It sat back from the road on a rolling hillside. A black, ominous cloud hung overhead. I knew something dark lurked behind the barbed wired fences and gun towers. It was 7 am when I arrived. I wanted to be the first person processed in. As the dew burned off the grass, others began to arrive outside. The clock in the car clicked loudly, breaking the tense silence. It was 8:30. It was time.
I walked up the approaching walkway. At the end, a heavy metal door opened letting us in. I felt like a lamb being led to slaughter. The door slammed shut behind me with an irreversible heavy bang. The sound of that steel door slamming shut sent a bone-tingling echo through the concrete walled halls. It felt like something straight out of a Stephen King horror film. The only light shown through between the openings of the steel bars encasing the windows. There was a cold chill inside. A chill I’d felt before. There was no mistaking it was prison. A federal prison. And to think, I was at the minimum-security camp; reserved for the white-collar criminals. The isolation was so thick you could cut it with a knife. Every guard had a stern, stoic look on their face, like it was plastered on. Their body language communicated a clear message. I sensed they wanted you to get out of line. If this was minimum security, I would have dropped a load had I gone to the maximum-security facility just the other side of the 2-laned dirt road.
I was there for the duration. Fortunately, mine was to be only 8-hours. I was visiting a friend, an inmate. What would you do with 8-hours in federal prison, surrounded by criminals having committed God knows what crimes? We masterminded. Gary Halbert would have been proud. What I learned in those 8-hours, ‘on the inside’, under lock and key, is enough to fill a book. In fact, my friend, the inmate, wrote his book while serving time; and it’ll be ready for publishing when he gets out next month. What he shares in his book and what I could share in mine are very different.
I Could Walk to the Other Side
First, if you’ve never been on the inside of a prison (especially state or federal), you cannot take for granted the freedom you have. That hit me like a ton of bricks as I left the facility. It was vivid! As I walked the path toward the exit gates, I looked up at the impending fence in front of me. Sharp barbed wire curled the top of the fence. Picture 12 feet of a near impassable obstacle. I remember thinking to myself, “At least I have the freedom to reach the other side of that fence; the side of freedom. It’s hard to imagine the opposite. Standing on the inside looking out, trying to figure out how you could escape imprisonment. I now understand why long-term, hardened criminals attempt a jail break. They have nothing to lose.
You get the picture. It’s a place of imprisonment. But that’s not the lesson I learned on the inside with my friend. And this is the lesson that will be useful to you. Because you’re experiencing it too, whether you know it consciously or not.
After catching up on family and social stuff, I asked my friend the ‘elephant in the room’ question. What’s it like in here? I expected the, “it’s hard” answer; the woo is me position. That’s not what I got. He said something insightful to me. It’s something that’s gnawed away at me since he said it.
He said, “I know why I’m in here. The rest of these guys don’t understand why they’re here.”
He’s a smart guy. He knows what he did was wrong, and he knew what the ‘time’ was for. He got 12-months, so the ‘crime’ wasn’t as serious as others in there. Keep in mind this was a ‘white-collar’ federal facility. That means none of the inmates here were murders, rapist or bank robbers. These were guys who’d committed financial cybercrimes, money laundering, postal fraud, etc.
They knew what they were charged and sentenced for, but they didn’t understand how or why it was wrong. I need you to grasp that concept. It may not make sense to you. But you’ll understand why it’s important to comprehend that concept in a moment. Trust me, it will be insightful to you, as it was to me. They were going about their days routinely. All the time clueless as to why they were ‘victims’ of the circumstances. There’s a common belief among inmates. That is, they’re all innocent. To a degree that’s true. They’re innocent in their own minds.
Here’s the lesson. The one that was important to me and will be to you too.
We Build Our Own Prisons
Owning a business, being an entrepreneur is a lonely isolating job. We create our own prisons. We lock ourselves in behind tall damp walls and we can’t get out. You may not have the physical chain link and barbed wire fences, the concrete block walls and barred windows I described. But you’ve built the psychological ones. And that prison is harder to break out of. You go about your day doing what you think is the right thing to do, yet despite your best attempts, nothing works. Every day you get up, stop at the same Starbucks, drive the same route to the office and go about your day just like the last. These are the handcuffs of your life. Like the inmates I saw, you too don’t know what you’re doing wrong. As the inmates believe themselves innocent, you believe you’re doing right. Yet deep down, in places you’re not comfortable talking about, you feel yourself slowly going insane. Your grip on reality seems to slip away a little every day. What do you do? What have you done? You get up tomorrow and drink the same coffee, drive the same route and conduct the same business as today. You do the same things expecting (hoping for) different results. Do you think change will happen? Be honest with yourself. Really?
