Do you remember being 12 or 13, and your mother or father would say things that you didn’t quite understand? Like “Those are just Growing Pains,” or “you’ll know when you grow up,” and “just wait until you’re a parent.”
In our youth and our innocence, we just laugh these things off or meet them with a never-present sense that it’s too long into the future and nowhere near today.
Our parents and most adults go through a Rite of Passage that provides them with Knowledge and Wisdom and a dry sense of humor.
Then, you’re 18 – unending freedom and still wet behind the ears! You’re starting to get some of the things your parents said.
Then, you’re 27 – J.O.B., partner, car note, maybe your first or second on the way. Now the things your parents said are starting to make sense.
Beyond life experience and doing what’s typical, you changed when you became an adult.
We bring this up because starting a business can almost feel like going back to being a snot-nosed-awkward teenager again. The innocence, youth, and awkwardness included.
Trust the process. Your time is coming: Every parent says to a child who doesn’t understand the fullness of life that only experience can reveal.
First, to conclude the story:
Growing and maturing in a career takes patients and aptitude. Depending on the organization or the career field, it also takes wits and sometimes “office politics.” By doing this, you can become comfortable in the semi-predictable environment that an excellent job has to offer, even if this is an illusion.
Growing and maturing in a business takes character. Being a teenager growing into your own is founded on (and concluded by achieving) character – not “25-steps to conclude childhood.”
When lacking a step-by-step guide, sometimes the only thing you can do is just “never give up” and “being honest to a fault.”
When starting a business, there are very few rules and even fewer actual steps. Breaking into new markets or going toe-to-toe with a competitor has no step-by-step tactical playbook.
You’ll win, you’ll fail, you’ll learn. That’s life growing up; that’s business every day.
No one likes an unhappy customer.
Sometimes conversations get emotional; maybe you made a colossal mistake or dropped the ball. At this moment, it’s probably the most stressful thing you’re dealing with.
So what do you do when a customer is unhappy? Well, this is when you start to learn character and integrity. You just have to do the only thing you can do, which is: make it right.
After the dust has settled and the customer is satisfied – or at least as satisfied as they can be – there is one more critical step; you need to learn from that mistake. You need to understand what made the customer so unhappy. Were expectations not met? Was performance poor? Did you do something wrong, or was it simply on them?
This will prevent you from having that uncomfortable mistake again and ensure that you grow as a company and entrepreneur.
These are the inevitable lessons – you’re not perfect. It will happen again.
The reality of growing a business is that success is measured by the number of mistakes, mess-ups, and unhappy customers you bounce back from.
And, we’ve had many. That’s how we got where we are today, and that’s precisely how you will too.
Not just having unhappy customers. But learning from them.
When employees do something wrong at their job, they usually get put on performance plans or sometimes get fired.
What’s the lesson learned?
Hustle – try to get a new job, internalize the unhappy customer, don’t make that mistake again.
Learning from your mistakes as an entrepreneur can save your business. Even more, it’s also a great way to find areas for improvement that may actually reap greater rewards and put you ahead of your nearest competitors.
We mean really listening.
The painful kind where you shut up, drop the ego and just hear what they’re telling you.
Sometimes customers just have bad days and need to vent; other times (and these are the special moments), you have a customer who actually cares. They’re sharing feedback with you because they know it will help you.
This is an actual ego check.
What is this?
It’s free Consulting.
You’re having someone tell you precisely what’s wrong with your business. Consultants might take tens of thousands of billable hours to distill down what’s wrong with your company what a customer could say in a simple phone call.
If you see this as free consulting, then you’ll actually seek the input, good or bad. Obviously, you can’t take all of the feedback; again, sometimes people are just angry and despotic and want something to yell at. You’ll begin to learn the difference.
Like we said before, it’s not just listening to the unhappy customer. It’s about the moments after the dust has settled, the problems have been solved, and you’re ready to reflect inwardly about what happened and what you can do.
So here’s an action plan:
Write everything down, put it in a knowledge base.
Save it somewhere.
Because the reality is that this document is going to grow, just like you.
Michael E. Gerber
You put in your two-week notice at a company you’ve been at for a few years. Or, maybe you decided to skip a semester to take a stab at entrepreneurship. Congrats!
Leaping into starting a new business is exciting and scary. Few things have as many mixed emotions as starting a business.
As you’d expect, the first few months are unpredictable. But that’s okay because you’re up for the challenge, and you figured that things would be wild at first.
