“When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favour.”
— Elon Musk
It’s a simple quote from an extraordinary guy.
The question is: “What’s important to you?”
July, 2016, was a growth month all the way around. My travel experiences, personal life, and business have all been flourishing.
Normally these income reports have some kind of problem.
Like, it was a great month, BUT…
And for interest sake, it’s better to include the bad with the good.
However, this train is in one direction, and is not making any stops along the way.
What You’ll Hear About This Month:
- The Traffic Numbers
- Why I Stopped Publishing on YouTube?
- Lessons from a Month of Being a Full-Time Nomad
- The Income Numbers
- Why Fear is Your Friend?
Traffic Numbers — Merging into the Fast Lane
Sort of.
My traffic on YouTube has picked up.
I’m getting back to old numbers, and am ready to take them over in the coming months.
Despite a slow start to the month, my traffic went back to old levels.
Why?
Lots of videos were created in July.
We started with Trump:
It seems like everything starts and ends with Trump these days. Even in my travels around the world, people from all walks of life are invested in the conversation.
As a marketer, it’s hard not to jump on the Trump Phenomenon.
I by no means support him as a politician. In case you were wondering, I am more of a socialist that believes that everyone has a right to live in any country.
Politics aside, though, there are marketing lessons to learn from Trump.
The next video was on fear:
Actually, we will talk later in this post about how fear is an asset.
But in this video, I talked about fear as a detractor. I recently ended a long term relationship that was toxic to my well being. This video was created as a reminder of how to survive and thrive at our most fearful states.
Fear is unavoidable.
It’s how you deal with fear that will ultimately impact you the most in the end.
The next video was back to business:
$100 a day is an ideal goal for a traveller.
That’s really all you need to travel the world. In fact, a guy named Nomadic Matt documented his travels around the world on less than $50 per day.
Whether you want it for travel, or another variation of freedom, $100/day is an excellent goal.
In this video, I show you the two different ways that I surpass this milestone.
As of writing this, it already has 8,500+ views.
So looks like a winner in YouTube-land.
Next was a simple little shortcut on niche finding:
We tend to overcomplicate things a lot.
Some of business is unavoidably complicated — finding a niche on Amazon isn’t.
This short clip shares a simple way to find your market.
After that, I gave away my FREE strategies:
I recommend that you have a budget.
You’ll get better results faster if you’re willing to invest in your own business.
And after all, if you’re not willing to put something down, I question your determination.
However, sometimes money is tight.
This video is for people that simply do not have the funds to invest yet.
Next video learns from the all-time greats:
“Success leaves clues”
– Tony Robbins
One of the most effective ways to shortcut your success is to learn from those that are successful.
Sounds stupidly obvious — it is.
These three masters of business have accomplished tremendous things.
In this video, I share my favourite insight from Steve Jobs, Tony Robbins and Elon Musk.
The next one was on “no work” opportunities:
It seems like I get requests daily to learn how to make money with no work.
You’ve heard people say the “Four Hour Work Week” is not realistic.
That’s just not true.
It’s more difficult to build a business on less time. But not impossible.
This video shared seven business models that actually take close to ZERO hours.
The final YouTube episode this month was on building a business for FREE:
People love free.
I don’t recommend staying in the freebie mindset.
However, maybe just to get your feet wet.
This last video shared the different ways you can start a business with no money down.
In Conclusion:
I enjoy making YouTube videos.
This month has seen a lot of them.
Actually, about two a week until July 22nd (more on this later).
When I publish a video, I look at it as a lottery ticket. Some of the videos turn into consistent traffic sources. Other videos get a small burst at the beginning, and then die off.
Whether the video catches on or not, I like providing value and letting the market decide.
Generally, if your video connects with your audience, YouTube will find ways to get it more traffic.
My goal is to find what my audience wants.
There will be many more YouTube videos in the future, that you can watch right here.
Why I stopped on July 22nd?
I’m creating a new course.
So far, the content is mostly finished.
The sales page and everything included in marketing is not.
I find that most marketers spend more time on selling than they do on creating.
I’m the opposite.
I don’t enjoy sales pages. I much prefer creating the value people will enjoy.
However, if you can’t make the steak sizzle in the pan, you can’t get people to buy the steak.
And at the end of the day, I want my course to reach as many people as possible.
So I am excited to learn new things.
I will be forced to discover how to launch a product. Which means some really interesting YouTube content in the future.
My Shenanigans this Month:
It started in London.
Then I made my way to Prague.
Which is like a museum city. The buildings are beautiful.
Like this funky one:
Met some new people.
If anyone’s afraid of solo travelling, you should consider checking out an APP called CouchSurfing.
