Fat Drunk And Stupid Is No Way To Go Through Life, Son.

Dear Friend,

Remember in the 1978 movie "Animal House", when Dean Wormer turns around to John Belushi's character, John Blutarsky, and right after he expels him from school, he says "Fat, drunk and stupid, is no way to go through life, son."

Well, I have met a man who is the real-life business-version of John Blutarsky, except for the "drunk" part.

A few months ago, I hired a landscaper to do some "fixing up" around the outside of our house.  What we mostly needed was some "trimming", but he also stuck a bunch of new plants and shrubs in, out front.

If having a green thumb means you bring life to all the flora and fauna you go near, then I have a black thumb.  I am the angel of death of plant-life.

Anyway, so we hire this guy who tells me all his stuff is guaranteed... that he'll replace whatever I need if it dies, and all that jazz.  The cost was around $2,500 dollars, but the REAL kicker here, is that I referred him to a friend of mine who has a larger property and who need substantially MORE work done, and the ticket on that job was $6,500 Dollars.

So out of the blue, I hook up with this guy, and BAM! 9 Grand later, he's feeling good about life.

Now most landscapers are NOT very reliable. 

Why?  I don't know, but they kind of fall into the same category as a lot of homeowner service business - I think since the barrier to entry for a lot of these professions is low (like pest control, handy man, landscaper, painter) these businesses just tend to attract a lot more "non-productive" people looking for an easy ride, proportionally to other careers where the barrier to entry is higher (you just can't hang out a shingle and say you're a cardiologist, if you know what I mean.)

So what I'm saying here is, to get $9 Grand out of 2 clients is a freakin' field day for a guy like this.  Not that there aren't much bigger jobs out there, but this guy sure isn't seeing any of them.

A couple of months later, I started having some problems with basically one FULL bed of flowers that were planted.  (Oh, and somewhere in the middle of all this, I even hired the plant-guy's mother - "Mother Plant-Guy" - to dog-sit for us when we were out of town on vacation.)  I called the plant guy and got his voice-mail, and I left him a message asking him to come over and just fix up or replace the plants that died -- just like he said he'd do.

And call me dizzy or something, but that isn't anything you should need some kind of a guarantee for, no?  I mean, if you put 50 plants in, and 8 of them die for no reason inside of 60 days, you just come out and replace them or figure out what's what, and that's it, true?

Not to mention, who knows -- maybe I'd have another big account to refer you to, right?

After the guy doesn't call me back for a week, I call him back, and... I leave another message on his machine.

And guess what?

Nothing happens.

I somehow DO get through to actually talking to him the following week and he says he's really busy now but he'll be back out to see me REAL soon.

Well, since I have more things to do than get all stressed out over the landscaper, I just moved on from things.  We've already got someone else coming out to clean up that guy's mess, no big deal.

I'm telling you this because I KNOW for a fact, that while NONE of my subscribers are this unethical, "some" of them ARE consnstently getting in their own way of making money, like the doofus landscaper I just fininshed telling you about.

And the truth is, if you DO want to reach out and grab the brass ring, you have to run your business like a well-oiled machine, and at a minimum, even if your back-office isn't like that -- the part of your business your customer is experiencing, MUST work like that.

Plus, listen, if you're not getting out of your OWN way, then how in the hell can you ever expect your prospects and customers to get out of your way, either?

The line to success is far from straight, and you're going to constantly have to make adjustments, but Lord knows, if YOU aren't on your OWN team at a minimum, then you are simply NOT going to win the game!

So, be brutally honest with yourself and figure out what you're doing that you shouldn't be doing -- and what aren't you doing, you should be doing instead.  Stop farting around and stop making excuses for sloughing off and get to it, simple as that.

Now before I go, I want you to know about the very BEST way for you to start winning, and to start accomplishing far MORE than what you ever imagined possible during the next 12 months, even in your WILDEST imagination. 

The smartest thing YOU can do, but only if you really have a BURNING DESIRE to start sky-rocketing your business and leaving all the bad news, excuses, and mental baggage behind, is to participate in the Maverick Marketers Mastermind Alliance in March.  But you'd better hurry, there isn't much time (or very many seats) left.  Check it out right here:  http://www.kingofcopy.com/mastermind

I consider this Mastermind Alliance, my personal gift to you, to change your life.  All you need to do is be there to accept it.  And for the VERY small investment it's going to take, even the LAZIEST goofball out there will be able to make this up, many many times over, in no time at all.

Now go sell something,

Craig Garber

P.S. If you are sick and tired of reading books that don't tell you much, then get your hands on the 2006 Magic Marketing Research and Resource Guide here: http://www.kingofcopy.com/magicmarketing

Any comments?

Send them to me by scooting over to the contact form on my "Here's How To Contact Craig" page, and maybe I'll publish them -- I appreciate your feedback!

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