generate brand awareness and consumers require you to have more history. Over time Etsy can be a great store front but requires much more work and time. I wish you luck. My wife retiring, having less stress and spending more time together is priceless for me and her. Make it a great day! David

I am going to be brutally honest here and my hope is that it helps. How would you define financial freedom? You seem to be depressed by hard work? Define your goal. Define what you want in life. If that goal is financial freedom define what that is. Determine what is standing in your way of that goal. Clear the path and work HARD to that goal. Be ready to pivot along the way. Success is never a straight line and there are no short cuts. Anything worth having is worth the effort. But ask yourself can I be happy and grateful for what I already have. That is true wealth. Good luck you your journey! David

I would love to help you with this please feel free to book a call with me and I will collaborate with you to build your network. To fully help you I would need to better understand your goals and the network you need built. Just having connections is not a valuable network. Your network is only as strong as the trust you have built within it. I would consider my network very strong. I built it over thirty years and there are about two dozen connections I know I can go to and get trusted results if needed. Each of those connections has trusted connections and so forth. I would focus on value versus volume. Trust is built by keeping your say do equation 1 to 1. With too many connections its impossible to manage and trust wanes. Money flows on trust. The most valuable thing for me in my industry are the relationships and trust I have built over 30 years. I have helped connections reach their goals and make more money. When I call they pick up the phone and listen. If you are looking at creating a more passive network I have found that short videos that bring a lot of value to the subject matter and create a great following. Using LinkedIn to connect to you YouTube or TickTock will help reinforce your brand and build credibility. Great job on recognizing that networking is important. It's the fine details and maximizing that network that I could help you with. Make it a great day! David

I have created my share of pricing for outsourced activity. Knowing what my competition is charging both on the high end and low end helped me understand the landscape but I created my pricing based on my own value proposition for each specific partner. First I needed to understand where they were and where they wanted to go. Then what has typically stood in their path to achieving their goal. Knowing these things was a good start in creating a plan for them. Next communicate to them what it would take for them to do it themselves in terms of manpower, management, infrastructure, investment and total cost without the guarantee of success. Are they experts in the problem you are solving? Position yourself as the expert solution provider. Then communicate to them how your team would manage this process and produce results for them. Not only reducing the complexity and reducing the cost but the additional value of partnering with your team. If you lead with your product and solutions then the number one objection will be price. If you take a consultative approach and tailor a plan based on results and value the objections will be around the inputs and desired outputs. These will be objective discussions and basis for negotiation. Of course my explanation is a simplified approach but hopefully gives you food for thought and creativity. Good luck! David

Great question! If you are not catching their attention within a few seconds it is going to the recycle bin. When creating marketing campaigns the first thing I am identifying is, "What is the goal?" Is it to create market awareness, demonstrate market leadership, or to engage with specific decision makers at your target audience? The goal will define the process and tactics. Then think of what benefit this campaign would provide not only to you but to your prospect or customer. Whether it's sales or marketing you have to be where your customer is in their process. In most cases it's at no and don't waste my time. Unless they are feeling active pain they are most likely less to engage let alone act. Can you have them feel the unrealized pain? Can you elevate that concern so you can increase their curiosity? A curious prospect is a potential partner. I recently was working with a company looking to invest in infrastructure. They had many cost benefit analysis scenarios completed. They were looking to get approval for the investment from their ownership. The analysis was well done but it did not identify why they should act now versus waitinig. In the standard SWOT there was too much focus on the S and the O. The W and T are what create the urgency. Doing nothing is an option and the option to do nothing became such a losing proposition that investment became the only option. I truly enjoy working with partners on these types of challenges. If you ever want to brain storm don't hesitate to schedule a call. Make it a great day! David

There are many publications, articles, and books on this subject. I feel I would be doing you a disservice recommending any without more detailed knowledge of your business model. The one thing I can say and its the best advice I ever got when paying commercial folks and I live by it now, "You get what you incentivize." Often in sales we unconsciously incentivize activity. Activity doesn't mean results. I am not certain the size of your sales team but take a look at Price's Law. Price's law says that 50% of the work is done by the square root of the total number of people who participate in the work. For thirty years this has been nearly a science. Keep that in mind when creating an incentive plan. I also keep this in mind when creating teams. 4 is a magic number. 2 people do 50% of the work and the other two do 50% of the work. I have created many comp plans. I have seen some that work amazingly and if you have done this long enough some that you look back and think what was I thinking. It's nice to have lived long enough to make mistake to learn from. If someone tells you that they haven't either they are lying or their mistakes are coming soon. Feel free to give me a call if you wish to brainstorm or develop a plan for growth. Make it a great day! David

My advice would be to identify recruiters (headhunters) in the industry in which you are experienced. These recruiters are well networked and are incentivized to find the right fit for you. It costs you nothing and they can match you up with your specific requirements. The value of creating your own network of recruiters in the industry you serve is immense. I spent 30 years building that network. Anytime they contact me if I'm not interested or I'm not looking to hire, I always try to give them a lead or two. When I needed to find the next adventure they were eager to place me and put extra effort into marketing my skills. Great thing is the larger your salary the more money the recruiter makes. They are really an amazing resource that's often overlooked. If you haven't started building a strong network on LinkedIn I would highly recommend that also. It's a great way to keep your finger on the pulse of your industry and opportunity to find recruiters and other hiring managers. Good luck in your pursuit. If you ever want to brainstorm I would be happy to hear your story. Make it a great day! David

I love this question. I've heard it hundreds of times and a question that is asked by every owner or CEO each quarter. It's a question that must be asked in every business . It's also a question I'm ready to take on. But keep in mind any expert sales consultant is going to follow up with many questions of their own. If this is still a need for you I highly suggest you call one of the experts that have commented or other experienced members of Clarity. If you would like to brainstorm I would welcome speaking with you and if I don't think I can help I would be sure to direct you to the resource that could. I welcome you to review my profile to see if some of the solutions I have provided would relate to your sales goals. Make it a great day! David

I think often sales and marketing get mixed together. They are directly connected however very different functions. Think of it as a two lane street going in both directions. They can not succeed without the other. I don't claim to be an expert in Marketing however I would say that I am in Sales. Sometimes instead of a marketing effort streamlining and improving sales is what is truly needed. With a recent partner I was working with they were only converting 10% of new projects to actual business. No amount of marketing was going to improve what they really wanted, more revenue. They only wanted to hit 20% but we came up with a plan to exceed 90%. We actually hit 94%. With that type of success rate they can afford to put more resources into marketing that will generate projects where they actually close and turn into new revenue. If you ever get to the point where you think you need to work on the sales side I would love to brainstorm with you. Make it a great day! David

As with many things in life most things are not necessary. From a Sales Expert perspective I would look at this perhaps differently than others. There are many life coaches that you have to compete with. How would you like to differentiate yourself from them? When researching your competition do they have specific certifications that they promote? If not would you having certain certifications set you apart? I always think why do my customers buy from me? Taking that a step farther I actually ask them, "You have a lot of great choices in our market but you decided to do business with me. Can you explain to me why you made that choice?" My favorite answers are; I feel like I am your only customer You actually asked me that question The difference between you and everyone else, you care Even if you can't solve my problem you help me find someone who can. If you are trying to decide to go into business no matter what you have a product to sell. In this case you are the product. If you ever want to brainstorm. Feel free to give me a call. Make it a great day! David