On the 4th May Rachael Bermingham was guest speaker at my Red Hot Mastermind Event. She shared with us her 'Ingredients for Success'. Rachael knows a thing or two about what it takes to be successful in business. She's gone from near bankruptcy to having sold millions of copies of her '4 Ingredients' cookbook series. She's also a single Mum of 3 very little boys. She knows what it's like to juggle kids, family, business and try to have some kind of balanced life.

Megyn Carpenter shared Rachael's tips on her blog which I'd like to share with you here. 

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I have a friend. A very special one. Her name is Karen. We became friends when we were teenagers. She was skinny, blonde, ambitious, beautiful and someone I admired a great deal. We became good friends. She owned her own Beauty Therapy Salon, worked hard and planned an amazing future in business. At 23 she had to sell it. She was having trouble massaging clients, wondering why her wrists were so sore. She was diagnosed with severe Rheumatoid Arthritis. 

Throughout the next 20 years she has endured 6 joint replacements and 17 operations. Her joints were so severely damaged that they had to be replaced!! The amazing thing is though that Karen has never stopped trying to live the best life possible. She's had three children, ran successful businesses and worked really hard despite the pain and debilitating effects on her body from the arthritis. She is such a positive person and a huge inspiration to all who know her, including me.

When she had her sixth joint replaced recently I decided something needed to be done to give her a break. I wanted to bless her and her family and show them that they deserve some kindness and a little bit of help. They've never asked for anything, trying to cope as best they could through much adversity.

I've set up a fundraiser for Karen and her family to finish off an ensuite and some minor renovations in their home. The very least she deserves is to come home to a place of peace and comfort. We've raised about $2000 so far and have had some awesome business people put up their hand to help out. We're aiming for another $3000 to finish off the reno. If you can help by simply donating $10 directly into Karen's account this will go a long way to helping us reach our goal. Please consider this. Your donation will be greatly appreciated and will not go un-noticed.

You can read more about this fundraiser here.

http://www.redhoteventsandseminars.com/karens-story/

To deposit your $10……..

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It's that time of the year again. The MOST important day of the year for us Mummys. In fact we should really declare a Public Holiday in honour of us all. We work so hard, we sacrifice so much for our kiddies, this is our one chance to really soak up a bit of attention and be a princess for a day. And why not. We deserve it. Foot massages, pressies, breakfast in bed, the works. Lets not lift a finger to do one bit of washing, dishes, vacuming…..nothing. Who am I kidding. Most of you Mums will have the washing machine on before you even get that first cup of tea. We can't help ourselves really. The jobs have to be done and we just automatically do them. Perhaps just try to take it easy and enjoy a beautiful, restful day. For once let the jobs go and trust your family to do them. (I know they wont get done the right way but just let it go okay!)

Mothers Day can also be a day of very mixed emotions. For some yearning for a child can bring

intense sadness, other women will be remembering a child they may have lost. There are those that remember a Mother they've lost. Some people have difficult relationships with their Mothers so it can be a day of confusion and longing for something better. Both children/adult children and Mothers alike will spend this day reflecting on the family they have. I truly hope for you it is one of joy and blessings. Enjoy your day, stop and smell the roses and be grateful for what you have. 

Sue

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Today I spent day one at The Sunshine Coast Business Expo. I love Expos. So much action, people and freebies galore. It's a huge buzz. I love meeting people, seeing what other people are up to and chatting about what I'm up to. As a business owner it's a perfect way to increase your visibility and really 'get yourself out there'. I loved the expo today because it was full of local business owners from my own Sunshine Coast Community. It was an awesome chance to meet them and see them displaying their work. 

The most powerful thing about expos is having that face to face contact with people. When so many of us are online more than not these days, we can often forget the importance of getting out there to meet people. When you have a conversation with someone, shake their hand and personally connect with them they are most certainly going to remember you. We all know if someone knows, likes and trusts you they are more likely to do business with you. An expo is the perfect opportunity to do this and on a grand scale. 

Make the most of your time when you go to one, work it, get your face, your name and your business in front of as many people as you can. Everyones there for the same reason so no-ones going to mind. Its your time to shine so go for it and shine as brightly as you can. Thats what I did today. And loved every minute of it. 

I also got to attend the lunch with Ita Buttrose. Now THAT was worth going to. What an amazing woman. If I can be just half as inspirational as Ita I'll be happy. She had so much great advice for business owners. Her story is fascinating. What struck me about her though was how real she was. Brilliantly accomplished and yet someone you feel like you could sit and talk to for hours. 

