Niching Up by Chris Breyer - Book Review

Title: Niching Up; The Narrower the Market, the Bigger the Prize

Author: Chris Breyer

Publisher: LionCrest Publishing

Publication Date: October 24, 2022

Length: 133 Pages
 

About the Author
Chris Breyer is the CEO and founder of Rankings.io, an SEO agency specializing in elite personal injury law firms.

Specialization Pays Off
Chris Breyer provides insights and guidance on the benefits of specialization and establishing authority within a chosen market. The author shares personal stories about his youth and how he established an award-winning SEO agency that specializes in personal injury law firms.

My Thoughts
A niche is defined as a specialized segment of the market for a particular kind of product or service.

This book contains a great deal of knowledge about an important business concept. The author explains how you can demand higher fees if you specialize in a niche topic. 

"It was my goal in writing this book, to change the narrative on niching from being about scarcity to having an abundance mindset. Niching is not restrictive, it provides opportunity."

Mr. Breyer writes in a style that is pleasant to read and easy for a layman to understand. He emphasizes the importance of networking and giving/receiving referrals in building a successful business.  He believes that if build a reputation of excellence in a specific niche, you will have plenty of clients. 

My Rating: 5 Stars Out Of 5

Thank you to NetGalley for an excellent reading experience.

Book Review: Everything I Know About Success I Learned From Napoleon Hill by Don Green

Everything I Know About Success I Learned from Napoleon Hill: Essential Lessons for Using the Power of Positive Thinking

Author: Don M. Green

Publisher: McGraw-Hill

Date: March 2, 2013




About the Author
Don M. Green is executive director of the Napoleon Hill Foundation and president of the foundation board at the University of Virginia-Wise. He became CEO of Black Diamond Savings Bank at 41 and studied under personal development master W. Clement Stone.

Think and Grow Rich
"What the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve."
In 1937, Napoleon Hill published his groundbreaking book "Think and Grow Rich". Today, this book continues to inspire and motivate millions of world-wide readers seeking success.

Don Green shares the lessons that he has learned about success and the power of positive thinking in this autobiographical book. Mr. Green discovered the book "Think and Grow Rich" when he was in his twenties. He details Napoleon Hill's influence on his own success, growing up in rural Virginia and going on to become a bank CEO at just 41 years old. The author has been a life-long lover of books on success, including biographies, and has gained a great deal of knowledge from these readings.

The contents of this book include the following chapters;

• The Formula
• Success
• Adversity and Failure
• Purpose and Belief
• Books
• Desire and Discipline
• Goals
• Habits and Perseverance
• Frugality and Self-Reliance
• Learning From Others
• Mentors
• Opportunities
• Visualization
• Thinking
• Your Personal Success Equation
• Perseverance and Passion
• Legacy

The principles of success do not change. When these principles are studied and applied, those who follow them can expect the same results that successful people have obtained.  But remember, you can't just think, dream, or wish for something to happen; you must take action!

My Thoughts
This book is a real gold mine of insight, inspiration and motivation. The author shares his own experiences and shares the life stories of many successful people who have influenced his career and his personal life.

As a former librarian, I am especially impressed with Mr. Green's love of reading. Biographies are true lessons in life from which the reader can glean life-changing ideas and examples. Mr. Green includes an entire chapter in this book about how reading hundreds of inspirational stories, self-help books and biographies has inspired him to great levels of success. I have always been drawn to biographies and I felt a special connection with the author and his love of true-life books.

"Everything I Know About Success I Learned From Napoleon Hill"  is much more than a guide to achieving monetary success. This is a guide for successful living that will benefit all ages. If you read this book and apply the principles to your life, you will be greatly rewarded. The lessons presented in this book are an educational course for living life to the fullest. Highly recommended!

My Rating: 5 Stars Out Of 5

FYI ~ I received a complimentary digital copy of this book to read and review from NetGalley.

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Children's Book Review: When I Grow Up by Jason Bardwell

When I Grow Up!

Author: Jason Bardwell

Publisher: Amazon CreateSpace

Date: October 5, 2012





About The Author
Jason Bardwell is an independent author and artist who has written and published two children's books. I recently read and posted a review of his first book ~ Beware of the Teacher!

I Wonder What I'll Be?
Children are often asked what they want to be when they grow up. This picture book provides a nice selection of occupations that children will want to learn more about.

The book begins with a confused young man thinking about all the possibilities that he will consider in the future. The color illustrations show the same young man on each page of the book dressed in appropriate clothes for his occupation.

He might be a game show host, astronaut, scientist, teacher....the sky is the limit! The author invites the young reader to draw a picture of himself doing the job he is dreaming about on the last page of the book. The author shares his address and asks the reader to write comments about the book and send him the picture in the mail.

