How You Can Overcome Self-Sabotage

by Roy Varner

I’ve noticed over my decades of developing video and learning systems for many folks that a lot of people have trouble dealing with competition.

So I consulted with some gurus in that area and discovered three common thoughts and related behavior that hold people back from competing well.

All three tend to be based on the remnant thoughts that many people adopt after early life experiences dealing with intimidating and belittling authority figures.

When we’re hobbled with low self-esteem from believing the crap others say about us, it’s no wonder we have trouble facing challenges and stiff competition online for business.

The human subconscious is programmed to automatically avoid trauma (physical or emotional) by developing protective coping habits such as procrastination or fleeing from conflict and competition.

Therapists call these limiting assumptions and coping habits self-sabotage – accepting as true the depressing mindset of doubt, feelings of vulnerability, and lack of self-confidence just because others claimed those things about you. 

The result is living fearfully within your safe comfort zone of the same old thoughts and behaviors.

Trouble is, there is no growth or progress in your comfort zone, only the repetition and recycling of old thoughts and decisions that got us where we are now.

Like quicksand, this mentally self-defeating land of “stuck” has a tenacious hold that resists every attempt to feel better about ourselves.

Yet hope springs eternal, and many of us hiding out in our comfort zones discover we’re in Einstein’s self-defeating loop:  Doing the same things over and over, while expecting different results.

You can’t get up “there” to that higher, more productive, braver mindset by thinking and behaving in ways that got you where you are.

So take a quick little REALITY CHECK and see if you regularly experience any of these three common limiting assumptions about yourself that trap you in your comfort zone.

Self-Sabotaging Assumption #1 – “I feel everyone is judging me on my appearance. Makes me want to be invisible where nobody can observe me and criticize things about me. There’s safety in hiding.”

First, it’s important to be aware of, and admit to yourself, that worrying so much about how you look to others is being overly sensitive and self-absorbed.  Doesn’t sound like a successful way to think if you want to get ahead in business, does it?

You can turn this claim around by realizing you’d be so much more productive and successful if you believed that “it’s not about me, but about the pains and problems of people I serve, and getting them to a level of thriving and feeling good about themselves.”

Focusing on helping others is a powerful antidote that leaves no time for worrying about what people think of you.

Think about it…your audience isn’t there to criticize and tear you down.

They are taking the time to listen to you because (1) they believe you know something about their major pain, fear, need, or want, and (2) they hope you have a solution for their urgent concern.

If you talk about their common problem using their own words (from your surveys and research of your ideal prospects), and offer a solution, they don’t care what you look like.

More later on how to actually look and sound more like a pro, so this transition can be easier for you.

Self-Sabotaging Assumption #2 – “I don’t ask for the sale as often or as directly as many others do.  I’m not confident that I did a good job of convincing others of the value of my products and services – I’m always bracing for them to say no.”

First, note the limited thinking (not confident I presented enough value) and the protective coping habit (withdrawal, or bracing for “no”). 

Obviously if you don’t putt the ball, and with confidence, it will never make it in the hole.  All the previous swings from tee to green are therefore wasted without the finish.

And wouldn’t you be more willing to ask a person to buy if you were comfortable that your words, logic, and emotional appeal were right on target for your ideal prospect?

When you believe in the value of what you’re providing – the end result, the positive change in the buyer’s life – then asking for the sale is truly an invitation for the buyer to thrive.

Self-Sabotaging Assumption #3 – “If I’m not 100% sure I can do a task, I won’t even suggest it. So I miss a lot of opportunities to break free of my limiting comfort zone where there is no learning, nor getting better.”

I know a number of people who jump all over opportunities, regardless of whether they think the task is doable for them.

One friend told me that, “Hey, I always say YES at each new opportunity in my wheelhouse, because I can always research it on the Internet and/or hire help to get something done that’s beyond my skills.”

Fear of failure keeps many from even trying…when it’s precisely failure that is the greatest school for success in the long run.

We learn by doing things wrong, and then build determination to find a better way next time.  If you always win, you’re not trying hard enough to grow.

I’ve made huge leaps in my career by jumping at new and challenging opportunities, and using the good stress to work my way to a new skill. One got me a $400,000 project to produce 30 training videos, and another turned into a strong customer with regular work over 23 years.