Then, for Drew, at least, there was a moment that you honestly and inwardly asked yourself.
“How is this any different than having a J.O.B (just over broke?)” Yes, you have more freedom – and you set the terms. But (as any new business will understand) you show up sooner, leave later, and put in way more effort.
You didn’t plan for “time” management. Which, as I have said, is my most essential and completely invaluable asset.
You think that just showing up is what’s needed. And sometimes that’s true. The reality is that there’s an unspoke and hard to reason formula for being productive, providing value, and living. What in your business is taking you away from being productive?
From working on-the-business rather than working in-the-business.
That (helpful reminder) you went on this path to get more than more money. You wanted more freedom and time.
The reality is that most people’s attention spans don’t go beyond 18 minutes. So why then do you have so much “planned for today” that isn’t needed. You’re wasting your own time. You’re unproductive.
It’s because you’ve never taken the time to reflect on the things in your day that suck the time out of you. Maybe you’ve never given yourself a limit.
You don’t own a business; you’re just another employee.
Between strategic initiatives and weekly tasks, you (like millions of American’s who don’t take vacations) haven’t prepared for when you “won’t work.”
If you’ve got a J.O.B. then I’d invite you to walk into your manager’s office and tell her that you’re planning on only showing up for 2 hours a day over the next few weeks. You want to catch up on reading or spend more time with the wife.
See. You’re not an employee – because you can decide this. You control your time.
I don’t like meetings. I hate them. The reality is that most times, there’s a meeting that could have been an email.
Like Tim Ferris suggested in the 4-hour workweek. Being upfront and transparent with people – that they should forward as much information as possible before the meeting may actually result in no meetings at all.
Problem solved. Time back.
Let’s think about the extreme for a moment. What would happen if you never showed up at your small business ever again?
What would happen? Are you getting apprehensive?
Maybe less extreme – what if you had 1 hour a week that you checked in with your team – it was a power-problem solving event. When you were done, you went back to the other 39 Hours of the week.
What would happen? Sounds odd, right?
What you’re likely thinking about is all of those tasks that need you. Maybe it’s the small tasks that add up, but you feel like you own them. Or perhaps it’s the most critical tasks that you’d never feel comfortable giving away to someone else… yet.
What if we suggested you compromise. Could you find a way to shrink every day down to two hyper-efficient hours of problem-solving? You delegate the small tasks, own the complex functions. Then… you take two more hours (so a four-hour workday.) to only focus on this one problem.
How do I get rid of the “critical” two hours a day?
How do I shrink this to 4 hours a week?
If you do, you own a business.
“In order to succeed, your desire for success should be greater than your fear of failure.”
The answer is yes. Fear is a reactionary emotion, designed to keep us safe, but if you’re not careful, it can get in the way of your success.
You may not even be aware that you’re acting out of fear, but a Plan B = a fear of failure. The fear of failure has a way of holding us back so that we don’t give a 100% to what we’re doing. And in order to succeed, it’s all or nothing.
Most people think of failure as not making lots of money, but the reality is that failure means something different to each individual.
For me, failure is having a 9 to 5 job because it means I’m sacrificing my freedom. As long as I’m able to pay the bills while maintaining my freedom to be able to go where I want and work when I want, I’m living a successful life.
For other though, failure may be losing that 9 to 5 job, because success for them is stability.
As humans, we tend to worry more about our social image than our own personal desires. At the end of the day though, what matters most is your own happiness.
So take some time to figure out what failure is to you. Then, do yourself a favor and own it!
In order to be successful, you have to push past your failures. Life is full of ups and downs, but it’s important to keep moving forward.
The number one thing that successful people do is own their mistakes so that they can learn from them and not repeat the same mistakes. So fail often, and fail fast. Then keep going. As long as you don’t give up, you’re still succeeding. Don’t let your fears outdo your success!
And then once you’ve found something that works, stick with it!
We often see something called the Law of Diminishing Return, which essentially means you get what you give. And as motivation runs out, so does your effort. When this happens, you stop seeing results. Don’t let this happen to you. Give it your all, because giving up is failure.
If something just isn’t working out though, don’t be afraid to pivot directions! Ask yourself if staying where you’re at is worth it. Are you happy with what you’re doing? Is what you’re doing making you successful (in your terms)?
If the answer is no, then adjust your course! But be sure you give it 100% of your effort!
I always say, it’s motivation that gets you started, but habit is what keeps you going. In our next session, we’ll discuss how you can build habits that set you up for success!