Not only does it provide free accommodation (which I don’t use), it also has events + hangouts.
Which means that in most touristy areas of the world, you can easily find friendly people to share some pints.
After that I ventured on to to Berlin.
Germany was a lot of fun. More of a serious culture, but there are some really cool things to see.
Like the Reichstag:
Now I’m living in Barcelona.
Which has become my FAVOURITE city in the world.
Even above Medellin, Colombia. Which for a long time held my heart.
I will save the Barcelona pics for next month’s report!
The Income Numbers — What You Really Want to See:
Here goes…
The dollars and cents 🙂
The #’s
- JvZoo = $1,073.21
- WarriorPlus = $681.53
- ClickBank = $318.44
- HostGator = $150
- ListSpark = $34
- Aweber = $94.72
- BuzzBundle = $0
- 7 Steps to Passive Income = $70
- Adsense = $1,300 approx. (not allowed to give specific numbers)
- Amazon Earnings = $485.84
- Coaching Sessions = $5,300
Total Gross Earnings = $9,507.74
Expenses:
- Aweber = $180
- ListSpark Pro = $18
- TrafficPlanetHosting = $50
Total Expenses = $248
Expenses are the same as last month.
Was it a Good Month?
Let’s do the calculations.
$9,507.74 – $248
Grand Total = $9,259.74
Almost a record month.
A predictable growth as a result of the actions taken in July.
Quote I’m digging this month:
“Winners are busy taking imperfect action. Losers are busy perfecting their plans.”
That’s nasty.
I don’t like calling anyone a “loser,” but likely you get my point.
You have to be publishing something to grow.
Perfectionists take way to long to execute their ideas, and furthermore miss out on learning from taking risks.
You can brainstorm for years whether your ideas are good.
Executing on them is the only way to know for sure.
In my coaching program, this problem runs rampant.
The students that end up achieving their dreams are the one’s that take continuous imperfect action.
Unfortunately, I also get students that are reluctant to push forward.
Even though they have the full blueprint on EXACTLY what works, they don’t want to continue.
There is a tendency in human nature to distract ourselves from actions that cause change.
Seth Godin calls this The Lizard Brain.
We are designed to survive and stay safe. In our earlier evolution, that meant avoiding danger or discomfort.
In our more civilized world, this avoidance of discomfort actually harms us.
It prevents us from making the uncomfortable changes that benefit us the most.
Why Fear is Your Friend?
Any time you feel fearful in business, there’s a likely chance that’s what you need to attack.
Usually the things that scare us the most, are what we most need to do.
There are obvious exceptions to this principle.
I’m not suggesting that you invest your life savings into a single stock option because it makes you feel uncomfortable.
Instead, I am asking that you rationalize your fears.
You must understand the difference between ‘actual danger’ and ‘fear of growth’
If there’s no real danger, then I insist you to push forward into your fears.
Let me give you a few examples:
Example 1) My YouTube Channel
When I started this channel, I hated being on camera.
The idea that real people were listening to me mumbling through my videos was daunting. And certainly a good number of viewers were mocking me for one reason or another.
But you know who doesn’t matter?
People that don’t take risks.
If you create something, and there are critics incapable of publishing their own work, their negative opinions are valueless. The only negative feedback you should take into account is from people in the arena with you.
Results:
My YouTube Channel makes around $1,500/month in passive income.
I could not create another video, and I’d still make close to minimum wage from this one asset alone. Without having to do any work.
Beats working at McDonalds.
Example 2) The Man/Woman that Makes You Uncomfortable (in a good way)
Perhaps this is the best example.
There are times in your life where a certain person will activate a strong emotional response.
Your social fear will persuade you to cower away.
Of course, you must overcome this weak fear, and triumph over it.
Results:
I have been in love multiple times.
And as Shakespeare says “It’s better to have loved and lost then never loved at all”
A life without love is meaningless.
Example 3) Travelling.
This one could be replaced with any adventurous decision.
A life of routine is boring.
I often say, the opposite of a good experience is not a bad experience — which is the assumption.
Good or bad moments are still both interesting.
You can learn and evolve from bad moments as much as from good.
The opposite of experiencing is boredom.
It’s EASY to do the safe thing. But it’s also boring.
Turn your world into an adventure, and your life will be immensely more exciting.
Results:
My confidence, personality and well being have all been massively impacted by my adventures. They haven’t all been positive — and that’s good.
I’ve learned from every single one of them.
Bye for Now — See you next month!
Thanks for listening to my rambles this month.
I particularly got into a bit of a roll with this one. It’s been awhile since I’ve put my thoughts into the blog, and it feels good to share.
As always, thanks for reading.
Make it happen!!
