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Introduction: What you will learn
The entrepreneurial industry is one that attracts hundreds of thousands of
people every year. Everyone wants to own their own business. Everyone
wants to reap the rewards that come with independent success which
include financial freedom, more time to spend with your family and the
ability to work for yourself rather than someone else.
But becoming an entrepreneur isn’t easy. If you want to become financially
independent and get more time to spend with your family, be prepared to
spend some money and hardly spend any time with your family at all while
you work towards your goals. The rewards are great, and certainly worth it,
but it’s going to take some hard work. This book is about making that
process as painless as possible and giving you the tools and information
that you need to be successful more quickly.
What Exactly Is an Entrepreneur?
An entrepreneur, basically, is anyone who starts a business. However most
people don’t consider those who start a business, such as a website with
little or no investment, and then don’t do any work on the business, to be
entrepreneurs; in order to be a true entrepreneur, you must be actively
working toward success with your business.
The National Federation of Independent Businesses reports that around 4
out of every 10 businesses actually make a profit. That means 6 out of 10
actually cost their founders money or lose money for the investors. This
flies in the face of conventional wisdom that says only 1 out of every 10
businesses are successful. Obviously, there are people out there that are
making money and creating successful businesses. You definitely have the
ability to be part of those statistics.
If you look at data from the Census and Bureau of Labor Statistics you’ll
see that five years is the approximate time that it will take to know whether
or not you are part of the successful businesses or whether your business
is going to fail. What you do in those five years is going to determine your
success or failure and it’s not about your product, it’s not about your
customer base, it’s not about your website; it’s not about anything except
how hard you’re willing to work to make this happen.
What You Will Learn in This E-Book
- Do you know what the most important factor is when it comes to your success? This ultimate factor is the difference between a successful person and a failure.
- You’ll learn what your current strengths are and how they’re going to help you be successful as an entrepreneur, as well as how to develop new strengths.
- Figuring out what your weaknesses are and how you can make up for them. You’ll learn exactly how you can identify each and every weakness that has kept you from being successful in the past and then create a plan to combat them so that they don’t stop you this time.
- You get motivation to succeed like you’ve never had before. You’ll know that you have the tools, the information and the ability to make success happen and for the first time in your life you’ll believe that you have everything it takes to make it: consciously and subconsciously.
- You’ll learn how to create new habits that will keep you on the road to success without even trying. You’ll be able to develop these habits so that you automatically do the things that you need to do to be successful.
- You’ll learn how to let go of the past and not allow past mistakes to influence your current successes.
- You’ll learn how to recognize successes in the past and allow them to motivate you so that you can reach your current goals.
- You’ll learn how your scheduling habits are killing your business and how you can find time to be successful even if you don’t think you can fit it in.
- You’ll learn how to be the best self that you can be and you’ll be able to use that knowledge to create the best business that you can create.
- You’ll learn how to be grateful for the opportunities and knowledge that you have.
Chapter One: The Ultimate Factor To You Success
Have you ever wondered why some people are successful over and over
again, while other people just can’t seem to catch a break? You can take
two people; give them the same skills, the same opportunities and ensure
that everything is equal between them, and one person might succeed
while the other fails. This is not really a hypothetical example. People do
this all of the time. One person sees that someone they know or admire is
becoming successful by doing A, B and C, so they will try to replicate that
person’s results by also doing A, B and C. But does that guarantee that
they will have the same success? Almost never; so, what is the difference?
What is the ultimate factor that determines whether or not a person is
successful?
What Does a Mindset Determine?
Your mindset may be the most important asset that you have and the way
that you look at the world is going to influence many things in your life. A
mindset can also be thought of as a window that you see the world through,
a paradigm or the attitudes that you have. You could almost argue that if
you had the right mindset you would be successful even if all of the other
factors were dead set against you. Of course, that is not exactly the case
because your mindset determines how and if you see opportunities when
they come along.
Changing your mindset isn’t actually that difficult. Think of it sort of like
mining coal. Once you can dig down deep and find out what your current
mindset is you’ll be able to change it. But the hard part is getting past all
those defenses and convincing yourself that you not only have the power to
change your attitudes but that you have the responsibility as well, to
yourself and to those who are trying to help you be successful. There are a
few things that you want to understand about mindsets so that you can
have the best chance possible of changing yours and avoiding the pitfalls
that plagued so many other people on this path. Let’s discuss a few things
to keep in mind.
It’s Never off – It’s Always Working
The first thing that you need to understand about your mindset is that it’s
always on. No matter what you’re doing, no matter where you are in the
world and no matter how you may be currently feeling your mindset is still
working, positively or negatively, for better for worse. What this means, of
course, is that everything in your life is affected by your mindset. Even your
family life is affected by your mindset. The way that you handle yourself
with members of the opposite sex, the way that you present yourself to
those you consider above or even below you, the way that you view
yourself and the way that you view other people who have had success.
Meet Frank. Frank is a middle-aged office drone who has been looking into
starting his own business online. He has researched some of the people
who have been successful at various forms of Internet marketing and Frank
thinks that the reason that he hasn’t been able to be successful at it is
because they have more free time than he does, they had money to
actually run their company and they were better informed when they started than he is. That’s why Frank thinks that he’s not successful. The truth is, Frank hasn’t even tried one single Internet marketing method. Frank’s mindset is that he’s already at such a disadvantage that he might as well just give up before he even starts. The amazing thing is – Frank doesn’t
even realize that that’s the problem.
Mindset and Your Subconscious or Unconscious Mind
You might think that you get a break from a destructive mindset when
you’re sleeping, but sadly, this is not the case. No matter if you’re awake,
asleep or somewhere in between, your mindset directly affects the kind of
things that your subconscious mind tells you. If you have a negative
mindset, your subconscious mind could be reinforcing negative attitudes at
night while you’re sleeping. Even your dreams could have an impact.