The inmates have counselors. Advisors whose job it is to help them see past their understanding of reality, to change the direction of their life. To understand what they did wrong and what needs to be done to be successful in society.
You Simply CANNOT IGNORE IT
You and I need the same thing. We need guidance. The right guidance. But where does it come from? You’ve hired consultants and advisors, yet they seem to deliver the same cup of coffee to you and they expect by drinking it change will manifest itself. They want you to drink the Kool-Aid. Change will not happen until you break the routine. You know it.
American Humorist Mark Twain said, “The secret to getting ahead is getting started.” Sometimes, getting started is the hardest part.
How do you bring about profound change when all else has failed you? When all the advisors, gurus, pundits and experts have failed you? When the money you’ve invested has brought you up short of where you want to be in your business and your life. What do you do? You must do something different.
In 2004 I was where you may be right now. I was 38 years old. I was recently married. We were expecting our first child. We’d just bought a house. And the company I’d worked for since I was 13 years old closed shop because the owner (and my first mentor) had a stroke. And the business closed.
AI felt like I was in prison and there was not way to break out. Fortunately, I surrounded myself with smart, successful people. Unbeknownst to me, they were my first mastermind group. Truth be told, the friend I visited in prison, whom I’ve spoke of countlessly to this point, was one of those people. So, you can understand why I ventured across country and traversed the desolate lands and made my way to that federal prison on the lifeless hillside to visit him. I’m sure you formed an idea of the kind of guy this man is. He’s in prison. And only bad people go to prison. Yes, he did something wrong and he’s served his time. But it’s not reason for me to abandon him. He’d been there for me in my darkest hour. The people around you can pick you up or keep you down. You’re the product of those you surround yourself with. They either add to the walls that hold you back or they help break them down. He’d helped me, which then lead to a formal mastermind group. Where, in my first year as a member, my business grew 226%. Finally, I was free of the fences, bars and walls. And you can too.
I’m starting a new mastermind group. Before I discuss the details for it, understand the principles of mastermind have change a lot over the years. The mastermind principle has morphed into different concepts. I’ve been a member to mastermind groups numbering near a hundred members. This is unproductive. The idea of a mastermind group is to join with likeminded people and share your successes, failures and ideas. It is an advisory board. The best boards are small, with members of diverse backgrounds and experiences. Napoleon Hill fathered the definition of the first mastermind group, and that group consisted of John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and Harvey Firestone. Their successes speak for itself. They were successful on their own yet became more successful after they joined forces, and not just in business dealings, but in the meeting of the minds.
Hill described the Mastermind principle as, “The coordination of knowledge and effort between two or more people who work towards a definite purpose in a spirit of harmony… no two minds ever come together without thereby creating a third, invisible intangible force, which may be likened to a third mind.”
Both positions lasted less than a year. I decided I wasn't employable.
Announcing the NEW Gold Crown Business Coaching Program and Millionaire Maker Mastermind Group
I’m getting back to the original format. Call it ‘the old is new again’. Napoleon Hill defined success as requiring only:
• Using the mastermind principle
• Focusing your attention
• Learning from defeat
• Going the extra mile
• Improving your mental attitude
I have been in great mastermind groups. By great, I mean the member’s businesses grew. In my first mastermind, my business grew 226%. I’m a believer of the power of the mastermind.
I’m resurrecting the original format for coaching and masterminding. I’ve cut my teeth in Dan Kennedy’s highest-level mastermind groups for the past 9-years. Some liked that style, some did not. Personally, I loved it because I always walked away with actionable ideas and strategies. That’s what I’m bringing to this newest mastermind group… along with my friends. And I have one of the most extensive rolodexes of top marketers, as friends and clients.
This presents a great opportunity to get direct, hands-on help in taking your business to new heights, at a faster pace of progress.
