fewer returns, etc.). It’s less headache. This is HUGE. 3. Higher pricing also creates higher profit margins. It’s safer. I personally aim for an 8—/0x markup, which means a $100 product can’t cost me more than $10— 12.50.24 If I had used the commonly recommended 5 x markup with BrainQUICKEN, it would have gone bankrupt within 6 months due to a dishonest supplier and late magazine. The profit margin saved it, and within 12 months it was generating up to $80,000 per month. High has its limits, however. If the per-unit price is above a certain point, prospects need to speak to someone on the phone before they are comfortable enough to make the purchase. This is contraindicated on our low-information diet. I have found that a price range of $50—-200 per sale provides the most profit for the least customer service hassle. Price high and then justify. It Should Take No More Than 3 to 4 Weeks to Manufacture. This is critically important for keeping costs low and adapting to sales demand without stockpiling product in advance. I will not pursue any product that takes more than three to four weeks to manufacture, and I recommend aiming for one to two weeks from order placement to shippable product. How do you know how long something takes to manufacture? Contact contract manufacturers who specialize in the type of products you’re considering: http://www.thomasnet.com/. Call a related manufacturer (e.g., toilet bowls) if you need a referral to a related manufacturer you cannot find (e.g., toilet cleaning solutions). Still no luck? Google different synonyms for your product in combination with “organization” and “association” to contact the appropriate industry organizations. Ask them for referrals to contract manufacturers and for the names of their trade magazines, which often contain advertisements for contract manufacturers and related service providers we’ll need for your virtual architecture later. Request pricing from the contract manufacturers to ensure the proper markup is possible. Determine the per-unit costs of production for 100, 500, 1,000, and 5,000 units. It Should Be Fully Explainable in a Good Online FAQ. Here is where I really screwed up in my product choice with Brain-QUICKEN. Even though ingestibles have enabled my NR life, I would not wish them on anyone. Why not? You get 1,000 questions from every customer: Can I eat bananas with your product? Will it make me fart during dinner? On and on, ad nauseam. Choose a product that you can fully explain in a good online FAQ. If not, the task of travelling and otherwise forgetting about work becomes very difficult or you end up spending a fortune on call center operators. Understanding these criteria, a question remains: “How does one obtain a good muse product that satisfies them?” There are three options we’ll cover in ascending order of recommendation. Option One: Resell a Product P orechasine an existing product at wholesale and reselling it is the easiest route but also the least HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013896

profitable. It is the fastest to set up but the fastest to die off due to price competition with other resellers. The profitable life span of each product is short unless an exclusivity agreement prevents others from selling it. Reselling is, however, an excellent option for secondary back-end2@ products that can be sold to existing customers or cross-sold22 to new customers online or on the phone. To purchase at wholesale, use these steps. Contact the manufacturer and request a “wholesale pricelist” (generally 40% off retail) and terms. 2. If a business tax ID number is needed, print out the proper forms from your state’s Secretary of State website and file for an LLC (which I prefer) or similar protective business structure for $100-200. Do NOT purchase product until you have completed Step 3 in the next chapter. It is enough at this point to confirm the profit margin and have product photos and sales literature. That’s reselling. Not much more to it. Option Two: License a Product I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow. — WOODROW WILSON Some of the world’s best-known brands and products have been borrowed from someone or somewhere else. The basis for the energy drink Red Bull came from a tonic in Thailand, and the Smurfs were brought from Belgium. Pokémon came from the land of Honda. The band KISS made millions in record and concert sales, but the real profit has been in licensing— granting others the right to produce hundreds of products with their name and image in exchange for a percentage of sales. There are two parties involved in a licensing deal, and a member of the New Rich could be either. First, there is the inventor of the product 22 called the “licensor,” who can sell others the right to manufacture, use, or sell his or her product, usually for 3-10% of the wholesale price (usually around 40% off retail) for each unit sold. Invent, let someone else do the rest, and cash checks. Not a bad model. The other side of the equation is the person interested in manufacturing and selling the inventor’s product for 90-97% of the profit: the licensee. This is, for me and most NR, more interesting. Licensing is, however, dealmaking-intensive on both sides and a science unto itself. Creative contract negotiation is essential and most readers will run into problems if it’s their first product. For real-world case studies on both sides, ranging from Teddy Ruxpin to Tae-Bo, and full agreements with actual dollar amounts, visit www.fourhourblog.com. From how to sell inventions without prototypes or patents to how to secure rights to products as a no-name beginner, it’s all there. The economics are fascinating and the profits can be astounding. In the meantime, we will focus on the least complicated and most profitable option open to the most people: product creation. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013897

Option Three: Create a Product Creation is a better means of self-expression than possession; it is through creating, not possessing, that life is revealed. — VIDA D. SCUDDER, The Life of the Spirit in the Modern English Poets CC eating a product is not complicated. “Create” sounds more involved than it actually is. If the idea is a hard product—an invention—it is possible to hire mechanical engineers or industrial designers on www.elance.com to develop a prototype based on your description of its function and appearance, which is then taken to a contract manufacturer. If you find a generic or stock product made by a contract manufacturer that can be re-purposed or positioned for a special market, it’s even easier: Have them manufacture it, stick a custom label on it for you, and presto—new product. This latter example is often referred to as “private labeling.” Have you ever seen a massage therapist’s office with its own line of vitamin products or the Kirkland brand at Costco? Private labeling in action. It is true that we'll be testing market response without manufacturing, but if the test is successful, manufacturing is the next step. This means we need to keep in mind setup costs, per-unit costs, and order minimums. Innovative gadgets and devices are great but often require special tooling, which makes the manufacturing start-up costs too expensive to meet our criteria. Putting mechanical devices aside and forgetting about welding and engineering, there is one class of product that meets all of our criteria, has a manufacturing lead time of less than a week in small quantities, and often permits not just an 8—10 x markup, but a 20-50 x markup. No, not heroin or slave labor. Too much bribing and human interaction required. Information. Information products are low-cost, fast to manufacture, and time-consuming for competitors to duplicate. Consider that the top-selling non-information infomercial products—whether exercise equipment or supplements—have a useful life span of two to four months before imitators flood the market. I studied economics in Beijing for six months and observed firsthand how the latest Nike sneaker or Callaway golf club could be duplicated and on eBay within a week of first appearing on shelves in the U.S. This is not an exaggeration, and I am not talking about a look-alike product—I mean an exact duplicate for 1/20 the cost. Information, on the other hand, is too time-consuming for most knockoff artists to bother with when there are easier products to replicate. It’s easier to circumvent a patent than to paraphrase an entire course to avoid copyright infringement. Three of the most successful television products of all time—all of which have spent more than 300 weeks on the infomercial top-10 bestseller lists—reflect the competitive and profit margin advantage of information products. No Down Payment (Carlton Sheets) Attacking Anxiety and Depression (Lucinda Bassett) Personal Power (Tony Robbins) I know from conversations with the principal owners of one of the above products that more than $65 million worth of information moved through their doors in 2002. Their infrastructure consisted of fewer than 25 in-house operators, and the rest of the infrastructure, ranging from media purchasing to shipping, was outsourced. Their annual revenue-per-employee is more than $2.7 million. Incredible. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013898

On the opposite end of the market size spectrum, I know a man who created a low-budget how-to DVD for less than $200 and sold it to owners of storage facilities who wanted to install security systems. It’s hard to get more niche than that. In 2001, selling DVDs that cost $2 to duplicate for $95 apiece through trade magazines, he made several hundred thousand dollars with no employees. But I’m Not an Expert! L, you aren’t an expert, don’t sweat it. First, “expert” in the context of selling product means that you know more about the topic than the purchaser. No more. It is not necessary to be the best—just better than a small target number of your prospective customers. Let’s suppose that your current dreamline—to compete in the 1,150-mile Iditarod dogsledding race in Alaska—requires $5,000 to realize. If there are 15,000 readers and even 50 (0.33%) can be convinced of your superior expertise in skill X and spend $100 for a program that teaches it, that is $5,000. Bring on the Huskies. Those 50 customers are what I call the “minimal customer base” — the minimum number of customers you need to convince of your expertise to fulfill a given dreamline. Second, expert status can be created in less than four weeks if you understand basic credibility indicators. It’s important to learn how the PR pros phrase resume points and position their clients. See the boxed text later in this chapter to learn how. The degree to which you personally need expert status also depends on how you obtain your content. There are three main options. 1. Create the content yourself, often via paraphrasing and combining points from several books on a topic. 2. Repurpose content that is in the public domain and not subject to copyright protection, such as government documents and material that predates modern copyright law. 3. License content or compensate an expert to help create content. Fees can be one-time and paid up front or royalty-based (5-10% of net revenue, for example). If you choose option 1 or 2, you need expert status within a limited market. Let’s assume you are a real estate broker and have determined that, like yourself, most brokers want a simple but good website to promote themselves and their businesses. If you read and understand the three top-selling books on home-page design, you will know more about that topic than 80% of the readership of a magazine for real estate brokers. If you can summarize the content and make recommendations specific to the needs of the real estate market, a 0.5—1.5% response from an ad you place in the magazine is not unreasonable to expect. Use the following questions to brainstorm potential how-to or informational products that can be sold to your markets using your expertise or borrowed expertise. Aim for a combination of formats that will lend itself to $50-200 pricing, such as a combination of two CDs (30-90 minutes each), a 40-page transcription of the CDs, and a 10-page quickstart guide. Digital delivery is perfectly acceptable—in some cases, ideal—if you can create a high enough perceived value. 1. How can you tailor a general skill for your market—what I call “niching down”—or add to what is being sold successfully in your target magazines? Think narrow and deep rather than broad. 2. What skills are you interested in that you—and others in your markets—would pay to learn? Become an expert in this skill for yourself and then create a product to teach the same. If you need help or want HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013899

to speed up the process, consider the next question. 3. What experts could you interview and record to create a sellable audio CD? These people do not need to be the best, but just better than most. Offer them a digital master copy of the interview to do with or sell as they like (this is often enough) and/or offer them a small up-front or ongoing royalty payment. Use Skype.com with HotRecorder (more on these and related tools in Tools and Tricks) to record these conversations directly to your PC and send the mp3 file to an online transcription service. 4. Do you have a failure-to-success story that could be turned into a how-to product for others? Consider problems you’ve overcome in the past, both professional and personal. The Expert Builder: How to Become a Top Expert in 4 Weeks L.. time to obliterate the cult of the expert. Let the PR world scorn me. First and foremost, there is a difference between being perceived as an expert and being one. In the context of business, the former is what sells product and the latter, relative to your “minimal customer base,” is what creates good products and prevents returns. It is possible to know all there is to know about a subject—medicine, for example—but if you don’t have M.D. at the end of your name, few will listen. The M.D. is what I term a “credibility indicator.” The so-called expert with the most credibility indicators, whether acronyms or affiliations, is often the most successful in the marketplace, even if other candidates have more in-depth knowledge. This is a matter of superior positioning, not deception. How, then, do we go about acquiring credibility indicators in the least time possible? Emulating the client-grooming techniques of some of the best PR firms in New York City and Los Angeles isn’t a bad place to start. It took a friend of mine just three weeks to become a “top relationship expert who, as featured in Glamour and other national media, has counseled executives at Fortune 500 companies on how to improve their relationships in 24 hours or less.” How did she do it? She followed a few simple steps that created a credibility snowball effect. Here’s how you can do the same, 1. Join two or three related trade organizations with official-sounding names. In her case, she chose the Association for Conflict Resolution (www.acrnet.org) and The International Foundation for Gender Education (www.ifge.org). This can be done online in five minutes with a credit card. 2. Read the three top-selling books on your topic (search historical New York Times bestseller lists online) and summarize each on one page. 3. Give one free one-to-three-hour seminar at the closest well-known university, using posters to advertise. Then do the same at branches of two well-known big companies (AT&T, IBM, etc.) located in the same area. Tell the company that you have given seminars at University X or X College and are a member of those groups from step 1. Emphasize that you are offering it to them for free to get additional speaking experience outside of academics and will not be selling products or services. Record the seminars from two angles for later potential use as a CD/DVD product. 4. Optional: Offer to write one or two articles for trade magazines related to your topics, citing what you have accomplished in steps 1 and 3 for credibility. If they decline, offer to interview a known expert and write the article—it still gets your name listed as a contributor. 5. Join ProfNet, which is a service that journalists use to find experts to quote for articles. Getting PR is simple if you stop shouting and start listening. Use steps 1, 3, and 4 to demonstrate credibility and HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013900

online research to respond to journalist queries. Done properly, this will get you featured in media ranging from small local publications to the New York Times and ABC News. Becoming a recognized expert isn’t difficult, so I want to remove that barrier now. I am not recommending pretending to be something you’re not. I can’t! “Expert” is nebulous media- speak and so overused as to be indefinable. In modern PR terms, proof of expertise in most fields is shown with group affiliations, client lists, writing credentials, and media mentions, not /Q points or Ph.D.s. Presenting the truth in the best light, but not fabricating it, is the name of the game. See you on CNN. =» Q&A: QUESTIONS AND ACTIONS E.. this hands-on chapter, the Q&A is simple. In fact, it’s more like a Q. The question is, “Did you read the chapter and follow the directions?” If not, do it! Instead of the usual Q&A, the end of this chapter and the following two will feature more extensive resources for taking the action steps described in detail in the text. = COMFORT CHALLENGE Find Yoda (3 Days) Call at least one potential superstar mentor per day for three days. E-mail only after attempting a phone call. I recommend calling before 8:30 A.M. or after 6:00 P.M. to reduce run-ins with secretaries and other gatekeepers. Have a single question in mind, one that you have researched but have been unable to answer yourself. Shoot for “A” players—CEOs, ultrasuccessful entrepreneurs, famous authors, etc.—and don’t aim low to make it less frightening. Use www.contactanycelebrity.com if need be, and base your script on the following. Unknown answerer: This is Acme Inc. [or “the office of Mentor X’’]. You: Hi, this is Tim Ferriss calling for John Grisham, please 24 Answerer: May I ask what this is regarding? You: Sure. I know this might sound a bit odd,32 but I’m a first-time author and just read his interview in Time Out New York 22 I'm a longtime*+ fan and have finally built up the courage to@= call him for one specific piece of advice. It wouldn’t take more than two minutes of his time. Is there any way you can help me get through to him?2"I really, really appreciate whatever you can do. Answerer: Hmmm ... Just a second. Let me see if he’s available. [two minutes later] Here you go. Good luck. [rings to another line] John Grisham: John Grisham here. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013901

You: Hi, Mr. Grisham. My name is Tim Ferriss. I know this might sound a bit odd, but I’m a first-time author and a longtime fan. I just read your interview in Time Out New York and finally built up the courage to call. I have wanted to ask you for a specific piece of advice for a long time, and it shouldn’t take more than two minutes of your time. May I?22 John Grisham: Uh ... OK. Go ahead. I have to be on a call in a few minutes. You (at the very end of the call): Thank you so much for being so generous with your time. If I have the occasional tough question—very occasional—is there any chance I could keep in touch via e-mail?28 » LIFESTYLE DESIGN IN ACTION OVER THE MOON My 13-year-old daughter would like to be an astronaut when she grows up. Last year she had an extreme challenge to deal with. The phrase from Apollo 13 “Failure is not an option” sort of became our motto. I got the idea of contacting the commander of Apollo 13, Jim Lovell. It didn’t take much to find him and he sent her a wonderful letter about his ordeal just to get into the Apollo program, not to mention dealing with a crippled spacecraft. His letter made a big difference to my daughter. A couple months later, we were able to take things a little further by getting her VIP access to a shuttle launch. —ROB » TOOLS AND TRICKS Confirming Sufficient Market Size » Compete (www.compete.com) and Quantcast (www.quantcast.com) Find the number of monthly visitors for most websites, in addition to the search terms that generate the most traffic for them. = Writer’s Market ( www.writersmarket.com ) Here you'll find a listing of thousands of specialty and niche magazines, including circulation and subscription numbers. I prefer the print version. => Spyfu ( www.spyfu.com ) Download competitors’ online advertising spending, keywords, and ad-word details. Consistent and repeat spending generally indicates successful advertising ROI. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013902

» Standard Rate and Data Services ( www.srds.com ) Check out this resource for annual listings of magazine and company customer mailing lists available for rent. If you’re considering creating a how-to video for duck hunting, check out the size of customer lists from hunting gun manufacturers and related magazines first. Use the print version in libraries instead of paying for the somewhat confusing online access. Finding Products to Resell or Manufacturing » Affiliate Networks: Clickbank ( www.clickbank.com ), Commission Junction ( www.cj.com_), Amazon Associates ( www.amazon.com/associates ) No inventory, no invoices. Experimenting with products and categories through affiliate networks such as Clickbank and Commission Junction, which pay you 10-75% of each purchase, is a fast method for doing a proof-of-concept using similar products. It’s often worth setting up accounts at both just to observe how bestselling items are being sold and promoted. Amazon Associates averages 7-10% commissions, but bestselling books are excellent for testing target markets for more elaborate informational products. For all of the above: Do not get into bidding wars against other affiliates using expensive general keywords or overexposed brand names. Go niche or go broke. » Alibaba ( www.alibaba.com ) Based in China, Alibaba is the world’s largest business-to-business marketplace. From MP3 players for $9 each to red wine for $2 per bottle, this site is the source. If someone here doesn’t make it, it probably can’t be made. =» Worldwide Brands ( www.worldwidebrands.com ) Offers an extensive how-to guide for finding manufacturers willing to dropship product to your customers, which allows you to avoid pre-purchasing inventory. This is where Amazon and eBay power users find not just drop shippers, but also wholesalers and liquidators. Shopster (www.shopster.com) is also a popular option, with more than 1,000,000 dropship products to choose from. » Thomas’s Register of Manufacturers ( www.thomasnet.com ) (800-699-9822) Searchable database of contract manufacturers for every conceivable product, from underwear and food products to airplane parts. > Electronics, DVDs, Books ( www.ingrambook.com , www.techdata.com ) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013903

» Housewares and Hardware ( www.housewares.org , www.nationalhardwareshow.com_) (847- 292-4200) For these product categories and related talent (on-screen demonstrations), also consider attending local or state fairs. » Consumables and Vitamin Products ( www.expoeast.com _, expowest.com ) Finding Public Domain Information to Repurpose Be sure to speak with an intellectual property attorney before using apparent public domain material. If someone modifies 20% of a public domain work (through abridging and footnotes, for example), their “new” complete work can be copyrighted. Using it without permission would then be a punishable infringement. The details can get confusing. Do the beginning research yourself, but get a pro to look over your findings before moving ahead with product development. » Project Gutenberg ( www.gutenberg.org ) Project Gutenberg is a digital library of more than 15,000 pieces of literature considered to be in the public domain. > LibriVox ( www.librivox.org ) LibriVox is a collection of audiobooks from the public domain that are available for free download. Recording Seminars or Phone Interviews with Experts for CD Downloadable Products ~ HotRecorder ( www.hotrecorder.com ) (PC), Call Recorder ( http://ecamm.com/mac/callrecorder/_) (Mac) Use these programs to record any inbound or outbound phone call via computer using Skype (www.skype.com) and other VoIP programs. = NoCost Conference ( www.nocostconference.com ) Provides a free 800-number conference line, as well as free recording and file retrieval. Normal phones can be used for call-in, so no computer or web connection is required for participants. If you’ll have a Q&A, I suggest soliciting attendee questions beforehand to avoid issues with muting/ unmuting of lines. » Jing Project (www.jingproject.com) and DimDim (www.dimdim.com) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013904

If you’d like to record the actions on your screen for video tutorials, both of these free programs will get the job done. If you need advanced editing features, Jing’s big brother Camtasia is the industry standard (www.camtasia.com). Licensing Ideas to Others for Royalties > InventRight ( www.inventright.com_) (800-701-7993) Stephen Key is the most consistently successful inventor [’ve ever met, with millions in royalties from companies like Disney, Nestlé, and Coca-Cola. He is not high-tech but specializes in creating simple products, or improving on existing products, and then licensing (renting) his ideas to large corporations. He comes up with the idea, files a provisional patent for less than $200, and then lets another company do the work while he collects checks. This site introduces his fail-proof process for doing the same. His techniques for cold-calling alone are invaluable. Highly recommended. »Guthy-Renker Corporation (www.guthyrenker.com) (760-773-9022) GRC is the 800-pound infomercial gorilla. It brings in more than $1.3 billion per year in sales with mega-hits like Tony Robbins, Proactiv Solution, and Winsor Pilates. Don’t expect more than a 2-4% royalty if you make the cut, but the numbers are huge enough to make it worth a look. Submit your product online. Searching Patents for Unexploited Ideas to Turn into Products e » United States Patent and Trademark Office (www.uspto.gov) (800-786-9199) e» lLicensable Technologies Developed at Universities § ( www.autm.net _; see “view all listings” under “Technology Transfer Offices” ) e » Inventors Groups and Associations (call and ask if members have anything to license) ( Wwww.uiausa.org/Resources/InventorGroups.htm Becoming an Expert »Prof Net via PR Leads (www.prleads.com) and HARO (www.helpareporterout.com) Receive daily leads from journalists and TV and radio producers looking for experts to cite and interview for media ranging from local outlets to CNN and the New York Times. Stop swimming upstream and start responding to stories people are already working on. HARO offers select leads at no cost, and you HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013905

can mention my name with PR Leads to get two months for the price of one. »PRWeb Press Releases (www.prwebdirect.com) The press release is dead for most purposes, but using this service has some serious search-engine benefits, such as appearing at the top of related Google News and Yahoo! News results. =» ExpertClick ( www.expertclick.com ) This is another secret of the PR pros. Put up an expert profile for media to see, receive an up-to-date database of top media contacts, and send free press releases to 12,000 journalists, all on one website that gets more than 5 million hits per month. This is how I got on NBC and ended up developing a prime- time TV show. It works. Mention my name on the phone, or use “Tim Ferriss $100” online, to get a $100 discount. » LIFESTYLE DESIGN IN ACTION Bon Jour Tim, I was in Barnes & Noble at the help desk this past Saturday, April 25, waiting for an employee to get a book for me (Tropic of Cancer if you must know). While I was waiting, I noticed a copy of 4-Hour Workweek on the counter that someone else had ordered. Not one to be shy, I reached over the counter and started reading their copy. As you might guess, I had the employee go back and get me my own copy. Haven’t finished Tropic of Cancer but finished your book ... ... On Monday I got a yes when I asked my boss to work two days remotely per week. I start next week. On Monday I also booked the most stunning apartment in Paris for the month of September, at a cost of half of the rent I pay in Southern California. I plan to increase my remote time now through August so that September will be an easy ask to leave for remote work. If the answer happens to be no (which I now doubt), I will be prepared to quit my job. Now at work on my Income Autopilot project. Tim: amazing. My life has changed in three days. (Plus, your book was funny as hell.) Thank you!!! —CINDY FRANKEY 21. There are a few limited exceptions, such as online membership sites that don’t require content generation, but as a general rule, products require much less maintenance and will get you to your TMI faster. 22. Muses will provide the time and financial freedom to realize your dreamlines in record time, after which one can (and often does) start additional companies to change the world or sell. 23. Distributors are sometimes also referred to as “wholesalers,” depending on the industry. 24. It is illegal to control how much someone sells your product for, but you can dictate how much they advertise it for. This is done by including a Minimum Advertised Pricing (MAP) policy in your General Terms and Conditions (GTC), which are agreed to automatically when a written wholesale order is placed. Sample GTC and order forms are available at www.fourhourblog.com. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013906

25. The Wall Street Journal, July 18, 2005 (http://www.technologyinvestor.com/login/2004/Jull 8— 05.php). 26. This was a new product category that I created to eliminate and preempt the competition. Strive to be the largest, best, or first in a precise category. I prefer being first. 27. If you decide to resell someone else’s higher-end products like Doug, especially with drop- shipping, the risk is lower and smaller margins can suffice. 28. “Back-end” products are products sold to customers once the sale of a primary product has been made. iPod covers and car GPS systems are two examples. These products can have lower margins, because there is no advertising cost to acquire the customer. 29. “Cross-selling” is selling a related product to a customer while they’re still on the phone or in an online shopping cart after the sale of a primary product has been made. For a full marketing and direct response (DR) glossary, visit www.fourhourblog.com. 30. This also refers to owners of copyrights or trademarks. 31. Said casually and with confidence, this alone will get you through surprisingly often. “I'd like to speak with Mr./Ms. X, please” is a dead giveaway that you don’t know them. If you want to up the chances of getting though but risk looking foolish if they call the bluff, ask for the target mentor by first name only. 32. I use this type of lead-in whenever making off-the-wall requests. It softens it and makes the person curious enough to listen before spitting out an automatic “no.” 33. This answers the questions they’ll have in their head: “Who are you and why are you calling now?” I like to be a “first-time” something to play the sympathy card, and I find a recent media feature online to cite as the trigger for calling. 34. I call people ?'m familiar with. If you can’t call yourself a longtime fan, tell them that you have followed the mentor’s career or business exploits for a certain number of years. 35. Don’t pretend to be strong. Make it clear you’re nervous and they’ll lower their guard. I often do this even if I’m not nervous. 36. The wording here is critical. Ask them to “help” you do something. 37. Just rework the gatekeeper paragraph for this, and don’t dillydally— get to the point quickly and ask for permission to pull the trigger. 38. End the conversation by opening the door for future contact. Start with e-mail and let the mentoring relationship develop from there. 10) Income Autopilot I = TESTING THE MUSE HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013907