Suppose that deep inside, you don’t really believe that you have the ability
or power or skill or whatever it is that you believe you are lacking – to be a
successful entrepreneur. Until you change that mindset, you’ll be getting it
from your mind when you’re awake, when you are asleep, and pretty much
always, for the rest of your life until you’re dead, and who knows, maybe not even then. While you’re unconscious your subconscious mind will be
working overtime to plant seeds of doubt that will keep you from success.
The Cost of Making Big Changes
Are you a smoker or have you ever been a smoker? If not, do you know
someone who has? If any of those are true you might be aware that when
people desire to quit smoking one of the biggest barriers that stand in their
way is that they believe that they will be sacrificing something if they give
up cigarettes. Their brain somehow convinces them that they’re going to be
giving up a huge part of themselves – a vital part of themselves – if they
quit smoking. Of course, the truth is, that all the things that they’ll be giving
up such as poor health, difficulty breathing, increased risk for lung cancer
and the rest, are all things that they want to give up anyway. They’re not
giving up a part of themselves and all. In fact, there getting a part of
themselves back.
But the mind isn’t an easy thing to convince. Defense mechanisms are built
up, pathways in the brain are forged and that metaphorical wall is built,
reinforced and then surrounded by a dozen snarling Rottweilers. When you
want to change, you have to make it through these defenses and although
it definitely is doable, it isn’t going to be easy. But getting rid of the failure
mindset and giving yourself the entrepreneurial mindset is worth it.
Chapter Two: Utilizing Your Strengths
What’s the first thing you do if you want to climb Mount Everest? While you
might jokingly respond that the first thing you would do is get yourself a
CAT scan the fact is that climbing Mount Everest – or any other difficult feat
of physical endurance – can easily be compared with entrepreneurial
success. If you’re going to scale Mount Everest the first thing that you
would do is take inventory and find out if you had the tools to climb it. You
would need food, climbing gear, water, medical supplies and many other
things. With striving toward entrepreneurial success (which can seem as
insurmountable as climbing Mount Everest) you are also going to take
inventory of your assets. What are your current strengths and how can they
help you reach your goals?
Do You Think You’re Better than Everybody Else?
The first thing that we are going to do is make a list of things that you do
better than anybody else. This is not a list of things you do better than
anybody else in the entire world, this is a list of things that you do better
than the people that you know or the people you’re surrounded by. Also,
we are not going to include things that aren’t actually going to help you on
your road to success. For example, you might be the best sous chef in
three counties but unless you’re planning on opening a restaurant it’s not
going to help you with your entrepreneurial goals.
However, it is going to include things that might not be directly related to
being an entrepreneur or to being successful, but are strengths that will still
help you get where you’re going. An example of this would be if you are
good at inspiring people. This might not seem to directly relate to your
success as an entrepreneur but if you are trying to launch a successful ecommerce website, the fact that you are good at inspiring people could be
used in all kinds of ways. You can inspire people to share your products on
social media. You can inspire people to participate in and spread the word
about contests that you run. As you are making your list, if you come
across anything that you think might be even be slightly related, err on the
side of caution and write it down anyway.
You’re also going to be careful about adding things to your list that might be
thought of as strengths at first glance but are actually reasons that you
have failed in the past. One example of this might be an attribute like flying
by the seat of your pants instead of planning out in advance. This could go
on your list as self-starter or ready to jump in at a moment’s notice but if it
hasn’t served you well in the past, it probably isn’t going to do you any
favors in the future and you should avoid putting it on your list of strengths.
You are also going to want to include technical or artistic skills that might
not seem to directly relate but could come in handy later on. For example,
you might be really great at graphic design. You might simply be a natural
technical wizard. You might even be a writer. Think about some of these
strengths as they relate to your goals of being successful, including the
earlier example of sous chef. While culinary arts might not help you start an e-commerce website, the patience that you have cultivated as a sous chef
could definitely help.
What Are the Attributes of Success?
The next thing that you’re going to do is determine what sort of attributes
the most successful people in the world have, or especially, the people that
you admire. Especially, you’re going to make a list of things the entrepreneurs have to have in order to be successful. These can be both
wide and specific depending on what your particular goals are. For
example, they need to be good at whatever industry they are in and they are probably also going to want to be skilled in things like social networks,
choosing products, building business relationships and marketing.
You’re going to want to be as specific as you possibly can because at the
end were going to compare the two lists and try to find how many strengths
you have already that can help you be successful. The more things you list,
the more things that you’re going to discover are actually true about
yourself. This exercise isn’t actually about finding all of the qualities that
entrepreneurs need to succeed; it is about realizing that you already have
the attributes that it takes to be successful. You do have the attributes that
it takes to be successful. This is readily apparent, because you’re reading
this book. People that are interested in success or aren’t motivated to
better themselves and reach their goals don’t read books on success. In
fact, they tend to avoid the subject as much as possible because it reminds
them of their failures.
Here are some of the more apparent attributes just to get you started:
• Determination: you have the idea or attitude that you are going to
succeed no matter what, no matter who stands in your way and no
matter what obstacles you encounter.
• A Passion for Entrepreneurship: if you aren’t passionate about
working for yourself and owning your own business, it can be almost
impossible for you to be successful at it.
• Optimism: you are optimistic about the future. You believe that good
things are in store for you and your outlook is almost always a glass
half-full kind of mindset.
• Patience: you are willing to work over a long period of time to get the
results that you want. You’re not going to give up if it doesn’t happen
quickly.
• Reliable: you will be able to handle the responsibility of being an
entrepreneur. You have a reputation for being reliable so people are
willing to work with you.
Chapter Three: Your Weaknesses?
