See also: Cialdini’s six principles to influence your website reader

Habit 1: Be proactive

You should decide which things you can influence and which don’t. And then rather than just reacting to external forces, start to change something.

Habit 2: Begin with the end in mind

Think how you want people to remember you, what you want them to say about you. Start every day with this image and do your best to rich this behaviors.

Habit 3: Put first things first

Decide what is important to you and devote your time for it. In other words prioritize. Take time for important things not urgent, because otherwise urgent tasks will take up all your time.

Habit 4: Think Win-Win

Always think about the best solution, that everyone would win. Win-Win is a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all human interaction.

Habit 5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood

Many people listen to the idea in mind that they have to reply something. They are either speaking or preparing to speak. But rather than this you should listen first to understand. Don’t try to understand it through your own experience. Better try to put yourself into that person’s position. Listen with empathy for feeling and meaning. Convey presents this habit as the most important principle of interpersonal relations.

Habit 6: Synergize

Appreciate the differences and try to find the best in it. Respect differences and compensate for weaknesses by building on strengths.

Habit 7: Sharpen the saw

Maintain the balance between your work and personal life, with this helping your potential to grow. Build a routine on improving yourself physically, mentally, spiritually, emotionally and socially and keep with it.

See also: 4 best techniques to enhance productivity

Like Ten principles of God is mandatory to keep your spiritual stability in the same way S. Covey’s 7 habits is mandatory for being effective and gain professional grow.

See also: Cialdini’s six principles to influence your website reader

The Pomodoro technique

Pomodoro technique works on concentration. Choose a big task that needs a concentration. Set a timer for 25 minutes. Fully concentrate on the task until the timer rings and put a check mark on paper. Take 5 minutes break and set your timer for 25 minutes again. Put the check mark again and at the end count how many intervals you needed to tackle the task. After 4 intervals take a break of half an hour. Repeat until the task is finished.

Eat that frog

This technic says that you should do the most challenging or unpleasant task as the first thing. First, make a list of everything that you need to do. Then identify the frog(s) – task or tasks that needed to be done first. Put them on the top of the list. Eat that frog the first thing in the morning. This will give you a confidence to tackle anything else on your list that day.

Getting things done

Gather all tasks in one place: big, small, personal, professional, immediate, long term and so on. Clarify the tasks and make sure they’re actionable. Make categories for them. Reflect them repeatedly: every week, month or even day.

The action method

This method says that you should organize your tasks in certain groups. First group: list of specific tasks that are actionable items. Other list: supplementary info/resources you need to get task done. The third list: things that don’t need to be done immediately.

The Seinfeld method

This method counts on consistency. It says that you should choose one or more specific tasks/goals that you want to improve. Mark off each day you complete the task on a calendar. And the most important – try not to break the chain.

See also: Marketers’ techniques to attract customers

You shouldn’t use them all, because it will make your life even more complicated. Choose one and do it continually. And remember that you can eat an elephant if you approach one bite at time!

See also: How to create a perfect blog post

Reciprocity

If you do something nice for someone, they’ll do something nice for you. So give people something for free. It can be your time while consulting them, small gifts on giveaway, free ebooks, webinars or other content. These are all ways to create feelings of reciprocity.

Commitment and Consistency

When people are presented with the idea which fits their self-image, they are very likely to convert. They have decided through consistency, that a certain action coheres with who they believe themselves to be and then they do commitments. For marketing, craft headlines and value propositions that speak directly to that person’s desires and self-images. You’re establishing influence by creating consistency.

Social Proof

People are very much influence by social opinion, so social proof is a crucial ingredient in online marketing. People will buy, see, do what other people buy, see and do. So use testimonials, show your facebook likes if the number is nice. Moreover, create a content that gets commented on and then write content that gets people’s feedback.

See also: Marketers’ techniques to attract customers

Authority

People want to be told what to do so badly that they’ll listen to anyone. If you have a well-described niche, buy adding more and more content about it you can become an opinion leader. And then the other step would be say what people have to do.