Many of these theories have been killed off only when some decisive experiment exposed their incorrectness.... Thus the yeoman work in any science ... is done by the experimentalist, who must keep the theoreticians honest. —MICHIO KAKU, theoretical physicist and cocreator of String Field Theory, Hyperspace Bove: than 5% of the 195,000 books published each year sell more than 5,000 copies. Teams of publishers and editors with decades of combined experience fail more times than not. The founder of Border’s Books lost $375 million of investor funding with WebVan.2 a nationwide grocery delivery service. The problem? No one wanted it. The moral is that intuition and experience are poor predictors of which products and businesses will be profitable. Focus groups are equally misleading. Ask ten people if they would buy your product. Then tell those who said “yes” that you have ten units in your car and ask them to buy. The initial positive responses, given by people who want to be liked and aim to please, become polite refusals as soon as real money is at stake. To get an accurate indicator of commercial viability, don’t ask people if they would buy —ask them to buy. The response to the second is the only one that matters. The approach of the NR reflects this. Step Three: Micro-Test Your Products Mtcro testing involves using inexpensive advertisements to test consumer response to a product prior to manufacturing 22 In the pre-Internet era, this was done using small classified ads in newspapers or magazines that led prospects to call a prerecorded sales message. Prospects would leave their contact information, and based on the number of callers or response to a follow-up sales letter, the product would be abandoned or manufactured. In the Internet era, there are better tools that are both cheaper and faster. We’ll test the product ideas from the last chapter on Google Adwords—the largest and most sophisticated Pay-Per-Click (PPC) engine—in five days for $500 or less. PPC here refers to the highlighted search results that are listed above and to the right of normal search results on Google. Advertisers pay to have these ads displayed when people search for a certain term related to the advertisers’ product, such as “cognitive supplement,” and are charged a small fee from $.05 to over $1 each time someone clicks through to their site. For a good introduction to Google Adwords and PPC, visit www.google.com/onlinebusiness. For expanded examples of the following PPC strategies, visit www.fourhourblog.com and search “PPC.” The basic test process consists of three parts, each of which is covered in this chapter. Best: Look at the competition and create a more-compelling offer on a basic one-to-three-page website (one to three hours). Test: Test the offer using short Google Adwords advertising campaigns (three hours to set up and five days of passive observation). Divest or Invest: Cut losses with losers and manufacture the winner(s) for sales rollout. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013908

Let’s use two people, Sherwood and Johanna, and their two product ideas—French sailor shirts and a how-to yoga DVD for rock climbers—as case studies of what the testing steps look like and how you can do the same. Sherwood bought a striped sailing shirt in France while traveling last summer, and upon returning to NYC has been continually approached by 20—30-year-old males on the street who want to know where to get their own. Sensing an opportunity, he requests back issues of NYC-based weekly magazines aimed at this demographic and calls the manufacturer in France for pricing. He learns that he can purchase shirts at a wholesale price of $20 that sell for $100 retail. He adds $5 per shirt to account for shipping to the U.S. and arrives at a per-shirt cost of $25. It’s not quite our ideal markup (4x vs. 8-10x), but he wants to test the product regardless. Johanna is a yoga instructor who has noticed her growing client base of rock climbers. She is also a rock climber and is considering creating a yoga instructional DVD tailored to that sport, which would include a 20-page spiral-bound manual and be priced at $80. She predicts that production of a low- budget first edition of the DVD would cost nothing more than a borrowed digital camera and a friend’s iMac for simple editing. She can burn small quantities of this first-edition DVD—no menus, just straight footage and titles—on the laptop and create labels with freeware from www.download.com. She has contacted a duplication house and learned that more-professional DVDs will cost $3-5 apiece to duplicate in small quantities (minimum of 250), including cases. Now that they have ideas and estimates of start-up costs, what next? Besting the Competition First and foremost, each product must pass a competitive litmus test. How can Sherwood and Johanna beat the competition and offer a superior product or guarantee? 1. Sherwood and Johanna Google the top terms each would use to try and find their respective products. To come up with related terms and derivative terms, both use search term suggestion tools. Google Adwords Keyword Tool (http://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal) Enter the potential search terms to find search volume and alternative terms with more search traffic. Click on the “Approx Avg Search Volume” column to sort results from most to least searched. SEOBook Keyword Tool, SEO for Firefox Extension (http://tools.seobook.com/) This is an outstanding resource page with searches powered by Wordtracker (www.wordtracker.com). Both then visit the three websites that consistently appear in top search and PPC positions. How can Sherwood and Johanna differentiate themselves’? e »Use more credibility indicators? (media, academia, associations, and testimonials) « »Create a better guarantee? e« » Offer better selection? e »Free or faster shipping? HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013909

Sherwood notices that the shirts are often hard to find on the competitive sites, all of which feature dozens of products, and the shirts are either made in the U.S. (inauthentic) or shipped from France (customers must wait two to four weeks). Johanna cannot find a “yoga for rock climbing” DVD, so she is starting from a blank slate. 2. Sherwood and Johanna now need to create a one-page (300-600 words) testimonial-rich advertisement that emphasizes their differentiators and product benefits using text and either personal photos or stock photos from stock photo websites. Both have spent two weeks collecting advertisements that have prompted them to make purchases or that have caught their attention in print or online —these will serve as models. Johanna asks her clients for testimonials and Sherwood lets his friends try on the shirts to get several for his page. Sherwood also asks the manufacturer for photos and advertising samples. See www.pxmethod.com for a good example of how I have created a test page using testimonials from seminar attendees. Please note that it’s just a template for readers and not a live sales page. Free how-to seminars as recommended in the Expert Builder are ideal for identifying popular selling points and securing testimonials. Testing the Advertisement Sherwood and Johanna now need to test actual customer response to their advertisements. Sherwood first tests his concept with a 72-hour eBay auction that includes his advertising text. He sets the “reserve” (the lowest price he’ll accept) for one shirt at $50 and cancels the auction last minute to avoid legal issues since he doesn’t have product to ship. He has received bids up to $75 and decides to move to the next phase of testing. Johanna doesn’t feel comfortable with the apparent deception and skips this preliminary testing. Sherwood’s cost: <$5. Both register domain names for their soon-to-be one-page sites using the cheap domain registrar www.domainsinseconds.com. Sherwood chooses www.shirtsfromfrance.com and Johanna chooses www.yogaclimber.com. For additional domain names, Johanna uses www.domainsinseconds.com. Cost to both: <$20. Sherwood uses www.weebly.com to create his one-page site advertisement and then creates two additional pages using the form builder www.wufoo.com. If someone clicks on the “purchase” button at the bottom of the first page, it takes them to a second page with pricing, shipping and handling “* and basic contact fields to fill out (including e-mail and phone). If the visitor presses “continue with order,” it takes them to a page that states, “Unfortunately, we are currently on back order but will contact you as soon as we have product in stock. Thank you for your patience.” This structure allows him to test the first-page ad and his pricing separately. If someone gets to the last page, it is considered an order. Johanna is not comfortable with “dry testing,” as Sherwood’s approach is known, even though it is legal if the billing data isn’t captured. She instead uses the same two services to create a single webpage with the content of her one-page ad and an e-mail sign-up for a free “top 10 tips” list for using yoga for rock climbing. She will consider 60% of the sign-ups as hypothetical orders. Cost to both: <$0. Both set up simple Google Adwords campaigns with 50-100 search terms to simultaneously test headlines while driving traffic to their pages. Their daily budget limits are set at $50 per day. (At this segue into PPC testing, I recommend you first visit www.adwords/google.com/onlinebusiness and then follow along by creating your own account, which should take about 10 minutes. It would be a waste of rain forests to use ten pages to explain terms that can be understood at a glance online.) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013910

Sherwood and Johanna decide on the best search terms by using the search term suggestion tools mentioned earlier. Both aim for specific terms when possible (“french sailor shirts” vs. “french shirts;” “voga for sports” vs. “yoga”’) for higher conversion rates (the percentage of visitors that purchase) and lower cost-per-click (CPC). They aim also for second through fourth positioning, but no more than $.20 CPC. Sherwood will use Google’s free analytical tools to track “orders” and page abandonment rates— what percentage of visitors leave the site from which pages. Johanna will use www.wufoo.com to track e-mail sign-ups on this small testing scale4 Cost to both: $0. Both Johanna and Sherwood design Adwords ads that focus on their differentiators. Each Google Adwords ad consists of a headline and then two lines of description, neither of which can exceed 35 characters. In Sherwood’s case, he creates five groups of 10 search terms each. The following are two of his ads. SAILOR SHIRTS FROM FRANCE SAILOR SHIRTS FROM FRANCE REAL FRENCH SAILOR SHIRTS French Quality, Shipped from U.S. French Quality, Shipped from U.S. Lifetime Guarantee! Lifetime Guarantee! www.shirtsfromfrance.com www.shirtsfromfrance.com Johanna creates the same five groups of 10 terms each and tests a number of ads, including these: YOGA FOR ROCK CLIMBERS YOGA FOR ROCK CLIMBERS DVD Used by 5.12 Climbers DVD Used by 5.12 Climbers Get Flexible Fast! Get Flexible Fast! www.yogaclimber.com www.yogaforsports.com Notice that these ads can be used to test not just headlines but guarantees, product names, and domain names. It’s as simple as creating several ads, rotated automatically by Google, that are identical except for the one variable to be tested. How do you think I determined the best title for this book? Both Sherwood and Johanna disable the feature on Google that serves only the best-performing ad. This is necessary to later compare the click-through rates from each and combine the best elements (headline, domain name, and body text) into a final ad. Last but not least, ensure that the ads don’t trick prospects into visiting the site. The product offer should be clear. Our goal is qualified traffic, so we do not want to offer something “free” or otherwise attract window shoppers or the curious who are unlikely to buy. Cost to both: $50 or less per day x 5 days = $250 Investing or Divesting Five days later, it’s time to tally the results. What can we consider a “good” click-through and conversion rate’? This is where the math can be deceiving. If we’re selling a $10,000 abominable snowman suit with an 80% profit margin, we obviously need a much lower conversion rate than someone who is selling a $50 DVD with a 70% profit margin. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013911

For sophisticated tools and free spreadsheets that do all sorts of calculations for you, visit the reader-only resources at www.fourhourblog.com. Johanna and Sherwood decide to keep it simple at this stage: How much did they spend on PPC ads and how much did they “sell”? Johanna has done well. The traffic wasn’t enough to make the test stand up to statistical scrutiny, but she spent about $200 on PPC and got 14 sign-ups for a free 10-tip report. If she assumes 60% would purchase, that means 8.4 people x $75 profit per DVD = $630 in hypothetical total profit. This is also not taking into account the potential lifetime value of each customer. The results of her small test are no guarantee of future success, but the indications are positive enough that she decides to set up a Yahoo Store for $99 per month and a small per-transaction fee. Her credit isn’t excellent, so she will opt to use www.paypal.com to accept credit cards online instead of approaching her bank for a merchant account.4@ She e-mails the 10-tip report to those who signed up and asks for their feedback and recommendations for content on the DVD. Ten days later, she has a first attempt at the DVD ready to ship and her store is online. Her sales to the original sign-ups cover costs of production and she is soon selling a respectable 10 DVDs per week ($750 profit) via Google Adwords. She plans to test advertising in niche magazines and blogs and now needs to create an automation architecture to remove herself from the equation. Sherwood didn’t fare as well but still sees potential. He spent $150 on PPC and “sold” three shirts for a hypothetical $225 in profit. He had more than enough traffic, but the bulk of visitors left the site on the pricing page. Rather than drop pricing, he decides to test a “2x money-back guarantee” on the pricing page, which will enable customers to get a $200 refund if the $100 shirts aren’t the “most comfortable they’ve ever owned.” He retests and “sells” seven shirts for $525 in profit. Based on these results, he sets up a merchant account through his bank and Authorize.net to process credit cards, orders a dozen shirts from France, and sells them all over the following ten days. This gives him enough profit to buy a small display ad at 50% off (asking for a “first-time advertiser discount” and then citing a competing magazine to get another 20% off) in a local weekly art magazine, in which he calls the shirt “Jackson Pollock Shirts.” He orders two dozen more shirts with net-30 payment terms and puts a toll-free number* in the print ad that forwards to his cell phone. He does this instead of using a website for two reasons: (1) He wants to determine the most common questions for his FAQ online, and (2) he wants to test an offer of $100 for one shirt ($75 in profit) or “buy two, get one free” ($200 - $75 = $125 profit). He sells all 24 shirts in the first five days the magazine runs, most through the special offer. Success. He redesigns the print ad, putting answers to common questions in the text to cut down on calls for information, and decides to negotiate a longer-term ad agreement with the magazine. He sends his sales rep a check for four issues at 30% of their published rates. He calls to confirm that they received his check via FedEx and, with check in hand and deadlines looming, they don’t refuse. Sherwood wants to go to Berlin during a two-week break from his job, which he is now considering quitting. How can he roll out his success and escape his own company’? He needs to build the architecture and get his mobile M.B.A. That’s where the next chapter comes in. New Rich Revisited: How Doug Did It R onemver Doug from ProSoundEffects.com? How did he test the idea and go from $0 to $10,000 per month in the process? He followed these steps. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013912

1. Market Selection He chose music and television producers as his market because he is a musician himself and has used these products. 2. Product Brainstorm He chose the most popular products available for resale from the largest manufacturers of sound libraries and arranged a wholesale purchase and drop-ship agreement with them. Many of these libraries cost well above $300 (up to $7,500), and this is precisely why he needs to answer more customer-service questions than someone with a lower-priced product of $50—200. 3. Micro-Testing He auctioned the products on eBay to test demand (and the highest possible pricing) before purchasing inventory. He ordered product only when people placed orders from him, and product shipped immediately from the manufacturers’ warehouses. Based on this demand confirmed on eBay, Doug created a Yahoo Store with these products and began testing Google Adwords and other PPC search engines. 4. Rollout and Automation Following this testing, and upon generating sufficient cash flow, Doug began experimenting with print advertising in trade magazines. Simultaneously, he streamlined and outsourced operations to reduce his time requirements from two hours per day to two hours per week. =» COMFORT CHALLENGE Rejecting First Offers and Walking Away (3 Days) Before performing this exercise, if possible, read the bonus chapter “How to Get $700,000 of Advertising for $10,000” on our companion site, and then set aside two hours on a consecutive Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. On Saturday and Sunday, go to a farmers’ market or other outdoor event where goods are sold. If this isn’t possible, go to small independent retailers (not chains or mass retail). Set a budget of $100 for your negotiating tuition and look for items to purchase that total at least $150. Your job is to get the sellers down to a total of $100 or less for the lot. It is better to practice on many cheap items rather than a few big items. Be sure to reply to their first offer with, “What type of discount can you offer?” to let them negotiate against themselves. Negotiate near closing time, choose your objective price, bracket, and make a firm offer with cash in hand for that amount@ Practice walking away if your objective price isn’t met. On Monday, call two magazines (expect the first to be awkward) and use the script on the companion site to negotiate, minus the last firm offer. Get them as low as possible and then call them back later to indicate that your proposal was refused by upper management or otherwise vetoed. This is the negotiating equivalent of paper trading.42 Get used to refusing offers and countering in person and— most importantly —on the phone. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013913

» TOOLS AND TRICKS Sample Muse Test Page » The PX Method ( www.pxmethod.com ) This sales template was used to determine the viability of a speed-reading product, which tested successfully. Notice how testimonials, credibility indicators, and risk-reversal guarantees are used, as well as how the pricing is put on a separate page so it can be isolated as a testing variable. Use this as a reference—it is a simple and effective model that can be copied. Please do not input your credit card information, as it is just a mock-up for teaching purposes. Fast and Simple Website Creation for Non-Techies (and Techies) = Weebly ( www.weebly.com ) Weebly, which the BBC labeled “a must,” allowed me to create www.timothyferriss.com in less than two hours and have it appear on the front page of Google for “timothy ferriss” searches within 48 hours. It is, like WordPress.com below, designed to be very SEO-friendly (search-engine optimization) without any knowledge or action on your part. No HTML or Internet expertise is required. » WordPress.com ( www.wordpress.com ) I used WordPress.com to set up www.litliberation.org from a coffee shop in Bratislava, Slovakia, when a U.S.-based designer flaked out and left me scrambling. It took me less than three hours to learn how to use it and build the site. The site, an experimental educational fundraiser, ended up raising 200%+ more than Stephen Colbert in the same period of time. I also use their free open-sourced version of WordPress (www.wordpress.org, which requires separate hosting) to manage everything for my top-1,000 blog at www.fourhourblog.com. This offers greater customization but requires more management and technical know-how. Both Weebly and WordPress.com host your site for you, so additional hosting setup isn’t required. If you choose to use www.wordpress.org (not.com) for greater customizability, I suggest using a hosting service with one-click WordPress installation like www.bluehost.com. The Shopp plug-in (http://shopplugin.net/) or Market Theme plug-in (http://www.markettheme.com/) can then be used to add e-commerce capabilities. Shopify.com (discussed later) is another good all-in-one alternative. Create Forms in Seconds for Testing Checkout with or Without Payment = Wufoo ( www.wufoo.com ) Wutoo does not offer a full-featured shopping cart, but it provides the cleanest, easiest-to-use forms on HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013914

the web. Create a checkout page that connects to PayPal and you can (1) link to this checkout page from your site on Weebly, WordPress.com, or elsewhere, or (2) drop the code into your own website and have it hosted there. Wufoo is appropriate for testing and selling single products, as people can’t add multiple items to a shopping cart or otherwise customize the order a la Amazon. For those additional options, which are often desirable after successful testing, you will want to use an “end-to-end site solutions” listed later in these resources. Cost-Effective Trademark Filing and Company Formation (LLC, C-Corp, etc.) Though I also have a C-Corporation (often used to issue common and preferred stock to investors), created through the second option below, LLCs and S-Corps are generally favored by small businesses. Consult your accountant to determine the best entity form. » LegalZoom ( www.legalzoom.com ) Company formation, trademarks, and nearly all legal documents. I know one founder who used this service to incorporate his tech start-up, which is now worth more than $200 million. » Corporate Creations ( www.corporatecreations.com ) Domestic and overseas company formation. Services for Selling Downloadable Products (e-books, videos, audio, etc., in descending order of reader preference) » E-Junkie ( www.e-junkie.com ) > Lulu ( www.lulu.com ) Lulu will also do print-on-demand and other forms of manufacture and fulfillment. Like Lightning Source (www.lightningsource.com), it offers distribution through Amazon, Barnes & Noble online, and other major outlets. » CreateSpace ( www.createspace.com ) A subsidiary of Amazon.com that offers inventory-free, physical distribution of books, CD and DVDs on Demand, as well as video downloads through Amazon Video On Demand“™, HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013915

= Clickbank ( www.clickbank.com ) Provides integrated access to affiliates willing to sell your product for a percentage of sales. Introduction to Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising and Testing » Google Adwords ( www.google.com/adwords ) Market Sizing and Keyword Suggestion Tools Brainstorm additional PPC search terms and determine the number of people who are searching for them. = Google Adwords Keyword Tool ( http://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal ) Enter the potential search terms to find search volume and alternative terms with more search traffic. Click on the “Approx Avg Search Volume” column to sort results from most to least searched. » SEOBook Keyword Tool, SEO for Firefox Extension ( http://tools.seobook.com /) Outstanding resource page with searches powered by Wordtracker (www.wordtracker.com). Low-Cost Domain Registration e » Domains in Seconds ( www.domainsinseconds.com_) I have registered more than 100 domains through this service. e > Joker ( www.joker.com ) e » GoDaddy ( www.godaddy.com ) Inexpensive but Dependable Hosting Services Shared hosting solutions, where your site is hosted alongside other sites on a single server, are so cheap that I recommend using two providers, one as a primary and one as a backup. Put your site pages on each host and sign up with www.no-ip.com, which can redirect traffic (DNS) to the backup in five minutes instead of the usual 24 to 48 hours. e » land! ( www.land1.com ) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013916

e » BlueHost ( www.bluehost.com ) e » RackSpace ( www.rackspace.com_; known for dedicated and managed servers ) « > Hosting.com ( www.hosting.com_; known for dedicated and managed servers ) Royalty-Free Photos and Materials = iStockphoto ( www.istockphoto.com ) iStockphoto is the Internet’s original member-generated image and design site, which has more than 4 million photographs, vector illustrations, videos, audio tracks, and Flash files available for use. » Getty Images ( www.gettyimages.com ) This is where the pros go. Stock photos and film of anything for a price. I pay $150—400 for most images I use in national print campaigns and the quality is outstanding. E-mail Sign-up Tracking and Scheduled Autoresponders Both of these programs can be used to embed e-mail address sign-up forms on your site. e » AWeber ( www.aweber.com ) e » MailChimp ( www.mailchimp.com ) End-to-End Site Solutions with Payment Processing =» Shopify ( www.shopify.com ) This is a reader favorite that, in addition to beautiful design, offers full SEO (search-engine optimization), drag-and-drop use, statistics, and product fulfillment through one of their certified partners such as Fulfillment by Amazon.com. Clients range from small-business owners to Tesla Motors. Unlike with Yahoo and eBay, however, you will need to set up a payment-processing service to accept payments from customers. (See below — PayPal is the easiest to integrate.) = Yahoo! Store ( http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/ecommerce ) (866-781-9246) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013917

This is what Doug of Pro Sound Effects used. As little as $40 a month with 1.5% per transaction. » eBay Store ( http://pages.ebay.com/storefronts/start.html ) From $15—500 per month, plus eBay fees. Simple Payment Processing for Testing Pages, from Least to Most Involved » PayPal Cart (www.paypal.com; see “merchant’’) Accept credit card payments in minutes. No monthly fees, 1.9—2.9% of each transaction (called “discount rate”) and $0.30 per transaction. = Google Checkout ( http://checkout.google.com/sell _) Get $10 in free processing for each $1 spent on AdWords; 2% and $0.20 per transaction thereafter. Requires that customers have a Google ID, and is thus most useful as a supplement to one of the aforementioned payment solutions. Be sure to link your Checkout account to your AdWords account to receive credit. Important note: free transaction processing for nonprofits. > Authorize.net ( www.authorize.net ) The Authorize.Net Payment Gateway can help you accept credit card and electronic check payments quickly and affordably. More than 230,000 merchants trust Authorize.net to manage their transactions, help prevent fraud, and grow their business. The fees per transaction are lower than PayPal or Google Checkout, but setup will require a merchant account, covered in the next chapter, and other time- consuming applications. I suggest setting up Authorize.net only after a product has tested successfully through one of the other two options above. Software for Understanding Web Traffic (Web Analytics) How are people finding, browsing, and leaving your site?) How many prospective customers are being delivered by each PPC ad, and which pages are most popular? These programs tell you all this and more. Google is free for most low-volume sites—and better than a lot of paid software-and the others cost $30 and upward per month. = Google Analytics ( www.google.com/analytics ) » CrazyEgg ( www.crazyegg.com ) I use CrazyEgg to see exactly where people are clicking most and least on homepages and landing pages. It is particularly helpful for repositioning the most important links or buttons to help prompt visitors to take specific next actions. Don’t guess what’s working or not— measure it. »Clicktracks (www.clicktracks.com) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013918

=> WebTrends ( www.webtrends.com ) A/B Testing Software Testing is, as you know, the name of the game, but testing all the variables can be confusing. How do you know which combination of headlines, text, and images on your homepage results in the most sales? Instead of using one version for a bit, then alternating, which is time-consuming, use software that serves up different versions to prospects at random, then does the math for you. = Google Website Optimizer (WO) ( http://www.google.com/websiteoptimizer_) This is a free tool that, like Google Analytics, is better than most paid services. I used Google WO to test three potential homepages for www.dailyburn.com and increased sign-ups 19%, then again by more than 16%. e - Offermatica ( www.offermatica.com ) e > Vertster.com (www.vertster.com ) e > Optimost (www.optimost.com ) Low-Cost Toll-free Numbers > TollFreeMAX (www.tollfreemax.com) (877-888-8MAX) and Kall8 (www.kall8.com) TollFreeMAX and Kall8 both allow you to set up toll-free numbers in 2-5 minutes. Calls can then be forwarded to any other numbers, and voicemail and statistics can be managed online or via e-mail. Checking Competitive Site Traffic Want to see how much traffic your competition is getting and who is linking to them? e » Compete ( www.compete.com ) e » Quantcast ( www.quantcast.com ) e » Alexa ( www.alexa.com ) Freelance Designers and Programmers HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013919