You know the story of Superman. You’re familiar with the boy from Krypton
who was sent to earth and took on the job of a lowly newspaper reporter at
the Daily Planet, hiding behind a pair of thick framed glasses, while at the
same time dashing off to the nearest phone booth to save a plane that was
falling out of the sky or help the police catch a bank robber. With all of the
strengths that Superman has there is still one tried-and-true way to bring
him down: a radioactive piece of his planet known as kryptonite. What
about your kryptonite? What are the weaknesses that have prevented you
from being successful in the past and, unless you overcome them, are
going to keep preventing you from being successful in the future?
Okay, here’s where you’re going to need to be honest. Don’t worry, no one
is going to grade this after you finish it; no one is even going to see it. You
can be honest with yourself here because if you can’t be honest with yourself, who can you be honest with? If you really want to improve your
life and start achieving your goals you are going to have to take a good,
hard look at some things that you might not be proud of. If you
procrastinate doing work on your online business because it interferes with
your primetime television shows, be honest about it. If you are terrible at
managing your time and whatever spare moments you might have had in
use during the day get lost in the shuffle, be honest about that as well.
We’re going to split these weaknesses into three different categories.
Interpersonal Weaknesses
The first type of weaknesses that we are going to discuss is interpersonal
weaknesses. These are weaknesses that come from other people. Most of
the time, you will not actually have people stopping you from achieving
success, you will just think they are stopping you. This is a form of the
mental block rather than an interpersonal one. You can identify when
interpersonal weakness is actually a mental one, because the person that
you think is keeping you from achieving success actually hasn’t said or
done anything to prevent you from being successful. An example of this
would be someone who is afraid of taking a leap of faith because they don’t
want to disappoint their parents, when they actually haven’t discussed the
matter with their parents and don’t know for sure what their reaction be at
all.
The actual interpersonal weakness, when you really have someone that is
impeding you, is more difficult to get past. This usually comes in the form of
a spouse. The spouse may not understand what it is that you’re trying to
do, they may have fears that you aren’t going to be able to pay your bills;
they might even be fearful that you, yourself, are going to change and they
aren’t sure where that leaves them. Most of the time, this impediment
comes in the form of anger. Rarely does a personal block like this resort in
a major life change such as a divorce thought.
Physical Impediments
The next type of weakness that we’re going talk about is the physical one.
Depending on the exact type of physical problem this can be easy to
resolve or can be nearly impossible. If you want to understand how this
weakness works, imagine that you wanted to become a graphic designer.
However, you didn’t own a computer; you had no access to Photoshop and
you wouldn’t have known how to create something in Photoshop even if
you did. In this situation, two of the physical blocks could be solved with
money. You could buy a computer to do graphic design on and you could
buy a copy of Photoshop, or sign up with Adobe’s monthly subscription
program to get access.
However, the last one is a little bit more difficult to manage. It is actually
one of the biggest reasons that people put off starting their online business
or their road to success for so long, because they think they don’t have the
appropriate training, schooling or experience. In the case of our graphic
designer, they could develop the skills that they need by watching online
tutorials and by starting to create graphic designs. However, that would
depend on whether or not they had a computer and access to the software.
Mental Blocks
The last type of weakness that we will talk about is probably the most
difficult to face. These are the mental blocks; the things that you believe or
think that keeps you from achieving your goals. Mental blocks can be
difficult to overcome because the first step is to identify them and this can
be extremely hard to do. Facing the facets of your own personality that are
self-destructive and are keeping you from being successful is a scary
proposition. In fact, figuring out what these mental weaknesses are is
probably the hardest step.
Once you’ve figured out what is mentally keeping you from success then
you can start to take steps to remove these mental blocks, one by one.
What you will normally find is that these blocks aren’t helpful and they
certainly aren’t logical. You might have a fear of failure that is based on
some past event that has no real bearing on your life today, but since that
mental block is always been there, it seems like it belongs. You have two
choices when it comes to these mental blocks: you can cultivate a failure
mindset, reinforcing it every single day with negative self-talk – even
subconsciously – or you can chip away at those mental blocks every day
until you have removed them completely. What is interesting is that both of
these take about the same amount of time. You just have to decide if you’re
going to shore up your mental blocks or work on removing them.
Chapter Four: Healthy Mindset Habits
So, we have discussed the fact that your mindset is the most important
factor when it comes to achieving success. You also should have identified
some of your strengths and a few of your weaknesses. So where do you go
from there? The very next step is to start yourself on the path to healthy
mindset habits. Habits are a funny thing. Your habits are things that you do
without even thinking about them. Each morning (hopefully), you get up,
brush your teeth and take a shower. You do these things without thinking
too much about them. You can be worried about something at work,
dwelling on a personal issue or even deeply engrossed in a great novel and
the subconscious part of your brain will still nudge you every morning until
you jumped in the shower and brushed your teeth or completed whatever
other morning routines that you have.
So, should be quite obvious that habits are one of your biggest assets
when it comes to being successful. The people who are successful in this
world are the people who developed the right habits. They don’t have to
think about doing things that make them successful; they just get up every
morning and do them, which of course, gives them the results that they
want in the long run. In this chapter were going to discuss how you can
create habits that will allow you to change your mindset from a negative,
self-destructive one to a healthy mindset that is ready for success.
Start Your Day with Positive Affirmations
Have you heard the term self-talk? Self-talk could be more accurately
described as internal memo-ing, or the constant communication between
your conscious mind and your subconscious mind. For people who are not
having success, and in fact, are having problems, negative self-talk is likely
the reason why. Their subconscious is telling their conscious mind all these
negative things and that just reinforces the idea that they aren’t successful
and are never going to be successful.
You’re going to do something different. You’re going to wake up each and
every day and give yourself positive affirmations. You’ve probably heard of
these before and you may think they’re silly. That’s perfectly okay to think
that they’re silly, but still do them because silly-sounding or not, positive
affirmations actually do work. Remember that your subconscious mind is
like a sponge. It soaks up information and then informs beliefs which then
drive your thoughts and your thoughts control your actions. If you change a
belief with positive affirmations, you will be changing your actions as well.