Liking

In order to make relationships with people you should be attractive and have sort of chemistry. In online relationship it look sort of impossible, but it isn’t. You can create a likeable persona by saying things that people like to hear, adding pictures of other people, because people like to see other people. You can create create attractiveness even through your web design: a good logo, smart graphics.

Scarcity

If people think that something is going to run out, they will rush to buy it. Put a timeline on your webinar, telling people that signup is closing on Thursday at 12pm. Or say that there are limited number of people that can attend it. Scarcity doesn’t need to be a reality. People simply need to think that something is scarce in order to be compelled into action.

So now that you know the principles, you just need to be smart and adjust them everywhere: website design, content, social media and so on. Social psychology can really do difference!

See also: http://oficinadamarca.com/blog/marketing-for-brands/

Brand logo has an impact

Brand logos have the power to activate a set of associations we have with that brand, leading us to specific behaviors that are similar to brand’s image. For instance, Apple logo is all about creativity. So when people were asked to tell the ways of using brick, the ones who so Apple logo came up with more creative ideas.

‘Feeling good’ attitude

It is all based on associations. You don’t promote your product, but in the commercial you surround it with things that make people happy. It can be sun, flowers, sea or anything else. And even though it sounds kind of awkward idea, it works. In experiment, people were more likely to take worth pen instead of good one, just because it was surrounded by positive things.

Luxury brands’ effect

It’s also connected with associations. You buy more expensive things from luxury brands if you watch then in commercial with other luxury brands. In experiment, it was noticed that people were more likely to buy Nike socks instead of cheaper ones, just because Nike ones where showed for them before with such a brands as “Tiffany”, “Nordstrom”.

Music can change things

Music can stimulate you do make a purchasing decisions. Research shows that shoppers make more impulsive purchases when they’re overstimulated by louder music. Moreover, if you put in the restaurant slow music, it will make people sit there longer and take some dessert with extra drink. The good news for restaurant staff. A French study revealed that playing songs with “prosocial” lyrics about empathy and helping others can increase tips – good news for servers everywhere.

See aslo: New social network trends you should know

And these are just a few tricks that marketers use. However, starting to use them is already a good beginning for making your brand powerful.

Developing time management skills is a journey that may begin with this Guide, but needs practice and other guidance along the way.

One goal is to help yourself become aware of how you use your time as one resource in organizing, prioritizing, and succeeding in your studies in the context of competing activities of friends, work, family, etc.

First: try our exercise in time management:
How do you spend your time each day?

Effective aids:

• Create a simple “To Do List”
  This simple program will help you identify a few items, the reason for doing them, a timeline for getting them done, and then printing this simple list and posting it for reminders.
• Daily/weekly planner
  Write down appointments, classes, and meetings on a chronological log book or chart.
  If you are more visual, sketch out your schedule
  First thing in the morning, check what’s ahead for the day
  always go to sleep knowing you’re prepared for tomorrow
• Long term planner
  Use a monthly chart so that you can plan ahead.
  Long term planners will also serve as a reminder to constructively plan time for yourself

Practice the following techniques to become the master of your own time:

