Why You Should Use Social Media In Your Business

Social media is here to stay!  It is not optional!  You need to consider this as a major part of your over all business strategy or you may miss valuable business opportunities!

Carve Out Some Non-Work Time

It's understandable that you feel like you have to be productive constantly. But try to find time every day to put work out of your mind. Try the 10/20/30 rule: 10 minutes of quiet time, 20 minutes of reading and 30 minutes of exercise. If that's too much to bite off, cut all numbers in half. It's better than nothing, and you're recharging your battery so you can run harder!

This tip comes from http://www.manta.com.

14 Easy Ways to Get Insanely Motivated

 
I came across the following by Geoffrey James.  I thought it was helpful.  I hope you will as well.

It's getting toward the end of the year, so with the holidays in sight, I thought it appropriate to give you all a little gift: a column that I guarantee will make you more more successful in the coming year.
Here are 14 quick strategies to get and keep yourself motivated:
1. Condition your mind. Train yourself to think positive thoughts while avoiding negative thoughts.
2. Condition your body. It takes physical energy to take action.  Get your food and exercise budget in place and follow it like a business plan.
3. Avoid negative people. They drain your energy and waste your time, so hanging with them is like shooting yourself in the foot.
4. Seek out the similarly motivated. Their positive energy will rub off on you and you can imitate their success strategies.
5. Have goals–but remain flexible. No plan should be cast in concrete, lest it become more important than achieving the goal.
6. Act with a higher purpose.  Any activity or action that doesn’t serve your higher goal is wasted effort--and should be avoided.
7. Take responsibility for your own results. If you blame (or credit) luck, fate or divine intervention, you’ll always have an excuse.
8. Stretch past your limits on a daily basis. Walking the old, familiar paths is how you grow old. Stretching makes you grow and evolve.
9. Don't wait for perfection; do it now! Perfectionists are the losers in the game of life.  Strive for excellence rather than the unachievable.
10. Celebrate your failures. Your most important lessons in life will come from what you don't achieve. Take time to understand where you fell short.
11. Don’t take success too seriously. Success can breed tomorrow's failure if you use it as an excuse to become complacent.
12. Avoid weak goals.  Goals are the soul of achievement, so never begin them with "I'll try ..."  Always start with "I will" or "I must."
13. Treat inaction as the only real failure.  If you don’t take action, you fail by default and can't even learn from the experience.
14. Think before you speak.  Keep silent rather than express something that doesn’t serve your purpose.
The above is based on a conversation with Omar Periu, one of the world’s best (and best known) motivational speakers.

Geoffrey James

Geoffrey James is an award-winning journalist and author of Inc.com's Sales Source column. Previously, he wrote Sales Machine, the world's most-visited sales-oriented blog. James has written hundreds of articles on sales and marketing for publications like Technology Marketing and SellingPower, and has helped thousands of sales professionals communicate more effectively with customers. To get column updates, sign up for his "insider" newsletter (weekly) or his @Sales_Source Twitter feed (daily). James' newly published book is How to Say It: Business to Business Selling.