Find a place where you can actually say your positive affirmations to
yourself, where no one will overhear you and where it is something specific
and meaningful that will say to your subconscious mind: “Hey! Pay
attention!” For example, some people stand in front of a mirror so they can
look themselves in the eye and say their affirmations. Some people want as
much privacy as possible so they do it in their car on the way to work. It
doesn’t matter how you do it, as long as you pick a place and a time that is
meaningful to you and do it every day. Create a routine that will develop
into a solid habit.
Spend Time with Your Feelings
When you do have doubts, try spending some time with yourself and taking
a good, hard look at those feelings, to see where they are coming from. As
mentioned, your behaviors today are the result of your thoughts which
come directly from your beliefs. That means, if you are convinced that
you’re going to fail, which you might be if you haven’t been able to attain
success so far, then that belief is what is driving all of those other factors
that is keeping you from success.
What you can actually do, is when these doubts enter your mind, and you
start thinking about all the ways that this could possibly go wrong, take a
step back, and evaluate where the thoughts are coming from. Remember,
just because your subconscious believes something to be true doesn’t
mean it is. So rather than trying to push away these negative thoughts or
avoid them, accept them and then work to eradicate them by finding out
which belief is driving them.
Spend Each Day Learning Something New
You should never stop learning. No matter how much you know, there is
always room for more information. Just as science discovers that the more
that we figure out about the world around us in the universe, the more we
realize that we don’t know; It works the same way with your learning as
well. Spend a little time each and every day learning something new that is
going to help you.
You could read a motivational book. There are many different ones out
there that are geared towards entrepreneurs and are written to give great
advice from experts who actually have made a success out of
entrepreneurship. You can find them at your local library or online in digital format. Books by Anthony Robbins, Stephen R. Covey, Dale Carnegie and Napoleon Hill are all great reads if you’re trying to motivate yourself and become more successful. There are many other places that you can find
motivation. Go on YouTube during your free time and look for motivational
videos if that’s more your style or you could even correspond via email with
someone who is more successful than you, who could be your mentor of
sorts.
No matter how you get information, the point is, to keep learning and to
devote some time each day to that learning. You don’t even necessarily
have to read motivational or self-help books. You could do something that
improves yourself like learning a new language or teaching yourself a new
skill, or by studying a subject that you been interested in, relating to your
business.
Chapter Five: Live In The Now
You’re probably keenly aware of just how many times you have failed in the
past. For some reason, the brain is wired to remember negative
experiences better. That’s why you should always look at product reviews
online with a skeptical eye because most people – in fact nearly all of the
people – who had a positive experience don’t think about it enough to post
an online review. Inversely, most of the people who had a negative
experience do think about posting an online review and many of them do.
So, your brain is wired to remember your failures better than your
successes but that doesn’t mean that you have to let those past failures
control you or even influence your actions in the present.
The Value of Past Mistakes
Of course, past mistakes do have some value. You can learn from your
past mistakes and that’s an advantage that we have over most of the
animals out there. We’re able to learn from our failures, change the way
that we’re doing it and then move forward with the new strategy. If you try
something in it doesn’t work, then you can try something else later on. So,
don’t hate your past mistakes. They have made you who you are now,
which is obviously someone who is motivated and desire success, but don’t
dwell on your past mistakes either.
Don’t live in the past. When you think about a past failure here are some of
the ways that you may feel about it: embarrassed, depressed, frustrated,
angry or fearful just to name a few. Now, throw all of those out the window
when it comes to past failures. In fact, you are not allowed to be emotional
about any past failure from here on out. You are going to look at the failure
objectively, see what worked and what didn’t, and then move forward,
because it’s never as bad as you think it is.
You’re probably the Only One Who Remembers Your Failures
It’s like that episode of Happy Days where Tom Hanks plays a man who
went to high school with The Fonz, had some sort of problem with him, and
spent a decade learning karate so that he come back and whoop on Arthur
Fonzerelli. You know what happened? The Fonz didn’t even remember him
and was more than happy to apologize for past mistakes. The guy spent 10
years of his life dwelling on the past and the only reason that it grew from a
tiny event in reality to this huge persecution that he had to get revenge for
was his own self-talk throughout those 10 years.
Turning Potential Failures into Successes
On the opposite end of the spectrum, another thing we do is to think
negatively about future events as well. How is this connected to past
mistakes? If your mind is dwelling on past mistakes, and your mindset is
failure because of that, obviously, any future events will be seen through
the same distorted lens. Many people let “what ifs” stand in their way. It’s
all in the way that things are worded and make no mistake; words are a
very powerful thing. A comedian once said something like: ‘I used to tell
people I was trying to be funny and I couldn’t get a gig to save my life, but
then I told the next guy I was being funny and he booked me!”
There are a lot of “what ifs” out there that could stop you dead in your
tracks or spur you onto success depending upon how you word them. For
example, instead of thinking that you’re going to fail at something, and
giving yourself that self-talk, take a positive spin on it and think that you’re
going to have massive success instead. Whenever you find yourself thinking a “what if” statement that is negative, stop yourself and turn it into a positive one. Eventually, this will become a habit and you will hardly ever
find yourself having a negative thought like that again. What you will notice
is that you start thinking “what if” positive statements and this will have a
huge impact on your life; your attitude will improve, you’ll be happier and
you’ll be more willing to work on the things that will bring you success.
Take It One Day at a Time
Each morning when you get out of bed, think of something that you can do
to make yourself proud of what you have accomplished. Think of a reason
that you should be proud of yourself and then do something to make that
happen. For example, you have your entire Saturday to yourself. You can
have a barbecue; you can watch some football on TV; you can work on the
hobbies that you been neglecting or you can spend eight hours working on
your business. At the end of the day, which one of these do you think that
you’ll be proud of yourself for?
This doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to spend every waking minute
that you’re not at work or every bit of free time that you get working on your business, although you could, but it does mean that when you have the
chance to work, don’t procrastinate. Spending time on your project isn’t the
only way to do something that you would be proud of either. If you put $100
in your savings account today, towards your online business in some way,
you can be proud of yourself for that. Just do something every day to make
yourself proud.
Don’t Try to Do Too Much
One thing to keep in mind however, is that you should limit what you’re
doing to a reasonable amount. Many people get excited about their goals
and then they bite off more than they can chew and end up feeling like a
failure. For example, you should spend no more than the eight hours
discussed earlier on that Saturday where you find yourself with free time.
You might think that you can work for 12 straight hours after a week of
doing your job, and maybe you can, but it’s more likely that you’re going to
burn out and then you’ll feel as if you failed. Set goals that you can actually
achieve and you’ll be proud of yourself.
Chapter Six: Clarity is Power
So, you are ready to make some goals. In order to discuss goals are going
to use the analogy of a vacation that you are traveling to by car (picturing
the station wagon from National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation is perfectly
acceptable). The goals that you set are like the ultimate destination, the
place that you’re going. The vehicle that you’re going to use to get there
are the short-term goals that you’ll be achieving along the way but without
an ultimate destination, a very specific ultimate destination, you aren’t
going to get anywhere. That’s like trying to drive to Florida on your vacation
and saying that it is somewhere “over there” east of you.
What Are Specific Goals?
What exactly are specific goals? Let’s take one of the goals that you
probably have, because everyone trying to achieve success as an
entrepreneur has this goal; to make more money. You can’t just use the
goal of making more money, becoming rich or financial independence
either, because those things mean nothing specifically. How are you going
to know when you get there? How will you know if you’re on the path to get
there? Unless you make your goals specific you’ll have no direction; no
specific place on the map that you can arrive at and know that you’re in the
right place.
So, let’s take our example of wanting to make money. Instead of having a
goal that is this general, try creating a goal with something like: increase
income by $10,000 per year by the end of the year, or by month 12 if you
happen to be in the middle of the year. So, you’ll know if you’ve actually
achieved that goal, because you can look in your bank account, or at your
financial information, and see that you earned an extra $10,000 in the past
12 months. Also, when you get to month six you’ll be able to look and see
just how on track you are. If you are around halfway there, you know that
you’re on track. If you haven’t made anything, you really need to step up
during the next six months.
Aim High, like the Air Force
Do you know what you’re capable of? You might think you do, but for most
people what they can actually achieve is quite different than what they think they can achieve. You have probably heard the axiom: whether you think you can or you can’t, you’re right. People have set world records in athletic events, and experts have deemed some of them the fastest or best the human body is capable of, and then someone from a remote part of the
world didn’t get the memo that there was a limit as to what the human body was capable of until after they’d already broken the record.
Set your goals higher than you think you can achieve. Of course, don’t set
them outrageously high to the point where they’re unrealistic, but set them
higher than you think you’re probably capable of. For example, our previous goal of earning an extra $10,000 in 12 months is pretty reasonable and probably achievable depending on what you do to make it happen. If your goal is to make $100,000 over the next 12 months, that’s pretty unrealistic. But what if your goal was to make an extra $15,000 in 12 months? You might think that you’re only capable of making an extra
$10,000 but by setting the go higher you have something to aim for, and
suppose you only make $12,000; that’s still $2000 more than your original
goal.
Putting Goals into Action
You want to make a list of around five goals to start with. The number is not
important; it is arbitrary. What is important is that you create enough goals
that will allow you to accomplish something substantial in the next 12
months, or five years, or whatever your timeframe is, and not so many
goals that you have no chance of achieving them all. Then, for each goal,
you’re going to make a plan of action. Earlier we used the analogy of
driving a car to a vacation destination. Your plan of action is that car; it is
the vehicle that is going to take you all the way to the end where your
success waits.
Your plan of action is going to take you from where you are now all the way
to the end result, which is your goal. It is going to include milestones, or
places that you stop along the way to check your progress as well as
specific small goals that you’ll need to achieve to get to the big goal. It is
sort of like playing a videogame – you have to beat all of the easy monsters
before you get to the big boss at the end of the level. If your goal is to make
an extra $10,000 in the next 12 months then you need to know what
specific things you need to do to make that happen. Are you planning to
start an online store? Are you making investments? Whatever your method
is, you’ll have specific things that you need to accomplish, and that makes
up the framework for your plan of action.
What If You Don’t Know How to Get There?
Sure, you might be saying, this is all well and good, but what you do if you
don’t know how to get to your destination – or achieve your ultimate goal.
There are several ways that you can figure it out. You can do research
online, you could write to some of the people that you admire and that you
know of had success and asked them how they were able to achieve their
goals. You can read a few books or get advice from family or friends. There
are many things that you can do to learn how to get from point A to point B.
Chapter Seven: Be The Best Self Every Day
Have you ever had a job that you didn’t like? When you woke up in the
morning you to drag yourself out of bed and force yourself to go into work.
This might be the job that you’re working right now. Well, you know how
when you get to work, sit down to your cubicle and begin crunching those
numbers your heart really isn’t in it. You’re not giving your best self to your
employer. At most, you’re giving about half, and while this might get you a
paycheck it is death to an entrepreneurial venture.
So instead, you want to give yourself – your best self – which is the person
that is going to work the hardest, the person that is going to persevere the
longest and the person that is going to ultimately take you to success. You
want to be the kind of person that other people will look at and comment on how hard you work and how much you give to your business. Every single day you need to be the best self that you can. That doesn’t mean that you need to be perfect. No one is perfect. But it does mean that you can look
back at the end of the day and say: “I did a good job today.”
