Remember when Google started? Or Amazon? At Psychotactics we started a few years after these giants. It’s perfectly normal to assume that we got in at exactly the right time. But you and I know there’s no right time, and that opportunities are always presenting themselves. Which is why when clients ask: What would you do if you were starting today—my answer is remarkably similar. Find out why the strategy of 2020 is not that different from 2000.

Most of us think we have to be incredibly special, or at least different to stand out in a crowded market. Yet, at least at the starting point, it’s the mundane that gets the attention. If anything, being unique or different seems to be backfire. How do you use the power of mundanity to break into a market and then how do you sustain that momentum?

If you and I look around, we see product or services just like ours everywhere. Instantly we get a feeling of having missed the bus. The market is clearly saturated and there’s little or no point in us having to create more content, or product or services. Or is it? One of the most surprising—even surreal—experiences is dropping into this seemingly saturated market, and finding out that it’s a big, fat myth. Why is it such a myth? Let’s find out.

If you’ve ever wondered if your headline is lacking some oomph, it might be because of an incredibly simple omission. It’s the lack of contrast. Contrast works in real life with colours, textures or flavours. Not surprisingly, it works with headlines too. Here are three common questions about headlines. And they have surprisingly interesting ideas.

The advice about "free vs fee" is clear. Free should be avoided at all costs because you will just be taken advantage of, while others get paid. Yet, this seemingly black and white advice has shades of grey as well. As a startup, payment isn't the only or even the best option. Find out how and when free can work to your advantage.

After the home page, the second most-visited page on many sites is the About Us page. Yet almost all the About Us pages you visit are drab, long winded or don't give much detail at all. If you already have an About Us page going, here are three quick fixes that will dramatically improve the visual and the text on your site.

If you've used some sort of learning techniques all your life, the core principles of learning should not mislead you. Even so, we get hoodwinked and it's important to look at why we struggle with learning. Here's what I've learned about learning so far.

Do you often get stuck when trying to come up with article topics? One of the reasons why we tend to struggle is because we get stuck at the "topic" level. However, when you write headlines, not only move along to the sub-topic level, but headlines give you more precise direction. To find out how to use headlines—even not so good headlines—listen to this podcast.

We tend to learn in sequence. Chapter one, two and three. But what if we broke the sequence? Would that enhance our learning? In this rather sequential piece, you learn how I tend to break quite a few rules to get the results I want, and you'll find it works very well for you too. Tah, dah, time to jump the queue and learn in a whole different way.

Almost all of us feel like impostors from time to time. And we even have an official sounding name for it. But the impostor syndrome is an unfair burden to carry. What if we're just beginners? And what do real impostors look like anyway?

You'd think you'd need to be someone great or at least do something wonderful. Yet, you're a source of inspiration. How do you inspire? It's remarkably simple —and here's a short piece on how you need to go about it.

You've heard that it takes about 21 days to create a habit. But what if that weren't true at all? Could it be possible to create a habit overnight? Or even in the next few minutes? Let's find out.

It might seem that it's always up to us to change our habits. And that idea might be quite incorrect. Instead, what if something around us changed and our habits changed with it? Instead of us taking the blame all the time, this series is about how to look at habits differently and achieve lasting goals.

Researching an article is so frustrating because it's time-consuming. But there are ways to beat the pressure—and the pain. Believe it or not, there are ways to be productive with zero last minute research. This episode shows you how to make advance research work for you, as well as in situations where you have no research at all. Sounds too good to be true? Well, listen to the episode.

(Rerun of episode #220 Coaching Series Part 1 of 3). The toughest part of coaching isn't necessarily coaching itself. Instead, it's the niche, isn't it? How do you go looking for the right niche? And how do you know when you've found one that's rewarding as well as profitable? We go back in time with the British Cycling Team and what turned them into champions, and how their coach played a role. We also look at how Pilates went from being everything to everyone to finding a solid niche. Listen and enjoy.

It seems natural to keep an eye, even get obsessive about your competitors. However, it's a poor strategy for many reasons. In this episode we make the case for why the competition doesn't really matter as much as you think. And why focusing on them could possibly cause clients to desert you, instead.

