The Ten Times Rule: The Only Difference Between Success and Failure Read online

  We understand that this system will continue to change as my daughter grows up and that alterations will have to be made. However, the point is that we are controlling our time rather than just haphazardly trying to manage it. Our decision to set priorities and commit to a solution lets us be the bosses of our own time. The busier you become, the more you have to manage, control, and prioritize. Although I certainly don't have some scientific formula that will magically make this easier, I can tell you one thing: If you start with a commitment to success and then agree to control time, you will create an agenda that accommodates all you want.

  You have to decide how you are going to use your time. You must command, control, and squeeze every second out of it in order to increase your footprint and dominate the marketplace. Get everyone necessary—your family, colleagues, associates, employees—to recognize and agree upon which priorities are most important. If you don't do this, you will have people with different agendas pulling you in all sorts of directions. My schedule works for me because everyone in my life—from my wife to the people who work with me—knows what is most important to me and understands how I value time. This allows us to handle everything else that comes our way.

  In our culture, we're frequently encouraged to “slow down, relax, take it easy, find balance” and just “be happy” with where we are and what we have. Although this can sound great in theory, it can be very difficult for people who abandon every decision to be in control of their lives. Most people can't simply “relax and take it easy”—since they never do enough to free themselves of the meager existence that comes as a result of mediocre actions. Work should provide a purpose, a mission, and a sense of accomplishment. These things are vital to every single person's mental, emotional, and physical well-being. People who promote the new age, esoteric advice to “take it slow” are encouraging a mind-set that isn't doing anyone any good. Consider the types of traits this thinking has created in people: laziness, procrastination, a lack of urgency, sloth, a tendency to blame others, irresponsibility, entitlement, and the expectation that it's up to someone else to solve our problems.

  Wake up! No one is going to save you. No one is going to take care of your family or your retirement. No one is going to “make things” work out for you. The only way to do so is to utilize every moment of every day at 10X levels. This will ensure that you accomplish your goals and dreams. Happiness, security, confidence, and fulfillment come from utilizing your gifts and energy to achieve whatever you've decided is success for you. And it requires every bit of your time, which is yours—and only yours—to control.

  Chapter 18

  Criticism Is a Sign of Success

  Although getting criticized is certainly not the best feeling in the world, I have great news: Receiving criticism is a surefire sign that you are well on your way. Criticism is not something that you want to avoid; rather, it's what you must expect to come your way once you start hitting it big.

  Criticism is defined as the judgment of the merits and faults of the work or actions of one individual by another. Although “criticizing” does not necessarily mean “to imply fault,” the word is often taken to mean prejudice or disapproval. The dictionary fails to include the following helpful bit of information: When you start taking the right amount of action and therefore creating success, criticism is often not far behind.

  Of course, most people don't like being criticized. However, I've found that it comes as a natural result of getting attention. This may be why some people avoid attention in the first place—as an attempt to dodge judgment. However, there's no way to achieve serious levels of success without getting some attention. Yes, people will eye you and make it clear that they disapprove of what you're doing. Let's face it: No matter what choices you make in life, someone is going to criticize you somewhere along the way. Wouldn't you rather receive it from people who are jealous of your success than from your family, boss, or bill collectors for not taking enough action?

  When you start taking enough action, it won't be long before you're judged by people who aren't taking any. If you're generating substantial success, people will start to pay attention to you. Some will admire you, some will want to learn from you, but unfortunately, most will envy you. These are the people whose excuses for not doing enough will morph into reasons why what you are doing is wrong.

  You need to expect and anticipate this as one of the signs of success. It will come when you start really cranking at 10X levels—often before your accomplishment is even evident. Beware: This criticism can come in many forms. It may first show up as advice from others: “Why are you spending so much energy on that one client? He never buys anything” or “You should enjoy life more! It's not all work, you know.” These are the kinds of things that people say to you to make themselves feel better—because your abundance highlights their deficiency. Remember: Success is not a popularity contest. It is your duty, obligation, and responsibility.

  A buddy of mine who is in the fence business in Louisiana once admitted to me, “Grant, I don't want attention. The minute I get it, competitors start coming after me. I want to fly under the radar so no one knows what I'm doing.” Although that's certainly one way to approach success, you can't “fly under the radar” for too long and expect to ever make it to the top. Laying low in order to avoid attention (and consequently, criticism) probably means that you're holding yourself back to some degree. Your fear of being attacked is keeping you from going for it completely. However, once the naysayers realize and acknowledge that you aren't going away—and that your success is something they should imitate, not judge—they will give up and find someone else to pick on.