Okay, so that’s easy for me to say.

So what’s the answer for you, to give you the strength to jump at new and challenging opportunities?

The answer is not in the next “shiny object” online information program…because information and rah-rah motivation alone don’t pry us loose from our old programmed assumptions and coping habits.

Watching long videos and taking assignments home to “self-study” do not convince the subconscious of 97% of us to drop the walls of its comfort zone and suddenly think and act differently.

And we still can’t get up “there” with the thinking and habits that got us where we are now.

The good news is that a transformative coach or mentor knows how to walk you one baby step at a time through the process of building your self-confidence for expanding your comfort zone.

And one of the best type of coach to get you that transformation is a video coach who knows how to help you look and sound like a pro any time you’re on camera or in front of a live audience.

That’s a HUGE advantage when you can be your real self on camera.

The right coach can give you a confidence makeover with simple changes in these 5 key areas:

1. Camera position — Offering a more pleasing and attractive picture of you for your viewers to look at.
2. Lighting – Creating more natural skin tone, a pro studio look, so watching you will be a more pleasant experience.
3. Sound – Tweaking your voice to be rich and full to draw attention to your message.
4. Background – Creating a brandable look and avoiding all those distractions.
5. You – Choosing the right clothing, jewelry, hair style, etc. – and using body language proven to draw people to you and your message.

Then that same experienced video coach can show you how to make magnetic sales videos that will attract lots of ideal prospect to become ideal customers.

As the sales grow, your self-confidence and fun in life will zoom!

And finally, get help with how to use your customers words about their pains, fears, needs, and wants to draw them to your solutions.

Follow the Tiger Woods approach to getting super good at something new:  practice, practice, and then practice more!

As each coach-guided step turns into an encouraging win, you’ll be ever more willing to step outside your comfort zone and take the risks that really pay off financially and personally.

It’s a whole lot easier to continue to try something new and scary on the heels of a string of wins and victories – and with the support and encouragement of a transformative coach who thrives when you do.

Why COLOR is Key to Your Online Success

by Roy Varner

Humans are programmed to react to colors in a predictably emotional way.

There’s a whole psychology of colors, in fact, that allows us to create specific feelings and emotional responses by careful choice of colors for our advertising, websites, logos, etc.

Any time we can discern a pattern in the behavior of our ideal prospects and clients, we can use that built-in response behavior to attract them over and over.

You can quickly learn what colors mean to people and how to set up your Signature Colors to draw in exactly the right people who appreciate you and what you stand for.

COLOR BASICS YOU NEED TO KNOW

Let’s get a quick review of major color groups as a foundation for our discussion.

Primary colors are red, blue, and yellow. Of course, children love the primary colors because they’re bright and clean and fun. Who doesn’t, right? We’re all kids at heart.

Red is all about attraction — an action color, energy, strength, passion excitement, and adventure. It intensely challenges the eyes and the emotions. You see it with food logos such as Wendy’s, Chic Filet, and Kentucky Fried Chicken…not to mention Coca-Cola, ESP, and Canon.

Red is also about danger (fire / fire truck), anger (seeing red), and warning (stop sign).

Blue is calming, confident, trustworthy, purposeful, and loyal.  It’s relaxing, no stress, somehow feels good, like the blue sky and blue waters. Think IBM, Facebook, Samsung, HP, and PayPal…and your vacation to favorite seaside spots.

Yellow tends to feel cheery, positive, fun joyful, and bright like a sunny day.  It seems to stimulate the thought of logic, but also can convey cowardice, deception, and caution…as in when the traffic light turns yellow.  

Too much yellow, too bright can be off-putting.  Better to use it more for accents with colors that go well with yellow, such as blue, charcoal, and (think the Green Bay Packers), green. Think McDonald’s Golden Arches, Shell Oil (with red), and Post-Its.

Secondary colors are combinations of primary colors: green, orange, and purple.

Green (blue + yellow) is universally about life, nature, health, prosperity, harmony, and safety. Think outdoors, luck (four-leaf clover), and good things happening. Think John Deere tractors, Subway, and Land Rover logos.

Orange (red + yellow) evokes optimism, freedom, youth, and pleasure. Think of the soft drink logos for Fanta and Crush…UPS (on brown)…and Nickelodeon.

