** Update **

I’m doing a special online preview of the trip and we’ll start taking applications for membership this Thursday, Oct 25th at 3 pm, ET. Details here. 

I’m excited to report I’ve put down the deposit with the area’s top Baja racing outfitter, Wide Open Baja, to secure our first adventure trip. Here’s some quick details as it’s still developing…

Baja Racing Adventure Experience – Cabo San Lucas, Mexico

Dates: Jan 29 – February 2nd (and optional Super Bowl party February 3rd)

Price – to be determined (somewhere around $8000- 9000)

2 years I went on one of my absolute favorites trip – and that was a 4-day Baja racing adventure run with my friends Rob Olic and the late Corey Rudl. Corey had been the year before and he said it was the most fun he’s ever had. So I’m super excited that this has worked out to be the very first Maverick Business Adventure trip.

Each part of your trip is designed to make this an exceptional experience. From the superb qualifications of your guides (each one has won the prestigious Baja 1000) to the performance of the cars allowing you to push the envelope of performance driving but still provide all the safety of a modern desert racer to enjoying the best accommodations and authentic Baja cuisine (safari style). This is all included in one fee.

Just a reminder – Maverick Business Adventures combines truly unique, one-of-a-kind experiences with exclusive business building, high-level networking & powerful connections. It’s the first and only and only membership of successful entrepreneurs & top achievers to come together and really LIVE life to the fullest.

It’s all about…

* Unique, one-of-a-kind experiences….
* Big adventures…
* Powerful connections that happen outside of the ‘normal’ business setting…
* Business building & high-level networking…
* Plus lots of fun (that’s even tax deductible).

Here are a few highlights of this first trip…

* 3 days of wild off-road adventure driving starting in Cabo San Lucas. We’ll follow part of the famous Baja 1000 course along mountain roads, majestic ocean-view vistas and untamed trails not accessible to most others.

* Business building sessions each day where participant confidentially share “what’s working” in their business. (Members are required to adhere to a Non-disclosure agreement.)

* A bonus session with our high-profile business expert coming on the trip. This person could be a NY-times best-selling author, they could be a world-famous expert or they could even be a billionaire (serious). I’m in serious talks with all of the above and I’m not ready to tell you guest…yet… but I guarantee it will blow you away.)

* Scorpion Bay – we’ll spend a day in the sun & playing in and around the water at the famous “Scorpion Bay”. An oasis of wild and unspoiled nature that is well beyond mass tourism because there are no easy way to get here. It’s the world 2nd largest surf break and our exclusive, private retreat here is equipped for activities on and around the beach. You will be able to ride through the dunes on quads, surf the infamous Baja waves (rides of up to a minute are not uncommon), Jet Ski through the blue waters, or just relax on the beach with a cerveza in hand with your new friends. The head of Wide Open Baja (our Baja racing outfitter) has told me he’s taken several billionaires here and none of them have wanted to leave afterwards!

* Whale encounter at San Ignacio – there’s only a small window when the most massive creatures in the ocean are available for us to get close enough to them to actually touch them. Each winter from December through April, the longest known mammal migration occurs when the Pacific Gray Whales make their way south from the cold Arctic waters of the Bering Sea to the remote warm water lagoons of Mexico’s Baja peninsula.

People flock to San Ignacio to see the Gray Whales breach but they have to travel all-day over rugged terrain and in uncomfortable buses (or tiny planes) to get here. With our Baja racers our paths are completely unhindered as we head right to the water’s edge for an encounter only a few have experienced and one you won’t forget. Not only will you see the magnificent Gray Whales from shore but we’ll head out in private skiffs to actually ‘meet’ them. This is the best place on Earth to actually interact with these friendly Gray Whales in their own environment. You can get so close that you can actually pet them and scratch their backs.

* (Optional) VIP Super Bowl party in Cabo San Lucas. After the racing adventure the fun doesn’t have to end. You’re invited to an exclusive Super Bowl viewing party in one of Cabo’s top clubs. What’s more, we’re bringing in a former NFL player to give you true insider’s view as you watch the big game together.

Obviously this Trip Is NOT For Everyone…

Not only because of the price tag – but because each Maverick Business Adventures trip is by invitation-only based on an application process or by-referral only from other members (once we get going).

Each trip is a small exclusive group and the maximum number for this one is 26. We are not taking reservations yet (very soon!). And if you want to be the first to know about it – sign up at the site: www.MaverickBusinessAdventures.com

Have you ever noticed that if you’re in the market for a particular type of car or you’ve just bought one – you SEE them everywhere? An exception is a rare exotic – but I have been seeing more Astons lately.