So tomorrow is day two. I'll be there bright and early and working it for all its worth. Meeting, chatting and having a ball.

Sue

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Web Business is so competitive these days. If you own a website or a blog-especially if you earn a living out of it- you can’t just sit back and let your rivals take away your business. The math is easy, more traffic means more success. Alexa is a web matrix provider that can help you analyze and optimize your website.

You can use it to know traffic stats, search engine rankings, and also get an audit done to improve your website’s SEO. Keywords and back links play a very important role in establishing your website. Choosing the right keywords and creating sufficient back links can boost your search engine rankings. Alexa also has a free toolbar, which is a powerful tool for locating important keywords and quality back links. Let’s see how it works.

Alexa toolbar for locating keywords

If you’re new to the web business and finding it difficult to establish your website, there are two things that you should always keep in mind: play by the rule book and follow the leaders. It is the basics to a successful web-based entity. Alexa allows you to peak in successful websites and find keywords that are driving their success.

Download the free Alexa toolbar; it works with almost all browsers including Chrome and Firefox. Now, the next time you visit a website for reference, right click on the Alexa logo and select keywords. This will open a new window consisting of all the keywords deriving traffic to the website- starting from the most searched.

Pick the best and most relevant to your website’s subject and use them smartly in your content. Alternatively, you can also visit Alexa homepage and enter the URL of any website to get keywords along with other useful information.

Alexa toolbar for creating back links

Well, the rule book says, it’s important to have a good number of back links to your website build over time to get higher search engine rankings; but building back links can be a real pain in the rear. This is where Alexa can be very helpful. Using Alexa, you can dig out the best back links embedded in search engines’ most favorite websites.

Once you have the source, all you have to do is replicate those links to create great back links for your website without any hassle. This way, there’s nothing your competitors can hide from you.

Alexa site audit

Site audit offered by Alexa is a premium service but it’s worth your money. This service conducts an extensive analysis of your website, covering all aspects of an effective SEO. Post-analysis, you are given a detailed report including information on all misfiring and errors including content plagiarism, duplicate Meta tags, broken links, anchor texts, redirects, page not found, and long URL’s.

It also calculates the page loading time since it’s now a search engine ranking parameter included by Google. The Alexa site audit can evaluate as much as 10,000 pages of a website. Even if you have fewer pages on your website, it’s totally worth it. My advice, take a single report audit and if you’re impressed, you’re free to invest more.

Alexa is a powerful tool for successful SEO. I understand if you’re dicey about using its premium services, but there’s no reason why you should not downloading the free toolbar. Nonetheless, you can always keep an eye on your competitors. If they are accumulating huge wealth, there’s absolutely no harm in being a copycat.

About the author: Brianne is a blogger by profession. She loves writing on technology. Beside this she is fond of gadgets. Recently an article on best blackberry attracted her attention. These days she is busy in writing an article on best mobile phone.

This blog post is courtesy of Paul Barrs, Internet Business Training. http://www.paulbarrs.com/

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Do you think I'm bossy? Its a simple question. One I've often asked over the years. Some people laugh at me and say 'ofcourse not!', others say 'yeah, maybe!'. The thought of being bossy horrifies me. I don't want to order people around and tell everyone what to do. I like to think I'm nice and sweet and, well, not bossy!!!  But there are times when you have to tell people what to do right? How else will anything ever get done? I do have three kids so right there I've perfected the art of telling them what to do. I just didnt think I'd extended it out beyond my four walls of home. But maybe I have. 

You see I put a call out on Facebook for the 4370 friends of mine who havn't yet 'liked' my business page to please like it. I felt like that was the least they could do considering we were apparently 'friends'. It is right?? So anyway, there was a comment that followed saying something along the lines of me being bossy enough to have 300 of my friends 'like' the page. So it got me thinking. Oh No!! OMG!!! Was I being bossy here?? I asked my husband to read it. He never confirmed but I could tell by the look on his face that he agreed. Again, OMG, maybe I AM bossy!!

But then came another comment from another FB friend saying 'what a ballzy thing to do'. I liked that. Ballzy! Yeah, I can be ballzy. So what exactly is the difference. Well this is my take on the whole thing. Bossy is demanding people do what you want them to do. Ballzy on the other hand is taking charge of your life and the outcomes you expect and putting some action into place to achieve it. Hopefully in a half decently nice way. 

So no more Miss Bossy Boots for me. I'll be nice but I will be in control, steering things the way I believe they should go. All the while, being considerate of others but always aware of the outcome I desire and going for it. Thats Ballzy!!

