Straight up. Buy the book, help a child. Here's why...

   If you want to know the foundation of what allowed me to be successful. It's in the book. It's refreshingly short, and (from what I am told) enjoyably readable. Useful, short and inexpensive. Three excellent qualities for a book.

   There have been a few people that wonder about my "making money" off this book. Frankly, I made more money cutting grass when I was a teenager. It's really about sharing some information. If you truly can't afford it, send me an e-mail at tefargo@gmail.com and I'll get you a free copy. 

  Moreover, I'll donate the entire proceeds of all book sales this year to sponsor children in Africa via @SavetheChildren. If you're on the fence, buy the book and make a difference. For yourself, and a child. Click here, buy the book and make it happen. 

   Either way...Stay Awesome!

How'd that book get here?

   In the summer of 2000 I was driving to some sales calls. As usual my mind was wandering  It came to a sudden halt on the idea of writing a book. The thought of sharing the things that I learned along the way was interesting to me. While I had read and enjoyed many business books in the past, I wanted to do something different. 

   As I thought about it, the idea was increasingly appealing. However, I felt many "success" books gave you a bunch of information that, while valuable, was not easily remembered. After a bit of thinking I decided to use the alphabet so I could break down the "lessons" into nine acronyms that would make remembering them easier. An idea was born.

   Later that day I sat in my office and wrote out the following outline:

ABC - Always Be Committed  
DEF - Don't Ever Forget (to say thank you)
GHI - Getting Highly Inspired
JKL - Just Keep Looking
MNO - Make Notes and Observations
PQR - Pursue Quantitative Results
STU - Start Teaching and Understanding
VWX - Value with X-factor
YZ - Yellow Zebra

   While the book took over ten years for me to get around to writing, editing and finishing, the alphabetic outline survived. The reason is simple. In the time between then and now, my opinion didn't change. Learning has to be memorable.

   Will the book "make" you a success? No. That'd be a silly commitment to make. Will it make you better prepared to succeed? Absolutely. If success were on a shelf, my book is a step ladder to give you a hand getting there.  You'll have to put work into it, but that's true of any approach to improvement. What's more, I think you'll be able to easily recall the essence of every chapter due to the acronym anchor provided for each one. 

   Now you have the challenge of taking action. Knowing about my book won't make you better, but reading it will. I did my part. Click here to do yours: Buy the book, be better.  

    

   

Success is taking what you know, and creating the best YOU that YOU can be.

   There are no Ivy League degrees on my wall, since I graduated from Miami-Dade community college. I also went to an average public high school, never took the SAT exam, and was frequently in trouble in school. Some pedigree. 

   My reason to tell you this is because I, like you, thought I would never be able to "make it". There was no point of reference for success in my family or education. I was on a track to be pretty darn average. But I decided not to accept that. You can make that same decision.

   Is everyone capable of anything? Probably not. But you are certainly capable of being much more than you currently are. You are capable of being a pretty amazing YOU. 

   That's the central idea behind my book, Alphabet Success. "Making it" isn't so much about having a remarkable IQ, or a previously unheard of invention. Success is taking what you know, and creating the best YOU that YOU can be.

   My message to you is, don't settle. Discover the most powerful version of you. I too thought successful people were "special". Perhaps, but it's a sort of special that is available in some way to everyone is who is willing to try, and keep on trying until the "special" happens. 

   The trying part? That part is up to you. 

Why should you buy the book "Alphabet Success"?

   1) At $4.99, it's less than a Big Mac meal, of considerably more long-term value, and has zero calories.

   2) It's 78 pages. Very short, likely a twook (a tweet-like book). One of the major decisions in buying a book is what are you going to get out of it, esp. in relation to the time invested.

   3) The return on investment from my book is pretty much a guaranteed positive, provided you read it and apply it. There's is nothing in the book that cannot be done by "mortals". 

   4) The book in comprised of nine lessons, each told using an acronym to help remember it, and includes what I consider essential elements of succeeding, in anything.

   5) So, click anywhere here to get started.

   Thank you. Please let me know what you think. Feedback is awesome. 


PS - Yes, it's a Kindle book. Kindle has FREE software to read the book on any smart phone, tablet as well as PCs and MACs. It can be downloaded from Android for related tablets, iTunes for iPads and MACs by clicking here. Please let me know if you have trouble.