My Thoughts
Many children are encouraged to think about their future career path at an early age. This book will spark the imaginations of young readers and open many doors of opportunity for future research and learning.

Young readers will love the full-page color pictures of the same young man through-out the book. At the end of the story, the young man realizes that it doesn't matter what kind of job he does, he will always be a unique individual with special talents and skills.

I really like the author's invitation to interact with his readers. Children will enjoy writing a letter to the author (with a little help from a parent or teacher) and sharing their unique drawing.

This book offers an entertaining opportunity to explore future career opportunities and practice some art and writing skills. I highly recommend this book for pre-school and early elementary children.

My Rating: 5 Stars Out Of 5

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Jack And The Beanstalk

Do you remember the story of Jack and the Beanstalk?

Jack is a young boy living with his widowed mother. Their only means of income is a cow. When this cow stops giving milk, Jack is sent to the market to sell it. On the way to the market he meets an old man who offers to give him "magic" beans in exchange for the cow.

Jack takes the beans but when he arrives home without money, his mother becomes furious and throws the beans out the window and sends Jack to bed without supper.

As Jack sleeps, the beans grow into a gigantic beanstalk. Jack climbs the beanstalk and arrives in a land high up in the sky where he follows a road to a house, which is the home of a giant. He enters the house and asks the giant's wife for food. She gives him food, but the giant returns and senses that a human is nearby:

Fee-fi-fo-fum!

I smell the blood of an Englishman.

Be he live, or be he dead,

I'll grind his bones to make my bread.

However, Jack is hidden by the giant's wife and overhears the giant counting his money. Jack steals a bag of gold coins as he makes his escape down the beanstalk.

Jack repeats his journey up the beanstalk two more times, each time he is helped by the increasingly suspicious wife of the giant and narrowly escapes with one of the giant's treasures. The second time, he steals a hen which laid golden eggs and the third time a magical harp that played by itself. This time, he is almost caught by the giant who follows him down the beanstalk. Jack calls his mother for an axe and chops the beanstalk down, killing the giant. The end of the story has Jack and his mother living happily ever after with their new riches.

I think there are several life lessons in this folktale. Jack accepted the bag of  beans from the old man but his mother thought they were worthless. She never dreamed that the beans were truly magic and her brave son would use this opportunity to change their lives forever.

We should be thankful for the opportunities that we are given. We may not be able to see their value at the time, but they might lead to positive changes for us in the future.

I made this handmade greeting card for Challenge #142 - Anything Goes With/ Mo Image. I used the digital image They Grow So Fast from Mo's Digital Pencil Shop. I printed it on kraft cardstock and colored it with Prismacolor pencils. I used a vintage picture postcard for the background.

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Make Hay While The Sun Shines

Make hay while the sun shines - that's smart; go fishing during harvest - that's stupid.  Proverbs 10:5 (From The Message by Eugene Peterson)

He who gathers in summer is a wise son; He who sleeps in harvest is a son who causes shame.   Proverbs 10:5 (From the New Kings James Version of the Bible)

I live in a rural area of southeast Texas. The grass is allowed to grow and our neighbor cuts, rakes and bales the grass into large round bales of hay. He takes the hay to feed to his horses or sells the hay to ranchers for their cattle.

This week was our first harvest of hay in the 2012 season. It is very nice to see our grass green and the freshly baled hay in the field. Texas suffered a historic drought in 2011 and our grass dried up and died. We didn't have a single harvest of hay the entire year.

I started thinking about the saying "make hay while the sun shines." In general, it means to make the most of one's opportunities while you have the chance. It means to complete your work as soon as possible because you don't know what tomorrow will bring. It means to store up for bad times while things are good.

It goes back to the time when hay was cut by hand with a scythe. It had to be cut while the grass or grain was dry, so when the sun shone, it would dry out enough for hay to be cut. If you waited another day, it might rain, and the hay would begin to rot, and you wouldn't have enough to feed your stock in winter, and they, and you, would die. Life was dependent on getting things done at the right time.
So. The proverb means "take advantage of opportunity as soon as it arises. Your life may depend on it." John S.

One of Aesop's most famous fables was the story of The Grasshopper and the Ant. The ant was very wise and stored up food in the summer when there was plenty. He knew he would need the food to survive the winter. He was thoughtful and serious. The grasshopper was the merriest creature in the word. He sang all summer long, but when the winter came he died of hunger and cold.

Are you taking advantage of the opportunities that are available to you? Are you making hay while the sun shines?

Please share your thoughts in the Comments Section below?