Putting something on your own ‘radar’ helps our brains start seeking & searching for the answers you want. (Same thing with asking the right questions.) Right now I’m in mass gathering mode for the Maverick Business Adventures project and I’ve been adding stuff to my file folder.

Check out this article from Fortune:

The first one is about how to access high-level VCs and big-time entrepreneurs (like Sergey Brin & Larry Page, founders of Google). It’s about Kiteboarding (or Kitesurfing) and how these players hang out taking part in this extreme sport.

Hello?….Brain…are you listening?

So this one definitely went into my file. I mean it makes total sense about building more meaningful relationships in settings like these. Case in point – on my Baja racing trip I took in 06, I had the chance to hang out & build a relationship with the CEO of NASDAQ-listed company. We talked about our different adventures and he gave me tips for Running with the Bulls. And during the Players Run road rally I made friends with all sorts of cool entrepreneurs.

If I look at most of the best joint venture deals I’ve done the relationships have nearly all developed outside a seminar room or office. (Okay, truth be told – they were mostly at the bar!)

And another article I dug up that I saved was about Jake Burton, founder of Burton Snowboards. (I admit it, I used to have a Burton snowboard T-shirt in middle school even though I’m a skiier – so I guess I was a poser.)

I really like this section of Fortune called “How I work” and inside the article it talks about how Burton really personifies being a Maverick entreprenuer. I really also loved how he gathered up his family and traveled the world for 10 months. Very cool! That’s inspiring.

On my mindmap I have people like Burton & the founder of Clif Bars, Gary Erickson because these are the kind of Maverick entrepreneurs I’d love to bring onto the trips to share and be a part of it. Plus, some of my friends like Frank McKinney, Cindy Cashman and Tim Ferriss, who are into adventures and incredible experts in their own right. Hopefully, the lure of a unique group of business mavericks and a charitable contribution to their favorite charites would make it worthwhile for these guys to come along. We’ll see.

Speaking of the charity contribution, that’s something I’ve been doing for a long time (Secret #9) and I want to keep it going with this business. We’ll contribute 5% of our monthy GROSS sales to charities chosen by our members.

Once you start keying in on what you want – I think you’ll start ‘seeing’ it everywhere. Plus, like we talked about in (Secret #6) the fact that a decision is made will start the wheels turning to help uncover resources and introductions coming your way. Hopefully this VERY public decision will get it moving faster. (I’m open to help here from you guys – let me know!)
 

I really need your help picking my logo…

My contest on Sitepoint is about to end and I wanted to pick the winner. Here are the 4 I like the most (I guess 3 since 1 is a variation of another but still). Let me know what you think and which one represents the “brand” the best…

Logo 1 - 

Logo 2 - 

Logo 3 - 

Logo 4 -  

Let me know what you think by taking this quick poll – thanks

http://www.oneminutepoll.com/OneMinutePoll/OneMinuteSurvey.aspx?SID=-2147482074

Here’s the next update for Maverick Business Adventures.

My friend Jeff Walker called me and said I was crazy to release my mindmap into the wild

I really appreciate the comments and feedback so far from readers on the blog.

Looks like a lot of people like the yearly membership. I had two of my friends, Rob Olic & Chris Zavadowski, come over last night and we brainstormed some other details for the project. Amazing what luring them over for a steak dinner will do.

Rob came up with the idea of having an exclusive gathering each year of everyone who attended the trip. Probably some sort of Maverick Millionaires Summit with big keynote speakers like Richard Branson if I can get him. (Hey, I helped pay for his rocket ship)

I wonder how much the right price for membership would be if we include this big event? And that also includes x number of DVDs/Audios from the “What’s working” section and guest lectures. Then Chris came up with the idea of giving people back the membership fee based on the number of trips they go on a year. I like that so that essentially makes the membership free. I like that a lot – plus it helps incentives people to get on more trips and have more FUN!

I’ve had over 232 people take my survey and from the results there was interest in not just having more “extreme” trips like I’m into but having more typical adventure excursions. I’d like to come up with a list of 10 trips and then whittle it down to 2-3 and have those be our first trips in the beginning of ’08. Looks like some good interest in Whitewater rafting, bicycling and the Offroad Baja trip (which from personal experience I can is absolutely awesome!)

1. I’ve had my virtual assistants start researching even more of the competitive landscaping. Here’s what I asked them for:

a) Competitors – is there anyone else doing this for individual entrepreneurs?

b) “Side” competitors – people who put on corporate trips (incentive,team building,etc) combined with adventures.
For these I’d like sample pricing, what they get, etc.

c) What are the most popular adventure travel trips. You might need to call a few outfitters.

d) Articles/info on entrepreneurs combining fun pursuits with business

I wanted to get up to 3 hours of research and then we’ll re-evaluate direction and/or continuing. I’d like this info in the next few days please.