Success is like Sausage??? Tim has lost his mind!

   What the heck? How on earth is success like sausage? What do you mean?

   Well, I think success is very similar to sausage. With apologies to non-meat eaters, sausage tastes pretty awesome, just like success. But there are some things that going into making sausage that might make it a bit less appetizing if you really think about it. Same as success. What do I mean by that?

   When I was running Omega, before the big payoff, I had a business with over 300 people, and a $2 million dollar line of credit. Just to make it interesting the bank had a lien against my house in the event something went wrong. Yep, the place where I lived with my kids. One bad move and boom, goodbye villa, hello streets. 

   This is no pity party. But it is important to see success for what it is. An arduous journey to get past seemingly neverending obstacles while fending off the competition along the way. It can be incredibly fun and enjoyable. Except when it isn't. And if you want success, you don't get a button to select "fun stuff only". You get the spoils, but you also are in for the headaches and risks.

   So yes, success is like sausage, you'd be surprised what goes into it. 

   But don't let that stop you from taking a bite. 

Congratulations! The winner is....

   Let's put our hands together and give a big round of applause to.... nobody! That's right, nobody submitted an essay for the $500 "Alphabet Success" contest. As much as I might be happy that the $500 will be staying in my company account, there is a much much bigger lesson here. If you don't try, you can't win. 

   Of course, I could have done a countdown and reminded people, but as the time drew near I became curious whether anyone was going to make an entry. I even waited until it was 1:00am in Guam, the closest point to the international date line. Nope. Nada. Thus, we arrive at the question of why?

   One possibility is that nobody needed the money. Great news, apparently the global economy is much more robust than I had imagined. Frankly, I'm not sold on that theory. Somebody reading this, perhaps you, is thinking, I should have sent the guy a quick page about "Alphabet Success" and I'd have had his $500. And you would be correct!

  Another potential thesis is that I did not promote the contest enough. Maybe. But there are roughly 50,000 people on my Twitter account, another 1,550 on LinkedIn and to date there are roughly 1,400 copies of the book out in circulation. That would seem a large enough population to elicit at least a couple of responses. But I'll take some of the blame for not "mashing" on the accelerator more as the date drew near to pique your interest. So there is a partial explanation, but seemingly not enough to have prevented any entries.

   My theory? People may have thought what's the point? I hate writing, and I won't win anyhow. Well, that's not really the ABC (Always Be Committed) or JKL (Just Keep Looking) sort of attitude I was hoping to promote in the book. If you glanced at the numbers on my sites the raw data suggest that there was a reasonable shot of winning. But you miss 100% of the shots you don't take. 

   One other alternative? People might think, he'll be looking at a few papers and my writing needs work (which would have been improved by trying..but anyhow) so I have no shot. I'll tip my hand a little here and let you know that I would not have nor will I judge someone on the basis of their grammar or the poetry of their prose. It is nice when language flows, but I was after a STORY. So long as you can convey an example of something that happened, and relate it to a chapter in "Alphabet Success", that will be a solid contender.

   For what it is worth, I would have taken a powerful story over a finally crafted, but boring tale. But that's water under the bridge. It's August 1st, and the contest is over with no winner. Bummer.

   But wait,! What if we use this example to try another approach? Let's have a new contest, with a bigger prize and give you more time to write your story. Shall we say October 31st? That's almost two months from today. Same rules, same deal. I'll update the contest rules, but in short, $500 for the best story  related to a chapter in "Alphabet Success". It must be submitted by October 31st, 2013, no later than 5pm EST. All entries must be received at my e-mail address: tim.fargo@hammerfest.com.

  There you have it. A second chance! If you are interested, I suggest opening a document and just jotting down the most basic outline of what you are thinking. A couple of sentences. Then put a note in your calendar to get cracking at the earliest opportunity. Don't get all jammed up worrying about appearances, and that nonsense, just take some time to write out your thoughts. You can always recraft it. And, should your piece be published on my blog, I'll work with you on it beforehand if you think it will help.

  You'll have to do the heavy lifting though. I'm not dragging you to the finish line.

   Go on. Just Keep Looking!


   Alphabet Success, your personal step-ladder to success.  To buy, click here.