My salary for 10 years combined didn’t add up to a million
My father passed away when I was 22 years old. Still living at home, he was supporting my mother, my daughter and me on a $30K per year salary. This man had an amazing work ethic, worked for the same company for 28 years (worked the day he died), hardly ever missed a day of work, woke up without an alarm clock and would walk to work if necessary, all to support his family.
After he died, I began to emulate him. I got a job and for the next 10 years worked at least 60 hours per week. During that time, I was able to witness millionaires and how they worked. However, my salary for those 10 years combined didn’t add up to a million.
Somehow I wanted to understand how the most important man in my life could out work anyone but at the time of his death only made $30k per year. As I began venturing out into the entrepreneurial space, the first time I generated 7 figures in revenue for my business it took 6 ½ years. Then, I was able to cut it down to 2 years and 7 months. Then 14 months. By the end of this year, I am projecting 4 months.
This year I will become the same age my dad was when he died. I will generate more money this year than he did during his entire life.
This hasn’t come without trial and error, bumps and bruises and downright cry fests.
Last week, I was talking to a possible client about entering my program to help her grow her business. During the conversation, she told me how she has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and how her family and friends think she should give up. She told me everything that has gone wrong. I knew she couldn’t hear anything I was saying because she was too far in the done me wrong song (we all know what that sounds like). However, the conversation stuck with me. That could have been me! Why wasn’t it me? It took me awhile to get my head around it, to understand how I can keep striving.
The Entrepreneur’s Creed
- Fail Fast – Ed Rush of Top Gun Consulting says fail fast. You can not dwell in your failures or what went wrong. Yes, you should learn from your failures. With that being said, if you are still talking about them every day, your focus is still on the failure and not on forward movement. Process your feelings and find a way to move on. I’ve done the most growth in this area in the last 5 years. I remembered I would go in the house and not talk to anyone for a week when I failed. Now failure for me is an everyday occurrence. Understand that failure is necessary. In Darren Hardy’s The Entrepreneur Roller Coaster he talks about the pendulum of failure to success. You don’t get one without the other.
- Disregard the Peanut Gallery – Back in the days of vaudeville, they would call the cheap seats “the peanut gallery” because patrons would heckle and throw peanuts at the performers on stage. This is going to happen to you. Accept it now. If you stretch beyond where you are currently, someone is going to “heckle” you. This might also be the very people you expect to love and cherish you (yup, your family and friends). They are not doing it to hurt you. Actually, they think they are protecting you. Know this in advance. In fact, here is a video I did to someone that wanted me to help him run for political office (I have no idea why he wanted me to help). His wife called him a 2 time loser (ouch).
- Popularity vs Paid – What are you spending your time on? If money is the barometer of how you will gauge success in your business (one of the ways), how much time do you spend on money generating activities? How much time do you interact with prospects or leads? Are you measuring? This is probably the biggest trap I see for my clients. Many of them are spending hours upon hours each day on social media and calling that prospecting. When I ask how many people did they have sales conversations with directly (over the phone or in person) or indirectly (by way of email or video) that number is normally very low if sales are a problem in the business. They mistake engagement on their social media, getting additional followers, participating in groups as money generating activities. Sorry, it’s not. It helps with outreach. Without the sales conversation, it’s making you popular, not paid.
- The Right People On The Bus – In one of the best business books ever Good To Great, Jim Collins talks about having the right people on the bus. This goes for everyone that you are letting into your entrepreneurial world – employees, virtual assistants, and even clients. Yes, chasing after the wrong client takes so much time away from the right one. This is the one that I struggle with the most. I love people so much that I give them chance after chance. I’ll say “She has a family. Let’s see if we can use her somewhere else.” That is not the right move. Yes, it may show you have a heart but it does not help the success of your business. One of my mentors recently told me when you keep someone beyond their expiration date, you are giving them a check to destroy your morale, reduce productivity and cause you more work. It jeopardizes your vision. Duly noted.
- Delegate or Automate – Take the amount of money you want to make in a year and divide it by 2080 (standard number of hours worked in a year based on a 40 hour workweek). For now, keep this in your head as your hourly wage. Any duties that you are doing that you could essentially get someone else to do for less than that “hourly wage” is costing you money. Yes, you should know the tasks necessary to operate your business. Once you know, automate it or delegate it. There are a number of ways where automation works just as well as hiring someone. For instance, your sales messages. Delivery of products or services. If you say the same thing over and over again, create a video. So many ways.
- Know What You’re Selling and Why Your Clients Buy – Most entrepreneurs are stuck telling leads and prospects why they should want their products or services. This is coming from the wrong perspective. Learn to speak from your client’s perspective. Ask your clients. The “why” for a client can connect you faster to additional clients than any other process.
- If it’s not a hell yes, it’s a hell no – For a while, I forgot this. If you don’t like what you are doing, you have to at least love why you are doing it. If not, you are going through the motions and could be using your talents and gifts in a much deeper, more fulfilling way.
- Wash, Rinse and Repeat – You will never be perfect at the first 7. Take steps daily to get better and better knowing it’s a journey not a destination.
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