In this episode... Hear a tantalizing origin story filled with witty commentary and unnecessary anecdotes... Wrong! We cut to the meat. Each podcast is 30 minutes of hard-hitting facts and no-b.s. lessons from an entrepreneur who has seen it all (Chad Scott) and an entrepreneur who is just getting started (Drew Prescott.)
Babe Ruth, the American professional baseball legend, said it, and we happen to agree. We learn about Chad's early years in entrepreneurship, and about his method for finding and starting your business with a simple yellow legal pad.
"There is no substitute for hard work." — Thomas Edison, entrepreneur, and inventor
Michael E. Gerber
You put in your two-week notice at a company you’ve been at for a few years. Or, maybe you decided to skip a semester to take a stab at entrepreneurship. Congrats!
Leaping into starting a new business is exciting and scary. Few things have as many mixed emotions as starting a business.
As you’d expect, the first few months are unpredictable. But that’s okay because you’re up for the challenge, and you figured that things would be wild at first.
Then, for Drew, at least, there was a moment that you honestly and inwardly asked yourself.
“How is this any different than having a J.O.B (just over broke?)” Yes, you have more freedom – and you set the terms. But (as any new business will understand) you show up sooner, leave later, and put in way more effort.
You didn’t plan for “time” management. Which, as I have said, is my most essential and completely invaluable asset.
You think that just showing up is what’s needed. And sometimes that’s true. The reality is that there’s an unspoke and hard to reason formula for being productive, providing value, and living. What in your business is taking you away from being productive?
From working on-the-business rather than working in-the-business.
That (helpful reminder) you went on this path to get more than more money. You wanted more freedom and time.
The reality is that most people’s attention spans don’t go beyond 18 minutes. So why then do you have so much “planned for today” that isn’t needed. You’re wasting your own time. You’re unproductive.
It’s because you’ve never taken the time to reflect on the things in your day that suck the time out of you. Maybe you’ve never given yourself a limit.
You don’t own a business; you’re just another employee.
Between strategic initiatives and weekly tasks, you (like millions of American’s who don’t take vacations) haven’t prepared for when you “won’t work.”
If you’ve got a J.O.B. then I’d invite you to walk into your manager’s office and tell her that you’re planning on only showing up for 2 hours a day over the next few weeks. You want to catch up on reading or spend more time with the wife.
See. You’re not an employee – because you can decide this. You control your time.
I don’t like meetings. I hate them. The reality is that most times, there’s a meeting that could have been an email.
Like Tim Ferris suggested in the 4-hour workweek. Being upfront and transparent with people – that they should forward as much information as possible before the meeting may actually result in no meetings at all.
Problem solved. Time back.
Let’s think about the extreme for a moment. What would happen if you never showed up at your small business ever again?
What would happen? Are you getting apprehensive?
Maybe less extreme – what if you had 1 hour a week that you checked in with your team – it was a power-problem solving event. When you were done, you went back to the other 39 Hours of the week.
What would happen? Sounds odd, right?
What you’re likely thinking about is all of those tasks that need you. Maybe it’s the small tasks that add up, but you feel like you own them. Or perhaps it’s the most critical tasks that you’d never feel comfortable giving away to someone else… yet.
What if we suggested you compromise. Could you find a way to shrink every day down to two hyper-efficient hours of problem-solving? You delegate the small tasks, own the complex functions. Then… you take two more hours (so a four-hour workday.) to only focus on this one problem.
How do I get rid of the “critical” two hours a day?
How do I shrink this to 4 hours a week?
If you do, you own a business.
In this episode... Hear a tantalizing origin story filled with witty commentary and unnecessary anecdotes... Wrong! We cut to the meat. Each podcast is 30 minutes of hard-hitting facts and no-b.s. lessons from an entrepreneur who has seen it all (Chad Scott) and an entrepreneur who is just getting started (Drew Prescott.)
Babe Ruth, the American professional baseball legend, said it, and we happen to agree. We learn about Chad's early years in entrepreneurship, and about his method for finding and starting your business with a simple yellow legal pad.
"There is no substitute for hard work." — Thomas Edison, entrepreneur, and inventor
No one likes an unhappy customer.
Sometimes conversations get emotional; maybe you made a colossal mistake or dropped the ball. At this moment, it’s probably the most stressful thing you’re dealing with.
So what do you do when a customer is unhappy? Well, this is when you start to learn character and integrity. You just have to do the only thing you can do, which is: make it right.