  Weak and overwhelmed individuals respond to others' success by attacking it. The moment you elect to dominate or acquire territory, you run the risk of becoming a target for these people. You see this in politics constantly; when neither side has a real solution, they merely criticize and lay into one another—and that doesn't do anyone any good. Criticism of any individual or group should signal to the recipient that the person flinging mud is threatened by the entity he or she is belittling. People who habitually disparage others like this usually do not have solutions to their situation—except to degrade other players.

  The only way to handle criticism is to foresee it as an element of your success formula. Much like fear, it's a sign that you are making the right moves in the right volumes, getting enough attention, and making enough of a splash. One of my clients recently called my company to complain that my staff had been following up with him too aggressively. I called to ask him what the problem was. After listening to him malign my employees for doing what was essentially their job, I said, “Knock it off. They're simply doing what they know is right because they know we can help you. The fact that you haven't made a decision to move forward and pull the trigger is what should be criticized here—but I will refrain from doing so because it won't do either of us any good. Now, let's stop the negativity and do something positive to move your company forward.” I then rewarded my staff for aggressively following up with the client. Receiving complaints about “too much follow-up” is an indication that my staff is moving in the right direction. I refused to allow this client's protests to stop us and supported my staff in their efforts. We all understand that criticism is part of the success cycle, and I won't apologize for any employee of mine who is seeking success. And in case you were wondering—we did close the deal. This very same client now tells people with admiration and praise that “those guys follow up like maniacs.”

  When I finished college, I got a full-time sales job rather than taking a position in the area in which I had received my degree. Within a couple of years, my sales results had taken me to the top 1 percent of all the salespeople in that industry—and way ahead of the people with whom I worked directly. And if you think they didn't criticize me—well, think again. Of course they did! They made jokes about me, poked fun, tried to distract me, and even tried to convince me to cease the
very actions that had gotten me to where I was. That is what lower performers do; they make others wrong for doing what is necessary in order to make themselves feel okay about doing nothing! The highest performers—the winners—respond by studying successful people and duplicating success. They train themselves to reach top performers' levels. Because the lower performers are not willing to step up and take responsibility to increase their production, they can only seek to tear down those who are performing at higher levels.

  When my book If You're Not First, You're Last hit the New York Times best-seller list, some of my supposed competitors immediately began criticizing me. One person called the book's title “arrogant.” Another asked, “Who does Cardone think he is?” Yet another suggested that I was “getting too big for [my] own good.” One person even called me to tell me to get a new editor because he claimed that the grammar was wrong. Did I pay attention to any of these comments? Not for a second. I had a New York Times best-seller!

  From what I can tell, criticism precedes admiration and—like it or not—goes hand in hand with success. Keep pouring on the success, and sooner or later, the very same people who were putting you down will be admiring you for what you have done. Those who initially judged your actions will later be singing your praises—just as long as you take the criticism as a sign of your growing success and keep the accelerator on your actions at 10X. After all, what better way to retaliate against criticism than to keep succeeding?

  Chapter 19

  Customer Satisfaction Is the Wrong Target

  The topic of criticism provides an appropriate segue into a discussion about the overused and abused concept of customer satisfaction. One of the first protests I hear from people to whom I promote the idea of 10X actions is their concern that customer satisfaction will be damaged. They worry that if they and their company push too much or become overly aggressive, they'll somehow hurt their brand's reputation in the marketplace. Although I suppose that's possible, it's much more likely—due to the overabundance of products and organizations available today—that no one will even know about you or your company or notice your brand in the first place. The board of trustees of a national cable channel I was working with became concerned that a new show that the executives were very excited about did not fit the network's brand. I told them, “If you don't start bringing TV to people's homes that is current and relevant and that people have to tune in to, you ain't going to have a brand to defend.” When you fail to find supporters, establish customers, secure investors, and close the deal because you fail to do whatever it takes to get the job done and then you hide under the excuse of protecting brand and customer satisfaction, you'd just as soon have a shovel in your hand and dig your own grave.