Things That You Can Do as an Entrepreneur to Be Your Best
Self
- Don’t show up late for work. Show up early instead. Yes, sitting down at your computer to do whatever it is that you need to do to make your business work, whether that is marketing, building a website or simply finding a good opportunity for entrepreneurial success; that is going to be your job. You should be twice is committed as you are to your day job to the time that you spend working on your business and building your success.
- Be willing to help others. If you encounter someone that could use some of the skills that you possess, consider spending some of your free time helping them. For example, if you’re a graphic designer, and a colleague needs a business card, although you don’t directly benefit from creating a business card for your friend, it could pay back dividends down the road. If there is such thing as karma you’ll be building the good kind as well.
- Develop relationships. No one succeeds in a vacuum and the relationships that you build with other people can help you much later in life as well as build lasting friendships. Some people will only build a relationship with someone who they think is in a position to help them with their business and this is a huge mistake because you never know what might happen in the future and when somebody that you have developed a friendship or working relationship with suddenly finds themselves in a position to help you achieve success and is willing to do so.
- Start to cultivate patience. Many entrepreneurs want success right away. There is nothing wrong with this, but you’re probably going to want to learn to be patient if you’re in business for yourself because it can take a while to see the fruits of your labor. Rarely is someone an “overnight success.” It is much more likely that they worked hard to get where they are and you just weren’t aware of it.
- Become flexible when you have to be. One of the problems that entrepreneurs run into, particularly if they are the type of personality that likes a very rigid set of rules and working guidelines, is getting stuck at an impasse because something happened that they couldn’t plan for. Things are going to happen with your plan for success, no matter how much you try to prepare for every eventuality and the only way that you’re going to overcome those challenges is to be flexible.
- Be honest; use integrity and all of your personal and business dealings. If you think that a product that you are considering is of poor quality, or there’s some reason why it is not a good product to sell, don’t sell it. If someone comes to you and offers to make your website rank a whole lot higher using black hat SEO techniques, tell them no. You want to be the kind of businessman (or woman) that customers can depend on and trust and violating that trust will cost you.
Don’t Multitask
Everyone talks about multitasking like it’s the greatest thing since the
Macarena but the truth is multitasking can actually cost you time spent on
your project. In fact, studies show that you not only have a 40% reduction
in the amount of work that you get done, but that you actually might be
damaging your brain by multitasking. Instead of multitasking, give whatever project that you are currently working on your full focus. In fact, give your current project 110% and watch your productivity rise drastically. People tend to like multitasking, either because it offers them variety and makes work seem to go by faster or because they’ve been told it increases their productivity.
Make Sure Your Heart Is in It
You want make sure that your heart is in what you’re doing on two different fronts. First, make sure that you are passionate about what you’re doing to achieve success in your completely invested in the project. But also, make sure that you are invested in whatever specific project that you’re currently working on. If your heart isn’t in it, then consider outsourcing it to someone who is more passionate about it than you are. For example, if writing is not your forte, hire a freelancer. If you have been trying to design a company logo and you find yourself getting frustrated, consider hiring a graphic designer or using one of the premium logo services online.
Chapter Eight: Your Time is Precious
You might be confused by the title of this chapter. You might be saying:
“Hey, I value my time. That’s why I am doing this whole entrepreneurial
thing.” What you probably mean however, is that you value your leisure
time, and this chapter is more about valuing the extra time that you have
when you’re not doing something that you absolutely have to do, such as
going to the doctor or going to work, so that you can have the time you
need to be successful. “I just don’t have time,” is the common battle cry
among those who never actually make a success of themselves in any
field. You have time during the day or evening or when you should be
sleeping that you can use to be successful. You just have to find it.
Jealously Guard Your Time from Others
Do not let other people monopolize or even have any part of your precious
success time. If you’ve committed to working on your business from 7AM to
8AM every single weekday, then don’t agree to run an errand for a friend
during this period. You don’t want to be a “yes man.” Your time – at least
the time that you’re spending working on your business – is your most
precious commodity, and you should jealously guard it from others and not
let anyone take you away from spending that time working on your
business.
If you’re getting into the entrepreneur business because you don’t like to
work hard, you are definitely in the wrong occupation. While there are many entrepreneurs out who have achieved a great deal of success and now have free time that they can spend doing what they want, they either
worked very hard to get to that point or are still working hard. In fact,
successful people can’t seem to stop working. Even if they’re retired, there
is always something that they are doing to achieve goals or to better
themselves.
Is your business really your number one priority? Are you willing to make
some sacrifices to achieve your goals? The answer to both of these questions needs to be yes because if you don’t make your business your
number one priority it will slip further and further down on your ranking list of priorities until you almost never work on it and you need to be willing to make sacrifices to achieve your goals; some of the sacrifices are going to be painful. Just like a man or woman who is going on a diet, you might have to sacrifice the chocolate cake and Rocky Road ice cream of your life in order to achieve success.
Price Your Products What You’re Going to Be Worth
If you are entering the marketplace with a product or service, don’t do more than a basic, cursory examination of the going prices. Once you know what the going prices are, consider how much you think your services are worth, which also goes for products. Some people start their business off on the wrong foot by lowering their prices drastically in trying to undercut the
competition. This is a bad idea for many reasons. First, you’re not going to
be able to out price the biggest retailers out there like Amazon and Walmart. Second, people are more apt to buy something that costs what
they think is a fair price than something dirt cheap. Cheap stuff isn’t good
and good stuff isn’t cheap, as the saying goes.
Have you ever wondered how some people charge what seems like
exorbitant prices for the same services that you’re providing? It’s like the
story about the fruit merchant who met another fruit merchant on the road.
The second merchant asked the first how much he charged for apples and
the man replied that he sold them two-for-a-dollar. The second merchant
was aghast, and asked him how he could get people to pay two-for-a-dollar
for his apples when everyone else was charging two-for-a-quarter. The
man replied that he didn’t know what everyone else was charging, he just
charged with he thought they were worth. If you think you’re worth a certain amount, then charge that amount. You’d be surprised how willing people are to pay a competitive price if you’re confident and good at what you do.
