I am a greedy son of a gun… I am out for number one… I want my business to make loads of money and I want thousands to follow my blog so they’ll buy my next book!!

So how do I pull this off? For starters, if my business is to “succeed”, particularly being that our model is fee-based (as opposed to commissions), our clients must stick with us long-term. They thus have to know that we are uncompromisingly ethical and have their best interests at heart. That we know what we’re doing and that they receive great value for their money…

As for the blog; I have to be creative, concise, and fair in my assertions. My readers have to receive great value for their time…

Like Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations;

“Every individual is continually exerting himself to find the most advantageous employment for whatever capital he can command. It is his own advantage, indeed, and not that of the society which he has in view. But the study of his own advantage naturally, or rather necessarily, leads him to prefer that employment which is most advantageous to society…”

Ironically, there’s no system that better serves mankind than unadulterated, self-centered, free market capitalism…

But you know, the preceding notwithstanding, there’s just something special about seeing a client to retirement… It’s a feeling that charging a fee just can’t compare to. And the funny thing is, I don’t think even Adam Smith, The Father of Free Markets, would condemn that admission. As he wrote in The Theory of Moral Sentiments;

“How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it.” Hmm…

Take two minutes and watch Milton Friedman educate Phil Donahue on the transformative power of the free-market…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWsx1X8PV_A&feature=youtube_gdata_player