The “success” industry is worth billions of dollars a year selling seminars, videos, books and the like. They peddle guaranteed instant success formulas that for some reason first require you to fork out your hard-earned cash. Most truly successful people don’t apply any of this snake-oil, so what is it that they’ve discovered?

Several years ago, I found myself on the platform at a conference being interviewed about what it takes to create a successful blog. It was at the height of the SEO (search engine optimisation) hysteria and as I looked across the audience, I could see they were hoping for some formula that would guarantee they would become successful.

Maybe I would say that I incorporated a particular number of hot keywords into articles or ensured that each one was of a particular length. This would provide them what they needed to become successful!

I turned to the moderator and asked, “Are you sure you want to know?”

“Yes,” came the reply.

I looked across the audience and said, “It’s incredibly easy to create a successful blog.”

By this time the moderator was getting a little impatient and asked, “Well, what’s the secret?”

“Write two to three articles a week for ten years.”

A groan could be heard across the auditorium and the moderator looked at me with a particular level of disappointment. This isn’t what anyone wanted to hear. They wanted to hear that with a wave of my hand I could turn them all into successful bloggers.

Those businesses that have a vision for their future tend to create it. A vision isn’t just a plaque you put up on a wall but a rallying call that gets people excited. It’s inspires them to go “above and beyond” for not just the monetary rewards but because they are building something great!

I remember back in the early nineties I had a web development company. It was the early days of the Internet and people were only just getting online. There was one thing that I clearly understood and that the Internet was a global phenomenon.

Even though we were a tiny little startup I decided to inspire the team with a big and very audacious vision! It was, “We change the world!” Every time we published a website we could see people from all over the world going to it…..therefore, in our small way, we changed parts of the world.