This is a guest post from Brian – a past student (and now somebody we’re happy to call a friend) who had made some serious progress online. He emailed me this post out of the blue the other day; Court and I were blown away by his insights. Unfortunately, we can’t even link back to Brian’s blog because he’s anonymous on that site (his consulting business requires it). Hopefully at some point we’ll be able to link to him because I find his blog an extremely interesting read, even though I have no background (or future) in his field. I encourage you to soak up and internalize what Brian is trying to share with you.
Hey everyone, I’m Brian, one of Court and Mark’s former students.
I joined the coaching program in late January and Mark referenced me in a recent post as having gone from $0/month to over $10,000/month online recently.
Going from nothing to a full-time income online in just over half a year sounds impressive.
But it wasn’t easy, and I put in a huge amount of time and effort to get there. I reached my goal differently from what I had originally envisioned (I had planned to sell products, but I ended up selling my own high-priced consulting while my products were still under development).
Court and Mark might tell you that persistence, time, and effort are the most difficult parts of making money online. But I would add to that list the barriers I overcame to get there.
Barrier 1: Formal Education
In an earlier post, Mark mentioned how a formal university education is a terrible investment if you look at how little you earn right out of school.
I was in a much better position than most graduates because I had a $150K job shortly after graduating, due to a combination of persistence, luck and going to one of the top schools in the country.
But I still think Formal Education is a huge barrier to starting your own business for one simple reason: it gives you the wrong mindset.
In school, you get assignments from professors and get quick feedback on whether you succeeded or failed. The scope of each assignment is clear, and someone tells you exactly what to do.
But this is exactly the wrong kind of experience if you want to be a business owner rather than an employee.
Why?
- There is no such thing as “quick feedback” in business. You need to test things for weeks, months, or years before you know whether they worked.
- No one can tell you exactly what to do or what not to do. You need to test a lot of different ideas and see what sticks.
- There’s no one judge to tell you whether you succeeded. The only way to determine your success is whether or not your customers are satisfied.
Having spent so much of my life in school, these points were really difficult for me at first. I overcame this barrier by surrounding myself by people who had succeeded in business or were looking to succeed online, rather than by the naysayers who liked to complain rather than take action.
Barrier 2: Friends and Family
To this day, 90% of my friends and family do not support me even though I make more money than them and have a better lifestyle at the same time.
Why?
Here are 4 reasons that come to mind immediately:
- They don’t “get it” – they don’t understand that the money you make is determined by the value you create, not how many hours you spend doing it.
- They don’t know anyone else doing it, so they assume it’s impossible or that I’m lying.
- They get defensive because I’m implicitly telling them that their approach is flawed.
- They just don’t care - believe it or not, some people are happy to endure crappy situations because they assume everyone else’s life also sucks.
When you start making money online, there will be a million naysayers who say it can’t be done.
And if you listen to them, you immediately endanger your chances for success. It’s like getting marriage advice from the guy who has been divorced 5 times: if he hasn’t succeeded in achieving your goal, why should you listen to anything he says?
There are two methods I used to overcome this barrier:
First, surround yourself with a more supportive set of people. It can be hard to find people who have had success with their own businesses – but finding people who are supportive of what you do can be easier.
Second, prove the naysayers wrong and win supporters. You can then work with them on future projects, and even if they don’t want to commit to anything full-time, they can still help you out quite a bit.
When I was starting out, exactly 0 people in my immediate circle had succeeded online – so I found groups and forums for those with similar goals instead.
Proving the doubters wrong can also be a very powerful way to win supporters. Two friends who doubted me in the beginning have now expressed interest in working for me after seeing how much money I’ve made.
Barrier 3: Yourself
A few months ago, some friends who had studied abroad with me in Japan met up for dinner. Towards the end, someone mentioned how we should make a return trip but how no one could afford it. Then someone else said, “Well, maybe if one of us gets rich…” and everyone looked at me.
I’m not smarter or more talented than anyone else who was there. In fact, many of my friends were more capable than me or had skills I didn’t have.