>99Designs (www.99designs.com) and Crowdspring (www.crowdspring.com) I used 99Designs to get an excellent logo for www_litliberation.org in 24 hours for less than $150. I submitted the concept, more than 50 designers worldwide uploaded their best attempts, which I could browse, and I chose the best after suggesting a few improvements. From Crowdspring’s site: “Name your price, name your deadline, see entries within hours and be done in just days. The average project gets a whopping 68 entries. 25 entries or your money back.” e » eLance ( www.elance.com ) (877—435-2623) e > Craigslist ( www.craigslist.org ) » LIFESTYLE DESIGN IN ACTION I’m a USS. citizen and it was impossible for my friends and relatives to track me down by phone. Enter Skype In. It’s not new but allows you to lease a fixed U.S. (or other country) phone number which then forwards to your Skype account. About $60/year. Within Skype you can then set up call forwarding to ring you at your local number. You pay the rate as if you were calling from the United States to wherever you are. I’ve used this in about 40 countries and it works like a treat. The call quality is usually great and the convenience is amazing. http://www.skype.com/allfeatures/onlinenumber/. A caveat is to always, ALWAYS get a local SIM card for your unlocked GSM phone. Roaming is for amateurs. A local SIM also gets you GPRS, Edge, or 3G. Sometimes even free Wifi. Cheers, —TY KROLL Basically I try to keep all of my tools online so that if my laptop gets stolen, I can buy a new one and have everything up and running within 24 hours. Here are a few of the tools I use on a regular basis: ° RememberTheMilk.com has been really crucial to me keeping on top of my daily tasks. e Freshbooks.com for online invoicing e Highrise (http://www.highrisehg.com/) for online CRM e Dropbox (getdropbox.com) for easy file sharing/automatic backup of critical files while on the road e TrueCrypt (truecrypt.org) for keeping your laptop data secure while on the road. [Tim comment: This can also be used with a USB flash drive, and another cool feature—it provides two levels of “plausible deniability” (hidden volumes, etc.) if someone forces you to reveal the password.] ° PBwiki.com-Wiki site that helps me keep on top of the notes and ideas that I collect as I go through life. e FogBugz on Demand: http://www.fogcreek.com/FogBUGZ/IntrotoOnDemand.html. It’s a “bug tracker” aimed at software development companies, but I use it every day for both personal and business tasks. It’s almost like a VA, as you can route your mail through it and it will help you sort it and keep track of it. It has great features to track e-mails, and there’s a free version for two users (me + VA!). —RB CARTER HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013920

A really useful service is Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. With a small investment in time or money, a business that requires hundreds of people doing small bits of defined work becomes possible for extraordinarily low work-per-unit costs. Examples include the search for Steve Fosset (literally thousands of people looked at satellite photos that would have overwhelmed SAR agencies) and a trouble-ticket business that utilizes qualified labor all over the world (see Amazon.com/webservices). I am not an owner nor do I have any stake in Amazon—but I have used their services and some are trans forming when it comes to muse creation. Cheers, —jJ MARYMEE FAST TO MARKET The fastest way to market with a product idea is: Registera.ccom. Get hosting from dathorn.com [a cheap reseller account, like www.domainsinseconds.com]. With two clicks set up a wordpress blog. Apply a theme to it. Add your content and a buy now button. The buy now button links to an enter e- mail address, phone number, etc., page. The user then clicks a continue to PayPal button. This automatically e-mails me their details, but then shows the user a message stating that the link to PayPal is currently not working. I use this to determine how many sales I would have achieved. I use Google ads to drive traffic ... I calculate theoretical ROI (ideally using Google analytics). If after a week or two I can see a positive ROI that’s worth my effort I create or outsource the creation of the product (emag, PDF, whatever). I set it all up with a working link to PayPal, and then retrospectively send a message to the users who already tried to buy. Normally within hours [’ve got all my money back, and the cash starts to roll. An example is the DIY public relations pack at www.mybusinesspr.com.au. Great work of the 4HWW ... looking forward to the next edition. Regards, MATT SCHMIDT 39. http://news.com.com/2100—1017—269594 html? legacy=cnet. 40. It can be illegal to charge customers prior to shipment—so we will not charge customers— but it is still common practice. Why do so many commercials state “allow three to four weeks for delivery” if it only takes three to five days for a shipment to get from New York to California? It gives the companies time to manufacture product and use customers’ credit card payments to finance it. Clever but often against the law. 41. This applies to Sherwood and not Johanna. 42. How did I come up with the most successful BodyQUICK headline (“The Fastest Way to Increase Power and Speed Guaranteed”)? I borrowed it from the longest-running, and thus most profitable, Rosetta Stone headline: “The Fastest Way to Learn a Language Guaranteed.“™” Reinventing the wheel is expensive—become an astute observer of what is already working and adapt it.I keep a folder of all print and direct mail advertising that compels me to call a number or visit a website, and I use www.delicious.com to bookmark websites that convince me to provide my e-mail address or make a purchase. 43. Sherwood includes shipping and handling prior to the final order page so that people don’t finalize the order just to confirm total pricing. He wants his “orders” to reflect real orders and not price checkers. 44. If you are rolling out after a successful test or building a large e-mail database, tools like www.aweber.com in the resources are better at scaling. 45. Keeping in mind that 100 specific terms at $0.10 per click will perform better than 10 broad terms HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013921

at $1.00 per click, the more you spend, and thus the more traffic you drive, the more statistically valid the results will be. If budget permits, increase the number of related terms and daily expenditure so that the entire PPC test costs $500—-1,000. 46. This is a checking account for receiving credit card payments. 47. Set this up using services detailed at the end of this chapter and the next. 48. See the online bonus chapter on www.fourhourblog.com to understand all of these terms in context. Search “Jedi Mind Tricks.” 49. “Paper trading” refers to setting an imaginary budget, “purchasing” stocks (writing their current values on a piece of paper), and then tracking their performance over time to see how your investment would have done had it been for real. It is a no-risk method for honing investment skills before putting skin in the game. @ Income Autopilot II >» MBA—MANAGEMENT BY ABSENCE The factory of the future will have only two employees, a man and a dog. The man will be there to feed the dog. The dog will be there to keep the man from touching the equipment. — WARREN G. BENNIS, University of Southern California Professor of Business Administration; adviser to Ronald Reagan and John F. Kennedy Max entrepreneurs don’t start out with automation as a goal. This leaves them open to mass confusion in a world where each business guru contradicts the next. Consider the following: A company is stronger if it is bound by love rather than by fear.... If the employees come first, then they’re happy. — HERB KELLEHER, cofounder of Southwest Airlines Look, kiddie. I built this business by being a bastard. I run it by being a bastard. Pll always be a bastard, and don’t you ever try to change me 30 —CHARLES REVSON, founder of Revlon, to a senior executive within his company Hmm ... Whom to follow? If you are fast on your feet, you’ll notice that I just offered you an either- or option. The good news is that, as usual, there is a third option. The contradictory advice you find in business books and elsewhere usually relates to managing HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013922

employees—how to handle the human element. Herb tells you to give them a hug, Revson tells you to kick them in the balls, and I tell you to solve the problem by eliminating it altogether: Remove the human element. Once you have a product that sells, it’s time to design a self-correcting business architecture that runs itself. The Remote-Control CEO The power of hiding ourselves from one another is mercifully given, for men are wild beasts, and would devour one another but for this protection. —HENRY WARD BEECHER, U.S. abolitionist and clergyman, “Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit” RURAL PENNSYLVANIA L, a 200-year-old stone farmhouse, a quiet “experiment in 21st-century leadership” is proceeding exactly as planned.*4Stephen McDonnell is upstairs in his flip-flops looking at a spreadsheet on his computer. His company has increased its annual revenue 30% per year since it all began, and he is able to spend more time with his three daughters than he ever thought possible. The experiment? As CEO of Applegate Farms, he insists on spending just one day per week at the company headquarters in Bridgewater, New Jersey. He’s not the only CEO who spends time at home, of course—there are hundreds who have heart attacks or nervous breakdowns and need time to recover— but there is a huge difference. McDonnell has been doing it for more than 17 years. Rarer still, he started doing it just six months after founding the company. This intentional absence has enabled him to create a process-driven instead of founder-driven business. Limiting contact with managers forces the entrepreneur to develop operational rules that enable others to deal with problems themselves instead of calling for help. This isn’t just for small operations. Applegate Farms sells more than 120 organic and natural meat products to high-end retailers and generates more than $35 million in revenue per year. It is all possible because McDonnell started with the end in mind. Behind the Scenes: The Muse Architecture Orders are nobody can see the Great Oz! Not nobody, not nohow! — GUARDIAN OF THE EMERALD CITY GATES, The Wizard of Oz S tarting with the end in mind—an organizational map of what the eventual business will look like—is not new. Infamous deal-maker Wayne Huizenga copied the org chart of McDonald’s to turn Blockbuster into a billion-dollar behemoth, and dozens of titans have done much the same. In our case, it’s the “end in mind” that is different. Our goal isn’t to create a business that is as large as possible, but rather a HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013923

business that bothers us as little as possible. The architecture has to place us out of the information flow instead of putting us at the top of it. I didn’t get this right the first time I tried. In 2003, I was interviewed in my home office for a documentary called As Seen on TV. We were interrupted every 20-30 seconds with beeping e-mail notifications, IM pings, and ringing phones. I couldn’t leave them unanswered, because dozens of decisions depended on me. If I didn’t ensure the trains were running on time and put out the fires, no one would. The Anatomy of Automation THE 4-HOUR WORK WEEK VIRTUAL ARCHITECTURE PPC (FL) | Affiiotes | | Printods | PPC odcont + 20% URL 800 #s Website (KY) Coll centers (IL) Uncharged customer Wholesale order Encrypted order file orders posted to forms printed | e-mailed eoch morning secure website for from site, foxed pickup/downlood via eFox ORDER-TAKING charged cc? Monufocturer (CA/LV) rt) oS orders product { Returns? 2 threshold } a. is reoched Ships } id in bulk Send cc Confirm i ° dota successfully i °o 2.26% of charge amount i H { Deposit of cc orders 24 to 48 Customers (worldwide) hours later TIM'S BANK (CA) 1, This cost includes o webmaster/programmer. 2. Declined credit cards ore also sent back to fulfiliment for phone cols to customers 3, Fulfillment house refunds customers through the processor, 4. Chargebacks ore disputed credit cord chorges. ia tas = ° we w a] Vv > a a 4 = 2 te > a ion < = Splitting the Pie: Outsourcer Economics HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013924

Bua outsourcer takes a piece of the revenue pie. Here is what the general profit-loss might look like for a hypothetical $80 product sold via phone and developed with the help of an expert, who is paid a royalty. I recommend calculating profit margins using higher-than-anticipated expenses. This will account for unforeseen costs (read: screwups) and miscellaneous fees such as monthly reports, etc. REVENUE Product cost $80.00 Shipping/Handling $12.95 Total Revenue $92.95 EXPENSES Product manufacturing $10.00 Call center ($0.83 per minute x average call time of 4 minutes) $3.32 Shipping $5.80 Fulfillment ($1.85 per package + $0.50 for boxes/packing) $2.35 Credit card processing (2.75% of $92.95) $2.56 Returns + declined cards (6% of $92.95) $5.58 Royalties (5% of wholesale price of $48 [$80 = .6]) $2.40 Total expenses $32.01 PROFIT (revenue minus expenses) $60.94 How do you factor in advertising cost? If a $1,000 ad or $1,000 in PPC produces 50 sales, my advertising cost per order (CPO) is $20. This makes the actual‘ per-unit profit $40.94. I set a new goal after that experience, and when I was interviewed six months later as a follow-up, one change was more pronounced than all others: silence. I had redesigned the business from the ground up so that I had no phone calls to answer and no e-mail to respond to. I’m often asked how big my company is—how many people I employ full-time. The answer is one. Most people lose interest at that point. If someone were to ask me how many people run Brain- QUICKEN LLC, on the other hand, the answer is different: between 200 and 300. I am the ghost in the machine 22 From advertisements—print in this example—to a cash deposit in my bank account, the diagram is what a simplified version of my architecture looks like, including some sample costs. If you have developed a product based on the guidelines in the last two chapters, it will plug into this structure hand- in-glove. Where am I in the diagram? Nowhere. I am not a tollbooth through which anything needs to pass. I am more like a police officer on the side of the road who can step in if need be, and I use detailed reports from outsourcers to ensure the cogs are moving as intended. I check reports from fulfillment each Monday and monthly reports from the same the first of each month. The latter reports include orders received from the call center, which I can compare to the call center bills to gauge profit. Otherwise, I just check bank accounts online on the first and fifteenth of each month to look for odd deductions. If I find something, one e-mail will fix it, and if not, it’s back to kendo, painting, hiking, or whatever I happen to be doing at the time. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013925

Removing Yourself from the Equation: When and How The system is the solution. — AT&T Tre diagram should be your rough blueprint for designing a self-sustaining virtual architecture. There could be differences—more or fewer elements—but the main principles are the same: 1. Contract outsourcing companies that specialize in one function vs. freelancers whenever possible so that if someone is fired, quits, or doesn’t perform, you can replace them without interrupting your business. Hire trained groups of people who can provide detailed reporting and replace one another as needed. 2. Ensure that all outsourcers are willing to communicate among themselves to solve problems, and give them written permission to make most inexpensive decisions without consulting you first U started at less than $100 and moved to $400 after two months). How do you get there? It helps to look at where entrepreneurs typically lose their momentum and stall permanently. Most entrepreneurs begin with the cheapest tools available, bootstrapping and doing things themselves to get up and running with little cash. This isn’t the problem. In fact, it’s necessary so that the entrepreneurs can train outsourcers later. The problem is that these same entrepreneurs don’t know when and how to replace themselves or their homemade infrastructure with something more sealable. By “scalable,” I mean a business architecture that can handle 10,000 orders per week as easily as it can handle 10 orders per week. Doing this requires minimizing your decision-making responsibilities, which achieves our goal of time freedom while setting the stage for doubling and tripling income with no change in hours worked. Call the companies at the end of the chapter to research costs. Plan and budget accordingly to upgrade infrastructure at the following milestones, which I measure in units of product shipped: Phase I: 0-50 Total Units of Product Shipped Do it all yourself. Put your phone number on the site for both general questions and order-taking—this is important in the beginning—and take customer calls to determine common questions that you will answer later in an online FAQ. This FAQ will also be the main material for training phone operators and developing sales scripts. Is PPC, an offline advertisement, or your website too vague or misleading, thus attracting unqualified and time-consuming consumers’? If so, change them to answer common questions and make the product benefits (including what it isn’t or doesn’t do) clearer. Answer all e-mail and save your responses in one folder called “customer service questions.” CC yourself on responses and put the nature of the customers’ questions in the subject lines for future indexing. Personally pack and ship all product to determine the cheapest options for both. Investigate opening a merchant account from your local small bank (easier to get than with a larger bank) for later outsourced credit card processing at higher roll-out volumes. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013926

Phase II: >10 Units Shipped Per Week Add the extensive FAQ to your website and continue to add answers to common questions as received. Find local fulfillment companies in the yellow pages under “fulfillment services” or “mailing services.” If you cannot find one there or at www.mfsanet.org, call local printers and ask them for recommendations. Narrow the field to those (often the smallest) who will agree not to charge you setup fees and monthly minimums. If this isn’t possible, ask for at least 50% off both and then request that the setup fee be applied as an advance against shipping or their other fees. Limit the candidates further to those who can respond to order status e-mail (ideal) or phone calls from customers. The e-mail from your “customer service” folder will be provided as copy-and-paste responses, especially those related to order status and refund requests.4 To lower or eliminate miscellaneous fees, explain that you are a start-up and that your budget is small. Tell them you need the cash for advertising that will drive more shipments. If needed, mention the competitive companies that you are considering and pit them against one another, using lower pricing or concessions from one to get larger discounts and bonuses from the others. Before making your final selection, ask for at least three client references and use the following to elicit the negatives: “I understand they’re good, but everyone has weaknesses. If you had to point out where you’ve had some issues and what they’re not the best at, what would you say? Can you please describe an incident or a disagreement? I expect these with all companies, so it’s no big deal, and it’s confidential, of course.” Ask for “net-30 terms’—payment for services 30 days after they’re rendered—after one month of prompt payment for their services. It is easier to negotiate all of the above points with smaller operations that need the business. Have your contract manufacturer ship product directly to the fulfillment house once you have decided on one and put the fulfillment house’s e-mail (you can use an e-mail address at your domain and forward it) or phone number on the online “thank you” page for order status questions. Phase III: >20 Units Shipped Per Week Now you will have the cash flow to afford the setup fees and the monthly minimums that bigger, more sophisticated outsourcers will ask for. Call the end-to-end fulfillment houses that handle it all—from order status to returns and refunds. Interview them about costs and ask them for referrals to call centers and credit card processors they’ve collaborated with for file transfers and problem solving. Don’t assemble an architecture of strangers—there will be programming costs and mistakes, both of which are expensive. Set up an account with the credit card processor first, for which you will need your own merchant account. This is critical, as the fulfillment house can only handle refunds and declined cards for transactions they process themselves through an outsourced credit card processor. Optionally, set up an account with one of the call centers your new fulfillment center recommends. These will often have toll-free numbers you can use instead of purchasing your own. Look at the percentage split of online to phone orders during testing and consider carefully if the extra revenue from the latter is worth the hassle. It often isn’t. Those who call to order will generally order online if given no other option. Before signing on with a call center, get several 800 numbers they answer for current clients and make test calls, asking difficult product-related questions and gauging sales abilities. Call each number at least three times (morning, afternoon, and evening) and note the make-or-break factor: wait time. The phone should be answered within three to four rings, and if you are put on hold, the shorter the wait the better. More than 15 seconds will result in too many abandoned calls and waste advertising dollars. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013927

The Art of Undecision: Fewer Options = More Revenue Companies go out of business when they make the wrong decisions or, just as important, make too many decisions. The latter creates complexity. — MIKE MAPLES, cofounder of Motive Communications (IPO to $260 million market cap), founding executive of Tivoli (sold to IBM for $750 million), and investor in companies such as Digg.com J oseph Sugarman is the marketing genius behind dozens of direct-response and retail successes, including the BluBlocker sunglasses phenomenon. Prior to his string of home runs on television (he sold 20,000 pairs of BluBlockers within 15 minutes of his first QVC appearance), his domain was print media, where he made millions and built an empire called JS&A Group. He was once recruited to design an advertisement for a manufacturer’s watch line. The manufacturer wanted to feature nine different watches in the ad, and Joe recommended featuring just one. The client insisted and Joe offered to do both and test them in the same issue of The Wall Street Journal. The result? The one-watch offer outsold the nine-watch offer 6-to-1.22 Henry Ford once said, referring to his Model-T, the bestselling car of all time = “The customer can have any color he wants, so long as it’s black.” He understood something that businesspeople seem to have forgotten: Serving the customer (“customer service”) is not becoming a personal concierge and catering to their every whim and want. Customer service is providing an excellent product at an acceptable price and solving legitimate problems (lost packages, replacements, refunds, etc.) in the fastest manner possible. That’s it. The more options you offer the customer, the more indecision you create and the fewer orders you receive—it is a disservice all around. Furthermore, the more options you offer the customer, the more manufacturing and customer service burden you create for yourself. The art of “undecision” refers to minimizing the number of decisions your customers can or need to make. Here are a few methods that I and other NR have used to reduce service overhead 20-80%: Offer one or two purchase options (“basic” and “premium,” for example) and no more. Do not offer multiple shipping options. Offer one fast method instead and charge a premium. 3. Do not offer overnight or expedited shipping (it is possible to refer them to a reseller who does, as is true with all of these points), as these shipping methods will produce hundreds of anxious phone calls. 4. Eliminate phone orders completely and direct all prospects to online ordering. This seems outrageous until you realize that success stories like Amazon.com have depended on it as a fundamental cost-saver to survive and thrive. 5. Do not offer international shipments. Spending 10 minutes per order filling out customs forms and then dealing with customer complaints when the product costs 20-100% more with tariffs and duties is about as fun as headbutting a curb. It’s about as profitable, too. Some of these policies hint at what is perhaps the biggest time-saver of all: customer filtering. Not All Customers Are Created Equal HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013928

Ou. you reach Phase III and have some cash flow, it’s time to re-evaluate your customers and thin the herd. There are good and bad versions of all things: good food, bad food; good movies, bad movies; good sex, bad sex; and, yes, good customers and bad customers. Decide now to do business with the former and avoid the latter. I recommend looking at the customer as an equal trading partner and not as an infallible blessing of a human being to be pleased at all costs. If you offer an excellent product at an acceptable price, it is an equal trade and not a begging session between subordinate (you) and superior (customer). Be professional but never kowtow to unreasonable people. Instead of dealing with problem customers, I recommend you prevent them from ordering in the first place. I know dozens of NR who don’t accept Western Union or checks as payment. Some would respond to this with, “You’re giving up 10-15% of your sales!” The NR, in turn, would say, “I am, but I’m also avoiding the 10-15% of the customers who create 40% of the expenses and eat 40% of my time.” It’s classic 80/20. Those who spend the least and ask for the most before ordering will do the same after the sale. Cutting them out is both a good lifestyle decision and a good financial decision. Low-profit and high- maintenance customers like to call operators and spend up to 30 minutes on the phone asking questions that are unimportant or answered online, costing—in my case—$24.90 (30 x $0.83) per 30-minute incident, eliminating the minuscule profit they contribute in the first place. Those who spend the most complain the least. In addition to our premium $50—200 pricing, here are a few additional policies that attract the high-profit and low-maintenance customers we want: Do not accept payment via Western Union, checks, or money order. 2. Raise wholesale minimums to 12-100 units and require a tax ID number to qualify resellers who are real businesspeople and not time-intensive novices. Don’t run a personal business school. 3. Refer all potential resellers to an online order form that must be printed, filled out, and faxed in. Never negotiate pricing or approve lower pricing for higher-volume orders. Cite “company policy” due to having had problems in the past. 4. Offer low-priced products (a la MRI’s NO2 book) instead of free products to capture contact information for follow-up sales. Offering something for free is the best way to attract time-eaters and spend money on those unwilling to return the favor. 5. Offer a lose-win guarantee (see boxed text) instead of free trials. Do not accept orders from common mail fraud countries such as Nigeria. Make your customer base an exclusive club, and treat the members well once they’ve been accepted. The Lose- Win Guarantee — How to Sell Anything to Anyone If you want a guarantee, buy a toaster. — CLINT EASTWOOD Tre 30-day money-back guarantee is dead. It just doesn’t have the pizzazz it once did. If a product doesn’t work, I’ve been lied to and will have to spend an afternoon at the post office to return it. This HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013929

costs me more than just the price I paid for the product, both in time and actual postage. Risk elimination just isn’t enough. This is where we enter the neglected realm of lose-win guarantees and risk reversal. The NR use what most consider an afterthought—the guarantee—as a cornerstone sales tool. The NR aim to make it profitable for the customer even if the product fails. Lose-win guarantees not only remove risk for the consumer but put the company at financial risk. Here are a few examples of putting your money where your mouth is. Delivered in 30 minutes or less or it’s free! (Domino’s Pizza built its business on this guarantee.) We’re so confident you'll like CIALIS, if you don’t we’ll pay for the brand of your choice. (The “CIALIS@ Promise Program” offers a free sample of CIALIS and then offers to pay for competing products if CIALIS doesn’t live up to the hype.) If your car is stolen, we’ll pay $500 of your insurance deductible. (This guarantee helped THE CLUB become the #1-selling mechanical automobile anti-theft device in the world.) 110% guaranteed to work within 60 minutes of the first dose. (This was for BodyQUICK and a first among sports nutrition products. I offered to not only refund customers the price of the product if it didn’t work within 60 minutes of the first dose, but also to send them a check for 10% more.) The lose-win guarantee might seem like a big risk, especially when someone can abuse it for profit like in the BodyQUICK example, but it isn’t ... if your product delivers. Most people are honest. Let’s look at some actual numbers. Returns for BodyQUICK, even with a 60-day return period (and partially because of it), are less than 3% in an industry in which the average is 12-15% for a normal 30-day 100% money-back guarantee. Sales increased more than 300% within four weeks of introducing the 110% guarantee, and returns decreased overall. Johanna adopted this lose-win offer and came up with “Increase sport-specific flexibility 40% in two weeks or return it for a full refund (including shipping) and keep the 20-minute bonus DVD as our gift.” Sherwood found his guarantee as well: “If these shirts are not the most comfortable you’ ve ever worn, return them and get 2-times your purchase price back. Each shirt is also guaranteed for life—if it gets threadbare, send it back and we’ll replace it free of charge.” Both of them increased sales more than 200% in the first two months. Return percentage remained the same for Johanna and increased 50% for Sherwood, from 2 to 3%. Disaster? Far from it. Instead of selling 50 and getting one back with a 100% guarantee [(50 x $100) — $100 = $4,900 in revenue], he sold 200 and got six back with the 200% guarantee [(200 x $100) — (6 x $200) = $18,800 in revenue]. I'll take the latter. Lose-win is the new win-win. Stand out and reap the rewards. Little Blue Chip: How to Look Fortune 500 in 45 Minutes Are you tired of sand being kicked in your face? I promise you new muscles in days! HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013930