Purple (red + blue) is perceived as a royal shade of value, wisdom, luxury, and power.

Back to kids, we know they love the colors in a rainbow, which include both primary and secondary colors.

Tertiary colors are combinations of primary and secondary – yellow-orange, red-orange, red-purple, blue-purple, blue-green, and yellow-green. Tertiary colors work well with the others when picking your third basic color for your signature look.

Here’s an example of a mixed color that can work well for some people.

Champagne is a classy and stylish color and signature attraction, while still being “modest.”  It’s a tertiary color mixture of yellow and orange.

Make sure it works with your skin tone (see Video Color Rules down below).

And finally, complementary combinations tend to be pleasing to the eye and good combinations for marketing: blue and orange…red and green…purple and yellow.

Black represents power, boldness, mystery, elegance, and stability. It goes with almost every color as a background or accent. Black is actually blue + red + yellow…or orange + purple + green.

White is all about purity, innocence, luxury, security, and peace…wedding dresses, doves, and all things clean. White has equal shares of all the colors, which is why it tends to go well with everything except the super pale colors.

Then there are color mixes that tend to be trendy (remember avocado and gold appliances and shag carpets in the 70s?) – teal, peach, magenta, turquoise, and so on.

These mixtures show up in new car paint colors each year and interior decorators’ recommendations for your home (light grey-brown one year, beige another, etc.).



DON’T FORGET: You’re not picking your favorite colors, because it’s not about you. Choose colors for how your viewers react emotionally, to make it a connecting experience for them. That’s how you draw your ideal customers.

Capiche?

HOW VIDEO IS DIFFERENT

Video is built around electronic colors for televisions, mobile screens, and computer monitors.

It’s the RGB system — RED, GREEN, and BLUE as its primary colors…

Making CYAN, YELLOW, and MAGENTA the secondary colors.

A six-digit hex code identifies each color – for example, #23f4a3 – which makes it so much easier to pick precise colors for your video work.

HINT: It’s better to search RGB color samples because that’s what you see on screen. Find a site that lets you see all the various RGB color samples and also color families that work well together.

WHY COLOR IS KEY TO BUILD YOUR BRAND

It ain’t about you, friend, but all about your viewers.

Remember, your messages on video and elsewhere are not about you, but about attracting your ideal prospects – so don’t let yourself pick your favorite colors.  It’s the best colors to draw in your ideal clients that you want on that screen at all times.

You want your ideal prospects to resonate with you and your brand – i.e., to feel good about the way you look and sound as a potential solution to their urgent pains, fears, needs, or wants.

You want them to trust you, to accept your authority, and to be impressed with your credentials. You can accomplish all three with proper use of color and get almost immediate acceptance of you as a problem solver.

So your “Signature Look” that seals the deal is a combination of color, words, and etcetera that says “professional go-to expert in your niche” to your ideal customers.

Choose 3 RGB family colors for your outreach (website, online ads and social media posts, on-camera background and theme, etc.):

• 1 Main Theme – find one color that’s not too dark or light, but which richly conveys the feelings you want them to have about you. I like the widely appreciated dark but rich blue as my background for its sense of confidence, trust, professionalism, and just plain beauty.
• 2 Support Color – choose a blue family color, or a complementary color for accent lines, boxes, buttons, etc.  You can easily find charts online that show you all the combinations for picking here. For a blue main, this color could be red, yellow, gold, orange, magenta, etc.
• 3 Accent Color – used for thin lines, bullets, buttons to push, and anything you want to stand out and get noticed.  Red, yellow, gold, and white work well for most things.

Here are a few examples of ideal combinations from Canva.com.

Find that pleasant-to-your-viewers’-eyes combination that generates the right attributes in the viewer’s mind and sets a positive standard people will recognize as your brand.

Recommendation: Hire an experienced video graphic artist to lay out all your visuals to give them professional formatting, balance, and design. This person will be able to find the exact hex numbers for the best match of 1-3 above.

IN SUMMARY:

Color is a powerful way to attract your ideal customers who can appreciate your qualities and the solutions you can provide – or to chase them away with bad choices.

Set your own personal preferences aside and let the natural human message of each color you use serve to be a strong connection to you and your brand for your ideal customers.

