If you’ve met me over the years then you know I’m a pretty down to earth guy and I don’t have an ego or like to toot my own horn. Fairly often I’m asked by people why my businesses continue to be successful. Since 1998 I’ve been involved in nearly a dozen different online ventures which for the most part have all been successful. Not all have been multimillion dollar success stories but it’s not always about that. Some are about the shear experience and learning how to build sustainable businesses that retain assets and grow for the unforeseeable future.
I’m not one of those people that can just accept failure. I have to completely understand why something failed and what I need to do to make it work. Outside of knowledge about an industry or a specific vertical there are five characteristics that I bring to me with any venture I’m involved in. I feel that these have helped me over the years to be successful in all of my companies:
1. Patience – I’ve always been told that “patience is a virtue” and it’s something I’ve really had to work at. Over the last two years I’ve gained a lot of patience and it’s helped me in more ways than I can think. If you’re an Entrepreneur you have to learn how to sit back and wait for results. Not everything is instant.
2. Willing To Adapt To Change – If I took my same business model from 1998 and implemented it today it would fail. Especially online things move very fast so you have to be willing to adapt to change and develop accordingly. One common phrase around our office is A.D.P. – Adapt, Develop, and Progress.
3. Persistence – If it was easy everyone would do it. This is something I often talk about inside our Private Forum. While it’s possible, it’s also not likely that your very first website, business, or campaign is going to be successful. There is a learning curve but those that win are the ones that keep on plugging along regardless of what happens. Giving up is easy. Being persistent is challenging but it separates the true Entrepreneurs.
4. Keeping Focus – We often refer to this as “shiny object syndrome.” It’s only natural to have a bunch of ideas as an Entrepreneur but you can’t be bouncing around from one to another. You have to stick with something and go with it. If not you end up with 10 partially completed projects rather than 1 powerhouse.
5. Setting Goals – Going into any project without setting goals is dangerous. Before you know it you could be losing more money than planned or it can take a lot longer to get something done. You need to outline what exactly it is you’re trying to accomplish and set goals so you remain on schedule and on the right track.
I could go on and on with more characteristics that have helped me throughout my career but I feel that these five are credit for a lot of my success over the years. Evaluate these in your life/business and see where you stand. I know for the longest time I didn’t have patience and it was something that was holding me back. Once I recognized this and made a conscious effort I gained probably the most important characteristic in my career.
Great list Ryan. I struggle with #4 the most. It takes a lot of effort for me to focus on one thing until it’s done (or at a stopping point).
Speaking of focus, I wanted to ask you about #5. I want to focus on Facebook ads (dating vertical). I’m relatively new, although I can set up a campaign, landing page and tracking. I’ve just never ran campaign after campaign.
My trouble in setting goals is not knowing the entire process from start to finish — I still have to learn it, like when to optimize, how many ads to upload everyday and how many new campaigns to start (and when). I don’t really know what goals to set, because I’m not 100% sure on the process.
How would you set goals in this case to make sure you’re always trying to move forward / progress?