The people who start businesses are the ones who do something and will do anything to start.10/11/2012
One action leads to the next. Good things happen to those who take action. This isn't some simple truism or cliche, it makes sense. The more action you take the more things and people you will meet. The more things you will learn. The more times at bat, the more likelihood you will sooner or later have a success.
The people who start businesses are the ones who do something/ will do anything to start. You want to be someone who does things, you are someone you does things, because you are a person who is reading this blog. Now is time to take that next step. Start your next things. Remember, nothing is a business until someone exchanges money for something in return. That is the point, so you need to start finding ways to make that first dollar. Now. Seriously, let's do this. Go. D This is by the best short summary on how to think about and create a new product. It hits all the buttons. D
"So I asked a few basic questions, which you could call a toolkit for transformation (it can apply to practically any product): 1. How would these products be improved if they were connected to the Internet? 2. How would they be improved if the designs were open, so anyone could modify or improve them? 3. How much cheaper would they be if their manufacturers didn’t charge for their intellectual property?" Makers: The New Industrial Revolution by Chris Anderson Action cures Fear.
Everyone has problems, and I know exactly what it feels like to feel unsure where money will come from, how the bills will be paid. What you can't do is do nothing. Take action, get moving, and fear fades to the background as you reclaim your life. Remember this one thing; Action leads to opportunity. All the things you try, these are experiments not failures. As you test the waters and try different products, remember that if they don't work, they are not failures, they are experiments on the way to success. I read a quote once, and I am not sure who wrote it but to paraphrase, if it is not working, it doesn't mean it will end badly, it just means the work isn't finished. D I would argue that your relationships with others are your finest, most credible expression of who you are and what you have to offer. Nothing else compares. - Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi, Tahl Raz
Why do your personal networks matter? Why does who know matter? It isn't about what they can do for you, it is about what you can do for them, so you can work with them, learn what they know, learn from their mistakes and their wins. It is all about knowledge and skills. It is often said, and I believe it, that you are the average of those you know. If you want to get better, you need to upgrade those you know and learn from those people around you that you can. You want to get better at sports, you play against people who can play better than you as much as you can. You want to learn chess, you don't play people worse than you at chess, you play those people that are better than you at the game. If you want to be a chess master, you play chess with masters. You want to be a great entrepreneur, you compete, you talk to, you work for and with the best business people you can find. Being an entrepreneur is all about taking the opportunity when it comes, and the more opportunity you can get coming your way the better the odds one of them will work and that you will succeed. D "In 1968, when William Jefferson Clinton was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, he met a graduate student named Jeffrey Stamps at a party. Clinton promptly pulled out a black address book. “What are you doing here at Oxford, Jeff?” he asked. “I’m at Pembroke on a Fulbright,” Jeff replied. Clinton penned “Pembroke” into his book, then asked about Stamps’s undergraduate school and his major. “Bill, why are you writing this down?” asked Stamps. “I’m going into politics and plan to run for governor of Arkansas, and I’m keeping track of everyone I meet,” said Clinton. That story, recounted by Stamps, epitomizes Bill Clinton’s forthright approach to reaching out and including others in his mission. He knew, even then, that he wanted to run for office, and his sense of purpose emboldened his efforts with both passion and sincerity. In fact, as an undergraduate at Georgetown, the forty-second president made it a nightly habit to record, on index cards, the names and vital information of every person whom he’d met that day. (Bold Mine. D)
From Clinton, two lessons are clear: First, the more specific you are about where you want to go in life, the easier it becomes to develop a networking strategy to get there. Second, be sensitive to making a real connection in your interactions with others. There is almost an expectation among us that whoever becomes rich or powerful can be forgiven for high-handed behavior. Clinton illustrates how charming and popular you can become, and remain, when you treat everyone you meet with sincerity. Until you become as willing to ask for help as you are to give it, however, you are only working half the equation. My point is this: Relationships are solidified by trust. Institutions are built on it. You gain trust by asking not what people can do for you, to paraphrase an earlier Kennedy, but what you can do for others. In other words, the currency of real networking is not greed but generosity. From my earliest days growing up in Latrobe, I found myself absorbing wisdom and advice from every source imaginable—friends, books, neighbors, teachers, family. My thirst to reach out was almost unquenchable. But in business, I found nothing came close to the impact of mentors. At every stage in my career, I sought out the most successful people around me and asked for their help and guidance. I would argue that your relationships with others are your finest, most credible expression of who you are and what you have to offer. Nothing else compares." Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time by Keith Ferrazzi, Tahl Raz The best way to look at this is to build your business from day one planning to sell it from day one10/6/2012
Your business must be scalable.
