First stage of DiggiYoda is complete!

The first stage of the DiggiYoda site is complete. diggiyoda.com has launched!

Welcome to the DiggiYoda Blog. Our system teaches you everything you need to know to become
a master at online marketing. Using the power of Web 2.0, social networking, and relationships,
along with powerful branding techniques, you will master the digital age. Make more money,
have better relationships, and, most of all, let your passion and drive take control of your future.

For updates follow us on Twitter.

Position yourself as a leader today to get in on the top. This unique system allows you to earn while you learn.

First stage launch is set for June 1, 2009 (or earlier). Follow me on Twitter, or add me as a friend in Facebook to get notified!

Top 10 things to improve your image

Have you ever heard the saying, perception is 9/10ths of reality? You don’t know how true this is. For years I have worked in the public arena filled with other people’s egos. What they perceive of you is indeed where you will go. This is so powerful, that it almost doesn’t matter how good you really are at something, people’s perception of you is what really counts.

The purpose of this article is to show you ways you can improve your public image. This is the image you “put out there”. It doesn’t matter if it is a private group of friends, a social network, work, or in the public eye, the principles I have outlined will carry to each and every aspect in your life. Remember, however, it really doesn’t matter what people think about you that matters. It is what YOU think about yourself that will come through in the eyes of others.

Here are some things you can do to improve your image.

1- Understand what others see in you

Firstly, in order to understand how to improve your image, you need to understand what is wrong with your image. Obviously, you want to change your image for a reason. Maybe something bad has happened, or you aren’t popular. Whatever the reason, you need to understand what people see in you. Ask those around you for an honest opinion. Get feedback. Most imporantantly, please, don’t take what they say personally, but as positive criticism that you will use to better yourself. But remember, feedback is only valuable if it is honest, and from a trustworthy source.

Once you have done this, the next step is to understand how you want to be perceived. Write down everything you can think about yourself, and have a good look at how you interact with others. Become aware of yourself during conversations, and always ask if what you are saying is something that you would like to hear, and matches your new image of yourself. You need to understand where you are now, and where you want to be in the future before you can make any real changes.

Once you start to get a better understanding of how you are portrayed to others, and their opinion of you, you will start to see things that you put out there that can be improved. Remember though, in whatever you do, be true to yourself, and be real with others. It will not do you any good to put out someone you are not.

2- Dress for success
How do you feel in that new suit, or dress? Does it make you feel like the person you are trying to portray? Do you feel successful in it? Does it give you more confidence? How you dress is the first thing people see when they meet you. Do you want them to see someone who is vibrant with life, confident, alluring, or someone frumpy, unhappy, or miserable?

Your body shape doesn’t matter. If you are carrying a bit of weight, make sure you dress with class. If you dress with class, you will be class, and it shows.

3- Be confident in everything you do
Confidence is something that you can’t fake. You are either confident or you are not. Those that aren’t confident will be on edge, not sure what to say, avoid eye contact, and will generally just feel “icky” to be around.

Strut your stuff. Engage your audience by being a master of your own domain. Become an expert at everything you do. Find things to do to build your confidence. Take a course, or a martial arts class. Anything you do that will build your confidence will show to others. People won’t fear you if they think you are confident.

4- Be consistent
No one likes to be around someone who changes their mind all the time. Understand who you are, and stick to it. Otherwise people will just think you are a flake, and will not think you are real. If you are consistent, then, over time, more and more people will spread the word about you, and when someone new hears it from multiple sources, what they here will be consistent, and show stability.

5- Be truthful and ethical, and follow through on your word
No one likes a liar, or someone who says they will do something, but doesn’t follow through. Your integrity is the most important asset you have. Protect it at ALL costs. If you can’t be truthful to others, then how can you be truthful to yourself? Remember, in any relationship you are trying to build, trust is the very foundation. This relationship is GOLD to you. Don’t do anything that may tarnish this. People will only deal with people they trust. This goes for ANYTHING you do in life.

6- Live for the moment, not the past or the future
Live every day to its fullest, as if it were your last. Don’t dwell on things that happened in the past, or may happen in the future. You are here, right now. As a matter of fact, the past or future doesn’t exist!! The only thing that exists is RIGHT NOW. Nothing is more attractive to others than someone who lives life to the fullest, and finds joy in everything they have or do at the moment they do it.

7- Always offer help or assistance
Think of others before you think of yourself. What do they need? How can they be successful? If you always offer them help or assistance, they will return the favour when you need it most, or when you least expect it. This is particularly important if you are helping them make more sales, or build a team. In order to become a leader, you have to prove that you are a leader. But remember, a true leader is not someone who tells others what to do, but rather helps and empowers them to do it for themselves. You can give a person a fish, which will feed him for a day, or you can teach them to fish so he can eat for life.