—CHARLES ATLAS, strongman who sold more than $30 million worth of “dynamic-tension” muscle courses through comic books L, approaching large resellers or potential partners, small company size will be an obstacle. This discrimination is often as insurmountable as it is unfounded. Fortunately, a few simple steps can dramatically upgrade your budding Fortune 500 image and take your muse from coffee shop to boardroom in 45 minutes or less. 1. Don’t be the CEO or founder. Being the “CEO” or “Founder” screams start-up. Give yourself the mid-level title of “vice president” (VP), “director,” or something similar that can be added to depending on the occasion (Director of Sales, Director of Business Development, etc.). For negotiation purposes as well, remember that it is best not to appear to be the ultimate decision-maker. 2. Put multiple e-mail and phone contacts on the website. Put various e-mail addresses on the “contact us” page for different departments, such as “human resources,” “sales,” “general inquiries,’ “wholesale distribution,’ “media/PR,” “investors,” “web comments,” “order status,” and so on. In the beginning, these will all forward to your e-mail address. In Phase III, most will forward to the appropriate outsourcers. Multiple toll-free numbers can be used in the same fashion. oF ee 39 oe 3. Set up an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) remote receptionist. It is possible to sound like a blue chip for less than $30. In fewer than ten minutes on a site such as www.angel.com, which boasts clients such as Reebok and Kellog’s, it is possible to set up an 800 number that greets callers with a voice prompt such as, “Thank you for calling [business name]. Please say the name of the person or department you would like to reach or just hold on for a list of options.” Upon speaking your name or selecting the appropriate department, the caller is forwarded to your preferred phone or the appropriate outsourcer—with on-hold music and all. 4. Do not provide home addresses. Do not use your home address or you will get visitors. Prior to securing an end-to-end fulfillment house that can handle checks and money orders—if you decide to accept them—use a post office box but leave out the “PO Box” and include the street address of the post office itself. Thus “PO Box 555, Nowhere, US 11936” becomes “Suite 555, 1234 Downtown Ave., US 11936.” Go forth and project professionalism with a well-designed image. Perceived size does matter. => COMFORT CHALLENGE Relax in Public (2 days) This is the last Comfort Challenge, placed prior to the chapter that tackles the most uncomfortable turning point for most office dwellers: negotiating remote work agreements. This challenge is intended to HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013931

be fun while showing—in no uncertain terms—that the rules most follow are nothing more than social conventions. There are no legal boundaries stopping you from creating an ideal life ... or just being self- entertained and causing mass confusion. So, relaxing in public. Sounds easy, right? ’m somewhat famous for relaxing in style to get a laugh out of friends. Here is the deal, and I don’t care if you’re male or female, 20 or 60, Mongolian or Martian. I call the following a “time-out.” Once per day for two days, simply lie down in the middle of a crowded public place at some point. Lunchtime is ideal. It can be a well-trafficked sidewalk, the middle of a popular Starbucks, or a popular bar. There is no real technique involved. Just lie down and remain silent on the ground for about ten seconds, and then get up and continue on with whatever you were doing before. I used to do this at nightclubs to clear space for break-dancing circles. No one responded to pleading, but going catatonic on the ground did the trick. Don’t explain it at all. If someone asks about it after the fact (he or she will be too confused to ask you while you’re doing it for 10 seconds), just respond, “I just felt like lying down for a second.” The less you say, the funnier and more gratifying this will be. Do it on solo missions for the first two days, and then feel free to do it when with a group of friends. It’s a riot. It isn’t enough to think outside the box. Thinking is passive. Get used to acting outside the box. >» TOOLS AND TRICKS Looking Huge— Virtual Receptionist and IVR > Angel ( www.angel.com ) Get an 800 number with professional voice menu (voice recognition departments, extensions, etc.) in five minutes. Incredible. » Ring Central ( www.ringcentral.com ) Offers toll-free numbers, call screening and forwarding, voicemail, fax send and receive, and message alerts, all online. CD/DVD Duplication, Printing, and Product Packaging » AVC Corporation ( www.avccorp.com ) = SF Video ( www.sfvideo.com ) Local Fulfillment (fewer than 20 units shipped per week) = Mailing Fulfillment Service Association ( www.mfsanet.org ) End-to-End Fulfillment Companies (more than 20 units shipped per week, $500+ setup) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013932

> Motivational Fulfillment ( www.mfpsinc.com_) The secret backend to campaigns from HBO, PBS, Comic Relief, Body by Jake, and more. > Innotrac ( www.innotrac.com ) They are currently one of the largest DR marking companies. > Moulton Fulfillment ( www.moultonfulfillment.com ) 200 ,000-square-foot facility with real-time online inventory reports. Call Centers (per-minute and/or per-sale fees) There are generally two classes of call centers: order takers and commissioned reps. Interview each provider you consider to understand the options and costs involved. The former is a good option if you give the product price in an advertisement (hard offer), are offering free information (lead generation), or don’t need trained salespeople who can overcome objections. In other words, your ad or website is pre-qualifying prospects. The latter would more appropriately be called “sales centers.” Operators are commissioned and trained “closers” whose sole goal is to convert callers to buyers. These calls are often in response to “call for information/ trial/sample” ads that don’t feature a price (soft offers). Expect higher costs per sale. » LiveOps ( www.liveops.com ) Pioneer in home-based reps, which often ensures more calls are answered. Provides comprehensive service with agents, [VR, and Spanish. Often used for one-step order taking instead of soft offers. = West Teleservices ( www.west.com ) 29,000 employees worldwide, processes billions of minutes per year. All the high-volume and low-price players use them for lower-priced products or higher-end products with free trials and installment plans. > NexRep ( www.nexrep.com ) Highly skilled home-based sales agents that specialize in B2C and B2B, inbound and outbound programs. If performance, speed to respond, Internet integration, and quality customer experience are your priorities, this is a strong option to consider. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013933

» Triton Technology ( www.tritontechnology.com ) Commission-only sales center know for incredible closing abilities (see the movie Boiler Room and Alec Baldwin’s character in Glengarry, Glen Ross). Don’t call unless your product sells for at least $100. = CenterPoint Teleservices ( http://www.centerpointllc.com ) This sales force has experience to convert sales from hard offers, soft offers, and multiple offers (upselling additional products after a caller agrees to purchase the advertised product) originating from radio, TV, print, or the web. » Stewart Response Group ( www.stewartresponsegroup.com ) Sales-driven call center leveraging the home-agent model for both inbound and outbound programs. Another high-touch boutique center. Credit Card Processors (merchant account through your bank necessary) These companies, unlike options in the last chapter, specialize in not only processing credit cards but interacting with fulfillment on your behalf, removing you from the flowchart. > TransFirst Payment Processing ( www.transfirst.com ) » Chase Paymentech ( www.paymentech.com ) = Trust Commerce ( www.trustcommerce.com ) » PowerPay (www.powerpay.biz) One of the Inc. 500 Fastest-Growing Private Companies. Process credit cards from your iPhone and more. Affiliate Program Software » My Affiliate Program ( www.myaffiliateprogram.com ) Also see the affiliate programs listed in the “Tools and Tricks” at the end of Chapter 9. Discount Media Buying Agencies If you go to a magazine, radio station, or TV channel and pay rate card—the “retail” pricing first given— you will never make it big. To save a lot of headache and expense, consider using ad agencies that HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013934

negotiate discounts of up to 90% in their chosen media. » Manhattan Media (Print) ( www.manhmedia.com ) Great agency with fast turnaround. I’ve used them since the beginning. » Novus Media (Print) ( www.novusprintmedia.com ) Relationships with 1,400+ magazine and newspaper publishers with an average of 80% of rate card. Clients include Sharper Image and Office Depot. =» Mercury Media (TV) ( www.mercurymedia.com ) Largest private DR media agency in the U.S. Specialists in TV but can also handle radio and print. Offer full tracking and reporting to determine ROI. » Euro RSCG (Cross Media) ( http://www.eurorscgedge.com /) One of the worldwide leaders in DRTV media across all platforms. » Canella Media Response Television (TV) ( http://www.drtv.com ) Uses the innovative P/I (per inquiry) model for compensation, where you split order profits instead of paying for time upfront. This is more expensive per order if you have a successful campaign, but it lowers upfront investment in media. » Marketing Architects (Radio) ( www.marketingarchitects.com ) The de facto leaders in radio DR but a bit on the expensive side. Almost all of the most successful DR products—Carlton Sheets No Money Down, Tony Robbins, etc.—have used them. » Radio Direct Response (Radio) ( www.radiodirect.com ) Mark Lipsky has put together a great firm, with clients ranging from small direct marketers to Travel Channel and Wells Fargo. Online Marketing and Research Firms (PPC campaign management, etc.) Starting Small—Find a Local Individual to Help HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013935

»SEMPO (www.sempo.org; see the member directory) Excellent Mid-Size Firms » Clicks 2 Customers (www.clicks2customers.com) = Working Planet (www.workingplanet.com) The Hard-Hitting Pros—Small Campaigns Start at Several Thousand Dollars » Marketing Experiments (www.marketingexperiments.com) This is my team. > Did It ( www.did-it.com ) > ROIRevolution ( www.roirevolution.com ) Cost is determined by a percentage above monthly PPC spend. > iProspect ( www.iprospect.com ) Full-Service Infomercial Producers These are the companies that made Oreck Direct, Nutrisystem, Nordic-Track, and Hooked on Phonics household names. The first has an excellent DRTV glossary and both sites offer excellent resources. Don’t call unless you can budget at least $15,000 for a short-form commercial or $50,000+ for a long- form infomercial. =» Cesari Direct ( http://www.cesaridirect.com /) = Hawthorne Direct (www.hawthornedirect.com) => Script-to-Screen (www.scripttoscreen.com ) Retail and International Product Distribution Want to get your product on the shelves of Wal-Mart, Costco, Nordstrom, or the leading department store in Japan? Sometimes it pays to have experts with relationships get you there. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013936

» Tristar Products ( http://www.tristarproductsinc.com ) Behind the PowerJuicer and other hits. Tristar also owns their own production studio and can therefore offer end-to-end services in addition to retail distribution. » BJ Direct (International) ( www.bjgd.com ) Celebrity Brokers Want a celebrity to endorse your product or be a spokesperson? It can cost a lot less than you think, if you do it right. I know of one clothing endorsement deal with the best pitcher in Major League Baseball that cost just $20,000 per year. Here are the brokers who can make it happen: = Celeb Brokers ( www.celebbrokers.com ) President Jack King was the one who first turned me on to this fascinating world. He knows it all inside and out. » Celebrity Endorsement Network ( www.celebrityendorsement.com ) Celebrity Finding » Contact Any Celebrity ( www.contactanycelebrity.com ) It is possible to do it yourself, as I have done many times. This online directory and its helpful staff will help you find any celebrity in the world. » LIFESTYLE DESIGN IN ACTION After I read the section on outsourcing, I thought it sounded like a novel idea but would never work for me. However, since the rest of the book was “spot on,” I decided to try it. Rather than ship my money overseas, I opted to keep it in the U.S. and use my niece in college, with skills on computers I can’t even fathom, to test the theory. Turns out it has been a great experience and timesaver for me, as well as moneymaker for her. It seems I have all of the positives of out sourcing but none of the hassles of language and such.... Being able to mold a young mind for the better ties in well with the rest of your book ... —KEN D. Hey Tim, You mentioned www.weebly.com a few months ago, and I’ve been using that to build all HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013937

my muse sites and think it’s great! Also, Facebook groups has (almost) every niche imaginable. So what I have found success in doing is: (1) Finding a niche group that would buy my muse, (2) sending a message to each admin telling them how my muse will help their group members. Then politely asking them to put a blurb in the “Recent News” section of the group. This makes it more trustworthy than a wall post, and it stays up there (free advertising) until the admin removes it. One hundred times better than a wall post. In one case, the admin purchased my muse, posted my note for me on the groups’ “Recent News” section, then e-mailed the entire group telling them they have to check out my site. —GAVIN 50. Richard Tedlow, Giants of Enterprise: Seven Business Innovators and the Empires They Built (2001; reprint, HarperBusiness, 2003). 51. This is adapted from “The Remote Control CEO,” Jnc. magazine, October 2005. 52. Actually, ’'m the ghost in new machines now, as I sold BrainQUICKEN in 2009 to a private equity firm. 53. “Contract outsourcing companies” can be as simple as dependable web-based services. Don’t let the term intimidate you. 54. Sample e-mail responses for fulfillment purposes can be found at www.fourhourblog.com. 55 Joseph Sugarman, Advertising Secrets of the Written Word (DelStar Books, 1998). 56 Depending on whose math is used (number of cars vs. gross sales), some claim the original Volkswagen Beetle holds the record. 57. For the benefit of the customer and to capitalize on universal laziness (me included), provide as much time as possible to consider or forget the product. Ginsu knives offered a 50-year guarantee. Can you offer a 60-, 90-, or even 365-day guarantee’? Gauge average return percentages with a 30- or 60-day guarantee first (for budgeting calculations and cash-flow projections) and then extend it. Step IV: L is for Liberation It is far better for a man to go wrong in freedom than to go right in chains . — THOMAS H. HUXLEY, English biologist; known as “Darwin’s Bulldog” 12) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013938

Disappearing Act =» HOW TO ESCAPE THE OFFICE By working faithfully eight hours a day, you may eventually get to be a boss and work twelve hours a day. —ROBERT FROST, American poet and winner of four Pulitzer Prizes On this path, it is only the first step that counts. — ST. JEAN-BAPTISTE-MARIE VIANNEY , Catholic saint, “Curé d’ Ars” PALO ALTO , CALIFORNIA e’re not going to expense the phone.” “Tm not asking you to.” Silence. Then a nod, a laugh, and a crooked smile of resignation. “OK, then—it’s fine.” And that was that, lickity-split. Forty-four-year old Dave Camarillo, lifelong employee, had cracked the code and started his second life. He hadn’t been fired; he hadn’t been yelled at. His boss seemed to be handling the whole situation quite well. Granted, Dave delivered the goods on the job, and it wasn’t like he was doing naked snow angels in client meetings, but still—he had just spent 30 days in China without telling anyone. “It wasn’t half as hard as I thought it would be.” Dave works among more than 10,000 employees at Hewlett- Packard (HP), and—against all odds—he actually likes it. He has no desire to start his own company and has spent the last seven years doing tech support for customers in 45 states and 22 countries. Six months ago, however, he had a small problem. She measured 5'2” and weighed 110 pounds. Was he, like most men, afraid of commitment, unwilling to stop running around the house in Spider- Man underoos, or inseparable from the last refuge of any self-respecting man, the PlayStation? No, he was past all that. In fact, Dave was locked and loaded, ready to pop the big question, but he was short on vacation days and his girlfriend lived out of town. Waaaaay out of town—5,913 miles out of town. He had met her on a client visit to Shenzhen, China, and it was now time to meet the parents, logistics be damned. Dave had only recently begun to take tech calls at home, and, well, isn’t home where the heart is? One plane ticket and one T-Mobile GSM tri-band phone later, he was somewhere over the Pacific en route to his first seven-day experiment. Twelve time zones hence, he proposed, she accepted, and no one was the wiser stateside. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013939

The second field trip was a 30-day tour of Chinese family and food (pig face, anyone’), ending with Shumei Wu becoming Shumei Camarillo. Back in Palo Alto, HP continued its quest for world domination, neither knowing nor caring where Dave was. He had his calls forwarded to his newly begotten wife’s cell phone and all was right in the world. Now back in the U.S. after hoping for the best and preparing for the worst, Dave had earned his Eagle Scout mobility badge. The future looks flexible, indeed. He is going to start by spending two months in China every summer and then move to Australia and Europe to make up for lost time, all with the full support of his boss. The key to cutting the leash was simple—he asked for forgiveness instead of permission. “T didn’t travel for 30 years of my life—so why not?” THAT’S PRECISELY THE question everyone should be asking—why the hell not? From Caste to Castaway Tre old rich, the upper class of yore with castles and ascots and irritating little lapdogs, are characterized as being well-established in one place. The Schwarzes of Nantucket and the McDonnells of Charlottesville. Blech. Summers in the Hamptons is sooooo 1990s. The guard is changing. Being bound to one place will be the new defining feature of middle class. The New Rich are defined by a more elusive power than simple cash—unrestricted mobility. This jet-setting is not limited to start-up owners or freelancers. Employees can pull it off, too = Not only can they pull it off, but more and more companies want them to pull it off. BestBuy, the consumer electronics giant, is now sending thousands of employees home from their HQ in Minnesota and claims not only lowered costs, but also a 10-20% increase in results. The new mantra is this: Work wherever and whenever you want, but get your work done. In Japan, a three-piece zombie who joins the 9-5 grind each morning is called a sarari-man —salaryman—and, in the last few years, a new verb has emerged: datsu-sara suru, to escape (datsu) the salaryman (sara) lifestyle. It’s your turn to learn the datsu-sara dance.22 Trading Bosses for Beer: An Oktoberfest Case Study T. create the proper leverage to be unshackled, we’ll do two things: demonstrate the business benefit of remote working and make it too expensive or excruciating to refuse a request for it. Remember Sherwood? His French shirts are beginning to move and he is itching to ditch the U.S. for a global walkabout. He has more than enough cash now but needs to escape constant supervision in the office before he can HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013940

implement all the timesaving tools from Elimination and travel. He is a mechanical engineer and is producing twice as many designs in half the time since erasing 90% of his time-wasters and interruptions. This quantum leap in performance has been noticed by his supervisors and his value to the company has increased, making it more expensive to lose him. More value means more leverage for negotiations. Sherwood has been sure to hold back some of his productivity and efficiency so that he can highlight a sudden jump in both during a remote work trial period. Since eliminating most of his meetings and in-person discussions, he has naturally moved about 80% of all communication with his boss and colleagues to e-mail and the remaining 20% to phone. Not only this, but he has used tips from chapter 7, “Interrupting Interruption and the Art of Refusal,” to cut unimportant and repetitive e-mail volume in half. This will make the move to remote less noticeable, if at all noticeable, from a managerial standpoint. Sherwood is running at full speed with less and less supervision. Sherwood implements his escape in five steps, beginning on July 12 during the slow business season and lasting two months, ending with a trip to Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany, for two weeks as a final test before bigger and bolder vagabonding plans. Step 1: Increase Investment First, he speaks with his boss on July 12 about additional training that might be available to employees. He proposes having the company pay for a four-week industrial design class to help him better interface with clients, being sure to mention the benefit to the boss and business (i.e., he’ll decrease intradepartmental back-and-forth and increase both client results and billable time). Sherwood wants the company to invest as much as possible in him so that the loss is greater if he quits. Step 2: Prove Increased Output Offsite Second, he calls in sick the next Tuesday and Wednesday, July 18 and 19, to showcase his remote working productivity.2 He decides to call in sick between Tuesday and Thursday for two reasons: It looks less like a lie for a three-day weekend and it also enables him to see how well he functions in social isolation without the imminent reprieve of the weekend. He ensures that he doubles his work output on both days, leaves an e-mail trail of some sort for his boss to notice, and keeps quantifiable records of what he accomplished for reference during later negotiations. Since he uses expensive CAD software that is only licensed on his office desktop, Sherwood installs a free trial of GoToMyPC remote access software so that he can pilot his office computer from home. Step 3: Prepare the Quantifiable Business Benefit Third, Sherwood creates a bullet-point list of how much more he achieved outside the office with explanations. He realizes that he needs to present remote working as a good business decision and not a personal perk. The quantifiable end result was three more designs per day than his usual average and three total hours of additional billable client time. For explanations, he identifies removal of commute and fewer distractions from office noise. Step 4: Propose a Revocable Trial Period Fourth, fresh off completing the comfort challenges from previous chapters, Sherwood confidently proposes an innocent one-day-per-week remote work trial period for two weeks. He plans a script in advance but does not make it a PowerPoint presentation or otherwise give it the appearance of something HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013941

serious or irreversible @! Sherwood knocks on his boss’s office door around 3 P.M. on a relatively relaxed Thursday, July 27, the week after his absence, and his script looks like the following. Stock phrases are underlined and footnotes explain negotiating points. Sherwood: Hi, Bill. Do you have a quick second? Bill: Sure. What’s up? Sherwood: [ just wanted to bounce an idea off of you that’s been on my mind. Two minutes should be plenty. Bill: OK. Shoot. Sherwood: Last week, as you know, I was sick. Long story short, I decided to work at home despite feeling terrible. So here’s the funny part. I thought I would get nothing done, but ended up finishing three more designs than usual on both days. Plus, I put in three more billable hours than usual without the commute, office noise, distractions, etc. OK, so here’s where I’m going. Just as a trial, I’d like to propose working from home Mondays and Tuesdays for just two weeks. You can veto it whenever you want, and I’ll come in if we need to do meetings, but I'd like to try it for just two weeks and review the results. ’m 100% confident that Pll get twice as much done. Does that seem reasonable? Bill: Hmm ... What if we need to share client designs? Sherwood: There’s a program called GoToMyPC that I used to access the office computer when I was sick. I can view everything remotely, and I'll have my cell phone on me 24/7. Sooooo ... What do you think? Test it out starting next Monday and see how much more I get done?& Bill: Ummm ... OK, fine. But it’s just a test. I have a meeting in five and have to run, but let’s talk soon. Sherwood: Great. Thanks for the time. [ll keep you posted on it all. ’'m sure you'll be pleasantly surprised. Sherwood didn’t expect to get two days per week approved. He asked for two so that, in the case his boss refused, he could ask for just one as a fallback position (bracketing). Why didn’t Sherwood go for five days remote per week? Two reasons. First, it’s a lot for management to accept off the bat. We need to ask for an inch and turn it into a foot without setting off panic alarms. Second, it is a good idea to hone your remote-working abilities—rehearse a bit—before shooting for the big time, as it decreases the likelihood of crises and screwups that will get remote rights revoked. Step 5: Expand Remote Time Sherwood ensures that his days outside of the office are his most productive to date, even minimally dropping in-office production to heighten the contrast. He sets a meeting to discuss the results with his boss on August 15 and prepares a bullet-point page detailing increased results and items completed compared to in-office time. He suggests upping the ante to four days per week remote for a two-week trial, fully prepared to concede to three days if need be. Sherwood: It really turned out even better than I expected. If you look at the numbers, it makes a lot of business sense, and I’m enjoying work a lot more now. So, here we are. I'd like to suggest, if you think it makes sense, that I try four days a week for another two-week trial. I was thinking that coming in Friday@would make sense to prepare for the coming week, but we could do whichever day you prefer. Bill: Sherwood, I’m really not sure we can do that. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013942

Sherwood: What’s your main concern? Bill: It seems like you’re on your way out. I mean, are you going to quit on us? Second, what if everyone wants to do the same? Sherwood: Fair enough. Good points.@ First, to be honest, I was close to quitting before, with all the interruptions and commute and whatnot, but I’m actually feeling great now with the change in routine. I’m doing more and feel relaxed for a change. Second, no one should be allowed to work remotely unless they can show increased productivity, and I’m the perfect experiment. If they can show it, however, why not let them do it on a trial basis? It lowers costs for the office, increases productivity, and makes employees happier. So, what do you say? Can I test it out for two weeks and come in Fridays to take care of the office stuff? Il still document everything, and you, of course, have the right to change your mind at any point. Bill: Man, you are an insistent one. OK, we’ll give it a shot, but don’t go blabbing about it. Sherwood: Of course. Thanks, Bill. I appreciate the trust. Talk to you soon. Sherwood continues to be productive at home and maintains his lower in-office performance. He reviews the results with his boss after two weeks and continues with four remote days per week for an additional two weeks until Tuesday, September 19, when he requests a full-time remote trial of two weeks while he is visiting relatives out of state.@4 Sherwood’s team is in the middle of a project that requires his expertise, and he is prepared to quit if his boss refuses. He realizes that, just as you want to negotiate ad pricing close to deadlines, getting what you want often depends more on when you ask for it than how you ask for it. Though he would prefer not to quit, his income from shirts is more than enough to fund his dream-lines of Oktoberfest and beyond. His boss acquiesces and Sherwood doesn’t have to use his threat of quitting. He goes home that evening and buys a $524 round-trip ticket, less than one week’s shirt sales, to Munich for Oktoberfest. Now he can implement all the time-savers possible and hack out the inessentials. Somewhere between drinking wheat beer and dancing in lederhosen, Sherwood will get his work done in fine form, leaving his company better off than prior to 80/20 and leaving himself all the time in the world. But hold on a second ... What if your boss still refuses? Hmm ... Then they force your hand. If upper management won’t see the light, you’Il just have to use the next chapter to fire their asses. An Alternative: The Hourglass Approach L can be effective to take a longer period of absence up front in what some NR have termed the “hourglass” approach, so named because you use a long proof-of-concept up front to get a short remote agreement and then negotiate back up to full-time out of the office. Here’s what it looks like. 1. Use a preplanned project or emergency (family issue, personal issue, relocation, home repairs, whatever) that requires you to take one or two weeks out of the office. 2. Say that you recognize you can’t just stop working and that you would prefer to work instead of taking vacation days. 3. Propose how you can work remotely and offer, if necessary, to take a pay cut for that period (and that period only) if performance isn’t up to par upon returning. 4. Allow the boss to collaborate on how to do it so that he or she is invested in the process. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013943