  Customer service is the wrong target; increasing customers is the right target. This doesn't mean customer satisfaction isn't important. Everyone knows that customers have to be satisfied and happy in order for them to return and give positive word of mouth. If your service or product or investment isn't built to satisfy, then you are a criminal, and this book will only land you in jail sooner. Make your primary focus commanding attention and generating customers before you worry about making them happy.

  Let me explain simply. Customer satisfaction doesn't concern me very much! Why? Because I know that we overdeliver to our clients and provide customer service that is well beyond “satisfactory.” We overdeliver to every client, and we never say no until we absolutely have to. We don't even talk about customer satisfaction in my office. We do talk a lot about how to get more customers because attracting customers to our program is the only way to increase customer satisfaction. You get it. Increasing customer satisfaction is impossible without increasing customers. Whether someone signs up for our free tip of the week or buys a book for $30, an audio program for $500, or a long-term training contract for $1 million, we always overdeliver what is expected. I only concern myself with getting more customers, then I overdeliver to my clients.

  I am most worried about noncustomer satisfaction; that is, the people who are dissatisfied because they do not have my product and may not even know that they are unhappy. I know that the only dissatisfied clients we can have are those who don't have my products or who have them and are not using them correctly. We talk about how getting our clients to increase their usage of our material, systems, and processes is the only way to increase customer satisfaction. Not getting a client or having the client use your products incorrectly are bigger “outpoints” than most of the ways that customer satisfaction is thought of. A customer getting the package a day late is an issue and should be handled, but the client who never buys your product suggests that you have a real serious customer satisfaction problem because you never made that person a customer. The first problem you can easily fix. The second one will kill you.

  I seek out clients who are qualified to do business with us. I then attend to that individual or company until they agree to hire me, knowing that until they get my product or service, they can't be satisfied. This isn't a pitch. This is what I believe to be true. The attainment of the customer is paramount to customer satisfaction, and customer satisfaction cannot exist without a customer! The attainment of the customer is the most important thing to me. Same thing in relationships: first it is getting the wife, then it is keeping her happy, then it is growing the family, and then looking at new ways to keep everyone happy. What was most important? Getting the wife was paramount to wife satisfaction.

  It is impossible for a company to create success by just focusing on customer satisfaction. I believe that the trend of focusing on customer satisfaction has been detrimental to customer acquisition. Companies become so consumed about their current customers' “satisfaction” that many are failing to aggressively acquire and expand their market share.

  Customer service is a business term meant to measure how the products and services that companies supply meet—or exceed—customer expectations after the purchase. This assessment is supposedly a key differentiator between the brands customers follow loyally and those that they abandon entirely. Yet most places I go into never service me enough before the sale to ever acquire me as a customer in the first place. Executives tout the importance of customer service from their ivory towers, yet they forget to promote the attainment of the customer to begin with. Most products don't get my attention so completely that I'm compelled to purchase them without the assistance of the company. Unfortunately, most salespeople never bother to ask the customer to buy when given an opportunity, and then they fail to follow up. Thus, they never make a client.

  We do mystery shopping campaigns for companies and have validated this over and over. The biggest problem with companies is that they never make a customer in the first place! If you have a subpar offering—a product that doesn't do what you state it will and that makes people feel like they've been cheated after purchase—the marketplace will dispose of you sooner rather than later. But most people don't fail because their offering is inferior or they have a poor product. Most people fail because they never get enough customers!

  Does Starbucks offer the very best customer service and coffee available? I don't know. I do know that the company has made a serious investment in making it easy and convenient to buy its coffee. Is Starbucks concerned about people standing in line too long and getting the right coffee and being greeted? Of course. But I assure you the company is concerned first with the acquirement of the client. Does Google provide the best search engine and the best customer experience and service? Does it look to improve the experience? Certainly. But first it dominates the space so clearly and gets so much attention that it's the first site used. What's my point here? Brands that truly deliver customer satisfaction do not talk about customer service; they focus on customer acquisition. Emerging organizations first need people to know about them, then do everything they can to make them happy. Remember, customer satisfaction cannot exist without a customer first.

  American corporations have become so
obsessed with “customer satisfaction” that they've lost sight of the first—and most vital—factor: customer acquisition! “Keep the main thing the main thing,” as they say in the South. Customer satisfaction shouldn't be an initiative but something so inherent to an organization that all of its attention is focused on customer acquisition. To garner the attention of a potential customer or market and then fail to capitalize on creating a user of your products and services makes no sense and is the most expensive of mistakes. Yet that is what happens with far too many organizations.