What I’m looking for is a “marketplace gap” to figure our where I can make the most differentiation points.

2. I also put up a “first notice” coming soon page  at www.surefiremarketing.com/maverick until my site propagates. Be sure to sign up there if you’d like to know when we open up for the first trip. Now after the survey is taken – people get taken to this page to start generating a list.

3. I also started tapping into some of the people I know. For instance, I emailed Tim Warren for consulting since he specializes in working with adventure travel outfitters. And it looks like we’ll be speaking this week. I had met Tim 2 years back when I first started researching this project and he was doing smart things (marketing-wise) to help outfitters. We had corresponding and he actually attended the Underground seminar.

I was looking through one of my journals and here were the words I wrote about no project in particular –

• Entrepreneurship
• Masterminding
• Brainstorming
• Adventures
• Fun
• Luxury
• Unique experiences
• Partying

That might be the guiding factors for this project (and not necessarily in that order)

More to come…

Something else before I forget – let me be the reminder that you should back up everything! Yesterday, my son, Zak, decided my cell phone looked thirsty and dunked it into my cup of tea. Ugh! I had over 200 numbers in there and never backed it up. I had bought some software/adaptor a few months ago to back it up to my computer but, of course, never got around to it.

So I had to send out the sheepish email to people asking for their contact info again. Who knows? Maybe my phone will dry out and I’ll actually be able to get the data off of it.

Trust me, I know it’s annoying back-up data, files, etc – but once you lose it you’ll be kicking yourself. For my computer I use Mozy.com because it’s so simple and does the back-up automatically without me thinking about it. Somebody mentioned there is that option for Verizon cell phones – I wish I had it now!
 

Want to see a brand new start-up built from the ground up? Keep reading and I’ll be exposing it all…

After posting and mentioning my idea for “Maverick Business Adventures” I got really excited by it again. I went back and looked at my idea journal and I’ve been kicking this around since 2005! (Ugh!)

So now I’m going to REALLY do something about it…

I’m going to publicly (right here) state that I’m going to start-up this business by January 2008 or sooner. You’ll get  a front-row seat for the successes, failures and everything else that happens along the way. But in order for me to spill the beans about my business plan, confidential mindmaps and other stuff I’d normally keep close to the vest – I have a proposition for you.

If you’ll help by chiming in with your opinions and take an active role in “jointly” creating this project – I’ll share it all with you.

Deal?

Okay cool…

The first thing I typically do when I get a project idea is whip out a piece of paper and start creating a Mind Map. I just start brainstorming what’s in the project, how it’ll happen, who will do it, the pieces of it, etc.

Here’s what I have on my first one:

If you open it up, you can see I have a couple questions up in the air about how to charge for possible memberships, staffing issues, dealing with the adventure outfitters, hiring/bringing in “marquee” speakers, bringing in recurring revenue (which is important) and so on. But this is just the first incarnation. (Comments are definitely welcome – what do you think I should add, take-away, etc?)

Next, I decided to create a survey to find out from my list if this is something they might be interested in. I’m going to be mailing some of the list this week to get results. But do me a favor and take this quick 7-question survey while you’re checking it out.

For some reason a project seems to get more exciting to me when I have a cool logo or design attached to it. Now this is an optional step and if you were on a shoestring budget I might not even recommend it. Check out the contest I have running here for a logo.

You can see some of my comments and the 3 I’m most partial to so far are these – let me know what you think.

 Logo Option #1

 Logo Option #2

 Logo Option #3

(Side note: Sitepoint contests are an awesome resource if you want pretty much anything from a website to a logo designed. You put out a contest and artists will compete for the prize. The coolest part is you see completed work not hope for something that will fit.)

Another aspect I’ve been playing with is a tagline (now this is totally optional for a direct response company) but I thought it might be cool here.

Here are a couple I’ve thought of…

“The New MBA” (Actually my friend and fellow adventure-lover Cindy Cashman came up with this one)

“The Fun MBA!”

“More fun! More profits!”

“Crazy Fun! Crazy Profits!”

I’m sure you can do better. Let me know if you got one.

My goal is have the first trip going in the first part of 2008 and you’ll see how it develops since I’ve made this commitment pretty public.

And I’ll be giving away Internet Lifestyle caps for the most useful post and for the best tagline help. And if you are want to help out in some way and join the “Maverick Business Adventures” TEAM I’d love to hear from you.