Personal Finance: 4 Ways to Save Money and Improve Your Money Management Skills

Personal Finance: 4 Ways to Save Money and Improve Your Money Management Skills

Brian Tracy's Four Keys to your Finacial Success

Virtually every single person in America who is financially independent started off with nothing. But they acquired good personal finance habits, learned how to save money, and improve their money management skills, eventually becoming some of the most successful people in their communities. And anything that anyone else has done, you can probably do as well.

Save Money by Using a Long Time Perspective

To save money and become financially independent you must begin living on less than you earn even if you are deeply in debt. One of the most important guarantors of your personal finance success is called “Long time perspective.” Take the long view. Develop a long term attitude toward yourself and your financial future and begin thinking in terms of where you want to be in five and ten years. This long-time perspective will have an inordinate impact on your personal finance habits and money management skills in the present, and will help you save money over the years.

Pitching the Deal to Investors 2012

Investors and senior executives are looking for “the next big thing.”  The Investors are looking for great ideas led by great teams to bring innovation and excellence to the fore and to show the determination, drive and commitment to drive success. Within our complex world many people are vying for attention. The teams that stand out are the ones that deliver their pitch in less than a minute, and still make their points persuasive.

Unfortunately many teams do not think about their story and how it comes across, a great project with an ineffective pitch.  Do not make polite conversation; tell the story in a sentence.

The Four Steps to Success

There is a four step exercise that will work for any company or product. You must simply answer each of the following four questions in no more than two sentences:

1. What do you do?
2. What problem do you solve?
3. How is your product or service different?
4. Why should I care?

By keeping each answer brief, you will develop a succinct story that should take no more than 60 seconds.

Let's use the example of an entrepreneur who is starting a housekeeping franchise. Based on those four questions, the company's story might sound something like this:

"We own Five Star Cleaning, an eco-friendly housekeeping service that pampers you and your home [what your business does]. Typical cleaning services make you prep your home ahead of time, supervise to prevent theft and hang around for hours while the cleaners do their work. Because we require no prep, this saves time right off the top, and we are bonded so our service is worry-free, allowing you to go about your day [what problem does it solve]. And, we always send a minimum team of three to get the job done quickly [how it's different]. Imagine coming home from a long day and your laundry is all done, your bed has been turned down and there are fresh flowers awaiting you. That's the extra pampering we offer that sets us apart from all the rest [why you should care].

Your first sentence should be a "Twitter-friendly headline." You should be able to describe your product or service in 140 characters or less, short enough for a tweet. Create product descriptions that are short, catchy, distinctive and memorable.

If you can tell your story in well under 60 seconds and have some extra time, be ready to relate an example or story that makes your product or service more tangible..

Don't let your idea die because you've lost the attention of your audience. Grab your listeners in the first 60 seconds and they'll want to hear more.