5. | Make the two weeks “off” the most productive period you’ve ever had at work. 6. Show your boss the quantifiable results upon returning, and tell him or her that—without all the distractions, commute, etc.—you can get twice as much done. Suggest two or three days at home per week as a trial for two weeks. Make those remote days ultraproductive. Suggest only one or two days in the office per week. 9. Make those days the least productive of the week. 10. Suggest complete mobility —the boss will go for it. =» Q&A: QUESTIONS AND ACTIONS Recently, I was asked if I was going to fire an employee who made a mistake that cost the company $600,000. No, I replied, I just spent $600,000 training him. — THOMAS J. WATSON, founder of IBM Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it. — GEORGE BERNARD SHAW y hile entrepreneurs have the most trouble with Automation, since they fear giving up control, employees get stuck on Liberation because they fear taking control. Resolve to grab the reins—the rest of your life depends on it. The following questions and actions will help you to replace presence-based work with performance- based freedom. 1. If you had a heart attack, and assuming your boss were sympathetic, how could you work remotely for four weeks? If you hit a brick wall with a task that doesn’t seem remote-compatible or if you predict resistance from your boss, ask the following: o» What are you accomplishing with this task—what is the purpose? o » If you had to find other ways to accomplish the same—if your lite depended on it—how would you do it? Remote conferencing? Video conferencing? GoToMeeting, GoToMyPC, DimDim.com (Mac), or related services? o» Why would your boss resist remote work? What is the HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013944

immediate negative effect it would have on the company and what could you do to prevent or minimize it? Put yourself in your boss’s shoes. Based on your work history, would you trust yourself to work outside of the office? If you wouldn’t, reread Elimination to improve production and consider the hourglass option. Practice environment-free productivity. Attempt to work for two to three hours in a café for two Saturdays prior to proposing a remote trial. If you exercise in a gym, attempt to exercise for those two weeks at home or otherwise outside of the gym environment. The purpose here is to separate your activities from a single environment and ensure that you have the discipline to work solo. Quantify current productivity. If you have applied the 80/20 Principle, set the rules of interrupting interruption, and completed related groundwork, your performance should be at an all-time high in quantifiable terms, whether customers served, revenue generated, pages produced, speed of accounts receivable, or otherwise. Document this. Create an opportunity to demonstrate remote work productivity before asking for it as a policy. This is to test your ability to work outside of an office environment and rack up some proof that you can kick ass without constant supervision. Practice the art of getting past “no” before proposing. Go to farmers’ markets to negotiate prices, ask for free first-class upgrades, ask for compensation if you encounter poor service in restaurants, and otherwise ask for the world and practice using the following magic questions when people refuse to give it to you. “What would I need to do to [desired outcome]|?” “Under what circumstances would you [desired outcome]?” “Have you ever made an exception?” “T’m sure you’ve made an exception before, haven’t you?” (if no for either of the last two, ask, “Why not?” If yes, ask, “Why ?’”) Put your employer on remote training wheels— propose Monday or Friday at home. Consider doing this, or the following step, during a period when it would be too disruptive to fire you, even if you were marginally less productive while remote. If your employer refuses, it’s time to get a new boss or become an entrepreneur. The job will never give you the requisite time freedom. If you decide to jump ship, consider letting them make you walk the plank—quitting is often less appealing than tactfully getting fired and using severance or unemployment to take a long vacation. Extend each successful trial period until you reach full-time or your desired level of mobility. Don’t underestimate how much your company needs you. Perform well and ask for what you want. If you don’t get it over time, leave. It’s too big a world to spend most of life in a cubicle. » LIFESTYLE DESIGN IN ACTION Consider trying Earth Class Mail, a service that you can reroute all your mail to, at which point they HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013945

scan and e-mail you everything that comes in, giving you the option of recycling/shredding junk, getting a scan of the contents, or having specific items forwarded to you or someone you designate. I have not personally used it yet (will be testing it out this month in preparation for an upcoming trip in May), but a friend and author in Portland swears by them and knows the CEO. Seems they’ve gotten good press and the idea seems far better than relying on friends/family who, if they’re anything like my friends/family ... will surely drop the ball at some point:-). — NATHALIE I also use GreenByPhone.com to process checks electronically that come in through my Earth Class Mail account—they charge $5 a check, but I live in San Diego, my Earth Class Mail office address is in Seattle, and I bank in Ohio. It works great! —ANDREW To add to your excellent list (we’ve traveled just like that for several years SWEET?), I’d like to add my modifications as a female traveler and a new mom (16-month-old baby). Personal favorites: (1) Athleta carries excellent, light, quick-dry clothing that hold up well to sports but still look very fashionable. Skorts are a must for looking feminine but being fully covered for hiking and steep pyramid steps—you know what I mean, ladies! Just a note, a slightly longer length will serve you well in a lot of countries, as well as tankini tops and swim skirts for swimming. (2) Fresh & Go toothbrush is simple to use. (3) Marsona sound machine for drowning out unfamiliar noises is a must (regularly use with baby at home too so when they hear the sound they know it’s sleep time!). This has been a lifesaver for us on many trips, and we now use it regularly at home for better sleep. No more changing hotels midtrip to avoid noise. AND, I know we have to travel light, but with baby a lot of things are nonnegotiable. These make for smoother sailing: (1) Peanut shell sling in black fleece—it’s more comfy than the cotton and you can pop baby in and out wherever you are, from birth to 35 Ibs. I never take mine off, it’s part of my outfit; (2) Peapod plus portable tent—this is baby’s main bed at home and travel so baby has the same sleep place everywhere we go, and the flaps give all travel parties privacy— great from small babies to five-year-olds. I can still jam this onto a little wheeled carry-on and pack mine and baby’s minimal clothing around it; (3) Go Go Kidz TravelMate (great for wheeling car seat up to the gate for gate check or use on plane); (4) Britax Diplomat car seat is small but kids can use it from birth to approx. four years old. Make sure the wheeled carry-on bag you get is one size smaller than the allowed carry-on size so you don’t get bumped to check the bag in if the plane is full. You can always nicely argue/reason/bat your eyelashes that you will put the bag in your foot space. Also, very helpful to give baby something to sip or munch on during take off and landing so yours isn’t the baby screaming from ear pain. Happy travels! —KARYL PRE-EMPTING THE BOSS: COMMON CONCERNS ABOUT REMOTE WORK HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013946

In the linked article, Cisco acknowledges that remote work arrangements are “here to stay” yet lists a set of security issues. It makes sense to preemptively research solutions so that you are armed and ready if your employer raises these concerns. http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2008/prod_020508 html. —Contributed by RAINA 58. If you’re an entrepreneur, don’t skip this chapter. This introduction to remote working tools and tactics is integral to the international pieces of the puzzle that follow. 59. This verb is used by Japanese women as well, even though female workers are referred to as “OL” — office ladies. 60. Any reason to be home will do (cable or phone installation, home repairs, etc.) or, if you prefer not to use a ruse, work a weekend or take two vacation days. 61. Review the Puppy Dog Close from “Income Autopilot II: Testing the Muse.” 62. Do not digress from your goal. Once you’ve addressed an objection or concern, go for the close. 63. Friday is the best day to be in the office. People are relaxed and tend to leave early. 64. Do not accept a vague refusal. Pinpointing the main concern in detail enables you to overcome it. 65. Don’t jump to the defensive after an objection. Acknowledge the validity of a boss’s concerns to prevent an ego-driven battle of wills. 66. Note this indirect threat dressed as a confession. It will make the boss think twice about refusing but prevents the win-lose outcome of an ultimatum. 67. This removes the boss’s ability to call you to the office. This is critical for making the first jump overseas. @ Beyond Repair » KILLING YOUR JOB All courses of action are risky, so prudence is not in avoiding danger (it’s impossible), but calculating risk and acting decisively. Make mistakes of ambition and not mistakes of sloth. Develop the strength to do bold things, not the strength to suffer. —NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI, The Prince Existential Pleas and Resignations Mad Libs BY ED MURRAY HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013947

Dear preferred deity of choice | realized something very _._ today as | was washing my adjective and that something is this: You are a/an animal adverb cruel personal expletive pronoun Last night, after drinking seven shots of _ = ard least favorite hard liquor snorting enough __._ to make blush, drug politician it became clear: It really is them, and not me. lam the one who is completely sh en it helpless state of being comes to the ____—————spersonal relationships in my life, and yet, favorite color | share my innermost ___ with no one else on this _.-_—=S type of candy adjective planet... because they areall insulting adjective extinct animals HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013948

| them all, and | hope they meet a demise emotion adjective choking on a platter of their own (Applebee's appetizer) This CC Ctthhaarsiss made me feel adjective smiley emotion and strangely alone, simultaneously. How can | connect with these | am surrounded by on a daily basis? | am just so sick of herd animals in the every day... Maybe it would synonym for “crying” part of your house help if | shoved a fistful of into my |t vegetables bodily orifice makes my heart when | see the defeat in my parents’ verb ____, and it becomes clear that they love the body parts adverb more than =. . Maybe I should type of car sibling's name stab my __ ith genitalia sharp object Today | have decided to buy a , which will serve as a noun , and asa symbol for the - metaphor timeless adjective expletive faced servitude | am bound to in this life . . . no more in control than the most -minded of . 1am trying adjective farm animals desperately to myself from all of my “st__p” active violent act co-workers .. . except , I've always wanted to person in the room him/her/it. | didn't ask to be forceful sexual act verb S ome jobs are simply beyond repair. Improvements would be like adding a set of designer curtains to a jail cell: better but far from good. In the context of this chapter, “job” will refer to both a company if you run one and a normal job if you have one. Some recommendations are limited to one of the two but most are relevant to both. So we begin. I have quit three jobs and been fired from most of the rest. Getting fired, despite sometimes coming as a surprise and leaving you scrambling to recover, is often a godsend: Someone else makes the decision for you, and it’s impossible to sit in the wrong job for the rest of your life. Most people aren’t lucky enough to get fired and die a slow spiritual death over 30-40 years of tolerating the mediocre. Pride and Punishment If you must play, decide on three things at the start: the rules of the game, the stakes, and the quitting time. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013949

— CHINESE PROVERB J ust because something has been a lot of work or consumed a lot of time doesn’t make it productive or worthwhile. Just because you are embarrassed to admit that you’re still living the consequences of bad decisions made 5, 10, or 20 years ago shouldn’t stop you from making good decisions now. If you let pride stop you, you will hate life 5, 10, and 20 years from now for the same reasons. I hate to be wrong and sat in a dead-end trajectory with my own company until I was forced to change directions or face total breakdown—I know how hard it is. Now that we’re all on a level playing field: Pride is stupid. Being able to quit things that don’t work is integral to being a winner. Going into a project or job without defining when worthwhile becomes wasteful is like going into a casino without a cap on what you will gamble: dangerous and foolish. “But, you don’t understand my situation. It’s complicated!” But is it really? Don’t confuse the complex with the difficult. Most situations are simple—many are just emotionally difficult to act upon. The problem and the solution are usually obvious and simple. It’s not that you don’t know what to do. Of course you do. You are just terrified that you might end up worse off than you are now. Pll tell you right now: If you’re at this point, you won’t be worse off. Revisit fear-setting and cut the cord, Like Pulling Off a Band-Aid: It’s Easier and Less Painful Than You Think The average man is a conformist, accepting miseries and disasters with the stoicism of a cow standing in the rain. —COLIN WILSON, British author of The Outsider; New Existentialist Trex are several principal phobias that keep people on sinking ships, and there are simple rebuttals for all of them. 1. Quitting is permanent. Far from it. Use the Q&A questions in this chapter and chapter 3 (Fear-setting) to examine how you could pick up your chosen career track or start another company at a later point. I have never seen an example where a change of direction wasn’t somehow reversible. 2.I won’t be able to pay the bills. Sure you will. First of all, the objective will be to have a new job or source of cash flow before quitting your current job. Problem solved. If you jump ship or get fired, it isn’t hard to eliminate most expenses temporarily and live on savings for a brief period. From renting out your home to refinancing or selling it, there are options. There are always options. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013950

It might be emotionally difficult, but you won’t starve. Park your car in the garage and cancel insurance for a few months. Carpool or take the bus until you find the next gig. Rack up some more credit card debt and cook instead of eating out. Sell all the crap that you spent hundreds or thousands on and never use. Take a full inventory of your assets, cash reserves, debts, and monthly expenses. How long could you survive with your current resources or if you sold some assets? Go through all expenses and ask yourself, If I had to eliminate this because I needed an extra kidney, how would I do it? Don’t be melodramatic when there is no need—few things are fatal, particularly for smart people. If you’ve made it this far in life, losing or dropping a job will often be little more than a few weeks of vacation (unless you want more) prior to something better. 3. Health insurance and retirement accounts disappear if I quit. Untrue. I was scared of both when I was eliminated from TrueSAN. I had visions of rotting teeth and working at Wal-Mart to survive. Upon looking at the facts and exploring options, I realized that I could have identical medical and dental coverage—the same provider and network—for $300-500 per month. To transfer my 401(k) to another company (I chose Fidelity Investments) was even easier: It took less than 30 minutes via phone and cost nothing. Covering both of these bases takes less time than getting a customer service rep on the phone to fix your electric bill. 4. It will ruin my resume. I love creative nonfiction. It is not at all difficult to sweep gaps under the rug and make uncommon items the very things that get job interviews. How? Do something interesting and make them jealous. If you quit and then sit on your ass, I wouldn’t hire you either. On the other hand, if you have a one-to-two-year world circumnavigation on your resume or training with professional soccer teams in Europe to your credit, two interesting things happen upon returning to the working world. First, you will get more interviews because you will stand out. Second, interviewers bored in their own jobs will spend the entire meeting asking how you did it! If there is any question of why you took a break or left your previous job, there is one answer that cannot be countered: “I had a once-in-a-lifetime chance to do [exotic and envy-producing experience] and couldn’t turn it down. I figured that, with [20-40] years of work to go, what’s the rush?” The Cheesecake Factor Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure. —THOMAS J. WATSON, founder of IBM SUMMER 1999 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013951

Buen before I tasted it, | knew something wasn’t quite right. After eight hours in the refrigerator, this cheesecake still hadn’t set at all. It swished in the gallon bowl like a viscous soup, chunks shifting and bobbing as I tilted it under close inspection. Somewhere a mistake had been made. It could have been any number of things: Three 1 Ib. sticks of Philly Cream Cheese Eggs Stevia Unflavored gelatin Vanilla Sour cream In this case, it was probably a combination of things and the lack of a few simple ingredients that generally make cheesecake a form of cake. I was on a no-carbohydrate diet, and I had used this recipe before. It had been so delicious that my roommates wanted their fair share and insisted on an attempt at bulk production. Hence began the mathematical shenanigans and problems. Before Splenda@ and other miracles of sugar imitation came on the scene, the hard core used stevia, an herb 300 times sweeter than sugar. One drop was like 300 packets of sugar. It was a delicate tool and I wasn’t a delicate cook. I had once made a small handful of cookies using baking soda instead of baking powder, and that was bad enough to drive my roommates to puke on the lawn. This new masterpiece made the cookies look like fine dining: It tasted like liquid cream cheese mixed with cold water and about 600 packets of sugar. I then did what any normal and rational person would do: I grabbed the largest soup ladle with a sigh and sat down in front of the TV to face my punishment. I had wasted an entire Sunday and a boatload of ingredients—it was time to reap what I had sown. One hour and 20 large spoonfuls later, I hadn’t made a dent in the enormous batch of soup, but I was down for the count. Not only could I not eat anything but soup for two days, I couldn’t bring myself to even look at cheesecake, previously my favorite dessert, for more than four years. Stupid? Of course. It’s about as stupid as one can get. This is a ridiculous and micro example of what people do on a larger scale with jobs all the time: self-imposed suffering that can be avoided. Sure, I learned a lesson and paid for the mistake. The real question is—for what? There are two types of mistakes: mistakes of ambition and mistakes of sloth. The first is the result of a decision to act—to do something. This type of mistake is made with incomplete information, as it’s impossible to have all the facts beforehand. This is to be encouraged. Fortune favors the bold. The second is the result of a decision of sloth—to not do something—wherein we refuse to change a bad situation out of fear despite having all the facts. This is how learning experiences become terminal punishments, bad relationships become bad marriages, and poor job choices become lifelong prison sentences. “Yeah, but what if I’m in an industry where jumping around is looked down upon? I’ve been here barely a year, and prospective employers would think...” Would they? Test assumptions before condemning yourself to more misery. I’ve seen one determinant of sex appeal to good employers: performance. If you are a rock star when it comes to results, it doesn’t matter if you jump ship from a bad company after three weeks. On the other hand, if tolerating a punishing work environment for years at a time is a prerequisite for promotion in your field, could it be HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013952

that you’re in a game not worth winning? The consequences of bad decisions do not get better with age. What cheesecake are you eating? > Q&A: QUESTIONS AND ACTIONS Only those who are asleep make no mistakes. —INGVAR KAMPRAD, founder of IKEA, world’s largest furniture brand Ten of thousands of people, most of them less capable than you, leave their jobs every day. It’s neither uncommon nor fatal. Here are a few exercises to help you realize just how natural job changes are and how simple the transition can be. 1. ‘First, a familiar reality check: Are you more likely to find what you want in your current job or somewhere else? If you were fired from your job today, what would you do to get things under financial control? 3. Take a sick day and post your resume on the major job sites. Even if you have no immediate plans to leave your job, post your resume on sites such as www.monster.com and www.career- builder.com, using a pseudonym if you prefer. This will show you that there are options besides your current place of work. Call headhunters if your level makes such a step appropriate, and send a brief e-mail such as the one below to friends and non-work contacts. Dear All, I am considering making a career move and am interested in all opportunities that might come to mind. Nothing is too outrageous or out of left field. [If you know what you want or don’t want on some level, feel free to add, “I am particularly interested in ...” or “I would like to avoid ...”’] Please let me know if anything comes to mind! Tim Call in sick or take a vacation day to complete all of these exercises during a normal 9-5 workday. This will simulate unemployment and lessen the fear factor of non-office limbo. In the world of action and negotiation, there is one principle that governs all others: The person who has more options has more power. Don’t wait until you need options to search for them. Take a sneak peek at the future now and it will make both action and being assertive easier. 4. If you run or own a company, imagine that you have just been sued and must declare bankruptcy. The company is now insolvent and you must close up shop. This is something you must legally do, and there are no finances to entertain other options. How would you survive? » TOOLS AND TRICKS Considering Options and Pulling the Trigger HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013953

» I-Resign ( www.i-resign.com ) This site provides everything from non-quitting options (work-leave, vacations) to sample resignation letters and second-life job-hunting advice. Don’t miss the helpful discussion forums and hysterical “web consultant from London” letter. Opening Retirement Accounts If you want an adviser and don’t mind some fees: > Franklin-Templeton ( www.franklintempleton.com_) (800-527-2020) » American Funds ( www.americanfunds.com ) (800-421-0180) If you will do your own investing and want no-load funds: » Fidelity Investments ( www.fidelity.com_) (800-343-3548) > Vanguard ( www.vanguard.com ) (800-414-1321) Health Insurance for Self-employed or Unemployed (in descending order of reader endorsement) » Ehealthinsurance ( www.ehealthinsurance.com ) (800-977-8860) =» AETNA ( www.aetna.com ) (800-MY-HEALTH) » Kaiser Permanente ( www.kaiserpermanente.com ) (866-352-0290) » American Community Mutual ( www.american-community.com ) (800-991-2642) 14) Mini-Retirements >» EMBRACING THE MOBILE LIFESTYLE HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013954

Before the development of tourism, travel was conceived to be like study, and its fruits were considered to be the adornment of the mind and the formation of the judgment. — PAUL FUSSELL, Abroad The simple willingness to improvise is more vital, in the long run, than research. —ROLF POTTS, Vagabonding U,. Sherwood’s return from Oktoberfest, dazed from killing neurons but the happiest he’s been in four years, the remote trial is made policy and Sherwood is inducted into the world of the New Rich. All he needs now is an idea of how to exploit this freedom and the tools to give his finite cash near- infinite lifestyle output. If you’ve gone through the previous steps, eliminating, automating, and severing the leashes that bind you to one location, it’s time to indulge in some fantasies and explore the world. Even if you have no ache for extended travel or think it’s impossible— whether due to marriage or mortgage or those little things known as children—this chapter is still the next step. There are fundamental changes I and most others put off until absence (or preparation for it) forces them. This chapter is your final exam in muse design. The transformation begins in a small Mexican village, in a parable that’s been shared in various forms around the world. Fables and Fortune Hunters A, American businessman took a vacation to a small coastal Mexican village on doctor’s orders. Unable to sleep after an urgent phone call from the office the first morning, he walked out to the pier to clear his head. A small boat with just one fisherman had docked, and inside the boat were several large yellowfin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish. “How long did it take you to catch them?” the American asked. “Only a little while,” the Mexican replied in surprisingly good English. “Why don’t you stay out longer and catch more fish?” the American then asked. “T have enough to support my family and give a few to friends,” the Mexican said as he unloaded them into a basket. “But ... What do you do with the rest of your time?” The Mexican looked up and smiled. “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take a siesta with my wife, Julia, and stroll into the village each evening, where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life, sefior.” The American laughed and stood tall. “Sir, ’m a Harvard M.B.A. and can help you. You should spend more time fishing, and with the proceeds, buy a bigger boat. In no time, you could buy several boats with the increased haul. Eventually, you would have a fleet of fishing boats.” He continued, “Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you would sell directly to the consumers, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing, and distribution. You HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013955

would need to leave this small coastal fishing village, of course, and move to Mexico City, then to Los Angeles, and eventually New York City, where you could run your expanding enterprise with proper management.” The Mexican fisherman asked, “But, sefior, how long will all this take?” To which the American replied, “15-20 years. 25 tops.” “But what then, sefior?” The American laughed and said, “That’s the best part. When the time is right, you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich. You would make millions.” “Millions, sefior? Then what?” “Then you would retire and move to a small coastal fishing village, where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take a siesta with your wife, and stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos ...” I RECENTLY HAD lunch in San Francisco with a good friend and former college roommate. He will soon graduate from a top business school and return to investment banking. He hates coming home from the office at midnight but explained to me that, if he works 80-hour weeks for nine years, he could become a managing director and make a cool $3—-10 million per year. Then he would be successful. “Dude, what on earth would you do with $3-10 million per year?” I asked. His answer? “I would take a long trip to Thailand.” That just about sums up one of the biggest self-deceptions of our modern age: extended world travel as the domain of the ultrarich. I’ve also heard the following: “Tl just work in the firm for 15 years. Then [ll be partner and I can cut back on hours. Once I have a million or two in the bank, I'll put it in something safe like bonds, take $80,000 a year in interest, and retire to sail in the Caribbean.” “Tl only work in consulting until ’'m 35, then retire and ride a motorcycle across China.” If your dream, the pot of gold at the end of the career rainbow, is to live large in Thailand, sail around the Caribbean, or ride a motorcycle across China, guess what’? All of them can be done for less than $3,000. I’ve done all three. Here are just two examples of how far a little can go.8 $250 U.S. Five days on a private Smithsonian tropical research island with three local fishermen who caught and cooked all my food and also took me on tours of the best hidden dive spots in Panama. $150 U.S. Three days of chartering a private plane in Mendoza wine country in Argentina and flying over the most beautiful vineyards around the snowcapped Andes with a personal guide. Question: What did you spend your last $400 on? It’s two or three weekends of nonsense and throwaway forget-the-workweek behavior in most U'S. cities. $400 is nothing for a full eight days of life-changing experiences. But eight days isn’t what ’m recommending at all. Those were just interludes in a much larger production. I’m proposing much, much more. The Birth of Mini-Retirements and the Death of Vacations HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013956