Let your ideal customers “choose” those colors for you, based on their sense of your personal qualities and what you have to offer as solutions for their problems.

If your research is thorough, your colors will convey that you understand their specific pains and have a trustworthy solution for them.

Those who resonate most with those colors and your message will end up being your ideal customers – the only ones you’ll want to attract, because they will be your long-term tribe and sell your business for you with their enthusiastic testimonials.

Color chosen by your ideal customers is your friend.  Embrace that new friend and prosper.

Why 3 Is Magic Number for You and Mankind

by Roy Varner

How many legs are on a tripod? How many strikes ‘til yer out? Why do U.S. presidents like to use first, middle, and last names?

Humans love relating things in threes.

Look at my first paragraph above, with three examples. We’re all naturally comfortable hearing things in threes.

Turns out that psychologically three examples of anything can be naturally persuasive – while a fourth can trigger doubt and even kill the first positive impression.

In fact, the number 3 is so ingrained in the psyche of humans that it’s a major force to be reckoned with in our lives, and certainly in business.

Take a couple of minutes to check out my examples below of how pervasive and fundamental that number is to your life and that of people worldwide and throughout the ages.

FUNDAMENTAL LIFE RHYTHM

• Holy Trinity – Father, Son, and Holy Ghost/Spirit
• ALL (three letters to represent the entire universe of existence)
• Omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence
• Past, present, and future
• Time, space, and matter
• Human time tracking: second, minute, hour… day, month, and year
• Three days in the tomb
• Three wise men
• Your Identity – me, myself, and I… mind, body, and soul
• Life cycle — birth, life, and death
• Beginning, middle, and end
• Crawl, walk, and run
• Family:  mother, father, and child
• Atoms are made up of protons, neutrons, and electrons.
• Three dimensions of height, width, and length
• Liquid, solid, and gas
• Earth’s core, mantel, and crust
• Air (nitrogen, oxygen, and carbon dioxide)
• Animal, vegetable, and mineral
• Protein, carbohydrate, and fat
• Primary colors (red, blue, green)… secondary colors (cyan, magenta, yellow)
• Newton’s three laws of motion: inertia, force, action/reaction
• In fact, the list of threes in science (including number of branches in each scientific field) goes on and on (I stopped researching after 10 single-spaced pages of listings).
• Also lots of grammar and punctuation rules (subject, verb, object… 1st, 2nd, and 3rd person… masculine, feminine, neuter… etc.)
• Beginner, intermediate, advanced
• Positive, neutral/zero, negative
• Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness
• Government of the people, by the people, and for the people (Abe Lincoln, three-letter first name)
• Branches of US Government: Legislative, Executive, Judicial
• Red, white and blue in the U.S. flag
• Blood, sweat, and tears
• Latin “omne trium perfectum” means everything that comes in threes is perfect, or every set of three is complete.
• In math, the triangle… Bermuda Triangle… everything common starting with “tri”
• Triathlon:  swim, cycle, and run
• Good things come in threes… more often than bad things
• In literature and movies: Three Stooges… The Three Musketeers… Three Little Pigs… Three Bears… Three French Hens… Three Blind Mice… Three Coins in the Fountain… Three wishes from the genie… Three guesses…
• Famous slogans: Just Do It (Nike)…Snap! Crackle! Pop! (Kellogg’s Rice Crispies)… Breakfast of Champions (Wheaties)… Finger Lickin’ Good (Kentucky Fried Chicken)… That Was Easy (Staples)… Let’s Go Places (Toyota)… Ultimate Driving Machine (BMW)
• Hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil
• Number of feet in a yard
• Three traffic light colors – green (go), yellow (slow), and red (stop)
• Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
• 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place medals at the Olympics
• Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria were Columbus’ ships
• Three books in a trilogy
• People like three acts in a typical story, movie, or play.
• Types of learning: psychomotor (manual dexterity), cognitive (memory), and affective (emotional), all parts of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, the bible of curriculum development people who create learning programs.
• Location, location, location as the priority in real estate sales.
• Stop, look, and listen – children’s road crossing safety phrase
• The Rule of Thirds in photography and video (ask me about this one).

WHY HUMANS LIKE IT SO

It’s obvious that the human mind, conscious and subconscious, is super comfortable with the cadence of three related things.

