Do you say "yes" to too many opportunities? If so, this episode is for you. On today’s episode of Marketing Secrets, we hear another excerpt from the affiliate mastermind. We hear Garrett Pearson go over the rules he must follow in order to see a project through. Here are some of the awesome things to look for in this episode:

-- Each of Garrett’s rules to follow to take on a new project, and why.

-- And how the rules may vary in different businesses, but why it is important to figure out your own rules.

So listen here to find out what rules a project must fall into for Garrett to take it on, and why you should be doing something similar with your own business.

We had to come up with a way to stop us from doing too much. Because you have to focus, like Russell said, you have to focus. So here’s how we stay grounded. We don’t do a software if it doesn’t pass all of these things, okay. So is it sexy, does your product fill a need or want in a desirable, attractive way? That’s pretty obvious right? You’ve got to find something that people want. More importantly in the software world, is it sticky? So in the software world, if you want recurring billing, you want recurring revenue, you need somebody that’s going to pay you over and over again, month after month, or year after year.

-- ClickFunnels: Everything you need to start market, sell, and deliver your products and services online (without having to hire or rely on a tech team!)

-- DotComSecrets: Get a free copy of the "Underground Playbook For Growing Your Company Online With Sales Funnels."

​-- Expert Secrets: Get a free copy of the "Underground Playbook For Converting Your Online Visitors Into Lifelong Customers."

-- ​Traffic Secrets: Get a free copy of the "Underground Playbook For Filling Your Websites And Funnels With Your Dream Customers.

What’s up everybody, this is Russell. I want to welcome you back to the Marketing Secrets podcast. This episode I’m going to be talking about some of the rules you need to setup before you say yes to any project. So for today’s podcast, again this is another cool thing that we got from the affiliate mastermind group.

One of my friends, his name is Garrett Pearson, he runs a bunch of cool companies, and we’re actually launching a company soon together, which I’m really excited for. I won’t ruin the surprise yet, but it is amazing and you’re going to go crazy. Should I tell you more? After you see the webinar you will want to create a software program inside of your company.

That’s all I’m giving you. With that said, Garrett came and showed the business we’re building together, kind of presented it to all the affiliates, because again, I think that every affiliate, I think every business should have a software component to it. I think you’re kind of crazy if you don’t. Of all the businesses I’ve been in, I’ve been supplements, info products, ecommerce, everything, by far my favorite business ever is software, which is probably why I love software, as you can tell.

But one thing that Garrett talked about, they have a list of rules that they, before they see a project, he’s like, “I have a new idea for a new software product every hour. If we didn’t have a filter…” and at first when he started his business, he didn’t. He’d just create everything. He said, “We created this filter.” So I asked him if he’d share that filter with everyone during the mastermind event. So I’m going to have him share that filter, I’m going to show you guys that clip right now.

His filter may be different than your filter, but listen to this because you need to create your own filter. And I struggle with it as well. So many opportunities come by and I’m like, “Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes, I gotta say yes.” And it’s like, no you have to create a filter otherwise it will consume your whole business and life. It’s something that I’m working on and so it was a good reminder for me. So I want you guys to hear Garrett’s filter, the thing he runs things through before he jumps in and says yes to a project.

So let me show you that clip right now.

Garrett: We had to come up with a way to stop us from doing too much. Because you have to focus, like Russell said, you have to focus. So here’s how we stay grounded. We don’t do a software if it doesn’t pass all of these things, okay. So is it sexy, does your product fill a need or want in a desirable, attractive way? That’s pretty obvious right? You’ve got to find something that people want. More importantly in the software world, is it sticky?

So in the software world, if you want recurring billing, you want recurring revenue, you need somebody that’s going to pay you over and over again, month after month, or year after year. So is it sticky? Is it going to be difficult or painful for a client to stop using our software. So Clickfunnels is a good example. I don’t know what Russell’s churn rate is, and that’s people that stop using it, but with the amount of users he has, that’s just part of doing business in the software world. But it’s super sticky, because if you’ve got ten funnels you’re not going to leave.

Russell: Even if you hate me.

Garrett: Exactly! You’re not going to leave, right? So our shopper approved software, it’s a rating and review software for ecommerce companies. They start using us, they get even 50 reviews, they’re going to stay with us forever and keep paying us and paying us. So is it sticky? That’s really, really important. For example, with Allison’s, it’s definitely sexy, it’s definitely sticky because you’re going to keep using it over and over again, hopefully. So people are going to keep paying her month after month. Can you charge recurring billing?

We don’t do anything unless we can charge recurring billing. So it’s very, very important because the recurring billing is where software, as we’ve already talked about today, why it’s the 9th wonder of the world. Can you sell it via call center? Now this is for us, these can be different for you guys. We love to sell our products in a call center. So for us, if we can’t sell it in a call center…for example, where something wouldn’t work for us, if it’s $47 a month.

Because we can’t sell that in a call center because our guys won’t make enough money, our sales team won’t make enough money. So if we can’t sell it in a call center, we generally don’t do it. Can you promote it to your existing customers target market? Now this is for us, because we already have software in certain niches right. So we try to build stuff that we can sell to our existing customers, or that market.

Now this software funnel is an exception, but sometimes you gotta make exceptions, right. Is it programming excessive? If it takes us more than 6 to 8 months to develop with one or two programmers, generally we won’t do it. Is it customer service friendly? It’s gotta be customer service friendly or it’s going to be a nightmare to work with over time. So those are the things that we go through and if it doesn’t pass those, we don’t do it.

Russell: Alright to recap what Garrett said. Is it sexy? Is it sticky? Can you charge recurrent? Can you sell it through a call center? Can you promote it to existing customers? Is it programming excessive and support friendly? For them those are the filters they need to have. You don’t have to have the same filters for you. Sometimes you don’t want a call center. Maybe that’s the opposite filter, like it cannot be sold in a call center, it’s gotta be sold online. But you gotta pick your rules.

These are the rules of what I’m willing to do and not willing to do. Otherwise, as I’ve found in my life, and I still struggle with it like I said. If you’re not careful, you’ll commit to too much stuff. If you suffer from over commitment, that’s the problem. I would definitely say that I fall in this trap. In fact, it’s been interesting, in the last two weeks, two people have been placed in my life.

One I haven’t seen in 16 or 17 years, a spiritual leader who I have so much respect for, but I haven’t heard from him in 16 or 17 years, and I hear from him and a couple of weeks later he’s in my office, sitting there talking to me, and then he’s gone. And then, just today it happened again. Again, someone I respect a ton. And both of them basically said, almost word for word, said the same thing. “Russell, you gotta slow down.

You need to be in this for the long haul.” I think God is telling me something consistently and I’m hearing it loud and clear and now I’m trying to figure out for myself, I’ve got to create my filters, I’ve got to create these rules for myself because as you guys can probably see, I’m running faster now. We’re doing a lot of stuff, which is good, it’s fun, I love it.

But at the same time, if I’m not careful I’m going to burn out. I need to be in the for the long haul for myself to keep me happy in the long term in my life, for my customers, for my partners, for our employees, for everyone. So just a good reminder for me and hopefully for you as well. Thanks again for listening to the Marketing Secrets podcast, I hope you appreciate it, if you do, if you learn anything please share this with your friends. Please come into iTunes, please comment, let us know. We’ll talk to you guys soon. Bye everybody.