1. Carry a schedule and record all your thoughts, conversations and activities for a week. This will help you understand how much you can get done during the course of a day and where your precious moments are going. You’ll see how much time is actually spent producing results and how much time is wasted on unproductive thoughts, conversations and actions.
2. Any activity or conversation that’s important to your success should have a time assigned to it. To-do lists get longer and longer to the point where they’re unworkable. Appointment books work. Schedule appointments with yourself and create time blocks for high-priority thoughts, conversations, and actions. Schedule when they will begin and end. Have the discipline to keep these appointments.
3. Plan to spend at least 50 percent of your time engaged in the thoughts, activities and conversations that produce most of your results.
4. Schedule time for interruptions. Plan time to be pulled away from what you’re doing. Take, for instance, the concept of having “office hours.” Isn’t “office hours” another way of saying “planned interruptions?”
5. Take the first 30 minutes of every day to plan your day. Don’t start your day until you complete your time plan. The most important time of your day is the time you schedule to schedule time.
6. Take five minutes before every call and task to decide what result you want to attain. This will help you know what success looks like before you start. And it will also slow time down. Take five minutes after each call and activity to determine whether your desired result was achieved. If not, what was missing? How do you put what’s missing in your next call or activity?
7. Put up a “Do not disturb” sign when you absolutely have to get work done.
8. Practice not answering the phone just because it’s ringing and e-mails just because they show up. Disconnect instant messaging. Don’t instantly give people your attention unless it’s absolutely crucial in your business to offer an immediate human response. Instead, schedule a time to answer email and return phone calls.
9. Block out other distractions like Facebook and other forms of social media unless you use these tools to generate business.
10. Remember that it’s impossible to get everything done. Also remember that odds are good that 20 percent of your thoughts, conversations and activities produce 80 percent of your results.

What do you think about this 10 tips for a more productive day? Tell me your opinion.

We think that nowadays the word BOSS is slowly dissapearing from the dictionary. Especially when we are talking about creative companies, where the LEADER is the new boss, the person that can not only delegate his/hers employees but also motivate them to do better everyday.

Honesty

According to Wikipedia: honesty refers to a facet of moral character and connotes positive and virtuous attributes such as integrity, truthfulness and straightforwardness along with the absence of lying, cheating or theft. Honesty is revered in many cultures and religions. Honesty means being truthful, trustworthy, loyal, fair and sincere.

We expect a leader should be someone you can trust that will not in any way let you down. Only when being honest a leader can be someone you can devote your working hours to, and you can be motivated to give more and more of you to the success of your company, because you know your leader won’t betrail you.

Sense of humor

Relieve  the tension when your team is working hard, with a simple joke is the best you can do. When you have good sense of humour, you are more capable to captivate your team’s attention and more easily persuade them to follow you.

It is more than obvious that having sense of humor is that one psicological skill that if you are able to master, you won’t have problems with making friends.

Enthusiastic

A leader that shows enthusiasm with everything is the best. The one that can transform a single annoying task in the most incredible thing to do in the world, can for sure succeed and have loyal employees that will be very happy to work with him.

Commited to Excellence

Attention to details and perfection driven is one of the must important skills to be a great leader. Do everything perfect and fast and you will succeed.

Be a great speaker

The power to persuade with words is the key essence to make any leader a great leader. The best example is the politicians that convince everyone to vote by throwing enpowering words that move hundreds to vote.

But I must warn you now, if you want to actual command your employees and motivate them using words mainly, be sure to know what you are speaking about. For example: you are explaining a new procedure of your sales team. They of course will make any small questions to be sure that they understood everything. If you don’t know how to reply to them, they will lose trust in you and hesitate to reach you with more questions. They will think “If my boss doesn’t know it, them why should I learn it?”

Celebrate your victories

“We think people who work here want … to do as much work as humanly possible to make something great, and our job as managers is to eliminate all the obstacles so they can move mountains,” Phil Libin, CEO of Evernote says. That includes offering benefits that help zap stress and increase productivity, like unlimited vacation time and even bimonthly house cleaning.

Deal with failure

“If we’re all accountable for the choices we make, we can look back at a day or a week and measure the time in what we were able to accomplish,” she says. “Failure is OK if you tried something for the right reasons and you’re able to learn and move forward.” says Sheila Johnson, CEO of Salamander Hotels & Resorts

With the passing of Steve Jobs, there has been an intense spotlight on both the man and the company he built. And while much of the attention has rightfully been focused on Jobs’ passion and creativity, as well as the remarkable period of innovation he presided over, there is another factor that has flown somewhat under the radar. That factor is the critical role that company culture played in Apple’s success.

