Construction plan: 1). Write in your journal exactly where you'd like to be in 5 year, and then in big bold letters write, "I COMMIT TO DOING WHAT IS REQUIRED OF ME TO ACCOMPLISH MY GOALS"

1). Keep it simple

2). In constructing your plan, you are going to begin working you backward from a long-term plan to a daily plan, your "to-do today" list. With this you'll not only know exactly what you want to accomplish, but you'll know exactly how you are going to go about getting it.

Your Five Year Plan Your Three Year Plan Your One Year Commitment Your Next 90 Days Your Weekly Method of Operation Your Daily Method of Operation

Your One Year Commitment: Think of this for a moment, can you imagine Jerry Yang, Co-founder, Yahoo, starting Yahoo and saying, and saying, "I'm going to give this 30 days"? Absolutely Not!

Yet, many take that non-committal attitude toward their goals and financial future. If you are going to to achieve your life's goals and financial freedom marketing on Internet, you are going to need to commit to working your plan for at least one year.

So, since achieving your 5 year goal is dependent upon achieving your 1 year goal, realistically you are going to have to commit to you success for one year. Whatever your long term goal is, example: to be a Real Estate Developer, then realistically one-year is what it will take to get your education and expertise in that area and your business off ground. Here are some of what you can expect in one year: * You'll make money * You'll make mistakes * You'll develop new relationships * You'll be doing all that it takes to fulfill you plan.

Your Five Year Plan: Most of us cannot wait. Five years may seem like a very long time, but if you think about it, what were you doing last five years? Did they seem to have just whizzed by? Doesn't seem that long, does it? Five years is a good time-frame for achieving one's long term goals. Some of you will do it much faster and some will do it slower, while some will not do it at all. You are going to accomplish this goal one step-at-a-time.

Your accomplishment of your goals, will all depend on each persons level of commitment.

Your Daily Plan: Here you need to list everything that should be done. Once you have everything listed, look at each activity and ask this question:

Priority #1: I must-do activity Ask your self question, how critical is accomplishing this task to meeting my one year goal? Priority #2: I should-do activity Ask yourself question, is this something I should do that is of benefit to me in achieving my one year goal?

Priority #3: I like-doing activity Ask yourself question, be honest here, I accomplished things that I must and should do, so that I am now able to do things I like to do??

If your answer is no, them you'll need to cut your time from doing things you like to do in order to do things you MUST do. You will need to do whatever it will take to get priorities 1 and 2 accomplished.

From this you will daily develop a To Do priority list. The accomplishment of this daily list will be foundation of your success.

The kids are screaming, you've already worked 8 hours plus 2 hours overtime with a 1 hour commute. How do you find time you ask?? Make It! It's called sacrifice. Commitment. It is Prioritizing!

Somehow we always find time to do things that are REALLY, REALLY important to us. If we want it great enough, we will create time if we have to.

Now tell me, would such a sacrifice be worth it, in order to enjoy Freedom of time, lifestyle and finances in as little 3-5 years??

Try it! You just may be surprised.

But here is an 'option' I might use because I'm a fan of first-class flamboyancy. I would probably purchase mid-line PC's (which I could write-off and later give away as gifts to my employees or customers) and install a monitor and mouse on each stores' counter, proudly displaying new MyCleaner website. Invite our customers to surf site. They will receive a flyer anyway on their drycleaning order so "connection" is strengthened and we of course, look more "leading edge".

Today, MyCleaner would be only techno-cleaner in this market of over 300,000. The promotional exposure and image enhancement benefits would be immense to say least.

GENERAL DEMOGRAPHICS

Drycleaning is a luxury service. I had a customer base of 20,000 families. Figure 90% of my customers are middle to upper middle class. Further, assume a conservative 50% have computers at home or work and are online. That's 9,000 customers. Let's be frugal again and estimate 25% of these customers actually visit our website because of high exposure we have given it. That's 2,250 at-home or at-work customer viewers. Now please hold that thought.

MORE PROMOTION

The billboards I mentioned would be bright, bold and clean (and funded by reduction of snail-mail coupons). Feature www.mycleaner.com address, online coupons, Dr. Drycleaner and I would implement a "refer-an-online-friend" program where referring customer receives a lifetime 5% bonus discount for bringing in a new customer. The MyCleaner website and its features are also appearing on television, what newspaper I am still running, my TV Guide ads, and I would definitely make sure my about-to-be, mainly computer-literate brides-to-be from Welcome Wagon receive my flyer highlighting online presentation of entire wedding gown process.

Also, I would set up a meeting with large local online mall in this region. Knowing me, I would talk a deal where I would offer Dr. Drycleaner column as a service for their customers in trade for a main page link.

OK, let's say another 2,250 people visit because of all above.

IS THAT NOT A REASON TO PUT OUT A NEWSLETTER?

You bet it is! I now have 4500 visitors to my site and ultra-conservative me predicts 25% of them will register to receive a periodic newsletter. My monthly newsletter circulation is then 1,125. This newsletter will feature upcoming specials, online coupons, refer-an-online-friend program, Dr. Dryclean column, and I would probably now run an online contest. Give away free drycleaning or pay for their Internet access for a year. Bear in mind that these newsletter recipients are dedicated, died-in-the-saddle cyber-customers. In other words, a captive audience.

MAKING THE MOST OF A CAPTIVE AUDIENCE

I'm not naïve. If I have consumers at arms-reach, I'm going to sell them everything within reason that they would have to go elsewhere to purchase (photo finishing was a great add-on to drycleaning for me). So, I would take advantage of my captive online audience and now offer them best Internet shopping available.

Yes, I'm talking about affiliate programs. I would include books, music CD's, videos, software and a mainstay shopping site. Promote to my customers using "for your convenience" approach.

Knock, knock, I'm just about done.

'NET' RESULTS

What I have done is taken a non-Internet business and made Web work for me and my customers. I have increased my visibility, added to my customer base, increased my sales and enhanced my profile in one fell swoop without increasing my advertising and promotion budget. I now have in my newsletter a "free" way to contact my customers and make them appreciate information they receive and notification of upcoming specials. I may have saved them even more money on their yearly drycleaning bill because they referred their next door neighbor to MyCleaner. Plus, I have an additional income stream coming from purchases through affiliate programs. It's win-win all way.

This has been a rather lengthy article but I'm confident that if you've stayed with me this long you will understand that Internet CAN be made to work for you, regardless of nature of your business. It is this writers hope that if you are aware of what's going on and still haven't made plans to expose yourself on Internet, that you will consider doing so now.

There is a country music saying, "where there's a Willie, there's a Waylon". You CAN make Internet work for you and your customers. It's simply a matter of some creative thinking and developing right application. If I were still in drycleaning business, I'd be cleaning up in town right now just using basic approach I've outlined in this article.

OK gotta go, there's a knock at door!

Rick is the author of 3 top-selling eBooks at: http://www.interniche.net/ebooks.htm and the purveyor of those amazing traveling billboards called I.D. IT! Plates: http://www.iditplates.net