How many books do you read in a year? Most people boast about how they read hundreds of books a year. That's what I used to do as well. Until I found that I wasn't really absorbing any information. So is speed reading a bad idea? Well, not entirely, but you need to know when to use it and why. Find out how speed works for you and more importantly, when it fails.

We're all told we should start with the end in mind, but we still get lost along the way. Why do we go off track? Could there be some barriers that show up a lot before the end? Let's find out we can stop focusing so much on the end and work on those barriers that blocks our progress.

Do you pre-sell if your audience is away on vacation? Should you pre-sell if you're unsure of a full house? These and other questions are what's on this Part 2 of the pre-sell podcast.

Which product should you pre-sell? Should it be the $20 product or the $2000 one? And why do silos matter so much? In this episode we not only learn why the $20 product might matter more, but also how you can promote a product almost endlessly without ever promoting it all.

Most of us believe that to cope with information, we have to speed up.

But we've all tried that, haven't we? And it doesn't seem to work at all.

This episode is about why we are so obsessed with trying to keep up. And how you can do quite the opposite and still be a lot smarter.

Click here to read this episode:  Information Overload

Many coaches and trainers struggle to get precise results for their clients

And it's not for want of trying, either. They work very hard, probably too hard, and yet the clients don't get the results they seek.

The question is: how we go from mediocrity to excellence?
Find out the guidelines to becoming a good coach.

Is there a fun way to get unstuck? From all the experiences we've had so far, getting stuck is a real pain. The more we try to get unstuck, the more we seem to dig a deeper hole. But what if there were a few fun ways to get unstuck? And what if they were quite different from what you've tried so far? Let's have a look.

Why are some sales pages so confusing?

Is it because of the message or rather because there are way too many messages hitting you all at once? A sales page needs a powerful message to get the client not just interested, but to keep reading. And yet sales pages often miss that goal.

But there's a way to start the sales page from getting off to a false start. And it's called “isolating the problem”. But how do we go about this isolation process?

Let's find out. shall we?
Click here to read: Why The Top-Half Of The Sales Page Goes Wrong (And How To Fix It)

As writers, we count words when we are creating a book or writing an article.

We look at completing a fixed number of words per day—800 words. And yet, that system can be counterproductive to finishing your article. Professional writers seem to follow another method, one that ignores the output and instead focuses on the article writing process. How do they do it? And what have we been doing incorrectly?

Let's find out how to fix this problem and finish our articles.

Click here to read: Why Writing 800 Words Every Day Could Be Hindering Your Article Writing Progress

Luck it seems, is fickle? Or is it?

How come some people are lucky (or as the case may be, unlucky) all the while. There is indeed a system and it may be off a bit, like weather forecasting, but by and large it's quite predictable.

Let's dump the “hard, hard, hard work” mantra for a while and find out how to make luck stick.

Read online: Can We Really Systemise Luck?

If you reached the top of your game, would you credit it to hard work or luck?

Most of us quite easily slide into crediting our success to hard work. But what if hard work isn't necessary? What if we've been slogging for no good reason at all?

Let's find out more in Episode 1 (yes there are two episodes) in this series on hard work vs luck.

Read online: Hard Work Vs Luck: Which One Is More Dependable?

Naming a book or info-product is often a royal pain in the neck.

And that's because most of us tend to sit down at our desk hoping for inspiration to strike. The weird bit is that inspiration is often in some other place altogether. It's right in front of your nose, but often you may not see it.

Let's go on a treasure hunt and find out how to get an enticing book title in next to no time.

Read online: How To Create Intensely Catchy Book Names (Without Too Much Of A Struggle)

How to avoid embarrassing time overruns when making presentations?

Timing your presentations are crucial yet all the practice in the world may not help if there's an external issue. An emcee may cause confusion, the sound system might cause delays. And all of these unexpected issues eat up into your time. But some presenters keep to their time, nonetheless?