When you think about Apple’s products, what words come to mind? For most people, words such as simple, elegant, and innovative are among the first. Of course, that is no accident. Those values were critically important to Steve Jobs, and he instilled them into the Apple company culture. These core values are the reason that Apple products have been so consistently excellent, and they are the reason that you can walk into any Apple store across the country and have essentially the same experience.

Apple is united by a common culture. And it is that culture that ensures that Apple customers enjoy the experience that they have come to expect whenever they interact with Apple, whether that means using their iPhone, visiting an Apple store,or calling Apple’s technical support line. A company with strong culture has also people that share common goals and visions for the company. More than sharing the same thoughts, people have to think BIG. As Donald Trump cites on his book THINK BIG “The harder I work, the luckier I get.”   If you’re changing the world, you’re working on important things. You’re excited to get up in the morning, You go through to it. Everyone wants to be working on meaningful, impactful projects.

Corporate Culture includes leadership, and when we talk about this, Richard Branson comes to our head, He is best known as the founder and chairman of Virgin Group. Branson is the 4th richest citizen of the United Kingdom, according to the Forbes 2012  list of billionaires, with an estimated net worth of US$4.2 billion. Branson shares his intelligence and understands its greatest creation that is the team that can imagine, create, care for and give back. The daily belief that teams that works and plays together stays together.

A company with a strong culture strives to maintain the open mind often associated with startups, in which everyone is a hands-on contributor and feels comfortable sharing ideas and opinions. Workers aren’t afraid to ask questions directly to their CEO about company issues.Great companies have great leaders, that work hard to make sure everybody has equal opportunities and that they feel they’re having a meaningful impact and are contributing to the good of society. The lifestyle perks may be a better-known aspect of a company, but the real focus is the family feel these benefits create. It’s important that the company be a family, it’s important that people feel that they’re part of the company, and that the company is like a family to them. Treating people that way, companies get better productivity. Rather than really caring what hours you have worked, you care about output. Great companies with great culture work hard to innovate in relationships with their employees and figure out the best things they can do for them. Women in Leadership – We believe women more than ever would lead major portions of business companies, growing their careers and themselves along the way, taking more responsibilities, building their networks and being empowered to make an impact around the world. The work space – The work space is an important factor to a good company culture. The offices have to be designed to encourage interactions between workers within and across teams, and to spark conversation about work as well as play. This is the reason Google Offices are extremely comfortable, providing different aspects also related with the culture of the country where google offices are, all around the globe. At Zara, the employees work has a team to get the job done successfully.  When they are considering a new product, it gets designed, made and criticized in a matter of a few hours.  All the employees have to work together to finish this process. Zara requires employees who are humble enough to accept feedback from colleagues, share credit with their team for winning ideas.  Having these standards has really helped Zara grow as a company and create a strong organizational culture. Team members are switched around to create fresh ideas, there is competition among the teams, and continuous feedback. Having this structure helps keep the workplace unpretentious and respectful.

Companies as varied as Adobe software and John Fluevog Shoes use the Web to bring customers into the development process. Fluevog fans submit shoe designs online, some of which actually are turned into products, while Adobe Photoshop’s best “plug-in” features are programmed by users and then uploaded to a special community site.

The Company Secret – Menina Design Group (the company that holds Oficina da Marca) is celebrating 10 years now and nothing better than creating “The 10 MDG Secrets” to pass the word through all employees.

1. PASSION IS EVERYTHING
2. MAKE IT HAPPEN
3. HARD WORK
4. BELIEVE
5. TIME
6. GO AROUND
7. POSITIVE THINKING
8. RESPECT
9. THINK LIKE A CHILD
10. HAVE FUN

Moreover, the practice of creating and sustaining relationships are key both inside and outside the company. When looking at good cultures, then it will be which ones do shareholders believe in and more align with their values.  After all, stakeholders are a part of the team.  Their contribution is not time, energy or creativity…they are contributing their hard earned dollars and trust into the team and the culture. Companies that develop an amazing culture and then proudly let others know about it, will create, hold and grow more value.

By Juliana Guiomar – CEO’s Personal Assistant