There is more to life than increasing its speed. —MOHANDAS GANDHI L, February of 2004, I was miserable and overworked. My travel fantasy began as a plan to visit Costa Rica in March 2004 for four weeks of Spanish and relaxation. I needed a recharge and four weeks seemed “reasonable” by whatever made-up benchmark you can use for such a thing. A friend familiar with Central America dutifully pointed out that it would never work, as Costa Rica was about to enter its rainy season. Torrential downpours weren’t the uplifting jolt I needed, so I shifted my focus to four weeks in Spain. It’s a long trip over the Atlantic, though, and Spain was close to other countries I'd always wanted to visit. I lost “reasonable” somewhere shortly thereafter and decided that I deserved a full three months to explore my roots in Scandinavia after four weeks in Spain. If there were any real-time bombs or pending disasters, they would certainly crop up in the first four weeks, so there really wasn’t any additional risk in extending my trip to three months. Three months would be great. Those three months turned into 15, and I started to ask myself, “Why not take the usual 20-30-year retirement and redistribute it throughout life instead of saving it all for the end?” The Alternative to Binge Traveling Thanks to the Interstate Highway System, it is now possible to travel from coast to coast without seeing anything. —CHARLES KURALT, CBS news reporter L, you are accustomed to working 50 weeks per year, the tendency, even after creating the mobility to take extended trips, will be to go nuts and see 10 countries in 14 days and end up a wreck. It’s like taking a starving dog to an all-you-can-eat buffet. It will eat itself to death. I did this three months into my 15-month vision quest, visiting seven countries and going through at least 20 check-ins and checkouts with a friend who had negotiated three weeks off. The trip was an adrenaline-packed blast but like watching life on fast-forward. It was hard for us to remember what had happened in which countries (except Amsterdam),@2 we were both sick most of the time, and we were upset to have to leave some places simply because our pre-purchased flights made it so. I recommend doing the exact opposite. The alternative to binge travel—the mini-retirement—entails relocating to one place for one to six months before going home or moving to another locale. It is the anti- vacation in the most positive sense. Though it can be relaxing, the mini-retirement is not an escape from your life but a reexamination of it— the creation of a blank slate. Following elimination and automation, what would you be escaping from? Rather than seeking to see the world through photo ops between foreign-but-familiar hotels, we aim to experience it at a speed that lets it change us. This is also different from a sabbatical. Sabbaticals are often viewed much like retirement: as a one- time event. Savor it now while you can. The mini-retirement is defined as recurring—it is a lifestyle. I HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013957

currently take three or four mini-retirements per year and know dozens who do the same. Sometimes these sojourns take me around the world; oftentimes they take me around the cormer— Yosemite, Tahoe, Carmel—but to a different world psychologically, where meetings, e-mail, and phone calls don’t exist for a set period of time. Purging the Demons: Emotional Freedom This is the very perfection of a man, to find out his own im perfection. — SAINT AUGUSTINE (354 A.D-430 A.D.) Tne freedom is much more than having enough income and time to do what you want. It is quite possible—actually the rule rather than the exception—to have financial and time freedom but still be caught in the throes of the rat race. One cannot be free from the stresses of a speed- and size-obsessed culture until you are free from the materialistic addictions, time-famine mind-set, and comparative impulses that created it in the first place. This takes time. The effect is not cumulative, and no number of two-week (also called “too wea yall sightseeing trips can replace one good walkabout.4 In the experience of those I’ve interviewed, it takes two to three months just to unplug from obsolete routines and become aware of just how much we distract ourselves with constant motion. Can you have a two-hour dinner with Spanish friends without getting anxious? Can you get accustomed to a small town where all businesses take a siesta for two hours in the afternoon and then close at 4:00 P.M.? If not, you need to ask, Why? Learn to slow down. Get lost intentionally. Observe how you judge both yourself and those around you. Chances are that it’s been a while. Take at least two months to disincorporate old habits and rediscover yourself without the reminder of a looming return flight. The Fimancial Realities: It Just Gets Better Tre economic argument for mini-retirements is the icing on the cake. Four days in a decent hotel or a week for two at a nice hostel costs the same as a month in a nice posh apartment. If you relocate, the expenses abroad also begin to replace—often at much lower cost—bills you can then cancel stateside. Here are some actual monthly figures from recent travels. Highlights from both South America and Europe are shown side by side to prove that luxury is limited by your creativity and familiarity with the locale, not gross currency devaluation in third-world countries. It will be obvious that I did not survive on bread and begging—I lived like a rock star—and both experiences could be done for less than 50% of what I spent. My goal was enjoyment and not austere survival. Airfare HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013958

e » Free, courtesy of AMEX gold card and Chase Continental Airlines Mastercard 2 Housing e » Penthouse apartment on the equivalent of New York’s Fifth Avenue in Buenos Aires, including house cleaners, personal security guards, phone, energy, and high-speed Internet: $550 U.S. per month e+ Enormous apartment in the trendy SoHo-like Prenzlauerberg district of Berlin, including phone and energy: $300 U/S. per month Meals e » Four- or five-star restaurant meals twice daily in Buenos Aires: $10 U.S. ($300 U.S. per month) e > Berlin: $18 U.S. ($540 U.S. per month) Entertainment e > VIP table and unlimited champagne for eight people at the hottest club, Opera Bay, in Buenos Aires: $150 U.S. ($18.75 US. per person x four visits per month = $75 U.S. per month per person) e - Cover, drinks, and dancing at the hottest clubs in West Berlin: $20 U.S. per person per night x 4 = $80 U.S. per month Education HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013959

e » [wo hours daily of private Spanish lessons in Buenos Aires, fives times per week: $5 U.S. per hour x 40 hours per month = $200 U.S. per month e > Iwo hours daily of private tango lessons with two world-class professional dancers: $8.33 U.S. per hour x 40 hours per month = $333.20 U.S. per month e» Four hours daily of top-tier German-language instruction in Nollendorfplatz, Berlin: $175 U.S. per month, which would have paid for itself even if I had not attended classes, as the student ID card entitled me to over 40% discounts on all transportation e » Six hours per week of mixed martial arts (MMA) training at the top Berlin academy: free in exchange for tutoring in English two hours per week Transportation e+ Monthly subway pass and daily cab rides to and from tango lessons in Buenos Aires: $75 U.S. per month e+» Monthly subway, tram, and bus pass in Berlin with student discount: $85 U.S. per month Four-Week Total for Luxury Living e - Buenos Aires: $1533.20 , including round-trip airfare from JFK, with a one-month stopover in Panama. Nearly one-third of this total is from the daily one-on-one instruction from world-class teachers in Spanish and Tango. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013960

e - Berlin: $1180 , including round-trip airfare from JFK and a one- week stopover in London. How do these numbers compare to your current domestic monthly expenses, including rent, car insurance, utilities, weekend expenditures, partying, public transportation, gas, memberships, subscriptions, food, and all the rest? Add it all up and you may well realize, like I did, that traveling around the world and having the time of your life can save you serious money. Fear Factors: Overcoming Excuses Not to Travel Travelling is the ruin of all happiness! There’s no looking at a building here after seeing Italy. —FANNY BURNEY (1752-1840), English novelist But I have a house and kids. I can’t travel! What about health insurance? What if something happens? Isn’t travel dangerous? What if I get kidnapped or mugged? But I’m a woman—traveling alone would be dangerous. Max excuses not to travel are exactly that—excuses. I’ve been there, so this isn’t a holier-than-thou sermon. I know too well that it’s easier to live with ourselves if we cite an external reason for inaction. I’ve since met paraplegics and the deaf, senior citizens and single mothers, home owners and the poor, all of whom have sought and found excellent life-changing reasons for extended travel instead of dwelling on the million small reasons against it. Most of the concerns above are addressed in the Q&A, but one in particular requires a bit of preemptive nerve calming. It’s 10:00 P.M. Do You Know Where Your Children Are? The prime fear of all parents prior to their first international trip is somehow losing a child in the shuffle. The good news is that if you are comfortable taking your kids to New York, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., or London, you will have even less to worry about in the starting cities I recommend in the Q&A. There are fewer guns and violent crimes in all of them compared to most large U.S. cities. The likelihood of problems is decreased further when travel is less airport and hotel-hopping among strangers and more relocation to a second home: a mini-retirement. But still, what if? Jen Errico, a single mother who took her two children on a five-month world tour, had a more acute fear than most, one that often woke her at 2:00 A.M. in a cold sweat: What if something happens to me? She wanted to prime her kids for worst-case scenario but didn’t want to scare them to death, so—like all good mothers—she made it a game: Who can best memorize the itineraries, hotel addresses, and Mom’s phone number? She had emergency contacts in each country whose numbers were loaded into the speed dial of her cell phone, which had global roaming. In the end, nothing happened. Now she’s planning to move to a ski chalet in Europe and send her kids to school in multilingual France. Success HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013961

begets success. She was most afraid in Singapore, and in retrospect, it was where she had the least reason to be worried (she took her kids to South Africa, among other places). She was scared because it was the first stop and she was unaccustomed to traveling with her kids. It was perception, not reality. Robin Malinsky-Rummell, who spent a year traveling through South America with her husband and seven-year-old son, was warned by friends and family not to visit Argentina after their devaluation riots in 2001. She did her homework, decided that the fear was unfounded, and proceeded to have the time of her life in Patagonia. When she told locals that she was originally from New York, their eyes widened and jaws dropped: “I saw those buildings blow up on TV! I would never go to such a dangerous place!” Don’t assume that places abroad are more dangerous than your hometown. Most aren’t. Robin is convinced, as are other NR parents, that people use children as an excuse to stay in their comfort zones. It’s an easy excuse not to do something adventurous. How to overcome the fear? Robin recommends two things: 1. Before embarking on a long international trip with your children for the first time, take a trial run for a few weeks. 2. For each stop, arrange a week of language classes that begin upon arrival and take advantage of transportation from the airport if available. The school staff will often handle apartment rentals for you, and you will be able to make friends and learn the area before setting off on your own. But what if your concern isn’t so much losing your children but losing your mind because of your children? Several families interviewed for this book recommended the oldest persuasive tool known to man: bribery. Each child is given some amount of virtual cash, 25-50 cents, for each hour of good behavior. The same amount is subtracted from their accounts for breaking the rules. All purchases for fun— whether souvenirs, ice cream, or otherwise—come out of their own individual accounts. No balance, no goodies. This often requires more self-control on the part of the parents than the children. How to Get Airfare at 50-80% Off This is not a book on budget travel. Most of the cost-cutting recommendations found in such guides are designed with the binge traveler in mind. For someone embarking on a mini-retirement, an extra $150 for hassle-free airfare amortized over two months is a better deal than 20 hours of manipulating frequent- flier points on an unknown airline or chasing questionable deals. Following two weeks of research, I once bought a one-way standby ticket to Europe for $120. I arrived at JFK brimming with enthusiasm and confidence—look at all these schmucks paying retail! — and 90% of the “participating” airlines refused my ticket. Those that didn’t were booked for weeks solid. I ended up staying in a hotel for two nights for a $300 tab, filing a complaint with AMEX, and eventually calling 1-800-FLY-EUROPE from the JFK terminal in frustration. I bought a round-trip ticket to London on Virgin Atlantic for $300 and left an hour later. The same ticket cost more than $700 a week earlier. After 25 countries, I’ve found a few simple strategies that get you 90% of the possible savings without wasting time or producing migraines. 1. Use credit cards with reward points for large muse-related advertising and manufacturing expenses. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013962

I am not spending more money to get pennies on the dollar—these costs are inevitable, so I capitalize on them. This alone gets me a free round-trip international ticket each three months. 2. Purchase tickets far in advance (three months or more) or last minute, and aim for both departure and return between Tues day and Thursday. Long-term travel planning turns me off and can be expensive if plans change, so I opt for purchasing all tickets in the last four or five days prior to target departure. The value of empty seats is $0 as soon as the flight takes off, so true last-minute seats are cheap. Use Orbitz (www.orbitz.com) and www.kayak.com first. Fix the departure and return dates between Tuesday and Thursday. Then look at prices for alternative departure dates each of three days into the past and each of three days into the future. Using the cheapest departure date, do the same with the return dates to find the cheapest combination. Check this price against the fares on the website of the airline itself. Then begin bidding on www.priceline.com at 50% of the better of the two, working up in $50 increments until you get a better price or realize it’s not possible. 3. Consider buying one ticket to an international hub and then an ongoing ticket with a cheap local airline. If going to Europe on a tight budget, you could get three tickets. One free Southwest ticket (from transferring AMEX points) from CA to JFK, the cheapest ticket to Heathrow in London, and then an iibercheap ticket on either Ryanair or EasyJet to a final destination. I have paid as little as $10 to go from London to Berlin or London to Spain. That is not a typo. Local airlines will often offer seats on flights for just the cost of taxes and gasoline. To Central or South American destinations, Pll often look at local flights from Panama or international flights from Miami. When More Is Less: Cutting the Clutter Human beings have the capacity to learn to want almost any conceivable material object. Given, then, the emergence of a modern industrial culture capable of producing almost anything, the time is ripe for opening the storehouse of infinite need! ... It is the modern Pandora’s box, and its plagues are loose upon the world. —JULES HENRY To be free, to be happy and fruitful, can only be attained through sacrifice of many common but overestimated things — ROBERT HENRI I know the son of one deca-millionaire, a personal friend of Bill Gates, who now manages private investments and ranches. He has accumulated an assortment of beautiful homes over the last decade, each with full-time cooks, servants, cleaners, and support staff. How does he feel about having a home in each time zone? It’s a pain in the ass! He feels like he’s working for his staff, who spend more time in his homes than he does. Extended travel is the perfect excuse to reverse the damage of years of consuming as much as you can afford. It’s time to get rid of clutter disguised as necessities before you drag a five-piece Samsonite set around the world. That is hell on earth. I’m not going to tell you to walk around in a robe and sandals scowling at people who have televisions. I hate that kashi-crunching holier-than-thou stuff. Turning you into a possession-less scribe HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013963

is not my intention. Let’s face it, though: There are tons of things in your home and life that you don’t use, need, or even particularly want. They just came into your life as impulsive flotsam and jetsam and never found a good exit. Whether you’re aware of it or not, this clutter creates indecision and distractions, consuming attention and making unfettered happiness a real chore. It is impossible to realize how distracting all the crap is—whether porcelain dolls, sports cars, or ragged T-shirts—until you get rid of it. Prior to my 15-month trip, I was stressed about how to fit all of my belongings into a 14x 10-foot rental storage space. Then I realized a few things: I would never reread the business magazines I'd saved, I wore the same five shirts and four pairs of pants 90% of the time, it was about time for new furniture, and I never used the outdoor grill or lawn furniture. Even getting rid of things I never used proved to be like a capitalist short-circuit. It was hard to toss things I had once thought were valuable enough to spend money on. The first ten minutes of sorting through clothing was like choosing which child of mine should live or die. I hadn’t exercised my throwing-out muscles in some time. It was a struggle to put nice Christmas clothing ['d never worn into the “go” pile and just as hard to separate myself from worn and ragged clothing I had for sentimental reasons. Once I’d passed through the first few tough decisions, though, the momentum had been built and it was a breeze. I donated all of the seldom-worn clothing to Goodwill. The furniture took less than 10 hours to offload using Craigslist, and though I was paid less than 50% of the retail prices for some and nothing for others, who cared? I’d used and abused them for five years and would get a new set when I landed back in the U.S. I gave the grill and lawn furniture to my friend, who lit up like a kid at Christmas. I had made his month. It felt wonderful and I had an extra $300 in pocket change to cover at least a few weeks of rent abroad. I created 40% more space in my apartment and hadn’t even grazed the surface. It wasn’t the extra physical space that I felt most. It was the extra mental space. It was as if I had 20 mental applications running simultaneously before, and now I had just one or two. My thinking was clearer and I was much, much happier. I asked every vagabond interviewee in this book what their one recommendation would be for first- time extended travelers. The answer was unanimous: Take less with you. The overpacking impulse is hard to resist. The solution is to set what I call a “settling fund.” Rather than pack for all contingencies, I bring the absolute minimum and allocate $100—300 for purchasing things after I arrive and as I travel. I no longer take toiletries or more than a week’s worth of clothing. It’s a blast. Finding shaving cream or a dress shirt overseas can produce an adventure in and of itself. Pack as if you were coming back in one week. Here are the bare essentials, listed in order of importance: 1. One week of clothing appropriate to the season, including one semiformal shirt and pair of pants or skirt for customs. Think T-shirts, one pair of shorts, and a multipurpose pair of jeans. 2. Backup photocopies or scanned copies of all important documents: health insurance, passport/visa, credit cards, debit cards, etc. 3. Debit cards, credit cards, and $200 worth of small bills in local currency (traveler’s checks are not accepted in most places and are a hassle) 4. Small cable bike lock for securing luggage while in transit or in hostels; a small padlock for lockers if needed 5. Electronic dictionaries for target languages (book versions are too slow to be of use in conversation) and small grammar guides or texts 6. One broad-strokes travel guide HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013964

That’s it To laptop or not to laptop? Unless you are a writer, I vote no. It’s far too cumbersome and distracting. Using GoToMyPC to access your home computer from Internet cafés encourages the habit we want to develop: making the best use of time instead of killing it. The Bora-Bora Dealmaker BAFFIN ISLAND, NUNAVUT J osh Steinitz44 stood at the edge of the world and stared in amazement. He dug his boots into the six feet of sea ice and the unicorns danced. Ten narwhals—rare cousins of the beluga—came to the surface and pointed their six-foot-plus spiral tusks toward the heavens. The pod of 3,000-pound whales then fell into the depths once again. The narwhals are deep divers—more than 3,000 feet in some cases—so Josh had at least 20 minutes until their reappearance. It seemed appropriate that he was with the narwhals. Their name came from Old Norse and referred to their mottled white and blue skin. Ndhvalr —corpse man. He smiled as he had done often in the last few years. Josh himself was a dead man walking. One year after graduating from college, Josh found out that he had oral squamous carcinoma—cancer. He had plans to be a management consultant. He had plans to be lots of things. Suddenly none of it mattered. Less than half of those who suffered from this particular type of cancer survived. The reaper didn’t discriminate and came without warning. It became clear that the biggest risk in life wasn’t making mistakes but regret: missing out on things. He could never go back and recapture years spent doing something he disliked. Two years later and cancer-free, Josh set off on an indefinite global walkabout, covering expenses as a freelance writer. He later became the cofounder of a website that provides customized itineraries to would-be vagabonds. His executive status didn’t lessen his mobile addiction. He was as comfortable cutting deals from the over-water bungalows of Bora-Bora as he was in the log cabins of the Swiss Alps. He once took a call from a client while at Camp Muir on Mt. Rainier. The client needed to confirm some sales numbers and asked Josh about all the wind in the background. Josh’s answer: “I’m standing at 10,000 feet on a glacier and this afternoon the wind is whipping us down the mountain.” The client said he’d let Josh get back to what he was doing. Another client called Josh while he was leaving a Balinese temple and heard the gongs in the background. The client asked Josh if he was in church. Josh wasn’t quite sure what to say. All that came out was, “Yes?” Back among the narwhals, Josh had a few minutes before heading to base camp to avoid polar bears. Twenty-four-hour daylight meant that he had much to share with his friends back in the land of cubicles. He sat down on the ice and produced his satellite phone and laptop from a waterproof bag. He began his e-mail in the usual way: “I know youre all sick of seeing me have so much fun, but guess where I am?” =» Q&A: QUESTIONS AND ACTIONS HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013965

It is fatal to know too much at the outcome: boredom comes as quickly to the traveler who knows his route as to the novelist who is overcertain of his plot. —PAUL THEROUX, To the Ends of the Earth L, this is your first time considering a commitment to the mobile lifestyle and long-term adventuring, I envy you! Making the jump and entering the new worlds that await is like upgrading your role in life from passenger to pilot. The bulk of this Q&A will focus on the precise steps that you should take—and the countdown timeline you can use—when preparing for your first mini-retirement. Most steps can be eliminated or condensed once you get one trip under your belt. Some of the steps are one-time events, after which subsequent mini-retirements will require a maximum of two to three weeks of preparation. It now takes me three afternoons. Grab a pencil and paper—this will be fun. 1. Take an asset and cash-flow snapshot. Set two sheets of paper on a table. Use one to record all assets and corresponding values, including bank accounts, retirement accounts, stocks, bonds, home, and so forth. On the second, draw a line down the middle and write down all incoming cash flow (salary, muse income, investment income, etc.) and outgoing expenses (mortgage, rent, car payments, etc.). What can you eliminate that is either seldom used or that creates stress or distraction without adding a lot of value? 2. Fear-set a one-year mini-retirement in a dream location in Europe. Use the questions from chapter 3 to evaluate your worst-case-scenario fears and evaluate the real potential consequences. Except in rare cases, most will be avoidable and the rest will be reversible. 3. Choose a location for your actual mini-retirement. Where to start? This is the big question. There are two options that I advocate: 1. Choose a starting point and then wander until you find your second home. This is what I did with a one-way ticket to London, vagabonding throughout Europe until I fell in love with Berlin, where I remained for three months. 2. Scout a region and then settle in your favorite spot. This is what I did with a tour of Central and South America, where I spent one to four weeks in each of several cities, after which I returned to my favorite— Buenos Aires—for six months. It is possible to take a mini-retirement in your own country, but the transformative effect is hampered if you are surrounded by people who carry the same socially reinforced baggage. I recommend choosing an overseas location that will seem foreign but that isn’t dangerous. I box, race motorcycles, and do all sorts of macho things, but I draw the line at favelas ~ civilians with machine guns, pedestrians with machetes, and social strife. Cheap is good, but bullet holes are bad. Check the U.S. Department of State for travel warnings before booking tickets (http:// travel.state.gov). Here are just a few of my favorite starting points. Feel free to choose other locations. The most lifestyle for the dollar is underlined: Argentina (Buenos Aires, Cordoba), China (Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taipei), Japan (Tokyo, Osaka), England (London), Ireland (Galway), Thailand (Bangkok, Chiang Mai), Germany (Berlin, Munich), Norway (Oslo), Australia (Sydney), New Zealand (Queenstown), Italy HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013966

(Rome, Milan, Florence), Spain (Madrid, Valencia, Sevilla), and Holland (Amsterdam). In all of these places, it is possible to live well while spending little. I spend less in Tokyo than in California because I know it well. Hip, recently gentrified artist areas, not unlike the Brooklyn of 10 years ago, can be found in almost all cities. The one place I can’t seem to find a decent lunch for less than $20 U.S.? London. Here are a few exotic places I don’t recommend for vagabonding virgins, though veterans can make them all work: all countries in Africa, the Middle East, or Central and South America (excepting Costa Rica and Argentina). Mexico City and Mexican border areas are also a bit too kidnap-happy to make it onto my favorites list. 4. Prepare for your trip. Here’s the countdown. =» Three months out— Eliminate Get used to minimalism before the departure. Here are the questions to ask and act upon, even if you never plan to leave: What is the 20% of my belongings that I use 80% of the time? Eliminate the other 80% in clothing, magazines, books, and all else. Be ruthless— you can always repurchase things you can’t live without. Which belongings create stress in my life? This could relate to maintenance costs (money and energy), insurance, monthly expenses, time consumption, or simple distraction. Eliminate, eliminate, eliminate. If you sell even a few expensive items, it could finance a good portion of your mini-retirement. Don’t rule out the car and home. It’s always possible to purchase either upon your return, often losing no money in the process. Check current health insurance coverage for extended overseas travel. Get the wheels in motion to rent, swap, or sell your home—renting out is most recommended by serial vagabonds—or end your apartment lease and move all belongings into storage. In all cases where doubts crop up, ask yourself, “If I had a gun to my head and had to do it, how would I do it?” It’s not as hard as you think. = Two months out— Automate After eliminating the excess, contact companies (including suppliers) that bill you regularly and set up autopayment with credit cards that have reward points. Telling them that you will be traveling the world for a year often persuades them to accept credit cards rather than chase you around the planet like Carmen Sandiego. For the credit card companies themselves and others that refuse, arrange automatic debit from your checking account. Set up online banking and bill payment. Set up all companies that won’t take credit cards or automatic debit as online payees. Set these scheduled checks for $15—20 more than expected when dealing with utilities and other variable expenses. This will cover miscellaneous fees, prevent time- consuming billing problems, and accrue as a credit. Cancel paper bank and credit card statement delivery. Get bank-issued credit cards for all checking accounts— generally one for business and one for personal—and set the cash advances to $0 to minimize abuse potential. Leave these cards at home, as they are just for emergency overdraft protection. Give a trusted member of your family and/or your accountant power of attorney, which gives that person authority to sign documents (tax filings and checks, for example) in your name. Nothing screws HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013967

up foreign fun faster than having to sign original documents when faxes are unacceptable. > One month out— Speak to the manager of your local post office and have all mail forwarded to a friend, family member, or personal assistant,2who will be paid $100-200 per month to e-mail you brief descriptions of all nonjunk mail each Monday. Get all required and recommended immunizations and vaccinations for your target region. Check the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (www.cdc.gov/travel/). Note that proof of immunizations is sometimes required to pass through foreign customs. Set up a trial account with GoToMyPC or similar remote-access software and take a dry run to ensure that there are no technological glitches. 2 If resellers (or distributors) still send you checks—the fulfillment house should handle customer checks at this point—do one of three things: give the resellers direct bank deposit information (ideal), have the fulfillment house handle these checks (second choice), or have the resellers pay via PayPal or mail checks to one of the people you are trusting with power of attorney (far third). In the last case, give the person with power of attorney deposit slips so he or she can sign or stamp and mail in the checks. It is convenient to become a member of a large bank (Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Washington Mutual, Citibank, etc.) with branches near the person assisting you so that they can drop off the deposits while running other errands. No need to move all accounts to this bank if you don’t want to; just open a single new account that is used solely for these deposits. = Two weeks out— Scan all identification, health insurance, and credit/debit cards into a computer from which you can print multiple copies, several to be left with family members and several to be taken with you in separate bags. E-mail the scanned file to yourself so that you can access it while abroad if you lose the paper copies. If you are an entrepreneur, downgrade your cell phone to the cheapest plan and set up a voicemail greeting that states, “I am currently overseas on business. Please do not leave a voicemail, as I will not be checking it while gone. Please send me an e-mail at__ @__.com if the matter is important. Thank you for your understanding.” Then set up e-mail autoresponders that indicate responses could take up to seven days (or whatever you decide for frequency) due to international business travel. If you are an employee, consider getting a quad-band or GSM-compatible cell phone so that the boss can contact you. Get a BlackBerry only if your boss will be checking to see if you are working via e- mail. Be sure to disable the dead giveaway “Sent from a BlackBerry” signature on outgoing e-mail! Other options include using a Skypeln account that forwards to your foreign cell phone (my preference) or a Vonage IP box that allows you to receive landline calls anywhere in the world via a phone number that begins with your home area code. Find an apartment for your ultimate mini-retirement destination or reserve a hostel or hotel at your starting point for three to four days. Reserving an apartment before you arrive is riskier and will be much more expensive than using the latter three to four days to find an apartment. I recommend hostels for the starting point if possible—not for cost considerations but because the staff and fellow travelers are more knowledgeable and helpful with relocations. Get foreign medical evacuation insurance if needed for peace of mind. This tends to be redundant if HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013968

you are in a first-world country and can buy local insurance to augment your own, which I do, and it is useless if you are a 10-hour flight from civilization. I had evacuation insurance in Panama, as it’s a 2- hour flight from Miami, but I didn’t bother elsewhere. Don’t freak out about this; it’s just as true if you’re in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the US. = One week out— Decide on a schedule for routine batched tasks such as e-mail, online banking, etc. to eliminate excuses for senseless pseudo-work procrasterbating. I suggest Monday mornings for checking e-mail and online banking. The first and third Mondays of the month can be used for checking credit cards and making other online payments such as affiliates. These promises to yourself will be the hardest to keep, so make a commitment now and expect serious withdrawal cravings. Save important documents— including the scan of your identification, insurance, and credit/debit cards —to a small handheld storage device that plugs into a computer USB port. Move all things out of your home or apartment into storage, pack a single small backpack and carry- on bag for the adventure, and move in briefly with a family member or friend. » Two days out— Put remaining automobiles into storage or a friend’s garage. Put fuel stabilizer like Sta-Bil@ in the gas tanks, disconnect the negative leads from batteries to prevent drain, and put the vehicles on jack stands to prevent tire and shock damage. Cancel all auto insurance except for theft coverage. » Upon arrival (assuming you have not booked an apartment in advance) — First morning and afternoon after check-in Take a hop-on-hop-off bus tour of the city followed by a bike tour of potential apartment neighborhoods. First late afternoon or evening Purchase an unlocked@2cell phone with a SIM card that can be recharged with simple prepaid cards. E-mail apartment owners or brokers on Craigslist.com and online versions of local newspapers for viewings over the next two days. Second and third days Find and book an apartment for one month. Don’t commit to more than one month until you’ve slept there. I once prepaid two months only to find that the busiest bus stop downtown was on the other side of my bedroom wall. Move-in day Get settled and purchase local health insurance. Ask hostel owners and other locals what insurance they use. Resolve not to buy souvenirs or other take-home items until two weeks prior to departure. One week later Eliminate all the extra crap you brought but won’t use often. Either give it to someone who needs it more, mail it back to the U.S., or throw it out. » TOOLS AND TRICKS HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013969