But there was one reason why everyone felt I had the best chance of “getting rich”: my mindset. Of course, they didn’t label it as such: they just felt I had been “born with talent” (I was terrible at sports, music, and most other things) or “born rich” (my parents never made more than $50K per year, combined).
The truth was simple: I thought big, while they thought small.
When you’re only making $10/month online, there are times when you’ll wonder if it’s even possible to make a full-time income via the Internet.
The best way to overcome this barrier is through incremental success. It took me many months to make a full-time income online – but even before that, incremental success helped keep me positive and focused on my goals.
One morning, for example, I woke up and the largest site in my niche had published one of my articles – that gave me thousands of visitors and offers to write for the 2 largest newspapers in the country. Of course, that didn’t just occur randomly – it happened because I had built up a relationship with the editor and kept sending him my articles each week, until I finally got my break.
Another time, before I had even begun selling anything, a reader emailed me and asked if he could pay to ask me for my advice. When you’ve been an employee or student your whole life, it’s quite refreshing to get an offer to give advice for $300/hour.
Incremental success is crucial online because most sites take many months, or even years, to become big successes.
If you wait for that to happen and don’t also set smaller goals in between, you lose motivation and can become the biggest barrier to your own success.
There Are Always Barriers
Although I successfully quit my day job and now work online full-time, I still run into barriers with each new project. For a new premium subscription site I’m working on, I’ve run into problems setting up partnership agreements, hiring voice talent, and even explaining to potential customers why it has been delayed.
Relative to the three barriers above, though, these seem like small problems – and that’s why I know I’ll succeed.
In fact, that might be the best part of overcoming barriers: you not only achieve whatever business goals you’ve set, but you’re also in a much better position to achieve whatever future goals you set.
I just finished reading this post for about the fifth time this morning…a thought keeps coming into my head: If the American (and world) economy is going to get back on track we need a lot more people like Brian and a lot fewer people like those that are trying to slow him down.
Choose to be a “Brian”. Decide to become part of the solution to the world’s economic problems.
Thanks Brian, for being the voice of optimism in a time when most people are choosing to live in fear.
- Mark
Wow what an unbelievable article. I have been going through these barriers for years. No one that I know on a person level has anything to do with being online besides everyone who is on Myspace and yet I still get asked for help with that. I have been asking my friends to help me write articles and to comment on my blogs but they still don’t understand what blogs are or how you can make money online besides selling on eBay. Little by little I have been proving them wrong however I still get brought back down to earth every time I brag. I told my friend that I met a book publisher on line and she sent me books to giveaway on my blog. He says, who is going to give a crap that you are giving away books on a blog? What he doesn’t understand is that there is a whole community out there who are really into blogging and reading blogs. I am one of them and I am the only one out of my friends. And if something funny amongst our friends happens I am always pointed out, “Don’t worry I’m sure Gio will just blog about it tomorrow.” It’s a blessing and a curse.
Lol Matt we’re all definitely in the same boat. Whenever I try to explain to people how I make my money they act like it sounds ridiculous. My thinking is that you’ll just be that much more ahead when people start to figure out that almost everything that used to happen offline will start to happen online.
I bet even Darren Rowse has next door neighbors that has no idea how popular he really is – way too funny!
Is Brian’s site a secret?
No, it’s not a secret – he just chooses to remain anonymous on the site. His consulting clients obviously know him, but with the blog he stays anonymous.
We already know each other.
Shh…
While I just started my online adventure and making about 10 to 20 euros per day, this article definitely help me to keep going. I believe if your online business takes time to build up, the new competitors will take time to beat you once you reached your goal
Court/Mark/Brian,
Thanks for the post. Always nice to see someone else succeeding online. I do need to think bigger. Patience and persistence seems to be the key, though. I am slowly getting there. Last month was my biggest adsense month. It’s peanuts, but it’s a start and I’m on pace to at least equal that this month.
Yeah, that’s definitely true. One thing I didn’t mention is that there’s a bit of a “snowball effect” – the longer you work on your business, the easier it becomes.
I don’t even proactively market myself much anymore and still do fine – and it’s all because of the work I did in the early months when I was seeing little to no results.
Hi Brian,
Wonderful post. Thanks
Quick question. From what it sounds like, you are using the internet to gain clients for the niche you are an expert in.