In fact, the human psyche tenaciously keeps your system in balance, as protection against trauma (mental, physical, and emotional).

That’s why it’s very hard to pry people loose from their erroneous assumptions and ingrained coping habits…and it’s a huge reason why information-only programs without 1:1 mentoring through the learning cycle don’t work to change mindsets and habits.

Why humans like things in threes is clear in the following two principles discovered over time by research.

1. Writing Power of Three:  Humans process information through pattern recognition, and three is the smallest, simplest, and easiest pattern to remember and to craft memorable phrases.

2. Reaction Rule of Threes:  Things that come in threes are seen as inherently funnier, more satisfying, and more effective than any other number.

So it makes huge sense to use that built-in proclivity in your communications to resonate with other people.

Want to master the “hook, engage, and close” process of gathering a steady stream of new clients? Then talk in their language, using their emotional words, and combine things in threes whenever it makes sense. (There I did it again with that last sentence!)

FOCUS ON TRI-POWER

You’ll be smart to use your new awareness of this special power to make all your communications resonate magnetically with your ideal clients.

Let me share a few techniques to attract people so you can thrive personally and financially.

Focus on Leadership:  Boil your work-related functions down to only 3 of the 9 “hats” (functions) it takes to build and run a successful business… and delegate the rest.

Productive Priorities First: To get a lot done, schedule work each day on your top three priorities, starting with the most important. Then if things come up, you’ve already done the critical stuff to move you forward.

Three Hotspots Matter: Most important priorities to build a satisfying, sustainable, and scalable business are (1) trustworthy & memorable brand, (2) magnetic high-converting sales videos, and (3) transformational life-changing learning programs.

Use Communication Power: Words convey no more than 10% of the full meaning of our message…tone of voice can add up to 38%…but body language can fill in the remaining 52% of your message. Be in person or on video to get the most impact in communicating your messages.

Keep It Simple:  Use one main point and three supporting points as the basis for a live talk, podcast, sales video, speech, social media post, blog, learning module, etc.  People can follow your logic easily and feel connected with you.

Do Results Testimonials: First, you need only three testimonials on your web site, sales message page, etc. if they talk about net changes and results from your services that transformed their lives.

Use Their Words: Use three-item phrases and examples that are recognizable, such as the above phrases I shared with you.  Name your programs, unit titles, slogans, etc. with only three words if you can – and those being words your ideal prospects and customers use to describe their pains, fears, needs, and wants.

Use Trio Groups: Your clients can learn a new skill or process well in trio group exercises, where they take turns role-playing situations as customer, coach / salesperson, and observer who reports on what worked well.

Watch Your Timing: You have literally about three seconds to hook an online surfer’s initial interest to stop and take a look at your message. You can present a full sales pitch on video in only three minutes. People won’t remember more than three items from a list… and they tend to remember the last three better.

(NOTE: How many words did I use in each section header in this blog? How many to identify each suggestion above? That’s called parallelism, and it has a natural cadence to it, even if you weren’t consciously aware of it as you read the copy.) 

Now be warned, because at least for a while now, you’re going to notice things in threes all over the place!

My summary advice today: Thrive With Threes.

Conversions: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

by Roy Varner

The private jet…yacht…Bentley or Ferrari…family on the beach in Fiji…

The braggadocious screen captures of big deposits in bank accounts…

Or the framed platinum records on stage with the guru.

Such unabashed bragging about amazing results is personally irritating – but more importantly…

…an indicator of why the online information and coaching industry and it’s virally adopted program model are a massive failure.

Every ad assures us that paying thousands to someone we don’t even know will get us certain riches…four-hour work weeks…sales while you sleep…and all the expensive toys of the rich and famous.

Yet there’s an elephant in the room, according to top coaches at well-known programs:

The common info/rah-rah model followed by almost everyone online has an actual success rate of about 1-3% of its high-paying clients achieving the expected results.

Think about that.

Would you pay money to get on an airplane with only a 3% chance of getting you to your desired destination? 

Yet most people continue to pay thousands for the next “shiny-object” program promising results but hardly ever delivering.

The irony:  even with a “100% satisfaction guarantee,”  hardly any ask for their money back, thinking they didn’t work hard enough to make the program work.