After the dust has settled and the customer is satisfied – or at least as satisfied as they can be – there is one more critical step; you need to learn from that mistake. You need to understand what made the customer so unhappy. Were expectations not met? Was performance poor? Did you do something wrong, or was it simply on them?
This will prevent you from having that uncomfortable mistake again and ensure that you grow as a company and entrepreneur.
These are the inevitable lessons – you’re not perfect. It will happen again.
The reality of growing a business is that success is measured by the number of mistakes, mess-ups, and unhappy customers you bounce back from.
And, we’ve had many. That’s how we got where we are today, and that’s precisely how you will too.
Not just having unhappy customers. But learning from them.
When employees do something wrong at their job, they usually get put on performance plans or sometimes get fired.
What’s the lesson learned?
Hustle – try to get a new job, internalize the unhappy customer, don’t make that mistake again.
Learning from your mistakes as an entrepreneur can save your business. Even more, it’s also a great way to find areas for improvement that may actually reap greater rewards and put you ahead of your nearest competitors.
We mean really listening.
The painful kind where you shut up, drop the ego and just hear what they’re telling you.
Sometimes customers just have bad days and need to vent; other times (and these are the special moments), you have a customer who actually cares. They’re sharing feedback with you because they know it will help you.
This is an actual ego check.
What is this?
It’s free Consulting.
You’re having someone tell you precisely what’s wrong with your business. Consultants might take tens of thousands of billable hours to distill down what’s wrong with your company what a customer could say in a simple phone call.
If you see this as free consulting, then you’ll actually seek the input, good or bad. Obviously, you can’t take all of the feedback; again, sometimes people are just angry and despotic and want something to yell at. You’ll begin to learn the difference.
Like we said before, it’s not just listening to the unhappy customer. It’s about the moments after the dust has settled, the problems have been solved, and you’re ready to reflect inwardly about what happened and what you can do.
So here’s an action plan:
Write everything down, put it in a knowledge base.
Save it somewhere.
Because the reality is that this document is going to grow, just like you.
In this episode... Hear a tantalizing origin story filled with witty commentary and unnecessary anecdotes... Wrong! We cut to the meat. Each podcast is 30 minutes of hard-hitting facts and no-b.s. lessons from an entrepreneur who has seen it all (Chad Scott) and an entrepreneur who is just getting started (Drew Prescott.)
Babe Ruth, the American professional baseball legend, said it, and we happen to agree. We learn about Chad's early years in entrepreneurship, and about his method for finding and starting your business with a simple yellow legal pad.
"There is no substitute for hard work." — Thomas Edison, entrepreneur, and inventor
Do you remember being 12 or 13, and your mother or father would say things that you didn’t quite understand? Like “Those are just Growing Pains,” or “you’ll know when you grow up,” and “just wait until you’re a parent.”
In our youth and our innocence, we just laugh these things off or meet them with a never-present sense that it’s too long into the future and nowhere near today.
Our parents and most adults go through a Rite of Passage that provides them with Knowledge and Wisdom and a dry sense of humor.
Then, you’re 18 – unending freedom and still wet behind the ears! You’re starting to get some of the things your parents said.
Then, you’re 27 – J.O.B., partner, car note, maybe your first or second on the way. Now the things your parents said are starting to make sense.
Beyond life experience and doing what’s typical, you changed when you became an adult.
We bring this up because starting a business can almost feel like going back to being a snot-nosed-awkward teenager again. The innocence, youth, and awkwardness included.
Trust the process. Your time is coming: Every parent says to a child who doesn’t understand the fullness of life that only experience can reveal.
First, to conclude the story:
Growing and maturing in a career takes patients and aptitude. Depending on the organization or the career field, it also takes wits and sometimes “office politics.” By doing this, you can become comfortable in the semi-predictable environment that an excellent job has to offer, even if this is an illusion.
Growing and maturing in a business takes character. Being a teenager growing into your own is founded on (and concluded by achieving) character – not “25-steps to conclude childhood.”
When lacking a step-by-step guide, sometimes the only thing you can do is just “never give up” and “being honest to a fault.”
When starting a business, there are very few rules and even fewer actual steps. Breaking into new markets or going toe-to-toe with a competitor has no step-by-step tactical playbook.
You’ll win, you’ll fail, you’ll learn. That’s life growing up; that’s business every day.