Brainstorming Mini-Retirement Locations = Virtual Tourist ( www.virtualtourist.com ) The single largest source of unbiased, user-generated travel content in the world. More than 1,000,000 members contribute tips and warnings for more than 25,000 locations. Each location is covered in 13 separate categories, including Things to Do, Local Customs, Shopping, and Tourist Traps. This is one- stop shopping for most mini-retirements. » Escape Artist ( www.escapeartist.com ) Interested in second passports, starting your own country, Swiss banking, and all the other things I wouldn’t dare put in this book? This site is a fantastic resource. Drop me a note from the Caymans or jail, whichever comes first. Also search “How to Be Jason Bourne” at www.fourhourblog.com. > Outside Magazine Online Free Archives ( http://outside.away.com ) The entire archive of Outside magazine available online for free. From meditation camps to worldwide adrenaline hotspots, dream jobs to Patagonia winter highlights, there are hundreds of articles with beautiful photos to give you the walkabout itch. » GridSkipper: The Urban Travel Guide ( www.gridskipper.com ) For those who love Blade Runner-like settings and exploring the cool nooks and crannies of cities worldwide, this is the site. Itis one of Forbes’s Top 13 Travel sites and is “high-falootin’ and low-brow all in the same breath” (Frommer’s). Translation: Much of the content is not G-rated. If four-letter words or a “world’s sluttiest city” poll bother you, don’t bother visiting this site (or Rio de Janeiro, for that matter). Otherwise, check out the hysterical writing and “$100 a day” info for cities worldwide. =» Lonely Planet: The Thorn Tree ( http://thorntree.lonelyplanet.com ) Discussion forum for global travelers with threads separated by region. » Family Travel Forum ( www.familytravelforum.com ) A comprehensive forum on, you guessed it, family travel. Want to sell your kids for top dollar in the Eastern Bloc? Or save a few dollars and cremate Grannie in Thailand? Then this isn’t the site. But if you have kids and are planning a big trip, this is the place. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013970

» U.S. Department of State Country Profiles (www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/) =» World Travel Watch (www.worldtravelwatch.com) Larry Habegger and James O’Reilly’s weekly online report of global events and odd happenings relevant to travel safety, sorted by topic and geographic region. Concise and a must-see prior to finalizing plans. » U.S. Department of State Worldwide Travel Warnings (http://travel.state.gov) Mini-Retirement Planning and Preparation— Fundamentals = Round-the- World FAQ (includes travel insurance) ( www.perpetualtravel.com/rtw_) This FAQ is a lifesaver. Originally written by Marc Brosius, it has been added to by newsgroup participants for years and now covers nuts and bolts from financial planning to return culture shock and all in between. How long can you afford to be away? Do you need travel insurance? Leave of absence or resignation? This is an around-the-world almanac. = Removing Clutter: 1-800-GOT-JUNK ( www.1800gotjunk.com_), Freecycle ( www.freecycle.org ), and Craigslist ( www.craigslist.org ) I used Craigslist’s “Free” category to get rid of four years of accumulated possessions in less than three hours on a Saturday evening. There were some for-sale items that I also cleared out at 30-40% of original retail. I then hauled off the last remaining items using the tiberfast 1-800-GOT-JUNK paid service. Freecycle is comparable to Craigslist for giving away, and getting, things for free when you’re short on time. Get unattached and you'll make it a habit. I purge every 6—9 months, often including donations to Goodwill (www.goodwill.org), which can do pickups for free with advanced notice. » One-Bag: The Art and Science of Packing Light ( www.onebag.com ) One of PC magazine’s “Top 100 [Can’t Live Without] Sites.” Pack light and experience lightness of being. » U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (www.cdc.gov/travel) Recommended vaccinations and health planning for every nation in the world. Certain countries require proof of inoculations to pass through customs. Get the shots well ahead of time, as some take weeks to order. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013971

> Tax Planning (www.irs.gov/publications/p54/index.html) More good news. Even if you permanently relocate to another country, you will have to pay U.S. taxes as long as you have a U.S. passport! Not to fret—there are some creative legal sidesteps, such as form 2555-EZ, which can provide up to an $85,700 income exemption if you spend at least 330 days of a consecutive 365 days off U.S. soil. This means you have 35 days in a given 12-month period to spend in the U.S. as you like, but no more. That’s part of the reason my 2004 trip extended to 15 months. Get a good accountant and let them do the detail work to keep yourself out of trouble. » U.S.-Sponsored Overseas Schools (www:state.gov/m/a/os) If the idea of pulling your children out of school for a year or two isn’t appealing, stick them in one of more than 190 elementary and secondary schools sponsored by the U.S. Department of State in 135 countries. Kids love home work. > Homeschooling 101 and Quickstart Guide (http://bit.ly/homeschooling101) This subsection of http://homeschooling.about.com/provides a step-by-step process for considering homeschooling options that can be applied to education during extended travel. Children can often return to traditional public or private schools ahead of their classmates. » Home Education Magazine (www.homeedmag.com) Rich collection of resources for homeschoolers, traveling families, and unschoolers. Links include curriculum, virtual support groups, legal resources, and archives. Good reasons to learn the law: Some U‘S. states offer up to $1,600 of funding per year for qualified homeschooling expenditures, as it saves the state money to not educate your child in the public school system. » Universal Currency Converter ( www.xe.com ) Before you get caught up in the excitement and forget that five British pounds does not equal five U.S. dollars, use this to translate local costs into numbers you understand. Try not to have too many “Those coins are each worth four dollars?” moments. » Universal Plug Adapter ( www.franzus.com ) Carrying bulky cables and connectors is irritating—get a Travel Smart all-in-one adapter with surge protection. The size of a pack of cards folded in half, it is the only adapter that ve used everywhere without problems. Note that it is an adapter (helps you plug things in), but it is not a transformer. If the foreign wall outlet has twice as much voltage as in the U'S., your gadgets will self-destruct. Yet another reason to purchase necessities abroad instead of taking them all with you. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013972

= World Electric Guide ( www.kropla.com ) Figure out outlets, voltage, mobile phones, international dialing codes, and all sorts of things related to electric mismatching worldwide. Cheap and Round-the-World Airfare > Orbitz (www.orbitz.com), Kayak (www.kayak.com), and Sidestep (www.sidestep.com) Search 400+ airlines worldwide for each service. Orbitz is my starting point for pricing comparisons, after which I check both Kayak and Sidestep. Sidestep has proven most effective when searching for flights that start and end outside of the U.S. = TravelZoo Top 20 ( http://top20.travelzoo.com /) Moscow for $129 one-way? These last-minute weekly travel specials might be the push you need to pull the trigger. => Priceline ( www.priceline.com ) Start bidding at 50% of the lowest Orbitz fare and move up in $50 increments. » CFares ( www.cfares.com ) Consolidator fares with free and low-cost memberships. I found a round-trip ticket from California to Japan for $500. > 1-800-FLY-EUROPE ( www.1800flyeurope.com ) I used this to get the $300 roundtrip from JFK to London that left two hours later. =» Discount Airlines for Flights within Europe ( www.ryanair.com , www.easyjet.com_) Free Worldwide Housing —Short Term » Global Freeloaders ( www.globalfreeloaders.com ) This online community brings people together to offer you free accommodation all over the world. Save HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013973

money and make new friends while seeing the world from a local’s perspective. » The Couchsurfing Project ( www.couchsurfing.com ) Similar to the above but tends to attract a younger, more party-hearty crowd. » Hospitality Club ( www.hospitalityclub.org ) Meet locals worldwide who can provide free tours or housing through this well-run network of more than 200,000 members in 200+ countries. Free Worldwide Housing —Long Term »Home Exchange International (www.homeexchange.com) This is a home exchange listing and search service with more than 12,000 listings in more than 85 countries. E-mail directly owners of potential homes, put your own home/apartment on the site, and have unlimited access to view listings for one year for a small membership fee. Paid Housing —from Arrival to the Long Haul = Otalo ( www.otalo.com ) Otalo is a search engine for vacation rentals that searches across the Internet’s many different vacation rentals sites and 200,000+ homes. Otalo is like a Kayak.com for vacation rentals. The site scours a variety of other rental search sites and aggregates the results in one easy-to-use search tool. > Hostels.com ( www.hostels.com ) This site isn’t just for youth hostels. I found a nice hotel in downtown Tokyo for $20 per night and have used this site for similar housing in eight countries. Think location and reviews (see HotelChatter next) instead of amenities. Four-star hotels are for binge travelers; this site can offer a real local flavor before you find an apartment or other longer-term housing. = HotelChatter ( www.hotelchatter.com ) Get the real scoop on this daily web journal with detailed and honest reviews of housing worldwide. Updated several times daily, this site offers the stories of frustrated guests and those who have found hidden gems. Online booking is available. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013974

» Craigslist ( www.craigslist.org ) Besides local weekly magazines with housing listings, such as Bild or Zitty (no joke) in Berlin, I have found Craigslist to be the single best starting point for long-term overseas furnished apartments. As of this writing, there are more than 50 countries represented. That said, prices will be 30-70% less in the local magazines—if you have a tight budget, get a hostel employee or other local to help you make a few calls and strike a deal. Ask the local helper not to mention you’re a foreigner until pricing is agreed upon. » Interhome International ( www.interhome.com ) Based in Zurich, more than 20,000 homes for rent in Europe. > Rentvillas.com ( www.rentvillas.com ) Provides unique renting experiences—from cottages and farmhouses to castles—throughout Europe, including France, Italy, Greece, Spain, and Portugal. Computer Remote Access and Backup Tools = GoToMyPC ( www.gotomypc.com This software facilitates quick and easy remote access to your computer’s files, programs, e-mail, and network. It can be used from any web browser or wireless device and works in real time. I have used GoToMyPC religiously for more than five years to access my U.S.-based computers from countries and islands worldwide. This gives me the freedom to leave all computers at home. => WebExPCNow ( http://pcnow.webex.com ) WebEx, the leader in corporate remote access, now offers software that does most of what GoToMyPC offers, including cut and paste between remote computers, local printing from remote computers, file transfers, and more. » DropBox (www.getdropbox.com) and SugarSyne (www.sugarsync.com); then JungleDisk (www.jungledisk.com) and Mozy (www.mozy.com) Both DropBox and SugarSync perform backups and synching of files between multiple computers (home and travel computers, for example). JungleDisk and Mozy—lI use the latter—have fewer features and are more specifically designed for automatic backups to their online storage. Free and Low-Cost Internet (IP) Telephones HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013975

» Skype ( www.skype.com ) Skype is my default for all phone calls. It allows you to call landlines and mobile phones across the globe for an average of 2—5 cents per minute, or connect with other Skype users worldwide for free. For about 40 euros per year, you can get a U.S. number with your home area code and receive calls that forward to a foreign cell phone. This makes your travel invisible. Lounge on the beach in Rio and answer calls to your “office” in California. Nice. Skype Chat, which comes with the service, is also perfect for sharing sensitive log-in and password information with others, as it’s encrypted. » Vonage (www.vonage.com) and Ooma (www.ooma.com) Vonage offers a small adapter for a monthly fee that connects your broadband modem to a normal phone. Take it on your travels and set it up in your apartment to receive calls to a U.S. number. Ooma has no monthly fees and doesn’t require a landline, but it offers similar hardware you can connect to broadband for a local U.S. number anywhere in the world. > VoIPBuster (www.voipbuster.com) and RebTel (www.rebtel.com) Both VoIPBuster and RebTel can provide “alias” numbers. Enter a friend’s overseas number on their sites, and both will give you a local number in your area code that will forward to your friend. VoIPBuster also acts as a cheaper Skype with free calls to more than 20 countries. International Multi-Band and GSM-Compatible Phones =» My World Phone ( www.myworldphone.com ) I’m partial to Nokia phones. Ensure whichever phone you purchase is “unlocked” —that the SIM card can be swapped out in different countries with different providers. = World Electronics USA ( www.worldelectronicsusa.com ) Good explanation of which GSM frequencies and “bands” function in which countries, which will determine which phone you purchase for travel (and perhaps home). Tools for Off-the-Beaten Path » Satellite Phones ( www.satphonestore.com ) If you will be in the mountains of Nepal or on a remote island and want the peace of mind (or headache) of having a phone nearby, these phones work via satellite instead of towers. Iridium has been HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013976

recommended for widest reception (pole to pole), with GlobalStar in second place (three continents). Rent or purchase. = Pocket-size Solar Panels ( www.solio.com ) Satellite phones and other small electronics are of little use (skipping stones, perhaps’) if their batteries die. Solio is about the size of two packs of cards and fans out into small solar panels. I was surprised to find that it charged my cell phone in less than 15 minutes—more than twice as fast as a wall outlet. Adapters are available for almost anything. What to Do Once You Get There— Career Experiments and More » Verge Magazine (see Restricted Reading appendix) > Meet Up ( www.meetup.com ) Search by city and activity to find people who share similar interests all over the world. =» Become a Travel Writer ( www.writtenroad.com ) Get paid to travel the world and record your thoughts? This is a dream job for millions. Get the inside scoop on the travel publishing world from veteran Jen Leo, author of Sand in My Bra and Other Misadventures: Funny Women Write from the Road. This blog was a Frommer’s Budget Travel Top Choice and also features great practical articles about low-tech travel and going gadgetless. » Teach Engrish ( www.eslcafe.com ) Dave’s ESL Café is one of the oldest and most useful resources for teachers, would-be teachers, and learners of English. Features discussion boards and “teachers wanted” job postings worldwide. > Turn Your Brain into Play-Doh ( www.jiwire.com ) Travel the world so you can instant message (IM) with your friends in the U.S. This site lists more than 150,000 hotspots where you can feed your information OCD. Be ashamed if this becomes your default activity. If you’re bored, just remember—it’s your fault. ’ve been there, so I’m not preaching. It happens to the best of us from time to time, but get more creative. » Test a New Career Part- or Full-Time: Working Overseas ( www.workingoverseas.com ) This encyclopedia is an exhaustive menu of options for the globally minded, compiled and updated by HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013977

Jean-Marc Hachey, former international careers editor of Transitions Abroad magazine. = World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms ( www.wwoof.com ) Learn and then teach sustainable organic farming techniques in dozens of countries, including Turkey, New Zealand, Norway, and French Polynesia. Chat and E-mail in a Language You Don’t Know » Google Chat Bots (http://bit.ly/imbot) Use this to chat in real time using almost any language. Instant message (IM) directly from your Gmail e-mail account with anyone in the world. » Nice Translator (www.nicetranslator.com) and Free Translation (www.freetranslation.com) Translate text from English into a dozen languages and vice versa. Surprisingly accurate, though the lost- in-translation 10-20% can get you in trouble. Nice Translator is faster and can be used on the iPhone. Become Fluent in Record Time Language Addicts and Accelerated Learning For all things language related, from detailed how-to articles (how to reactivate forgotten languages, memorize 1,000 words per week, master tones, etc.) to mnemonics and the best electronic shortcuts, click on “language” at www.fourhourblog.com. Learning languages is an addiction of mine and a skill I have taken apart and reassembled to be faster. It is possible to become conversationally fluent in any language in 3-6 months. Find Language Exchange Partners and Materials » LiveMocha ( www.livemocha.com ), EduFire (www.edufire.com), and Smart.fm (http://smart.fm/) I particularly like their BrainSpeed learning game. > About.com ( www.about.com ) Some of the more popular languages have excellent tutorials on About.com: http://italian.about.com HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013978

http://spanish.about.com http://german.about.com http://french.about.com 68. The dollar figures in this chapter are all from a period immediately following President Bush’s reelection in 2004, which correlated to the worst dollar exchange rates of the last 20 years. 69. I refer, of course, to the amazing bike-riding opportunities and famous pastries. 70. Coined by Joel Stein of the LA Times. 71. By all means, go ahead and take a post-office celebratory trip and go nuts for a few weeks. I know I did. Rock on. Ibiza and glow sticks here I come. Have some absinthe and drink lots of water. Following that, sit down and plan an introspective mini-retirement. 72. Muses are low maintenance but often expensive in one or both of two tactical areas: manufacturing and advertising. Shop for providers of both that are willing to accept credit cards as payment, and negotiate this up front if necessary by saying, “Rather than trying to negotiate you down on pricing, I just ask that you accept payment by credit card. If you can do that, we’ll choose you over Competitor X.” This is yet another example of a “firm offer,” and not a question, that puts you in a stronger negotiating position. For a detailed explanation of how I multiply points for travel using concepts like “piggybacking” and “recycling,” search for both terms on www.fourhourblog.com. 73. To see a video of how I pack to travel the world with less than 10 pounds, click on “travel” at www .fourhourblog.com. 74. Founder of www.nileproject.com. 75. http://www.usc.edu/hsc/dental/opfs/SC/indexSC html. 76. Brazilian shantytowns. See the movie City of God (Cidade de Deus) to get a taste of how fun these are. 77. This is a serious step and should not be taken with those you do not trust. In this case, it helps because your accountant can then sign tax documents or checks in your name instead of consuming hours and days of your time with faxes, scanners, and expensive international FedEx’ing of documents. 78. There are also services like www.earthclassmail.com, which will receive, scan, and e-mail all of your non-junk mail to you as PDFs. 79. This would be used if you leave your computer at home or in someone else’s home while traveling. This step can be skipped if you bring your computer, but that is like a recovering heroin addict bringing a bag of opium to rehab. Don’t tempt yourself to kill time instead of rediscovering it. 80. “Unlocked” means that it is recharged with prepaid cards instead of being on a monthly payment plan with a single carrier such as O2 or Vodafone. This also means that the same phone can be used with carriers in other countries (assuming the frequency is the same) with a simple switch of the SIM memory card for $10-30 U.S. in most cases. Some U.S.-compatible quad-band phones can use SIM cards. 15) Filling the Void HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013979

» ADDING LIFE AFTER SUBTRACTING WORK To be engrossed by something outside ourselves is a powerful antidote for the rational mind, the mind that so frequently has its head up its own ass. — ANNE LAMOTT, Bird by Bird There is not enough time to do all the nothing we want to do. —BILL WATTERSON, creator of the Calvin and Hobbes cartoon strip KING’S CROSS , LONDON I stumbled into the deli across the cobblestone street and ordered a prosciutto sandwich. It was 10:33 A.M. now, the fifth time I’d checked the time, and the twentieth time I’d asked myself, “What the & %$# am I going to do today?” The best answer I had come up with so far was: get a sandwich. Thirty minutes earlier, I had woken up without an alarm clock for the first time in four years, fresh off arriving from JFK the night before. I had soooo been looking forward to it: awakening to musical birdsong outside, sitting up in bed with a smile, smelling the aroma of freshly brewed coffee, and stretching out overhead like a cat in the shade of a Spanish villa. Magnificent. It turned out more like this: bolt upright as if blasted with a foghorn, grab clock, curse, jump out of bed in underwear to check e-mail, remember that I was forbidden to do so, curse again, look for my host and former classmate, realize that he was off to work like the rest of the world, and proceed to have a panic attack. I spent the rest of the day in a haze, wandering from museum to botanical garden to museum as if on rinse and repeat, avoiding Internet cafés with some vague sense of guilt. I needed a to-do list to feel productive and so put down things like “eat dinner.” This was going to be a lot harder than I had thought. Postpartum Depression: It’s Normal Man is so made that he can only find relaxation from one kind of labor by taking up another. — ANATOLE FRANCE, author of The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard I’ve Got More Money and Time Than I Ever Dreamed Possible ... Why Am I Depressed? It’s a good question with a good answer. Just be glad you’re figuring this out now and not at the end of life! The retired and ultrarich are often unfulfilled and neurotic for the same reason: too much idle time. But wait a second ... Isn’t more time what we’re after? Isn’t that what this book is all about? No, not at all. Too much free time is no more than fertilizer for self-doubt and assorted mental tail-chasing. Subtracting the bad does not create the good. It leaves a vacuum. Decreasing income-driven work isn’t HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013980

the end goal. Living more—and becoming more—is. In the beginning, the external fantasies will be enough, and there is nothing wrong with this. I cannot overemphasize the importance of this period. Go nuts and live your dreams. This is not superficial or selfish. It is critical to stop repressing yourself and get out of the postponement habit. Let’s suppose you decide to dip your toe in dreams like relocating to the Caribbean for island-hopping or taking a safari in the Serengeti. It will be wonderful and unforgettable, and you should do it. There will come a time, however—be it three weeks or three years later—when you won’t be able to drink another pifia colada or photograph another damn red-assed baboon. Self-criticism and existential panic attacks start around this time. But This Is What I Always Wanted! How Can I Be Bored?! Don’t freak out and fuel the fire. This is normal among all high-performers who downshift after working hard for a long time. The smarter and more goal-oriented you are, the tougher these growing pains will be. Learning to replace the perception of time famine with appreciation of time abundance is like going from triple espressos to decaf. But there’s more! Retirees get depressed for a second reason, and you will too: social isolation. Offices are good for some things: free bad coffee and complaining thereof, gossip and commiserating, stupid video clips via e-mail with even stupider comments, and meetings that accomplish nothing but kill a few hours with a few laughs. The job itself might be a dead end, but it’s the web of human interactions —the social environment—that keeps us there. Once liberated, this automatic tribal unit disappears, which makes the voices in your head louder. Don’t be afraid of the existential or social challenges. Freedom is like a new sport. In the beginning, the sheer newness of it is exciting enough to keep things interesting at all times. Once you have learned the basics, though, it becomes clear that to be even a half-decent player requires some serious practice. Don’t fret. The greatest rewards are to come, and you’re 10 feet from the finish line. Frustrations and Doubts: You’re Not Alone People say that what we are seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think this is what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive. — JOSEPH CAMPBELL, The Power of Myth O.. you eliminate the 9-5 and the rubber hits the road, it’s not all roses and white-sand bliss, though much of it can be. Without the distraction of deadlines and co-workers, the big questions (such as “What does it all mean?”) become harder to fend off for a later time. In a sea of infinite options, decisions also become harder— What the hell should I do with my life? It’s like senior year in college all over again. Like all innovators ahead of the curve, you will have frightening moments of doubt. Once past the kid- in-a-candy-store phase, the comparative impulse will creep in. The rest of the world will continue with its 9-5 grind, and you’ll begin to question your decision to step off the treadmill. Common doubts and self-flagellation include the following: 1. AmfTreally doing this to be more free and lead a better life, or am I just lazy? HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013981