It is strictly limited to no more than 15 primary participants, so you need to consider the opportunity presented here NOW.
This is the most complete and powerful program. It is appropriate for both beginner and intermediate marketers; those with core businesses begun and developed, even for the “kitchen table operators” with established revenue ready to move up to 6-figures and eager to do more, expand, grow and mature their companies.
There are two levels of membership. Each offers a collection of business growth and success resources, training, networking, mastermind work and support.
During the course of the 12 months…
#1: At the Millionaire Maker Mastermind meetings (twice a year-June & October) EVERY Member gets their business dissected, examined, worked on, with focus on the category of their choosing, in an extended “HOT SEAT”
#2: “SUPER LABORATORY ENVIRONMENT!” EVERY member will benefit from the probing of each other’s businesses, marketing, challenges and opportunities during mastermind meetings. The opportunity to Look “inside” up to 15 different businesses using different business models, sales methods and media. This is a great “accelerator” of your own knowledge – and certain to produce “Ah-Ha!” moments: gee, why aren’t I doing THAT? Hey, I could add THAT! etc.
#3: Special “How To” Training Workshop Sessions presented at each mastermind meeting. They are prepared to meet the needs and interests of the Members. This is in-depth Training CUSTOMIZED for this Group at each session!
#4: “INSIDE THE MINDS OF MARKETING GREATS” strategies, campaigns and their results, resources, contacts and opportunities arrive each month in the Gold Crown Business Coaching Program. Go behind the marketing and advertising of ‘in-the-trenches’ marketers at the top of their game (currently Dan Kennedy with new and 40 years of archived material, Pete Lillo, Ron Sheetz, Doberman Dan, Ben Glass & Dan Cricks – new contributors added regularly). Each month you’ll receive a collection of materials in print form which borrows strategies used by this collection of world-class marketers. Each month you’ll receive focused nuggets of marketing material you will be able to borrow and adapt for your own business. You also get “VIP” access to the authors and contributors (at their availability) to ask questions each month on the live members-only conference calls.
#5: TWO MASTERMINDS+WORKSHOP MEETINGS including 1-key associate (June & October), led and facilitated by Master Marketers, Ron Sheetz & Pete Lillo. Ron has operated in 37 different business categories. He’s worked with both Fortune 500 companies and startups. Ron was instrumental with taking his largest client from $18M to $37M in 18-months. Pete Lillo has over 45 years of entrepreneurial business experience. From a small startup print shop in Fairlawn, Ohio, Pete’s clients were Gary Halbert (during the Coat-of-Arms days), Dave Thomas (Wendy’s Restaurants) and Dan Kennedy’s original business partner of 45 years. Guest experts (from the Gold Crown Program) will also be involved in the mastermind meetings as schedules allow.
How much could just one session with a Piece of advice from Ron, Pete or the group be worth?
“I have to tell you as a physician, someone trained in clinical and not a lot of marketing experience, the advertising Ron created for us was instrumental in the $19 million growth our clinics experienced in 18 months. His one suggestion alone had a profound impact on closing sales faster.” Kevin Hornsby – Medical Director Men’s Medical Clinic
“Pete was responsible for putting the pig-tails on Wendy, and it’s been an iconic image of Wendy’s Restaurants internationally. Pigtails doesn’t sound like a groundbreaking idea, but having Pete’s experience and fresh eyes, it established our iconic image.” – Dave Thomas – Founder of Wendy’s Restaurants
#6: EVERY member will receive a digital audio recording of their hot seat session. Having your session recorded will allow you to be 100% engaged in the discussion and freed from having to ‘take notes’ and then interpret those notes later. You’ll have the full recording to refer to, have transcribed and create a fast-track to implementing your AH-HA moments and strategies from each meeting.
#7: ALSO, 12 Member-Only group teleconferencing calls with Ron Sheetz & Pete Lillo. It’s an opportunity to keep the power of masterminding among members going all year long. There will be 12 prescheduled calls (1-each month) so you can put them into your schedule
#8: EVERY member receives a digital audio recording from the monthly member teleconference call (regardless of attendance on the call)
#9: Membership roster
Two Programs in One
MILLIONAIRE MAKER MASTERMIND GROUP – accelerate your business growth in a safe, no-subject off-limits environment with 14 other like-mind, motivated, aggressive individuals.