The truth:  this ubiquitous broken model was designed to gather money, with little regard for how many benefitted.

WHY DON’T THESE “INFOR-MOTIVATION^TM” PROGRAMS DELIVER ON THEIR PROMISES?

1 – Information and rah-rah alone do not change most people’s mindset and behavior. 

If they did, we could all read a good get-rich-quick book or watch a motivational talking-face video and go live the easy life.

In fact, 97% of us who buy expensive online information programs never even finish going through the materials…

…much less “get it” and clone the guru’s mindset…

…and hardly anyone makes the promised leap to riches and financial freedom.

How many of each have you experienced without making the big leap to thriving in life? 

How much money and time have you spent getting no noticeable change in your financial freedom?

The culprit behind this conundrum is the amazing subconscious of the human mind.

The human psyche is programmed from ancient times to protect the being from trauma, physical or emotional.  It sets off emotional alarms whenever we cross the boundary of our comfort zone to protect against danger.

Along the way, this powerful force tenaciously holds onto limiting assumptions we’ve gathered over the years from unkind relatives and others about ourselves and the world:

I’m not a winner…I’m not worthy…I can’t sell to people…I’m not good at public speaking (etc.)

Meanwhile our psyche, doing its job, convinces us to develop coping habits such as procrastination to protect those assumptions.

Together, these cherished assumptions and their protective coping habits function as a concrete wall between where you are and where you want to be.

That built-in resistance to change is why “self-improvement” and “self-paced learning” for almost everyone are oxymorons – rendered practically impotent by self’s refusal to let us pass GO and collect our $200 (for you Monopoly fans).

So your own subconscious self will attempt to blockade every scary new way…

Your habits will kick in to support that defense…

And your programmed self-limitations remain in place as your happy comfort zone.

All of that explanation leads to this knee-jerk reaction:

Predictable relapse to old ways within days of coming home from a big convention or Zoom weekend of non-stop information, highly engaging motivational speeches, and (basic to human needs) the welcomed kumbaya bonding with your “club.”

Bottom Line:  the viral current model of these expensive shiny-object online courses is not working – for either paying customers or floundering entrepreneurs. Almost everyone is losing, regardless of the fun of belonging to a club or tribe.

(Same issue applies to most college classes that expose us to a bucketload of info but leave the actual “embrace and adopt” process to self-study assignments…but that’s a whole ‘nother story for another time.)

2 – What’s missing is the natural human change process led by a mentor.

The real change process, led by a mentor over time, wakes us up to the pain and damage our limiting assumptions and coping habits have had on our lives and happiness.

Good mentoring then shares better options with less pain and more rewards – and lets the increasingly self-confident individual drop the pain and make his/her own choices of better ways to embrace.

It’s the guided baby steps outside the zone over time, the regular bumps in clarity and self-confidence, that finally give us permission to embrace a new way to think and behave.

Unfortunately…there’s a stronger motivation for most entrepreneurs online.

3 – The enticement of riches often trumps commitment to real change. 

Enticement of riches make it really tough for the human mind to stick to principles.

This age-old mesmerizing force easily convinces most wannabe coaches to set aside the time-consuming personal commitment of effective 1:1 coaching, in favor of the path of least resistance…

…a one-to-many program structure that’s easy on the coach’s personal schedule but results in very few life-changing experiences for participants.

And therein lies the rub:

A faulty program model that lacks real coaching and real change over time is too much of a tempting pot of gold..

But that path is not the choice of a mission-based, purpose-based person of integrity.

It’s not the choice of other-directed givers who understand that the time and cost of doing things the right way is just part of the journey.

Now that you’re fully awake to the crises of non-transformation in online programs, I don’t think you’ll want that path for yourself, nor to role model for your clients.

While I can certainly show people how to create high-converting sales videos (using a proven formula and magnetic perspective that draws only your ideal customers to check out your solutions),

The real challenge is to back up the talk with the walk.

Be a person of character with a genuine desire to help others get out of pain and into thriving, committed to make sure every one of them has a transformative learning process that can reliably deliver the paid-for results.

Conversions and transformations for people of character are a welded pair that cannot be separated, if you want a sustainable business known for its integrity and commitment to deliver results.