8- Be firm in your beliefs, but easy going
Your beliefs are what drive you. These beliefs are the very foundation of who you are. You are what you believe you are. Have a good look at what you believe about yourself and others, and be firm in those beliefs. If there is something you don’t like about yourself, then there is something that you believe that is keeping you there. Is the belief valid? Remember, stand up for what you believe in, but make sure it is just not something that you have been taught.

Be careful though, if you are too strong in your beliefs, then you will be closed minded in the eyes of others. Be firm in your beliefs, but keep an open mind. There are always other perspectives that you should take into consideration, so always revisit your beliefs from time to time, and see if they are still valid.

9- Do things out of kindness or love, and be compassionate
Everyone likes to know they are loved. Every once and a while, show people that you are thinking about them, or that you care about them. Being loving to other people can be done in a thousand different ways. Show others that you care about them, and appreciate them. Remind them often. Get creative!

10- Spread the word, and sell yourself
If you are in an empty house without anyone around, how will your image get enhanced. Spread the word! Invite people out to lunch, and be social! Remember, this is about improving your public perception, not about selling a product and service. It is important to get out there and make money, but no one wants to have it shoved in their face up front. Get out there, make friends, find out what makes them tick and what they are interested in. Then, when you think you can help them with your product or service, they will be in a position to hear about it.

If you do the things I have outlined above, your image MUST improve. If you are already doing these things, then keep with it and believe that what you are doing is fine. The universe has a way of always bringing out the truth.

The most important thing you can do to change your public perception is to change what you feel about yourself. What you see when you look in the mirror is what is most important. Get rid of anything that associates yourself with a false sense of identity, such as the past or future. Are you fun to be around? If not, make it so. Remember, no one wants to be around someone that is miserable. Live right now, and enjoy life. and be the best you can be. This is the law of attraction.

The universe has a magical way of taking care of those that live by these principles. If you truly believe in yourself, respect yourself, you will automatically believe and respect in others, which will be returned back to you tenfold. Before you know it, suddenly everything you want out of life you will have it. Believe in yourself, and that you already have it, and it shall be. Work with others, and not against them, and you will have teamwork. Work with the universe, and you will have the world at your feet.

For more helpful articles, visit my blog, and signup to my social network!

Use the power of NOW to focus

Power of NOW

Things not working for you? Discover the Power of NOW

The power of now is a term given to “living in the moment”, or “In the now”. While these terms mean something to new age gurus, most people really don’t know what this means. I am here to dispel the hype around the buzzwords, and give you a brief understanding of the “power of now”.

Now is a moment in time. It is a single snapshot. What are you doing right now? You are reading this blog post. Now is not two minutes ago, now is not an hour from now, it is right now. Whoops, now just left, and there is now a new now… It is a fleeting moment in time.

No two “nows” are alike. Each now is different. There is no time when you live in the now. In the current moment, there is no access to a minute ago, hour ago, or a week from now. There is simply, and elegantly, NOW.

So why is “living in the now” so powerful? Well, it is all based on what you associate your identity with. If you are continually focusing your thoughts and beliefs on what has either happened in the past or what may happen in the future, then you are not living in the moment. Your mind is happily living in a fantasy world that doesn’t exist. Once you set some past or future event and put this into your identity, you lose sight of what is happening right now, and you miss it. Opportunities that may come up are missed because you are too busy thinking and focusing your attention on something else.

Living in the now is retraining your brain into only focusing on what is happening at the moment. It is ok to relive memories, or to have plans, but relive them, then let them go. Don’t associate any current emotion onto this because you will be feeding your sense of self with what has happened or might happen. This “loss of self” puts your body into a state of being that is associated with that event. Once this happens, anytime to relive something similar, you strengthen this feeling, which gives you a false illusion that you are that feeling.

Who you are is much more than what you are. What you are is a person traveling around in this busy world, working with appointments, trying to make a living, raising kids, or simply trying to “live”. We are constantly faced with distractions that take us away from right now. Advertisers use this technique to its fullest to get you to buy something. Carrying a bit of extra weight? Well this model in this diet soft drink ad (who is slender, sexy, and all around nice to look at) is subtly associated with what you might become. Your subconscious mind sees this image, and starts the association with your present identity. If your present identity is that you have a bit of extra weight, and you have prior to that moment told yourself “you are fat”, your subconscious will attach this image onto your existing image of being “fat”, and reconfirms it. This happens over, and over and over again, until your subconscious believes that you like to be “fat”, and takes steps to keep yourself in that identity. This is called a false sense of self. Another term: ego.