What method can you use to avoid this issue of overruns? How do you design your presentation? Let's find out, shall we?

Read Online: How To Avoid Time Overruns When Making A Presentation 

What is the biggest headache with transcription? Well, there are many, aren't there?

Errors bug me no end, and they seem to make a lot of them. There's also the cost, the turnaround time and other issues.

But what if there were a service that solved all of these problems?

Better still, what if there were a service that you could just dictate into, like normal speech and find that it put the right punctuation in place?

Here we go into the fantastic world of transcripts. You'll be amazed, because I sure was!

Click here to read the article: Coolest Transcription Service

You know how you're told to make lemonade when life hands you lemons?

Well, what do you do with overripe bananas? You make Filos!

This episode is about the times when we should have given up because the failure seemed so great. But they are also stories that show you what happens when you persist.

You'll enjoy these stories about 5000bc and Psychotactics. And it's all about failure, and how things turned out on the other side.

Read the transcript here: Failure Through Different Lenses.

Many, if not most of us, have already experienced what it seems like to be a fraud in our mind.

Still we can't seem to shake the impostor syndrome.

But what if we understood how the psychology works?

Find out the twin factors ramming into you and me, and how we can avoid feeling like we're not worthy.

Click here to read: How To Overcome The Impostor Syndrome

Most of us have probably said something to the effect of "If it weren't for the deadline, I'd get nothing done".

Yet, for many of us, a deadline is crushing, if not crippling. We scramble at the last minute and wish there were a better way to get things done on time.

We could fool ourselves by having an earlier deadline but that doesn't seem to work either.

But have you tried the "second-last-minute-deadline"?
And how do you use it to get things done not just well before time but also a lot better?

Read more here: How To De-Stress With The Second Last Minute Deadline

What makes some courses vastly better than others?

The answer lies not in the content, or the instruction, but rather in the set up.

But why is setup so crucial?

Setup becomes vital because it gets rid of clients that don't follow instructions and gives you the cream of the crop.

You get clients that follow through and therefore get better results. The more consistent the results, the less you have to market your course.

But the question is: how do you set up a course?
Let's find out. The Magic Of Set Up: Why Some Courses Are Better Than Other

Fun seems obvious as a concept.

But "fun in learning" almost seems like a bit of a paradox.

What is "fun" and how can you find it, let alone use it when you're teaching a skill?

Let's take a bit of a deep dive into intimidation and find how fun can save the day—yes, yet again. 

How To Accelerate Learning

Why do we get upset with ourselves when we forget information?

Surely we should be able to remember at least 30-40% of a book. But it seems to slide through our brain like semolina in a sieve. Yet, there is a way to remember things—and there's also a big reason to forget.

Find out why forgetting is just as important as retaining facts. Find out exactly how to go about it in this episode on memory.

How to Accelerate Client Learning

If you were asked: What is the uniqueness of this podcast, would you be able to answer the question?

The chances are that you might state one of the features, but not what makes it truly unique.

—What do you have to do to make the uniqueness come to life?
—And how do you get clients to pass on that uniqueness?

Find out in this case study on our own podcast.
How To Use Contrast To Create Your Uniqueness In Seconds

It's not unusual for clients to say they're perfectionists.

This means they take more time, spend more effort and they sound like the ideal client on your course. But as perfectionists know fully well, they're often jeopardising their own success, because all the extra work isn't dramatically improving their work.

—How, then should you make them pay attention to what's important?

—How can you help them gain the confidence and the skill?

If you want your clients to be really skilled, here are three concrete steps to get them away from circling and into results.
How to Stop "Perfectionist” Clients From Sabotaging Their Own Success

Most courses have huge dropout rates.

And yet, that's not the case for some teachers and trainers.

What makes some courses so dramatically different? The slightly surprising answer is that the course material itself can doom the course.

If that makes no sense, follow along, because there's a method to this madness.

Find out how to create a scenario where clients never want to leave.

Let's say you come up with what you believe is a great uniqueness for your product or service.

How would you know if it's great or not?