Sue

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(This blog post was written about Chris's year in 2011. It was written in Dec)

Hi Sue,

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On Friday I held my monthly Red Hot Mastermind Event. It was a bit of a special one. I had Karen and Wayne Clarke speaking about 'How to Apply NLP to Business'. But what I also did was invite the Doodle Man himself, Paul Francis along to conduct a Doodle Jam Session with us. Before you fall off your seat laughing with all sorts of images of 'doodles' going through your head, wait til I explain what a 'Doodle Jam' session is…..and who the 'Doodle Man' is.

Paul is a pommy. Apparently in Pommy land a Doodle is quite simply a painting or drawing. His tag lines are 'Show the World Your Doodle' and 'There's no such thing as a bad Doodle'. Now ofcourse in Australia this is very funny. Quite seriously though, Paul has a very unique business running Jamming sessions with groups of people where they each 'Doodle' on a collective canvas. They each paint something that represents them, their business or what they would like to express. This can be done for parties, weddings, families, corporate team building events and more. It's a brilliant way to bring people together to work on something beautiful. We had so much fun on Friday. Check out the pics.

Now to Karen and Wayne. WOW!! They were brilliant. They ARE Powerful Positive People!!! Their message is to empower people to break through their limiting, sabotaging behaviours and create a life of brilliance for themselves. It was such a powerful morning as they taught us so many strategies to use in Business to ensure effective communication, enhance relationships and create success in our Business. I could have listened to them all day. I'm pretty sure we all walked away with some amazing tools to use in every part of our lives. 

I'm pretty sure we all walked out of that room feeling like we too are Powerful Positive People!!!…..with great Doodles!! xxxxx

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Featured Red Hot Member- Hayley Green, Ausfunk.

(Hayley wrote this at the end of 2011. She's now back in full swing, busier than ever…and loving it!!)

My year…..The stepping stones were placed nicely in 2010, the year before. Everything to a plan, found my first Master Mind group through Sue and found support I needed to confirm what I was doing, away I can fly. I put on a permanent manager, trained 3 new staff, opened number 5&6 studio locations and injected a heap of corporate ideas that I thought would be right at the time……  Meanwhile in my personal life ( I do forget they are separate! )

With the downturn in building industry and my husbands new business only just kicking off we made the unpopular decision for John to leave me with the 3 kids,  while he travelled away for work. I ran the business & worked  in the business leading to me leaning on staff more than I would have liked in their first year. The consequences of this? The power shifts. My intentions became focused on their perceptions and ideas of what would keep them happy so I could get through my year. My decisions became based on what they needed. Oops!

Lesson 1:MY business will not run without it being MY ideals. It will never work out that way. Thank Goodness it Didnt actually take me long to figure this out. Perhaps thats due to the things I've learnt at master Minds group. Meanwhile, The business has had a very successful year, I got into the finals for Most Outstanding Business Person, the kids survived, my marriage stronger if anything! Karen from Positive People advices me: "Life isn't about how to survive the storm, it is about how to dance in the rain" - this I have forgotten ALL year.

I am proud of surviving this storm/tsunami of a year and thank god I dance for a living!!!!! Next year is going to be amazing with what I've just been through. Right now though…I need a holiday!

Photo: At the business awards Me, My mum and my sister

 

 

 

http://www.ausfunk.com.au/

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A couple of weeks ago I had Amanda Gore speaking at my first Red Hot Event of the year. Most people know who Amanda is but if you don't, you may like to look her up. Just sayin!! Amanda is a world class international speaker who travels the world speaking to millions of people. She has this ability to  touch the hearts of everyone who hears her in a hilarious, real, emotion charged way. She's amazing. You laugh and cry and as you hear what she's saying and think to yourself, 'Yeah, I do that', 'That's ME!'.

Her big focus is spreading the message of Joy around the world. I mean seriously, don't you think we all take things just way too seriously these days? All our problems and stress could quite possibly be as easy as us just learning to lighten up and laugh now and then. Its not rocket science but it can be rocket science teaching people HOW to do this. And that's what Amanda does with precision.

She was talking about 'Joy in the Workplace' and how important that is to create an environment thats happy, fun and most of all productive. As leaders, business owners or employers, the tone we set at work determines the tone of the organisation. It starts with us and filters down. It is of utmost important to bring Joy back into the workplace, allow people to feel valued, acknowledge them for their efforts and celebrate their achievments….including your own.

Watch these videos of Amanda and you'll know what I'm talking about. ENJOY!!!

Sue

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