Manage Your Time Effectively
If you want to be successful, you’re going to have to start managing your
time differently than you have in the past. In the past, you may have flirted
with the idea of starting an online business but spent most of the time
looking around, seeing what other people have done and watching videos
on YouTube – business-related or not. From now on, you have to be more
serious. You’re going to have to start devising a schedule and sticking to it
religiously. Make sure that you set aside enough time during the day to
actually make a significant amount of progress with your business. If you
have allotted 15 minutes per day to grow your e-commerce website, you’re
going to grow at a very, very slow rate
We live in a distraction filled society. When you get on the Internet there
are 4 billion things vying for your attention. Someone just got on Facebook
that you’ve been wanting to talk to; there is a tweet from your favorite
celebrity that you really want to read; there’s a video on YouTube that
literally everyone is watching. If this is how your Internet experience usually is and you are starting an online company you’re going to want to take active steps to remove the distractions. What used to be effective was a
tool called Freedom which allowed you to irrevocably and completely block
the Internet for a period of time. However, now that we have mobile devices at our disposal and multiple methods for accessing the web, you’re just going to have to exercise some good, old-fashioned self-control, buckle
down and get done what you need to do make your business successful.
Chapter Nine: Serve Your Audience
The next thing you are going to discuss is showing up to serve. The most
successful people in the world do not have people in service to them; they
are in service to other people. Think about Domino’s Pizza. A few years
ago, this pizza chain had reduced profits with low sales all over the United
States. So they changed their tactic. Instead of making pizzas according to
their recipes, because that is the way it had always been, they asked their
customers what they would prefer. It turned out, their customers wanted a
better tasting pizza and so Domino’s went to work creating one. Now,
profits are back up and the company is doing fine.
Another contemporary example: the fast food chain McDonald’s just
announced that they are going to provide breakfast all day long. For
decades, people have been held hostage to McDonald’s breakfast hours
and other restaurants have taken advantage of this and enticed those
customers by having a breakfast menu that was available longer or even all
day. McDonald’s finally decided that they were here to serve their
customers and not dictate the times that they should be eating breakfast,
and expanded their breakfast menu hours to the entire day. Needless to
say, the move was quite popular.
Who is your audience? Who are the people that are going to be
responsible for your success? Your customers, of course; they are the
people who buy your products and services. Some people look at this
audience like it is here to serve them and their needs and in fact, the
opposite is true. You need to be here to serve your audience. You need to
find out what they want and what they need and then provide it to them. No matter if you are providing a product or service, if you want to be successful then get ready to serve your audience.
Take Time off for Mentoring
Your customers aren’t the only people that you should be serving. Helping
people after you have already become successful is important but you don’t
have to wait until you’ve reached your goals to start helping other people.
There are many advantages that come with helping people with some of
the areas that they’re struggling with, that you’re able to assist in. First,
you’re going to feel great because you’re helping someone change their life
and that is one of the biggest rewards and the most fulfilling things that we
can do is human beings.
Also, you’re going to be teaching yourself at the same time you are
teaching others. They say that that is the best way that you can learn
something – by teaching it to someone else. You’ll be helping someone
and you’ll both be learning something valuable as you strive for success.
You’re also going to get some major motivation from helping others and
especially if you can help them succeed. Your own enthusiasm is going to
go up, your motivation is going to increase, your excitement will be high
and your successes can be greater than they have been before.
You might not have thought about it, but those same people you’re helping
now could end up being more successful than you and some areas and
that could be a valuable relationship down the road. Most people are going
to remember that you helped them for many years to come and not only
would they be willing to do a favor if they’re in a position to do so they might even seek you out and offer.
Seek out Ways That You Can Help Others
Whether you are helping mentor other people trying to be successful in the
same industry that you’re in or you’re helping your customers find exactly
what they’re looking for and making sure that you provide them with the
best service possible, you’re going to actually have to go out and seek
ways to help people; they may not come to you. So, what are some of the
ways that you can find people that you are able to help? How do you know
that they need help? Most importantly, what do you have to offer that is
valuable enough to teach others? This last question is important, not
because there’s something that qualifies you to be a great teacher above
all other things, but because you’re going to want to know the answer to
that question so that you have the confidence to teach.
As for finding people to help, your customers will probably come to you but
make it clear that if they’re looking for something specific, even if you don’t
necessarily deal with it in your own store or business, that they should ask
you about it anyway because you might be able help. Make sure that you
post this on your website somewhere and go to social media to offer help
as well. As far as mentoring goes, there are forums all over the Internet
with people that are seeking advice, some of them better than others. Try
to find people who are actually serious about being successful, like-minded
with your own values and goals and willing to accept your help. There’s no
sense in helping someone who isn’t going to put in the work because this
will not give you any of the benefits that comes from helping people.
Become Known As Someone Who Will Go above and beyond for Your
Customers
You want your customers to be happy. This means good customer service
but if you really want to shine, go above and beyond with every single
customer that you get. Do absolutely everything you can do to solve the
problem and make them happy and you will reap the rewards. They will talk about you to their friends, their colleagues and their family members and when they need a product or service that you sell they’ll be back to buy
from you again and again. This is how Amazon has become so successful,
by cultivating a reputation for customer service that is matched by no one
else.
Chapter Ten: Be Grateful
There is nothing like achieving the success you want to make you grateful,
but eventually the newness wears off and you forget to be grateful. There
are so many opportunities to be grateful each and every day and so many
reasons to do so. For one thing, people around you will be happier and
much more willing to spend time with you. You’ll also be happier yourself
and have a more positive attitude. You’ll also find that everyone is more
willing to help you when they know that you’re grateful for everything that
you have and everything that you receive.