In this episode... Hear a tantalizing origin story filled with witty commentary and unnecessary anecdotes... Wrong! We cut to the meat. Each podcast is 30 minutes of hard-hitting facts and no-b.s. lessons from an entrepreneur who has seen it all (Chad Scott) and an entrepreneur who is just getting started (Drew Prescott.)
Babe Ruth, the American professional baseball legend, said it, and we happen to agree. We learn about Chad's early years in entrepreneurship, and about his method for finding and starting your business with a simple yellow legal pad.
"There is no substitute for hard work." — Thomas Edison, entrepreneur, and inventor
3 Small Business Ideas You Can Start This Week!
We’ve compiled the best small business ideas for 2022. Any of these ideas could be the difference in you spending your weekends bored on the couch, versus building an additional stream of revenue.
1. Build an Online Course
The e-learning market size surpassed $250 billion in 2020. It is expected to continue to grow at a Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of more than 21% between 2021-2027.
Yet, how might you begin a business in the e-learning industry?
Let me tell you how I did it.
I spent part of the year in 2021 learning how to mine cryptocurrency. I found the passive income to be so fascinating, and not to mention it was so much better than my rental property income, that I wanted to share the information with everyone I could. The more people I told, the more questions I was getting on a daily basis. I decided to take the knowledge I’d gained and build a tell all course that would guide a true beginner with no experience to actually earning passive income in less than 2 weeks. This course became a best seller in the first week it was online. That is how my Online Course Business got its start.
https://www.udemy.com/course/tpb-crypto-mining/
The more I dove into the online learning business I realized that the educational opportunities we have in the United States are unlike any where else in the world. I personally believe that the future of education is going to be students teaching students. I think the rest of the world population is thirsty for knowledge and due to a lack of infrastructure, online learning is by far the most promising. So take any skill today that you think someone could benefit from, organize it, and start researching how to film it (even with your iPhone). From there, you just need an editor to polish it up, and get it ready for the big time! This is one of the most promising passive income ideas that you can start benefiting from ASAP!
2. Freelancing your way to Freedom
Businesses today are struggling to hire quality help more than ever. This is another reason why the freelancing market has exploded in recent years. Employers are learning more and more each day that they no longer need to employ another person full time to get high quality work. They can hire a freelancer, and when the job is complete, the company is no longer on the hook for paying the freelancer.
I’ve been a business owner for the better part of 16 years, and this was the #1 thing that changed the entire direction of my business. The first time I hired a freelancer to build a script in photoshop for me, I realized that this type of work would one day change the world. Here is what happened from my perspective:
As you can see, this works for everyone, the freelancer can work whenever they want with no one really being in charge of them, and it makes the employers job much easier as well. In my eyes, this is a win, win for all parties!
Now, here’s what you need to start a freelance business online:
Freelancing is one unique business idea that gives you the flexibility to choose your own projects and work hours. Start being your own boss today!
2. Online Advertising Business
Digital marketing is marketing of the future. How do I know? Because I own a business that has paid a ton of money to people to help with this for a long time now. I realized right a way that Facebook Marketing, Google Ads, TikTok Ads, and so on are where everyone “congregates” online. The best part about digital marketing is that you can learn how to do it by taking an online course, you don’t need a degree for this! There are so many businesses who just need someone they can trust to help them setup all of the necessary channels to take their business to the next level. Most people disregard this as a business idea because they’re not a great writer or a graphic designer, but I’m here to tell you that you can hire someone to do the copy and to do the design. I hire these services on Fiverr and Upwork all the time, and once you find a few people who you enjoy working with, they’re now on your team! To get started, you just need the courage to go our and find some businesses that need your help. Here are things that all small businesses need help with:
You can start this today by taking a course online at Udemy. After you learn the ropes, you can start from your kitchen table!
I hope this helps you realize that getting started is not as hard as it sounds and it can be done with very little money at all. Remember, the real reason to become a freelancer is because of the freedom it can provide. Now, start taking control of your life!
In this episode... Hear a tantalizing origin story filled with witty commentary and unnecessary anecdotes... Wrong! We cut to the meat. Each podcast is 30 minutes of hard-hitting facts and no-b.s. lessons from an entrepreneur who has seen it all (Chad Scott) and an entrepreneur who is just getting started (Drew Prescott.)
Babe Ruth, the American professional baseball legend, said it, and we happen to agree. We learn about Chad's early years in entrepreneurship, and about his method for finding and starting your business with a simple yellow legal pad.
"There is no substitute for hard work." — Thomas Edison, entrepreneur, and inventor