The Grizzled Pro Speaks, Part 4: Heres an answer I gave last night, in the comments of the last post. It qualifies as one of the 5 Im ranting on this week. Alex Ramirez is in a real fix, having blown his initial investment in becoming an entrepreneur, and now down to his final pennies... ... and, worse, paralyzed into inaction because of it. My colleague David Raybould chimed in first, with some good advice, and then I went off on my own answer. First, David: Alex Im a buddy of Johns and a former mentee, so I know he wont mind me jumping in. The ugly truth is that starting out in such a pressurized situation probably isnt going to lead to the instant success it seems youre hoping for. But thats okay. Thats why its called starting out. You will fail until you dont. But dont have an event mentality about it. Success isnt an event. Its a process. Perfect the process, trust the process, and rewards will follow. Its just traffic and conversions. Anything else is extraneous. Also be wary of feeling like you need to answer to family members in regard to your business. The two should be very separate. The only way for you to succeed from here Alex is to take some action. So get off Facebook and go do it. :-) Now, my added comments... relevant to ALL entrepreneurs, at all stages of the roller coaster: Excellent response, David. All entrepreneurs face failure, constantly. Put as many odds in your favor as possible, and when you have to grind, grind. Alex, everyone here feels for your situation. Many have been in some version of it themselves. There are no magic answers, however. Its business -- your plan, your marketing, your advertising, all the pieces are put into action, and you do all you can to get the results you seek. But plans fail, circumstances outside your control interfere, and sometimes even great ads stop working. Nothing in biz is guaranteed. Every top marketer you know of has had projects fail. You need to learn when to stop throwing good money after bad, when to regroup and start over, when to call it a loss and try something new. The gun-to--the-head attitude is just a reminder to make the best possible decision at all times. Its not a guarantee youll always be right, or that things will work out. The gun isnt real -- its a metaphor. So you dont do things on a whim, and you do the things with the greatest chance of winning. The problems you likely encountered happened long ago. The time to regroup is not at the end of your resources. Learn from this. Get a job, if you must, to restock your bank acct. Work out a repayment plan. Keep learning how to make a project work. Money is not a finite resource in the world. You can earn more, work your way into a better-position on your next project -- so youre not hemorrhaging money in a losing campaign. Again -- theres no magic to successful projects. Large amounts of money upfront doesnt mean youll succeed, big staffs dont mean youll succeed, and great ideas dont mean youll succeed. It isnt the end of the world to fail, when you can muster new opportunities after recovering. You sound young. That means you have time on your side. You are not forbidden to try again with a new project, if you fail. You can take a job, and focus on learning how to fix what you did wrong while repaying loans and starting a new war chest for the next project down the road. Again -- there are no magic answers. But there are other projects, other opportunities, and other ways to both learn from failure, and do better next time. Good luck. And dont call me pops. Plus, all I ever asked for from that first copywriter I met was a clue. A bit of info. Which is what Ive been pouring into the world, through my free blog, this free Facebook page, my free podcasts. Ive never asked anyone to save me. Just info. You have massive lessons to learn here. It may take you years to learn them, and get back in the game. You may never be a successful entrepreneur -- you must live in reality, and be honest about your situation at every stage. You may also make it all work the next time around. It depends on you, and how you apply the lessons you learn. Every biz owner alive faces the same risk of failure. Its a process, not an event, as David said above.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Nov 2014 03:53:04 +0000
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