I was thinking about making a blog post on the lessons I have learned during my Internet marketing journey. Upon reflecting, I was struck by a realization that I’ve been doing this for 10+ years. Time sure flies when you’re having fun. This calls for a drink!
So today, I’m going to go a little bit deeper than usual, and share some advice I wish someone had taught me when I was first starting out. If you want to do well in this business, here’s what you’re going to need.
You Need To Be Disciplined
Discipline is doing the essential things every day in your business, even when you don’t feel like doing them. An example of this is my new product, Ultimate Dot Com Lifestyle (UDCL). Launching a product is no fun. It takes a tremendous amount of discipline. You have to stay focused on the task at hand.
There’ll always be a part of you that will want to take a break and go do something else. I’d love to go watch a movie instead, or some bar and have a few drinks with friends. However, I’ve committed to giving a certain number of hours each day for this launch, so I’m going to stay home tonight.
This is how I try to approach my business every day. Normally it’s not this intense, but I still make sure the essential things get done. If there isn’t a blog post with my name on it for more than two days, then I know it’s been too long since my readers have heard from me. I will force myself to produce new content. It’s these little things you do on a daily basis that add up over time.
Perhaps you currently have a job and you work full time. You get home late at night, and you’re tired. Do you decide to veg out in front of the TV and watch your favorite show, telling yourself you deserve to rest after the long day? Or, do you sit down in front of your computer and place that extra ad, knowing it could lead to your next big sale and help you quit that job once and for all to pursue your dreams?
In that moment, it might seem like an inconsequential decision to remain in front of the TV. “What’s the big deal?†you might ask yourself, “it’s only one night off.†Yet those nights off soon add up, and turn into months, and then years. I have countless friends tell me they planned to start a blog shortly after I started my blog over ten years ago. To this very day, I am still waiting to see their blogs.
Every time you make the right decision and take the necessary actions to build your business, even when you don’t feel like doing them, you give yourself power. Where you are one year from today, will be the sum total of all those minor decisions you make every day here on out. Make sure you’re making the right ones, and have the discipline to stick to it.
It doesn’t Matter What Anyone Thinks
No one ever became successful without having critics along the way. The only way to guarantee you’ll never have critics, is to accomplish nothing. Many people in life seem happy to do this. You should expect to have people be skeptical of, scoff at, be negative at, laugh at, and even ridicule what you’re now doing. Pay them no attention.
Think about how many critics President Obama has. All I have to do is check my Facebook timeline to see all the critics blasting the candidates now running for POTUS. And then there are the critics of Apple computers, who still insist PCs are better. You should see some of the critics I have online.
There are people out there who love to observe from the sidelines of life and criticize the players in life instead of getting in the game themselves. It’s easier for them that way. No one ever remembers these people, and they never accomplish anything significant.
What you’re doing right now is taking a stand for your own financial future, and trying something that most never will. You’ll have people around you say that internet marketing doesn’t work, it’s a scam, that ‘if it’s so easy, then everyone would be doing it,’ etc. When I first started my online business I had people laugh at what I was doing, or tell me I was being scammed. I assure you, they are no longer laughing.
Instead of focussing on the critics, ignore them and surround yourself with other people who are on the same path as you. If you don’t know any other entrepreneurs, then get to seminars and meet them. Join me for a Dot Com Lunch. Spend more time discussing your business with these people than you do discussing it with people who are not on board with what you’re doing.
Stop Learning – Start Doing
Being the founder of a blog that teaches people new skills, I obviously am a huge advocate of learning. I believe self education determines what kind of life a person leads more than anything else. However, I don’t believe knowledge by itself has any value.
I only believe applied knowledge has value.
It makes no sense to fill your head with more and more theory if you’re not also taking action along the way. The best advice I can give you here, is that for every one hour you spend learning something, go spend three hours actually doing it.
This blog teaches you everything you need to know about making money online, but you must make sure that you are implementing the strategies you are being taught. This way the knowledge you gain will sink in at a much deeper level through real life experience, rather than the ‘surface level’ learning you get (and soon forget) when you’re accumulating more theory.
You Have To Have Faith
I remember when I started out, and I began to get very impatient with the process. Especially when people who were newer to the business would get started, who knew much less than I did, yet were still making sales. To be honest, that was infuriating.
I wondered why it was taking me so much longer. And yes, there were times when I started to doubt myself and whether I’d ever be successful in this business. There were times when I’d lay in bed at night, staring up at the ceiling unable to sleep, thinking about all the money I’d spent and being frustrated at my lack of results.
But no matter what, I always returned to a position of having faith that things would work out.
As long as you don’t stop taking action, sooner or later you’ll figure out what works. Even if you have to try 100 things that didn’t work to find the one thing that did, you’ll know the only way you’ll ever fail was through giving up. When my first $1,000 commission came in late 2007, it may as well have been $100,000. It felt so good to know that not only did I have a result, but, I’d found a series of action steps which had led to that sale which I could repeat.
If you have faith that things will work out, you will take the action steps needed to see it through, even when all signs point to failure. When you have nothing left, have faith.
Be a producer Rather Than a Consumer
When you’re first starting out in this industry, it’s easy to get caught up in what everyone else is doing. It’s easy to attend webinar after webinar, watch video after video, read blog post after blog post, and be constantly consuming everyone else’s marketing.
The problem with this is you become overwhelmed with information very quickly, and also begin to feel depressed about how little you’re doing. To avoid taking action, you procrastinate through continuing to look at everyone else’s marketing. More time passes, and you begin to feel worse. Before you know it, months have passed you by and you still haven’t made any money.
Don’t let this happen to you.
Each day you must focus first on producing your own marketing, before you give your attention to anyone else’s. Spend the first hour of your day placing your own ads and/or creating content that promotes you and your business.
A Final Word of Advice
The opportunity you have in front of you right now is unprecedented. It’s entirely possible that one year from now, you will have a completely different life.
A life with no debt, and where money is no longer a worry. A life where you get to choose how much you want to work each day. A life where traveling to exotic places is something you experience every few months. In other words, the Dot Com Lifestyle.
But, and it’s a big but, it’s going to require you learn some new skills, and more importantly, that you consistently and persistently implement them. It will take time (probably more than you think) and money (again, probably more than think).
The truth is, if I’d have known what was required in the very beginning of starting my first online business, it would have been a lot less appealing. I would have had second thoughts about it. All top earners in this industry, and top entrepreneurs in general, will tell you something similar. But they’ll also tell you that in hindsight, starting their business was the best decision they ever made.
Make the decision that no matter what, you’re going to make something of yourself as an Internet marketer. There’s only one person on this planet who will hold you back from achieving all of this. And that’s you.
Have faith that you can do this, take massive action, and begin immediately. If you’re looking for a proven system for making money online, then go apply for my new Ultimate Dot Com Lifestyle system. Here’s the results achieved with this system so far.
- 1 consultant has made over $10 million
- 6 consultants have made over $1 million
- 37 consultants have made over $100,000
- 345 consultants have made over $10,000
- 1,207 consultants have made over $1,000
- 3,567 consultants have made a commission
Real people are getting real results. It’s time for you to get in the game and join them.