This is why I closed my ebay bookstore, bambozzlebooks, (of course keeping the ID functiona)l. It was not scalable. If I wanted to sell more used books, it meant I would have to take more of my time to find used books to sell. I would have to find more books, list more books, and that takes a lot of time. I would have to find more valuable used books to sell. There is only so much of my time, and there is only so much of yours. Time is limited finite resource. You want your business to be scalable which means you can build a process that can sell ten units of a product or a thousand units of that product. You cannot let yourself be the bottleneck. The best way to look at this is to build your business from day one planning to sell it from day one. I read an article by author James Altucher who said the minute he creates a company, he starts to look to sell it. That is smart, because even if you choose not to sell, it is built to exist without you, it becomes a real process, that can build and adapt, and scale. D I heard a quote the other day, that no business plan survives contact with the first customer, and it is true. No one can foresee every possible issue or problem, or know how the world will interconnect, trust me, no one is that good.
What you think will happen will not happen the way you believe, and when it all hits, and your product is selling, or not selling, or there is some other problem, then you stop, you need to look at the data objectively, and then you decide on how to change your business, or as they say in the "in" crowd, Pivot. Pivot is simply taking your business and when an idea doesn't work, changing directions. The worst thing you can do is drive your business in to the ground because you refuse to admit that the first idea, made back before you had the information you had today, was not that great. Success goes to the tenacious, the networked, and the ones who can adapt. It is that simple. D What is Ramen Profitable?
Ramen Profitable is a phrase used in startups to determine when you are cash positive. You making some money, not much, but some. The goal with ramen profitable is make enough money that you can survive, you may have to eat instant ramen every night, but you make it. Getting to this point is important. Positive cash flow is good, it is the point of the whole project. Making money is what allows you to continue, to grow, making money gives you opportunities. We are starting our businesses to make money, build our skill set, and increase our network. You do that and you are far ahead of the rest of the pack. Most people never start. Many only dabble or merely try with no goal or idea of why you do it. If you do this, and you increase the number of people in your network, and you learn more and know how to learn, and you make money doing it, you just became an entrepreneur. D Excited by the new book of Chris Anderson, and just started it, and the first paragraph already has me intrigued.........
"Today we are spoiled by the easy pickings of the Web. Any kid with an idea and a laptop can create the seeds of a world-changing company—just look at Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook or any one of thousands of other Web startups hoping to follow his path. Sure, they may fail, but the cost is measured in overdue credit-card payments, not lifelong disgrace and a pauper’s prison. The beauty of the Web is that it democratized the tools both of invention and of production. Anyone with an idea for a service can turn it into a product with some software code (these days it hardly even requires much programming skill, and what you need you can learn online)—no patent required. Then, with a keystroke, you can “ship it” to a global market of billions of people. Huge as information industries have become, they’re still a sideshow in the world economy. To put a ballpark figure on it, the digital economy, broadly defined, represents $20 trillion of revenues, according to Citibank and Oxford Economics.1 The economy beyond the Web, by the same estimate, is about $130 trillion. In short, the world of atoms is at least five times larger than the world of bits." Makers: The New Industrial Revolution by Chris Anderson "If you’re not sure where to spend your business development time, spend 50 percent on creating and 50 percent on connecting. The most powerful channel for getting the word out usually starts with people you already know. If you build it, they might come … but you’ll probably need to let them know what you’ve built and how to get there. When you’re first getting started, say yes to every reasonable request. Become more selective (consider the “hell yeah” test) as you become more established. Use the One-Page Promotion Plan to maintain a regular schedule of connecting with people as you also spend time building other parts of your business."
One of the things "you need" to do is remember you actually need to make money. "This may sound simple, but busy entrepreneurs can easily become overwhelmed with all kinds of projects and tasks that have nothing to do with making money. Putting the focus on income and cash flow—measuring everything else against those standards—ensures that a business remains healthy. Remember that the goal of business is profit. It’s not being liked, or having a huge social media presence, or having amazing products that nobody buys. It is not having a beautiful website, or perfectly crafted email newsletters, or an incredibly popular blog. In larger businesses, this is called accountability to shareholders. Business is not a popularity contest. The CEO doesn’t get away with saying, “But look at all these people who like us on Facebook!” Shareholders will not accept that. You are the majority shareholder in your business, and you have to protect your investment. You have to make sure that your recurring activities are as directly tied to making money as possible. There’s nothing wrong with having a hobby, but if you want to call it a business, you have to make money." The $100 Startup: Reinvent the Way You Make a Living, Do What You Love, and Create a New Future by Chris Guillebeau |
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Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” |