The Ultimate Guide to Developing & Maintaining a Winning Mindset – Part 1

Behind every successful business is an entrepreneur with a winning positive mindset. The opposite of this is true too. Think you can’t be successful? Think you can’t grow? Think you can’t outperform your nearest competitor? Then I guarantee you won’t!.

I cannot tell you how important this topic is. It isn’t some wishy-washy trendy topic but a core discipline that separates the successful agency owners from those who are stuck or fail.  A seemingly small thing that makes a huge difference. 

You can have the right marketing strategies, the best products and interested, invested customers, but without the right mindset, none of it matters because you will stay stuck and frustrated.

We tend to have a cognitive bias towards negativity and focus on failure.  Negative thoughts limit your possibilities, undervalue achievements and breed more negative feelings.  This can pave the way to a serious lack of confidence and underperformance. Change the thoughts and you will change the feelings.  Change the feelings and you will change your behaviours.

Entrepreneurs with a positive mindset, however, tend to have a better outlook on life, they keep moving forward and pushing through even when setbacks arise (and they see a setback as a learning opportunity). They have learned the fundamentals and thus developed the correct mental attitude to achieve their goals. The right mindset can help you make the most of a bad situation, and move forward with confidence and clarity. Mindset training is vital when it comes to success. 

The Laws of Attraction

I am not trying to be too spiritual when I talk about the laws of attraction.  It simply asserts that positive thoughts attract positive outcomes while negativity begets negative outcomes. Whilst the ideas have been around for millennia, the laws of attraction have received a lot of attention in recent years with some people swearing by its effectiveness. It doesn’t matter if you believe in it, there are lessons entrepreneurs can learn from its core message. Focus on clear goals can create the kind of positive attitudes that motivates long-lasting business success. 

I have seen people who miss colossal opportunities by attracting the wrong things to their agency thanks to their persistent negative thinking. Their companies are now at risk of failing because their leaders have not incorporated the law of attraction into their everyday actions and thoughts. As a leader, you must envision yourself in the place you want to be and then work towards getting there. In practical terms, this is as simple as creating an exciting vision for your agency and hanging onto that vision no matter what curveballs come your way!

Mindset and Growth

Stretching yourself out of comfort zone

One of the ways in which you can thrive and grow as an entrepreneur is to take yourself out of your comfort zone. Do you ever have big lofty goals but talk yourself down to something that is more “doable” or “practical” because you are not sure or too fearful to stretch outside your comfort zone? This mindset will keep you safe but will also stop you from achieving what you truly want in life.  And there are three zones that we can step into - a comfort zone, a learning zone and a fear zone. 

Your comfort zone is an established pattern of thinking. This is where we have a heightened sense of security and control. Many people decide to stay in the comfort zone because they may be fearful of stepping out into the learning zone. But you will not develop if you are too comfortable. Once you leave your comfort zone, it will feel scary but you learn and develop and before you know it, what you feared becomes part of your comfort zone. Once you enter the learning zone i.e. the zone of awareness of the vast opportunities at your disposal, you will learn new skills and be better equipped to deal with whatever challenges come your way. In the end, you will realise the journey was not really about getting out of your comfort zone but expanding it. Between the comfort and the fear zone is space where optimal learning, development and progress take place. 

Play small - stay small

If your mindset is to think small because you are one-man-band and believe your only option is to do all the work yourself then (a) you’ll never grow and keep perpetuating this thinking and (b) in the end you’ll become the bottleneck to your growth. Remember, thoughts lead to feelings lead to behaviours.  Change the thought to change the behaviour.

I always tell my clients to think about how much of an hour of their time is worth and then to question whether the task they are doing is at the hourly rate or lower? If it’s lower then they should consider delegating the task. Now delegating doesn’t necessarily mean you need to have a member of staff, you could be outsourcing the work by hiring a VA or freelancer. 

Just remember that if you “play small you are gonna stay small”!  Your mindset needs to be “I want to delegate as much as possible - leaving me to do the things that I can only do - which are the strategic activities that move my agency forward. Everything else needs to be delegated, automated or ditched.”

Mindset and Your Market

Confidence in yourself and the service you offer is key. Do not underestimate the value of what you offer. If you do, it is going to be even more challenging to authentically convey the value to potential clients and ultimate sell a service or product that you believe in. If you have the mindset of being a small player in your marketplace or believing you can only target small clients to provide your service to, then that will all you will ever have. 

I see this time and again with agency leaders - when they have a narrow mindset, they end up targeting companies that keep them in the comfort zone which translates to small fees, small projects, and bashing your head against the brick wall!  If you believe you can provide a fantastic service to the top end of your market, (not necessarily large companies but customers who will value your service) and then have the confidence to target these clients in your sales and marketing efforts, you are going to be taking significant steps towards delivering your vision.

Mindset and Pricing

Knowing what to charge and then confidently asking for it can be challenging. But not with the right mindset. I often work with clients who have been undervaluing and therefore underpricing their services. It’s easy to put your head down and never properly consider the impact your product or service creates for your customer. This has, in part to do with the fact that often the agency is selling the wrong thing i.e. time or tasks rather than outcomes and impact.

The more aware you are of the value you deliver your clients (the unique and visible benefits you offer your customers), the greater your ability to charge what you are really worth and attract new ideal clients. If you ever doubt yourself, ask yourself this - “what are the core benefits my clients experience by working with me?” Value-based selling increases, not just the price the purchaser is willing to pay but also the likelihood of the sale in the first place. It assures customers they are making a worthwhile investment of their money. 

Value pricing offers a formula for a profitable stress-free agency. If we have a mindset of “I am not worth that much” or a mindset of worrying that “the client will think it’s too much” then, of course, we will undervalue what we do. Yet with a value-based mindset, we will be able to charge higher prices, focus on the value to the client and look that prospect in the eye and say “this is how much I charge because I know I am worth it”. 

Mindset and Team

A great leader with a winning mindset will recruit the best staff. The leader with a positive mindset isn’t threatened by top-notch, fantastic staff but delighted to be able to delegate as much as possible and have them chomping at the bit to take on more.  Yet I have seen people hiring the 2nd best candidate just because they will be easy to manage and they feel less threatened by them. You need to hire the best people you can who know how to get the work done, be responsible and accountable, meet deadlines and challenge you with their ideas. 

Mindset and Vision

Without a sense of purpose or vision, you wouldn’t be able to communicate a set of cohesive goals for your employees to work toward.  Your vision should be exciting and communicated with passion and belief. If you are not 100% confident your staff will pick this up. 

Mindset and Learning

Be agile enough to incorporate changing market needs and be open to listen to and act upon suggestions from your team or other trusted partners. You must be able to react quickly to changes and in turn, create a workforce who is willing to do the same. This world increasingly requires searchlight intelligence. Never let curiosity go to waste, always look for new knowledge, thinking patterns, innovative courses of action and skills from you and your team.

Continue developing your mindset - it never ends

As you have seen throughout this article, a positive mindset is vital to your success. Your mental toughness determines whether you can dig deep and work through numerous challenges or simply retreat and admit defeat. That’s what distinguishes a winning mindset from a losing one. Entrepreneurship starts in your head, and the winning mindset wins it all. Having the right entrepreneurial mindset will naturally encourage creativity. And your customers and team members will always trust those who seem to know what they are doing and are confident. Above all, a positive mindset means you are willing to make mistakes (& learn from them), take risks and hang on to your exciting vision, no matter what.

In part 2 of this blog, I am going to share with you 9 strategies to help you develop and sustain a positive mindset.