I guess I assumed that you had gotten your adsense to grow to the 10k.
Do you work adsense? And is your income from organic seo to money sites, or organic seo to gain consulting clients?
thanks
Matt
Matt,
That’s pretty much correct – I use organic SEO to boost my rankings and get more exposure.
I do have sites that make money with Adsense, but the majority of my income right now is from consulting.
Just another example of the many ways you can use SEO to build a business.
Well that was one hell of a post! This is a must-read for any bloggers that are just starting. I know the road to success is always hard but once you reach it, it is amazing.
As a Virtual Assistant I also make my living online. I am often met with blank stares when I tell friends and family what I do. Many people still aren’t even aware that Virtual Assistance exists, let alone how they can benefit from these services. It’s a real treat when I’m contacted by a prospect who understands what a Virtual Assistant does and how they can partner with a Virtual Assistant to build their business.
Brian, firstly, congratulations.
I’m an online marketer in South Africa and have been doing so for a good number of years. Unfortunately we’re a little more limited this side as we don’t have PayPal, but I’m getting there slowly, with my biggest month being last month, where I hit R12000, which is $1182 or so. In South Africa, that’s a really big amount. I’m sure you’re laughing
Anyway, I really enjoyed your post and can relate to a lot of the things you’ve mentioned.
Good luck with the future and all the best!
Christopher
The first 4-5 months doing this I made less than $1,000 each month – then it leaped up dramatically… online income tends to do that, so don’t get frustrated.
Lack of Paypal must make things tough – I’d pull my hair out if I lost my Paypal account!
“I bet even Darren Rowse has next door neighbors that has no idea how popular he really is – way too funny!”
That’s just classic Court!
Thanks for the great post Brian,
I totally agree with people having the wrong mind set. I think a lot of that comes from our education. The person in authority (the teacher) tells us what to do and how to do it and decides whether we did it correctly. I have fought that feeling of waiting for someone to tell me what to my whole life. I want to succeed but it has been ingrained in my head that I will be successful when I get an assignment, do it, and get an “A”
Business is so different. I have to decide what is important to do. I have to do the work. Than I have to decide if it was successful (usually with a marker like more sales or more traffic).
And as you say, no one supports you offline (in fact there is a lot of sabotage).
Thanks for the kick in the rear.
Yup exactly. I’ve found that setting artificial deadlines helps me a lot – I try to make an outside commitment to someone first (“This product WILL be done by next Wednesday”) and use that to force myself into finishing it.
Yah….. “yourself” is a HUGE barrier. In all of the things I have tried to do in life, (soccer, hockey, php, html, css, the rubik’s cube, video editing, etc, etc, etc, etc) I always was just average… I never worked hard enough to see things through to where I really could excel. I have many natural abilities, I just never worked to get over that invisible hump that separates the average from the best…
When I first came across Court’s other blog (to this day, I have no freaking clue in the world how I came onto Court’s site) but that was in February 08… I read a bit about keyword sniping and thought this could be really legit. I vowed to myself that I would work hard and really try everything he recommended, and really see this keyword sniping thing through. Well, the first site I created I ended up not really seeing through as Wordtracker gave me a really high number on the day I chose my keyword… and it wasnt good at all. But, the concept of sniping I didn’t give up on… in the mean time I also started a flagship blog (which i sold for $3600 after I got bored w/ it, but it had 350+ subscribers at the time of the sale, with a pr 3, and 50%+ organic traffic)… but I had also started another niche site… well, that niche site made me $1100 in October, $3100 in November, and in only the first 8 days of December, had made me $2600+, on target to make between $5k-6k… it’s holiday season, so that’s helping a bit, but it still was doing quite good in Sept and Oct, so I know it can continue to do well. (It’s a niche that despite higher prices for the items, and the economy, went up 8% in Q3 2008 compared to Q3 2007.)
I plan to have 15-20 solid niche sites at the top of Google by next holiday season. (I work a full-time job, so time is still limited… hope to quit in early 2010 as i still have a lot of debt to pay off)
Thank you very much Brian for a wonderful post. I would highly recommend for anyone out there wanting to increase their “mindset” the book ‘Think and Grow Rich’ by Napoleon Hill.