Living right now means that you don’t associate anything to what might have been to your already confirmed identity in the past. It is about becoming aware of what you are (not who you are right now, or who you are tomorrow or last week), but who you are right now. This has a magical force attached to it. You are suddenly aware of everything in that moment. The colors become richer, the foods you eat become tastier, and everything becomes highlighted, except your past or future associations, or your ego. You are no longer feeding your illusion of self-image. Over time, your-self image will automatically change and you will become who you really are. You are programming your subconscious to believe that you in the moment.

The same thing happens with the future. If you continually tell yourself that you will be better off “some day”, then your subconscious will continue to focus on “some day”. This will strengthen your self-image into being someone who waits for “some day” to happen, and your subconscious will start to believe that your sense of self will always be happy when it is “some day”. This day, of course, never really happens because you are quite happy continually saying “some day”. Instead, take action, do it NOW. You have grabbed the thought and acted on it. You haven’t “thought about it”, you just did it, and it happened. You keep doing this, suddenly you will become a person of action, rather than someone who thinks it might happen.

Living in the moment does not mean that you become irresponsible with your life, your goals, your dreams. You still have clocks, you still make appointments, still have memories, and you still have goals set down that you would like to achieve. The difference is that you are not associating, or telling yourself some illusion about the appointment or goal, or other event. You are brainwashing yourself into believing that “you are always late” or “that goal is too hard for you” to achieve. You are simply telling yourself you need to be somewhere at a certain time. And when that time comes, your mind will already be prepared for the fact that you are there. There is no “me” in the whole discussion, or sense of identity or self. There is simply an appointment that you are at when that present moment becomes comes to be.

Your subconscious is the driving force behind everything you do. It is also the driving force behind everything that happens in your life. If you live your life in the current moment, taking everything in, you open up the possibilities. Suddenly things start happening. And since you are now more aware of the current moment, you are in a position of recognizing the opportunity when it happens, and you grab it.

Another driving force behind your illusion of sense of self, is judgment. You don’t judge? CRAP. You do too. Everyone does. It takes a Zen master to not judge. When you look at a nice flower, do you not think “that flower is beautiful”? Well, sorry to burst your bubble, you have just judged.

Judgment leads to reconfirming what you previously learnt. Remember the diet soft drink ad? Did you say to yourself “Gee, that model is gorgeous”? Did you not judge? Your subconscious took that judgment as something it has previously been told it needs to try to achieve and reconfirmed that you are NOT that model. The judgment led to a self illusion. It is that easy!

Here is an exercise you can do. Sit down, shut your eyes, and listen. DON’T think, just listen. DON’T judge, just listen. Become witness to all sounds and feelings. The key is to NOT think when you are doing this. Just SIT AND BE. The more you do this, the more “in the now” you will become. You are simply “silent”. The gaps in your thinking will widen, and suddenly will be filled with an extra sense of self. You will be happy just being. Do this in the car, the office, watching TV, ANYWHERE YOU POSSIBLY CAN.

What you are doing is retraining your mind to stop the associations, and training it to just be. It is hard at first, but gets a lot easier. I have heard that if you can do this, and I mean really do this, for 45 minutes, you suddenly will become enlightened. But I will warn you, it may seem simple when you are reading it, but trust me, doing this for 45 seconds is hard, let alone 45 minutes.

Happy NOWING

Create your own Community

The power of social networking

Social Networking is certainly a fantastic way to build a following of people toward your brand. But what about organizing your own community? There are a few websites out there that allow you to do just that. These are sites that give you the ability to create a private community dedicated to your area of focus. One of these I use quite frequently for particular projects. Ning.com is a great place to create your community, and only takes a few minutes to get up and running.

Another network you may be interested in, and is one of the newest ones to hit the scene, is SocialGo.com. This site is similar to Ning and allows you to create your own private community. However, it does provide a few extra features, but is not as mature as Ning.

If you would like expert and professional help setting up your social network, contact me! You can do so with twitter, facebook, or my own social network!

Taking the “Spam” out of spam

No-SPAM

I thought it might be a good idea to post a blog entry about spam. Spam is frowned on, in some cases, drastically. Yet as marketers, we are drawn to doing it. Otherwise, how else will your opportunities get noticed?

BUT…

An opportunity that is “pushed” onto someone, and in particular, the masses, is frowned on. Using this style of advertising is abusive in nature, and will damage your reputation or brand. Much of the home page is syndicated and goes out to many other sites. So, yes, it is visible.