GOLD CROWN BUSINESS COACHING - monthly content arriving to your mailbox with proven, tested marketing and advertising advise from 6 highly experienced marketers in the direct response marketing world.
You want to STEP ON THE ACCELERATOR – it’s time to shift gears, and make your business become a strong force in its market, and a major income producer for you. From slow start-up, from sideline enterprise, from one-person show to a real business with 6-figure or 7-figure profits.
Gold Crown and Millionaire Maker is engineered to eliminate growth barriers and erase speed limits.
To take your business to its next level, you need advanced INFORMATION, elite TRAINING and real-world, high success EXAMPLES & CASE HISTORIES.
The Almost Magical Power of ‘MASTERMIND’
The power play is Multiplied-Intelligence, in a member helping member fraternity, access to resources and vendors who’ve been tested and vetted. There’s even the opportunity for deal-making and resource sharing among members. As they say in Vegas, what happens within the walls of mastermind stays in mastermind.
This is the original Mastermind- Concept put into practical application. Napoleon Hill, author of Think And Grow Rich popularized the term “master-mind”, and explained it as he learned it from his era’s greatest inventors, industrialists and entrepreneurs including Edison, Ford, Firestone and Carnegie: Hill defined it as: The bringing together of multiple minds focused on the same creative purpose and process thus creating an additional mind, a master-mind, drawing on and synthesizing all the participants’ knowledge as well as ‘universal intelligence’ available through the subconscious.
You will be a part of a carefully assembled mastermind alliance of forward- thinking, upwardly mobile marketers, each bringing different experience, knowledge, contacts and resources to the table. The foundational success of a great mastermind group is not to bring people together who are in business, rather, to bring successful people together who, as a unit, will become more successful together. This IS something almost “magical”.
When the creative ‘juices’ within the group is firing on all cylinders, You CAN actually feel the energy in the room – and the breakthrough ideas and realizations do occur as if materializing out of thin air.
Mastermind groups offering only this experience are often priced at $20,000.00 a year and more.
The cumulative knowledge base contained in the monthly Gold Crown Business Coaching program alone is valued in the high 5 & 6-figure range. Dan Kennedy alone, commanded 6-figures for consulting and copywriting. Add to it the cumulative knowledge of the mastermind meetings and the total package value easily tops the 5-figures range. Of course, it should be much more valuable to you than that. The reason anyone should engage in this is to move their business to the next level.
If for example, a customer, client or patient is worth just $3,000 each to you. And, from either a mastermind meeting, the monthly coaching program or from the monthly member teleconference call you pick up just one-idea that puts more of those $3,000 customers in your business faster, easier and at a lower acquisition cost, you’d need only 7 of those new customers via your ‘new found’ strategy to recoup a $20,000 investment for the program. You must agree that would have a profound impact on your business. This is about putting yourself in the right environment and exposing yourself to a whole new group of people. The greatest growth happens when you remove yourself from familiar (old) environments and become exposed to new people new ideas and new opportunities.
A $20,000.00 fee to increase your business is reasonable and easily justifiable. But…
You will be pleasantly surprised that the Gold Crown Business Coaching Program and Millionaire Maker Mastermind fee is not $20,000.00.
In fact, it is only $3495. To current members of the Gold Crown Business Coaching program who will be adding on the 2 mastermind meetings and monthly member teleconference calls reduces it to $2319. (Refer to Application for details and options.)
Again, here’s EVERYTHING that’s included:
#1: EVERY Member gets their business dissected, examined, worked on, with focus of their choosing, in an extended “HOT SEAT”
#2: “SUPER LABORATORY ENVIRONMENT!” Looking “inside” up to 15 different businesses using different business models, sales methods and media.
#3: Special “How To” Training Workshop Sessions at each mastermind meeting - CUSTOMIZED for this Group!
#4: “INSIDE THE MINDS OF MARKETING GREATS” – monthly Gold Crown Business Coaching package
#5: TWO MASTERMINDS+WORKSHOP MEETINGS (June & October – in Cleveland, Ohio – Dan Kennedy, Ron Sheetz & Pete Lillo are in Cleveland) including 1-key associate
#6: Digital audio recording of your mastermind hot seat session
#7: Monthly Member-Only teleconference calls
#8: Digital audio recording of teleconference calls – regardless of attendance
#9: Complete member roster with full contact information.