The answer is deceptively simple: every client needs to echo your uniqueness over and over again. But how are you supposed to hear that echo? Interestingly that echo is located in the testimonial. But not just anywhere in the testimonial, but in one really interesting area.

Listen to find out and then do the same for your products and services as well.

How to Validate Your Uniqueness

Big companies talk a lot about leadership. However you and I may not have that big charisma factor.

What do we have to do to get things done when working with freelancers? What if we need to work with several team members? In this episode, we look at how the primary task is to get the right people in, rather than playing leader. And how that frees up a lot of your time and moves your company forward with a momentum that is quite unexpected.

Why Staying Small Is Smart

Think Big. Really?

Studies show us that scaling up is often disastrous for most companies. But what's the alternative? That's what we look at in this book review—well, chapter review—of Company of One by Paul Jarvis.

Instead of driving ourselves crazy, we bring in sanity and upper boundaries to our business, while living a very good life. How do we do that? Let's find out.

Why Staying Small Is Probably A Smarter Move

People are often amazed at how quickly we fill our workshops and courses.

It's almost like we have a separate channel to our clients.

Well, as it appears, we do. And it's not quite a Facebook group. It's even cooler. Here's how we filled a big chunk of the Munich workshop.

How WhatsApp Helped Fill The Munich Workshop

Quick announcement regarding the Frankfurt Meetup coming up in May.

Hype works exceedingly well, even when the client knows they're being duped a bit.

But what if you can't stand hype?

Does that mean you roll over and play dead? Here's how you can avoid hype completely, if you wish to do so.

And if the hype is so great, that it can't be ignored, you can use the hype like mental judo to turn the tables and to achieve precise results for your clients.

 How to Avoid Hype and Still Get Clients

In business the advice we get is to hang in, no matter what happens.

Yet, to me that sounds like the wrong advice.

You definitely need to hang in a bit when things get slightly tougher than you expected.

But there's a time for quitting as well. How do you know if you should quit or soldier on?
When Quitting Is the Smarter Option

We may often hear ourselves saying, we have a long to-do list.

Or things that we still haven't completed.
Or worse, we may talk about how we have no time.

Often, it's just a matter of issues that can get resolved with a touch of philosophy.

There's work to be done as well, but the philosophy needs to come first.

In this second part of the series, let's find out how philosophy can come to our rescue and serve our business—even save us time!

The Philosophy of Psychotactics

When we think of business, marketing tactics and strategy comes to mind, doesn't it?

Philosophy does exist but it may be a bit on the back burner. Yet, for us at Psychotactics, philosophy looms large.

Here are just a few nuggets that you can ponder over and see how they apply to you—and how you can use them in your life and business.

The Psychotactics Marketing Philosophy

So much effort goes into the launch of a product, but what happens next? How do you handle the calm after the launch? How do you keep selling products on an ongoing basis? These are the questions we tackle in this episode as we get rid of the "post-launch" blues.

Click here to read the full transcript.

When we price a product or service we often use the ending 7 or 9. As in $27 or $29. Is there any basis for using such an ending? Yes, there is, but does it help to sell more products or services? This is the journey we go on, as we explore the crazy world of pricing. How to set prices shouldn't be voodoo and yet it is.

Let's go on this trip by first removing the silly myths.

Click here to read the full transcript.

How many books do you read in a year? Most people boast about how they read hundreds of books a year. That's what I used to do as well. Until I found that I wasn't really absorbing any information.

So is speed reading a bad idea? Well, not entirely, but you need to know when to use it and why.

Find out how speed works for you and more importantly, when it fails.

Click here to read the full transcript.

Most of us have grand plans to succeed. Yet, almost the moment we start there are a million distractions in our way. Chaos lurches around in our doorway and there seems to be no way out.

At Psychotactics, we had managed to get around most of the chaos but then I was in charge of mentoring my niece. As she moved from Year 6 to Year 7, it seemed like we were hit by an okinami of chaos.

What did we do to find our way out? How did we manage to avoid the madness that we had no control over? Find out in this episode of The Three Month Vacation.

Click here to read the full transcript.