If the message you want to portray is that you are a spammer, and reduce your income levels, then I suppose I should just be quiet. I would imagine, however, that this is NOT the case (correct me if I am wrong).

Here are some tips.

My Story Marketing
Make your advertisements about YOU. One of our techniques is “My story” marketing. Talk about your objectives, who you are, what makes you tick, and WHY you joined a program. Chances are there are a bunch of other people who are the same as you, feel the same way, are very similar in nature, and will do what you do. This is VERY effective, and won’t be labeled as “SPAM”. And remember, your profile is YOU, put your ads “softly” there. Let your people come to you. Talk about your achievements, your experiences, your … story.

Market your profile
Your profile is your biggest and most important asset you have in your marketing toolbox. It is a place where people can find out more about you, and your experiences. It is also a place where you can post ads and your links. Make use of the text box (which can also include videos).

Syndicate “YOU”
Your profile has an RSS link at the bottom. If your profile tells your story, experiences, and what you are into (including your ads) you will be branded. Welcome to Web 2.0.

Use Case Studies
Case studies are a very effective way of getting your story across. If you find a new program, and want to promote it, share the experience you have had with it (good or bad). Remember, this will always bring the readers back to your profile.

The “us” in Trust
It’s all about trust. If you tell someone (without knowing them) that they will make a million dollars, and they are driving a honda, chances are they are lying. They haven’t made that kind of money. Why should you believe that they will? Form relationships with people before introducing something to them.

It’s all in the follow up
Most (quality) sales that we get will come from the follow up. It is the follow up that should encourage trust, while at the same time giving them the tools they need to be successful. This follow up is critical in your success.

Write a “how to” article
If you author an information article on how to do something, you are given instant credibility. You will be seen as an expert. They will trust what you have to say, and want to know more about you (your profile)

Get Published
Writing an article is a very good way to brand, and will have a good effect. This article will be syndicated (the RSS links at the bottom are being indexed by search engines and syndication sites). Therefore, when you write a blog post or upload/link a video, you are ALREADY BEING PUBLISHED. But don’t stop there, use sites like squidoo and hubpages, among many others.

Take “I or me” out of your discussions

Focusing on what others are doing and how you might be able to help them will prove invaluable to them, and they will return the favor by talking to others about “you”

Use “Viral” Communications
If someone finds something good out about something, they will want to share it. That something might be you and/or your opps.

Put a “signature” at the end of all communications
When you write a post (of any kind), put a signature at the end. This signature may have URLs in it to your opps. You can even put a small catch phrase to pull them in. This is fine. This wasn’t the sole intent of your article! Therefore, you won’t be seen as spamming.

To your “online” success!

Branding and social networking

Social networks are here to stay.  And they are growing stronger daily!  Question is, are you going to sit by and watch them pass you by?

Just using the social networks to make friends, and message with them is such a waste!  You have the world at your fingertips.  You have access to millions of people.  You have the world literally sitting on your doorstep.  There are ways you can use this new set of technologies to bring people to you in the masses.  Have a product or service to sell?  Watch them come in droves.

Question is, how?  Well, that is the million dollar question, isn’t it.  Too many think the answer is just too hard.  But, actually, you already have the answer in you.  Well, more to the point, the answer is YOU.

Social networking is about finding and sharing with like-minded people.  Finding those people is not hard, once you know who YOU are, and have the confidence to brand yourself. All of the successful brands in the world have products or services that change over time, but the brand stays strong. Why? Because every small, medium or large company knows that their brand is the most important asset they have. They will do anything to protect the reputation of their brand.

Any product or service can be attached to a brand. You don’t need to be anything but you to get out there and be successful using social networks. Over time, your products and services will change, but your brand will not. So, rather than focusing on what you are selling, you should focus on making your brand the best it can be.

Your product and service will sell itself as long as you have a good brand. Focus on your story, and who you are rather than what you sell. Focus all of your energy on helping others be successful, rather than yourself. Be giving, kind, gentle, open, and loving to all. That will give you something worth a million times more than money. That is the real gold. The money will come to you as a result. This doesn’t mean you have to give all of your knowledge or ideas away, rather simply means that you are focusing on what is important.

Those that understand this principle are working with the power of ATTRACTION. You are someone that others want to connect with. You become attractive, like a magnet. As you explore your relationships with people, then they will start to become interested in what you are selling.

So, to conclude… Social networks are your key to relationships, and being attractive to others. Once you learn this fundamental principle, what your brand sells will sell like hotcakes. Stop focusing on selling, and start focusing on others. You will be truly and absolutely amazed at the results.