AND A BONUS: Receive four valuable resources
1. Headline Swipe Files from the Archives of Top Marketers 2. The Direct Mail Bible – over 50 years of Direct Mail Wisdom 3. Dan Kennedy’s THE ART OF CLIENT GETTING manual w/CD 4. Selection of any other program from Pete The Printer’s Gold in the Old library (as supplies allow on discontinued publications, such as Maxwell Sachiem’s Billion Dollar Marketing, etc.)
COMBINED, THESE BONUSES are up to a $1721.90 value !
Bluntly, nowhere but here can you participate in such a COMPREHENSIVE, MULTI-FACETED AND VALUABLE PROGRAM.
Also, bluntly, a warning: the concept of mastermind groups has changed over the years. This WILL be from the original concept of masterminds. I’ve been intimately involved in a lot of masterminds and I find the original concepts works best. I’ve been involved in every Dan Kennedy high-level mastermind groups for the past 9 years, so that’s what I’ve cut my teeth on and you’ll recognize a similar format here.
Also, there are the “history professors” – they haven’t been in the trenches doing it for years, when even a year creates enough change to antiquate the know-how. BEWARE. Place your trust thoughtfully and carefully. There has been much abandonment from other organization’s groups due to sweeping changes. Here, in this world, the world of what Kennedy has often referred to as ‘the old guard’ is where they exist. When other groups and programs have come and gone, the ‘old guard’ has always been here. So, you’re in good company, operating on solid ground. There is no greater and more current central culmination of activity, information and innovation in marketing than here. If you want CURRENT and HISTORICALLY SOUND, REALITY-BASED information and assistance, you simply cannot do better than membership in the Millionaire Maker Mastermind and Gold Crown Business Coaching programs.
WHAT TO DO NEXT:
YDecide whether or not you belong in this Program
If You Are “On the Fence”…
….that’s no place to be! The enclosed APPLICATION FORM may be of help to you in determining whether or not you should join us. But the main deciding factor should be your degree of seriousness about success as you define it, as an entrepreneur. Information alone will get you only so far. Attending seminars and taking notes will get you only so far. I’m sure you have a ‘place’ in your office, home or garage where the notes from all the other seminars have piled up. All the while you had good intentions for going back to those notes. BUT they collect dust and get piled-under with more notes from the next seminar. You can get only so far by study alone, only so far in isolation. The #1 way to make big leaps up and forward is through facilitated association with other like-minded entrepreneurs and expert coaching. So, if you are truly serious about making a big leap, then THIS is for you.
You certainly can’t doubt or question the value. You can only question yourself and your ability to convert everything provided to action, to business progress, to financial gain.
Only one thing is for sure: your business won’t grow in isolation. Without access to diverse yet focused input from a mastermind advisory board, insider information and examples, you are left to your own devices.
Entrepreneurship is lonely! No ‘civilian’ understands. This is a very, very small investment for a passkey to come in out of the cold!
HOW TO APPLY
FOR ONE OF THE LIMITED 15-MAX POSITIONS
Some positions are taken by Members who acted quickly. And we reserve the right to determine that you are not a good match with the group. It’s important to apply IMMEDIATELY, to prevent being locked out, as the Group will be filled with the first qualified applicants, then closed.
TURNING POINTS in business lives present themselves.
People make choices for different reasons at different times in their life. Often, they say “yes” and move forward on a path they may feel uncertain about at first. Even among my most successful client they still express feelings of doubt and uncertainty. Yet a common criterion among highly successful people is being fearless. Not afraid, but fearless to do what they feel in their gut is right. What is the direction calling to them? It’s like love. How do you know when you’re in love? YOU DON’T, yet it happens.
Your “yes” here may not elevate you to President Trump’s level of success or lead to celebrity fame. One thing is for certain: your “no” can’t bring any gains.
Best, Ron Sheetz
PS: Current Membership in Gold Crown Business Coaching entitles you to priority consideration for membership in the Millionaire Maker Mastermind Group. (see the application for details if you’re currently a G.C. member)