People Who Feel Entitled
You have probably encountered people who feel entitled. They somehow
believe that they deserve to have success without working for it, even
though all of the other successful people in the world have had to work their butts off to get where they are. These people are always negative, they
whine and complain about any work that they have to do and believe that
the world should be handed to them on a silver platter. If you are one of
these people, stop! If you just know people like that make sure you avoid
ever falling into that trap because it is a pit of negativity that is very difficult to crawl out of.
Be Grateful for Your Opportunities
Be thankful for the opportunities that you have. If you live in a developed
country, think of all the people around the world who don’t have the
opportunities that you have. Think of people who not only don’t have
access to the Internet and the ability to start their own business online, but
they don’t even have access to clean water or electricity. The opportunity to
build a business and achieve that much success is nothing to be scoffed at.
If you have that opportunity, you are a very lucky person and you should be
grateful for it.
Also, you should be grateful for the teachers that you have in the
information that you’re able to acquire, from the Internet or whatever
sources you are using. You should be grateful for the teachers that you
have, that they have the knowledge to teach and that they are willing to
teach you. There actually are successful people out there who don’t
subscribe to this particular thought model, instead taking the approach that
the more people they shared the secret of their success with, the more
competition there will be, which will apparently somehow devalue their own success, even if it’s not the same industry. However, most successful
people are really grateful for those who help them get where they are
today.
You’ve probably heard of Tony Robbins. Tony is a motivational speaker,
author and very successful individual. Even with as much success as he’s
had, and all the things that he has done to create this environment for
himself, he is still immensely grateful to the people who helped him get
where he is today. In a recent interview with success.com Robbins said
that he is still grateful to his earliest mentor, a man named Jim Rohn, who
motivated Tony Robbins when he was very young. Follow Tony’s example
and be grateful because there are benefits; not only the ones mentioned in
the first paragraph of this chapter, but also some pretty amazing benefits
for your business itself. Science can’t seem to find a metric to measure, but
people that are grateful for all the opportunities that they had and all of the
people who have helped them, are more likely to be successful than those
who are not, and are usually several times more successful.
Practice Being Grateful until You Get it Perfect
It’s okay if you don’t feel that you’re at the point where you can be very
grateful. Like anything else, being grateful takes practice. You might
actually have to think hard about what you have to be grateful for when it
comes to your online business, or you may have to wait until you actually
do have something to be grateful for. The point is, start changing the way
that you think. This grateful attitude goes along with everything else in this
book. You are just being grateful because you should, you’re being grateful
because it changes you as a person; it makes you a better person and it
magnifies your success.
Start a Gratitude Journal
One of the things that you can do to become better at being grateful is to
start a gratitude journal. A gratitude journal is when you sit down at the end of the day and write down some of the things that you’re grateful for. You can use your computer, you can use a piece of paper and a pen or even a smart phone app if you prefer. Just as long as you spend a little time each
day thinking about what you have to be thankful for, writing it down and
using it to further your success.
Ways That You Can Show Your Gratitude
One of the things that you can do to give back is use whatever assets that
you have gained from being successful to help someone else. If you’re an
Amazon affiliate, and you’re getting your first check from Amazon for just
over $100, if you can afford it donated to charity, or take it down to your
local soup kitchen to help buy groceries or even outsource some of the
things that you need for your business so that other people can make
money too.
If you can show the world that you’re grateful, the world will keep giving you opportunities and information to help you be successful. It sounds hokey, like some sort of new age philosophy, but it truly is the way this thing works and if you talk to anyone who has achieved a decent level of success they will tell you that positive attitude, gratefulness and a willingness to learn are all keys to success.
Conclusion
This book is intended to help the serious person desiring to be an
entrepreneur to take the first steps towards their success. In this book, you
learned how important mindset is when it comes to success. You’ve
learned that it’s the ultimate factor that stands between the average person
desiring success and the person that actually achieves it.
You are able to take stock of yourself, learn what your current strengths
are, and which ones you need to cultivate in the future as well as what
weaknesses have kept you from success in the past. You are able to learn
how to set yourself up with healthy mindsets instead and how to use that
new mindset to take you as far as you want to go. Of course, this is no
easy journey and it may take some time to develop that mindset. No one is
expecting you to change overnight but hopefully, this book will help you
take the first two steps towards success.
Action Steps to Take
Here is a step-by-step summary of all the things that you need to do to
attain the success that you desire, based on the principles and information
in this book.
- Realize how important mindset is. Understand that your mindset is what will determine whether or not your successful – for good or for bad. Know how to change your mindset so that you can steer it towards success.
- Know what all of your current strengths are. Know what skills you bring to the table, know which skills that you’re going to need but that you might need to hone and understand how to use the skills to achieve the success that you want.
- Conversely, know what your weaknesses are some they don’t prevent you from being successful. You know that in the past, your weaknesses have been responsible for you not achieving your goals. This time, tell yourself, it isn’t going to happen because you control your weaknesses; they don’t control you.
- You are going to change your mindset to be healthy and geared toward success. No matter what your goals are from this time forward your mindset will be a positive one and that will change your life completely. Even if you decide never to open up your own business this will give you success in your marriage, your job and your interpersonal relationships.
- You’ll know how to focus on the present and quit dwelling in the past.
- You’ll know the proper way to set goals so that they are clear, concise and specific, and they give you the ability to create a roadmap to reaching them.
- You know how to be the best self that you can be. You’ll understand the process of change and be actively working on it with the confidence of knowing that as of right now you truly are the best self you can be.
- Understand how to value your time so that other people don’t take it from you and so that you can use it to achieve the goals that will take you from here to wherever your success is. No one else is as important as you are when it comes to achieving your goals.
- You’ll learn why you should serve others and how you can serve others, including both your customers and other people in the business. You now understand why this is so important and how it can help you become a better person.
- You’ll be grateful for what you have currently, how to give thanks for each day and why this is great for your future success.