Did I quit the rat race because it’s bad, or just because I couldn’t hack it? Did I just cop out? 3. Is this as good as it gets? Perhaps I was better off when I was following orders and ignorant of the possibilities. It was easier at least. Am I really successful or just kidding myself? 5. Have I lowered my standards to make myself a winner? Are my friends, who are now making twice as much as three years ago, really on the right track? 6. Why amI not happy’? I can do anything and I’m still not happy. Do I even deserve it? Most of this can be overcome as soon as we recognize it for what it is: outdated comparisons using the more-is-better and money-as-success mind-sets that got us into trouble to begin with. Even so, there is a more profound observation to be made. These doubts invade the mind when nothing else fills it. Think of a time when you felt 100% alive and undistracted—in the zone. Chances are that it was when you were completely focused in the moment on something external: someone or something else. Sports and sex are two great examples. Lacking an external focus, the mind turns inward on itself and creates problems to solve, even if the problems are undefined or unimportant. If you find a focus, an ambitious goal that seems impossible and forces you to grow,@! these doubts disappear. In the process of searching for a new focus, it is almost inevitable that the “big” questions will creep in. There is pressure from pseudo-philosophers everywhere to cast aside the impertinent and answer the eternal. Two popular examples are “What is the meaning of life?” and “What is the point of it all?” There are many more, ranging from the introspective to the ontological, but I have one answer for almost all of them—I don’t answer them at all. I’m no nihilist. In fact, ?ve spent more than a decade investigating the mind and concept of meaning, a quest that has taken me from the neuroscience laboratories of top universities to the halls of religious institutions worldwide. The conclusion after it all is surprising. I am 100% convinced that most big questions we feel compelled to face—handed down through centuries of overthinking and mistranslation—use terms so undefined as to make attempting to answer them a complete waste of time.@2 This isn’t depressing. It’s liberating. Consider the question of questions: What is the meaning of life? If pressed, I have but one response: It is the characteristic state or condition of a living organism. “But that’s just a definition,” the questioner will retort, “that’s not what I mean at all.” What do you mean, then? Until the question is clear—each term in it defined—there is no point in answering it. The “meaning” of “life” question is unanswerable without further elaboration. Before spending time on a stress-inducing question, big or otherwise, ensure that the answer is “yes” to the following two questions: 1. Have I decided on a single meaning for each term in this question? 2. Can an answer to this question be acted upon to improve things’? “What is the meaning of life?” fails the first and thus the second. Questions about things beyond your sphere of influence like “What if the train is late tomorrow’?” fail the second and should thus be ignored. These are not worthwhile questions. If you can’t define it or act upon it, forget it. If you take just this point from this book, it will put you in the top 1% of performers in the world and keep most philosophical distress out of your life. Sharpening your logical and practical mental toolbox is not being an atheist or unspiritual. It’s not being crass and it’s not being superficial. It’s being smart and putting your effort where it can make the HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013982

biggest difference for yourself and others. The Point of It All: Drumroll, Please What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task. — VIKTOR E. FRANKL, Holocaust survivor; author of Man’s Search for Meaning I believe that life exists to be enjoyed and that the most important thing is to feel good about yourself. Each person will have his or her own vehicles for both, and those vehicles will change over time. For some, the answer will be working with orphans, and for others, it will be composing music. I have a personal answer to both—to love, be loved, and never stop learning—but I don’t expect that to be universal. Some criticize a focus on self-love and enjoyment as selfish or hedonistic, but it’s neither. Enjoying life and helping others—or feeling good about yourself and increasing the greater good—are no more mutually exclusive than being agnostic and leading a moral life. One does not preclude the other. Let’s assume we agree on this. It still leaves the question, “What can I do with my time to enjoy life and feel good about myself?” I can’t offer a single answer that will fit all people, but, based on the dozens of fulfilled NR [ve interviewed, there are two components that are fundamental: continual learning and service. Learning Unlimited: Sharpening the Saw Americans who travel abroad for the first time are often shocked to discover that, despite all the progress that has been made in the last 30 years, many foreign people still speak in foreign languages. — DAVE BARRY T. live is to learn. I see no other option. This is why I’ve felt compelled to quit or be fired from jobs within the first six months or so. The learning curve flattens out and I get bored. Though you can upgrade your brain domestically, traveling and relocating provides unique conditions that make progress much faster. The different surroundings act as a counterpoint and mirror for your own prejudices, making weaknesses that much easier to fix. I rarely travel somewhere without deciding first how [Il obsess on a specific skill. Here are a few examples: e » Connemara, Ireland: Gaelic Irish, Irish flute, and hurling, the fastest field sport in the world (imagine a mix of lacrosse and rugby played with axe handles) HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013983

e » Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: Brazilian Portuguese and Brazilian jujitsu e » Berlin, Germany: German and locking (a form of upright break- dancing) I tend to focus on language acquisition and one kinesthetic skill, sometimes finding the latter after landing overseas. The most successful serial vagabonds tend to blend the mental and the physical. Notice that I often transport a skill I practice domestically —martial arts—to other countries where they are also practiced. Instant social life and camaraderie. It need not be a competitive sport—it could be hiking, chess, or almost anything that keeps your nose out of a textbook and you out of your apartment. Sports just happen to be excellent for avoiding foreign-language stage fright and developing lasting friendships while still sounding like Tarzan. Language learning deserves special mention. It is, bar none, the best thing you can do to hone clear thinking. Quite aside from the fact that it is impossible to understand a culture without understanding its language, acquiring a new language makes you aware of your own language: your own thoughts. The benefits of becoming fluent in a foreign tongue are as underestimated as the difficulty is overestimated. Thousands of theoretical linguists will disagree, but I know from research and personal experimentation with more than a dozen languages that (1) adults can learn languages much faster than children@? when constant 9-5 work is removed and that (2) it is possible to become conversationally fluent in any language in six months or less. At four hours per day, six months can be whittled down to less than three months. It is beyond the scope of this book to explain applied linguistics and the 80/20 of language learning, but resources and complete how-to guides can be found under “language” at www.fourhourblog.com. I learned six languages after failing Spanish in high school, and you can do the same with the right tools. Gain a language and you gain a second lens through which to question and understand the world. Cursing at people when you go home is fun, too. Don’t miss the chance to double your life experience. Service for the Right Reasons: To Save the Whales, or Kill Them and Feed the Children? Morality is simply the attitude we adopt toward people we personally dislike. — OSCAR WILDE O,. would expect me to mention service in this chapter, and here it is. Like all before it, the twist is a bit different. Service to me is simple: doing something that improves life besides your own. This is not the same as philanthropy. Philanthropy is the altruistic concern for the well-being of mankind—human life. Human life has long been focused on the exclusion of the environment and the rest of the food chain, hence our current race to imminent extinction. Serves us right. The world does not exist solely for the betterment and multiplication of mankind. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013984

Before I start chaining myself to trees and saving the dart frogs, though, I should take my own advice: Do not become a cause snob. How can you help starving children in Africa when there are starving children in Los Angeles? How can you save the whales when homeless people are freezing to death? How does doing volunteer research on coral destruction help those people who need help now? Children, please. Everything out there needs help, so don’t get baited into “my cause can beat up your cause” arguments with no right answer. There are no qualitative or quantitative comparisons that make sense. The truth is this: Those thousands of lives you save could contribute to a famine that kills millions, or that one bush in Bolivia that you protect could hold the cure for cancer. The downstream effects are unknown. Do your best and hope for the best. If you’re improving the world—however you define that — consider your job well done. Service isn’t limited to saving lives or the environment either. It can also improve life. If you are a musician and put a smile on the faces of thousands or millions, I view that as service. If you are a mentor and change the life of one child for the better, the world has been improved. Improving the quality of life in the world is in no fashion inferior to adding more lives. Service is an attitude. Find the cause or vehicle that interests you most and make no apologies. => Q&A: QUESTIONS AND ACTIONS Adults are always asking kids what they want to be when they grow up because they are looking for ideas. — PAULA POUNDSTONE The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green earth, dwelling deeply in the present moment and feeling truly alive. — THICH NHAT HANH B ut I can’t just travel, learn languages, or fight for one cause for the rest of my life! Of course you can’t. That’s not my suggestion at all. These are just good “life hubs”—starting points that lead to opportunities and experiences that otherwise wouldn’t be found. There is no right answer to the question “What should I do with my life?” Forget “should” altogether. The next step—and that’s all it is—is pursuing something, it matters little what, that seems fun or rewarding. Don’t be in a rush to jump into a full-time long-term commitment. Take time to find something that calls to you, not just the first acceptable form of surrogate work. That calling will, in turn, lead you to something else. Here is a good sequence for getting started that dozens of NR have used with success. 1. Revisit ground zero: Do nothing. Before we can escape the goblins of the mind, we need to face them. Principal among them is speed addiction. It is hard to recalibrate your internal clock without taking a break from constant overstimulation. Travel and the impulse to see a million things can exacerbate this. Slowing down doesn’t mean accomplishing less; it means cutting out counterproductive distractions and the perception of being rushed. Consider attending a short silence retreat of 3-7 days during which HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013985

all media and speaking is prohibited. Learn to turn down the static of the mind so you can appreciate more before doing more: = The Art of Living Foundation (Course IT)— International—( www.artofliving.org ) » Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California ( http://www.spiritrock.org ) > Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Massachusetts ( http://www.kripalu.org ) » Sky Lake Lodge in New York ( http://www.sky-lake.org ) 2. Make an anonymous donation to the service organization of your choice. This helps to get the juices flowing and disassociate feeling good about service with getting credit for it. It feels even better when it’s pure. Here are some good sites to get started: »Charity Navigator (www.charitynavigator.org) This independent service ranks more than 5,000 charities using criteria you select. Create a personalized page of favorites and compare them side by side, all free of charge. »Firstgiving (www.firstgiving.com) Firstgiving.com allows you to create an online fund-raising page. Donations can be made through your personal URL. I have used Firstgiving in coordination with a nonprofit called Room to Read to build schools in both Nepal and Vietnam, with more countries pending: www _firstgiving.com/timferriss and www .firstgiving.com/timferriss2. If you specifically want to help animals, for example, you can click on a related link and access websites for hundreds of different animal charities, and then decide which one you want to donate to. The UK version of the website is http://www.justgiving.com. »Network for Good (www.networkforgood.org) Visitors to this website will find links to charities in need of donations as well as opportunities to do volunteer work. They can also set up an automated credit card donation online. 3. Take a learning mini-retirement in combination with local volunteering. Take a mini-retirement—six months or more if possible—to focus on learning and serving. The longer duration will permit a language focus, which in turn enables more meaningful interaction and contribution through volunteering. For the duration of this trip, note self-criticisms and negative self-talk in a journal. Whenever upset or anxious, ask “why” at least three times and put the answers down on paper. Describing these doubts in writing reduces their impact twofold. First, it’s often the ambiguous nature of self-doubt that hurts most. Defining and exploring it in writing —just as with forcing colleagues to e-mail—demands clarity of thought, after which most concerns are found to be baseless. Second, recording these concerns seems to somehow remove them from your head. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013986

But where to go and what to do? There is no one right answer to either. Use the following questions and resources to brainstorm: What makes you most angry about the state of the world? What are you most afraid of for the next generation, whether you have children or not? What makes you happiest in your life? How can you help others have the same? There is no need to limit yourself to one location. Remember Robin, who traveled through South America for a year with her husband and seven-year-old son? The three of them spent one to two months doing volunteer work in each location, including building wheelchairs in Banos, Ecuador, rehabilitating exotic animals in the Bolivian rain forest, and shepherding leather-back sea turtles in Suriname. How about doing archaeological excavation in Jordan or tsunami relief on the islands of Thailand? These are just two of the dozens of foreign relocation and volunteering case studies in each issue of Verge Magazine (www.vergemagazine.com). Reader-tested resources include: Hands on Disaster Response: www.hodr.org Project Hope: www.projecthope.org Relief International: www.ri.org International Relief Teams: www.irteams.org Airline Ambassadors International: www.airlineamb.org Ambassadors for Children: www.ambassadorsforchildren.org Relief Riders International: www.reliefridersinternational.com Habitat for Humanity Global Village Program: www.habitat.org Planeta: Global Listings for Practical Ecotourism: www.planeta.com 4. Revisit and reset dreamlines. Following the mini-retirement, revisit the dreamlines set in Definition and reset them as needed. The following questions will help: What are you good at? What could you be the best at? What makes you happy? What excites you? What makes you feel accomplished and good about yourself? What are you most proud of having accomplished in your life’? Can you repeat this or further develop it? HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013987

What do you enjoy sharing or experiencing with other people? 5. Based on the outcomes of steps 1—4, consider testing new part- or full-time vocations. Full-time work isn’t bad if it’s what you’d rather be doing. This is where we distinguish “work” from a “vocation.” If you have created a muse or cut your hours down to next to nothing, consider testing a part-time or full-time vocation: a true calling or dream occupation. This is what I did with this book. I can now tell people [’m a writer rather than giving them the two-hour drug dealer explanation. What did you dream of being when you were a kid? Perhaps it’s time to sign up for Space Camp or intern as an assistant to a marine biologist. Recapturing the excitement of childhood isn’t impossible. In fact, it’s required. There are no more chains —or excuses—to hold you back. 81. Abraham Maslow, the American psychologist famous for proposing “Mas-low’s Hierarchy of Needs,” would term this goal a “peak experience.” 82. There is a place for koans and rhetorical meditative questions, but these tools are optional and outside the scope of this book. Most questions without answers are just poorly worded. 83. Ellen Bialystok and Kenji Hakuta, In Other Words: The Science and Psychology of Second- Language Acquisition (Basic Books, 1995). 16) The Top 13 New Rich Mistakes If you don’t make mistakes, you’re not working on hard enough problems. And that’s a big mistake. —FRANK WILCZEK, 2004 Nobel Prize winner in physics Ho imparato che niente e impossibile, e anche che quasi niente e facile ... (I’ve learned that nothing is impossible, and that almost nothing is easy ...) —ARTICOLO 31 (Italian rap group), “Un Urlo” Msstane are the name of the game in lifestyle design. It requires fighting impulse after impulse from the old world of retirement-based life deferral. Here are the slipups you will make. Don’t get frustrated. It’s all part of the process. 1. Losing sight of dreams and falling into work for work’s sake (W4W) Please reread the introduction and next chapter of this book whenever you feel yourself falling into this trap. Everyone does it, but many get stuck and never get out. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013988

2. Micromanaging and e-mailing to fill time Set the responsibilities, problem scenarios and rules, and limits of autonomous decision-making —then stop, for the sanity of everyone involved. 3. Handling problems your outsourcers or co-workers can handle 4. Helping outsourcers or co-workers with the same problem more than once, or with noncrisis problems Give them if-then rules for solving all but the largest problems. Give them the freedom to act without your input, set the limits in writing, and then emphasize in writing that you will not respond to help with problems that are covered by these rules. In my particular case, all outsourcers have at their discretion the ability to fix any problem that will cost less than $400. At the end of each month or quarter, depending on the outsourcer, I review how their decisions have affected profit and adjust the rules accordingly, often adding new rules based on their good decisions and creative solutions. 5. Chasing customers, particularly unqualified or international prospects, when you have sufficient cash flow to finance your nonfinancial pursuits 6. Answering e-mail that will not result in a sale or that can be answered by a FAQ or auto- responder For a good example of an auto-responder that directs people to the appropriate information and outsourcers, [email protected]. 7. Working where you live, sleep, or should relax Separate your environments—designate a single space for work and solely work—or you will never be able to escape it 84 8. Not performing a thorough 80/20 analysis every two to four weeks for your business and personal life 9. Striving for endless perfection rather than great or simply good enough, whether in your personal or professional life Recognize that this is often just another W4W excuse. Most endeavors are like learning to speak a foreign language: to be correct 95% of the time requires six months of concentrated effort, whereas to be correct 98% of the time requires 20-30 years. Focus on great for a few things and good enough for the rest. Perfection is a good ideal and direction to have, but recognize it for what it is: an impossible destination. 10. Blowing minutiae and small problems out of proportion as an excuse to work 11. Making non-time-sensitive issues urgent in order to justify work How many times do I have to say it? Focus on life outside of your bank accounts, as scary as that void can be in the initial stages. If you cannot find meaning in your life, it is your responsibility as a human being to create it, whether that is fulfilling dreams or finding work that gives you purpose and self-worth—ideally a combination of both. 12. Viewing one product, job, or project as the end-all and be-all of your existence Life is too short to waste, but it is also too long to be a pessimist or nihilist. Whatever you’re doing now is just a stepping-stone to the next project or adventure. Any rut you get into is one you can get yourself out of. Doubts are no more than a signal for action of some type. When in doubt or overwhelmed, take a break and 80/20 both business and personal activities and relationships. 13. Ignoring the social rewards of life Surround yourself with smiling, positive people who have absolutely nothing to do with work. Create your muses alone if you must, but do not live your life alone. Happiness shared in the form of friendships and love is happiness multiplied. 84. To avoid the living room and coffee shop as offices, consider using a social “co-working” space on occasion: http://coworking .pbwiki.com. The Last Chapter HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013989

»- AN E-MAIL YOU NEED TO READ There is nothing the busy man is less busied with than living; there is nothing harder to learn. — SENECA For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every moming and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something ... almost everything—all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. —STEVE JOBS, college dropout and CEO of Apple Computer, Stanford University Commencement, 200585 L you’re confused about life, you’re not alone. There are almost seven billion of us. This isn’t a problem, of course, once you realize that life is neither a problem to be solved nor a game to be won. If you are too intent on making the pieces of a nonexistent puzzle fit, you miss out on all the real fun. The heaviness of success-chasing can be replaced with a serendipitous lightness when you recognize that the only rules and limits are those we set for ourselves. So be bold and don’t worry about what people think. They don’t do it that often anyway. Two years ago, I was forwarded the following poem—originally written by child psychologist David L. Weatherford—by a close friend. He quit his own deferred-life plan after reading it, and I hope you will do the same. Here it is. SLOW DANCE Have you ever watched kids On a merry-go-round? Or listened to the rain Slapping on the ground? Ever followed a butterfly’s erratic flight? Or gazed at the sun into the fading night? You better slow down. Don’t dance so fast. Time is short. The music won’t last. Do you run through each day On the fly? HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013990

When you ask: How are you? Do you hear the reply? When the day is done, do you lie in your bed With the next hundred chores Running through your head? You’d better slow down. Don’t dance so fast. Time is short. The music won’t last. Ever told your child, We'll do it tomorrow? And in your haste, Not see his sorrow? Ever lost touch, Let a good friendship die Cause you never had time To call and say, “Hi”? You’d better slow down. Don’t dance so fast. Time is short. The music won’t last. When you run so fast to get somewhere You miss half the fun of getting there. When you worry and hurry through your day, It is like an unopened gift thrown away. Life is not a race. Do take it slower. Hear the music Before the song is over. 85. http://news-service .stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505 html. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013991

Last but Not Least > THE BEST OF THE BLOG The Art of Letting Bad Things Happen [AFTER 3 WEEKS OFF OF THE BLOG] Loong time no see! I just landed back in California from a long overdue mini-retirement through London, Scotland, Sardinia, the Slovak Republic, Austria, Amsterdam, and Japan. Some unpleasant surprises awaited me when I checked in on the evil e-mail inbox. Why? I let them happen. I always do. Here are just a few of the goodies that awaited me this time: e » One of our fulfillment companies had been shut down due to the CEO’s death, causing a 20%+ loss in monthly orders and requiring an emergency shift of all web design and order processing e» Missed radio and magazine appearances and upset would-be interviewers e » More than a dozen lost joint-venture partnership opportunities It’s not that I go out of my way to irritate people—not at all—but I recognize one critical fact: Oftentimes, in order to do the big things, you have to let the small bad things happen. This is a skill we want to cultivate. What did I get in exchange for temporarily putting on blinders and taking a few glancing blows? e » I followed the Rugby World Cup in Europe and watched the New Zealand All Blacks live, a dream I’ve had for the last five years. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013992

e » I shot every gun I’ve ever dreamed of firing since brainwashing myself with Commando . Bless the Slovak Republic and their paramilitaries. e » I filmed a television series pilot in Japan, a lifelong dream and the most fun I’ve had in months, if not years. e» I met with my Japanese publisher, Seishisha, and had media interviews in Tokyo, where the 4HWW is now #1 in several of the largest chains. ¢ » I took a complete 10-day media fast and felt like I’d had a two- year vacation from computers. ¢ » I attended the Tokyo International Film Festival and hung out with one of my heroes, the producer of the Planet Earth television series. Once you realize that you can turn off the noise without the world ending, you’re liberated in a way that few people ever know. Just remember: If you don’t have attention, you don’t have time. Did I have time to check e-mail and voicemail? Sure. It might take 10 minutes. Did I have the attention to risk fishing for crises in those 10 minutes? Not at all. As tempting as it is to “just check e-mail for one minute,” I didn’t do it. I know from experience that any problem found in the inbox will linger in the brain for hours or days after you shut down the computer, rendering “free time” useless with preoccupation. It’s the worst of states, where you experience neither relaxation nor productivity. Be focused on work or focused on something else, never in-between. Time without attention is worthless, so value attention over time. Here are a few questions that can help you pop on the productivity blinders and put things in perspective. Even when you’re not traveling the world, develop the habit of letting small bad things happen. If you don’t, you’ll never find time for the life-changing big things, whether important tasks or true peak experiences. If you do force the time but puncture it with distractions, you won’t have the attention to appreciate it. e » What is the one goal, if completed, that could change everything’? e > What is the most urgent thing right now that you feel you “must” HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013993

or “should” do? e » Can you let the urgent “fail”—even for a day—to get to the next milestone for your potential life-changing tasks? e » What’s been on your to-do list the longest? Start it first thing in the morning and don’t allow interruptions or lunch until you finish. Will “bad” things happen? Small problems will crop up, yes. A few people will complain and quickly get over it. BUT, the bigger picture items you complete will let you see these for what they are— minutiae and repairable hiccups. Make this trade a habit. Let the small bad things happen and make the big good things happen. — OCTOBER 25, 2007 Things I’ve Loved and Learned in 2008 Dos was one of the most exciting years of my life. I did more dealmaking and met more people than in the last five years combined. This produced many surprise insights about business and human nature, especially as I uncovered dozens of my own false assumptions. Here are some of the things I learned and loved in 2008. Favorite reads of 2008: Zorba the Greek and Seneca: Letters from a Stoic. These are two of the most readable books of practical philosophies ve ever had the fortune to encounter. If you have to choose one, get Zorba, but Lucius Seneca will take you further. Both are fast reads of 2-3 evenings. Don’t accept large or costly favors from strangers. This karmic debt will come back to haunt you. If you can’t pass it up, immediately return to karmic neutrality with a gift of your choosing. Repay it before they set the terms for you. Exceptions: tiber-successful mentors who are making introductions and not laboring on your behalf. You don’t have to recoup losses the same way you lose them. I own a home in San Jose but moved almost 12 months ago. It’s been empty since, and I’m paying a large mortgage each month. The best part? I don’t care. But this wasn’t always the case. For many months, I felt demoralized as others pressured me to rent it, emphasizing how I was just flushing money away otherwise. Then I realized: You don’t have to make money back the same way you lose it. If you lose $1,000 at the blackjack table, should you try and recoup it there? Of course not. I don’t want to deal with renters, even with a property management company. The solution: Leave the house alone, use it on occasion, and just create incoming revenue elsewhere that would cover the cost of the mortgage through consulting, publishing, etc. One of the most universal causes of self-doubt and depression: trying to impress people you don’t like. Stressing to impress is fine, but do it for the right people—those you want to emulate. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013994

Slow meals = life. From Daniel Gilbert of Harvard to Martin Seligman of Princeton, the “happiness” (self-reported well-being) researchers seem to agree on one thing: Mealtime with friends and loved ones is a direct predictor of well-being. Have at least one 2-to-3-hour dinner and/or drinks per week—yes, 2— 3 hours—with those who make you smile and feel good. I find the afterglow effect to be greatest and longest with groups of five or more. Two times that are conducive to this: Thursday dinners or after- dinner drinks and Sunday brunches. Adversity doesn’t build character; it reveals it. Related: Money doesn’t change you; it reveals who you are when you no longer have to be nice. It doesn’t matter how many people don’t get it. What matters is how many people do. If you have a strong informed opinion, don’t keep it to yourself. Try to help people and make the world a better place. If you strive to do anything remotely interesting, just expect a small percentage of the population to always find a way to take it personally. F*ck ’em. There are no statues erected to critics. Related: You’re never as bad as they say you are. My agent used to send me every blog or media hit for The 4-Hour Workweek. Eight weeks after publication, I asked him to only forward me positive mentions in major media or factual inaccuracies I needed to respond to. An important correlate: You’re never as good as they say you are, either. It’s not helpful to get a big head or get depressed. The former makes you careless and the latter makes you lethargic. I wanted to have untainted optimism but remain hungry. Speaking of hungry ... Eat a high-protein breakfast within 30 minutes of waking and go for a 10-to-20-minute walk outside afterward, ideally bouncing a handball or tennis ball. This one habit is better than a handful of Prozac in the morning. (Suggested reading: The 3-Minute Slow-Carb Breakfast, How to “Peel” Hardboiled Eggs Without Peeling on www.fourhourblog.com.) I dislike losing money about 50x more than I like making it. Why 50X? Logging time as an experiment, I concluded that I often spend at least 50 x more time to prevent a hypothetical unit of $100 from being lost vs. earned. The hysterical part is that, even after becoming aware of this bias, it’s hard to prevent the latter response. Therefore, I manipulate the environmental causes of poor responses instead of depending on error-prone self- discipline. I should not invest in public stocks where I cannot influence outcomes. Once realizing that almost no one can predict risk tolerance and response to losses, I moved all of my investments into fixed-income and cashlike instruments in July 2008 for this reason, setting aside 10% of pretax income for angel investments where I can contribute significant UI/design, PR, and corporate partnership help. (Suggested reading: Rethinking Investing —Part 1, Rethinking Investing —Part 2 on www.fourhourblog.com.) A good question to revisit whenever overwhelmed: Are you having a breakdown or a breakthrough? Rehearse poverty regularly—restrict even moderate expenses for 1-2 weeks and give away 20%+ of minimally used clothing —so you can think big and take “risks” without fear (Seneca). A mindset of scarcity (which breeds jealousy and unethical behavior) is due to a disdain for those things easily obtained (Seneca). A small cup of black Kenyan AA coffee with cinnamon on top, no milk or sweeteners. It’s usually better to keep old resolutions than to make new ones. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_013995