Truly inspirational. The naysayers are abundant so focus on the vision in your mind and bring it into fruition. Keep doing it.
C.
Awesome post, thank you.
I would add a 5th reason to the Friends and Family barrier: They envy you! Some people can’t stand the fact that you’re succeeding and they’re not. Some even think that your success is somehow costing them theirs – as if there is only so much success in the world and you are taking their share! Absurd notion, I know, but it’s true.
That’s true, though most of those people have never even tried to succeed.
Still, the whole concept of a limited amount of success in the world is really funny to me.
Wow Brian! Great Post! It is so true that family and friends will bring you down. Most of them think you are crazy for even trying. I just keep telling them that there is money to be made on the internet and I am going to learn how to make it.
Keep writing the great articles.
Thanks Beth. Yeah, as I said, the most helpful thing is to surround yourself with a more positive group of people – if you can find that kind of support group, you can always beat the naysayers.
Brian/Mark, thanks a million for that post. It did wonders for me.
I hit many of the same barriers as you. Especially the family and friends thing!
My Wife knows how many hours I put in yet now that I’m making way more than her, she still says I ‘got lucky’. But what’s worse is that her and her Mom want to know when I’m going to go out and get a ‘real’ job! WTF!
I tell them that I would go out and get a real job, but I couldn’t afford to take the pay cut!
Nice to hear from folks who have went through the same thing.
Don
Your website is a genuine, truly informative space.
I look forward to the future now that I have found you and your expertise.
That family and friends barrier, I thought I was the only one having that handicap and that you guys are luckier than me. Now I know we have the same situations. Let’s prove them wrong!!!
Yeah … don’t get educated formally, tell your family to go to hell and pick yourself up by your own bootstraps. Genius.
Come on. This is getting so tired the bragging of making 0 – bazillion in 4 months and the recommendations to follow are skip school and ignore your family?
Please.
Produce a post of cognitive rational steps on how to attain a paycheck through blogging and you will have more respect from me.
Sorry for the rant but I worked hard for my degree and it serves me well in all areas of my life. I am getting so tired of internet superstars bragging about having no education. Great, good for you. It’s very useful though you don’t know it.
Guys, I can see both side of the argument in terms of the education piece and my thoughts are that everyone will do it differntly. I have to say that I personally find posts like this inspiring. I am just starting out, got pretty good results so far and my mantra is…try and work harder than everyone else because I am perhaps not as smart as they are. Just discovered this blog and it’s great, so thank you for all your hard work and input.
I see both sides as well. I reacted that way because I am a blog mentor and many times I help people out who want to be John Chow and such … it’s a misconception that successful bloggers can help fix but most prefer to brag.
Add to that ADVICE that people avoid formal education to me is just irresponsible but I think I already made that clear. Respects to this blog
The comment about friends and family not supporting you, but wanting a piece of the pie when you hit it big is right. 90% of the people around you are greedy bastards who could care less about you, and more about your money and what you can buy THEM. Lose them. They’re losers. Go to Japan by yourself.
Education? I wish I had had the money to finish my degree – two semesters short and student loan default makes that impossible now at age 50.
Get over being generous. Generous = taken advantage of. CHARGE FOR EVERYTHING. I don’t and I’m broke and looking for another model other than talented writer/designer/photographer. Lots of people want your stuff – none want to pay. Screw them. Stay anonymous. They’ll all free advice if you don’t…then expect people to PAY them for the advice they give.
Hard work? Yeah…and being a hard-nose is what it takes. This time around – no more doormat.
Great, great article.
i admire John Chow because of his innovative ways to gain traffic both from whitehat and greyhat methods..”"
Wow. Talk about hitting the nail on the head. This article is not just informative it’s downright true. For years I have been trying and missing making income online. Still, I have not given up and I will not give up until I start seeing the success I’m striving for. Great article/post.
God bless..
Lady J
anyone who makes money on the internet would love to know the secret of John Chow’s success.,~.
john chow is still the king of blogging and he is still my idol”*;