This is one process of accumulating wealth, notice the flow, and how to catch it, I arrived in Phoenix with 900 bucks, no job, no friends, a...
This is one process of accumulating wealth, notice the flow, and how to catch it,
I arrived in Phoenix with 900 bucks, no job, no friends, and no family-just 330 days of sun and a burning desire to hit the Fastlane. My possessions included an old mattress, a 10-year-old rusty Buick Skylark with no third gear, a few side businesses that made little cash, and several hundred books. Ground zero for my new life was a small studio apartment in central Phoenix that rented for $475 per
month. I transformed my studio apartment into an office. No bedroom set, no furniture, just a mattress that invaded the kitchen. I slept with Pop Tart crumbs, a side effect of laying a mattress next to the kitchen counter. I lived poor and without security, but I felt rich. I was in control of my life. One
of the many businesses I created was a Web site. While driving that limo in Chicago, sometimes I'd sit idle for hours and had plenty of downtime to read books. I didn't waste that time. While I waited for clients at the airport or while they got obliterated at the local watering hole, I sat in the limo and read. And read. I studied everything from finance to Internet programming to more autobiographies of the rich.
The limo job did something special: it put me at the forefront of an unsolved need that needed a solution. One of my limo clients asked if I knew of any good limo companies in New York. I dropped the passenger off at the airport, but he left me with a seed of invention. If I lived in Chicago and needed a limo in New York, where would I go to find it? I didn't have a New York Yellow Pages handy,
and surely no one else outside of New York did either. Faced with this question, I concluded that other travelers would have the same challenge. So I built a Website that would solve this problem.Naturally, the Internet has no geographical limits, so this venture traveled to Phoenix well. But, like my prior businesses, it didn't make a lot of money.
However, now it was different. I was naked in a strange town with no money, job, or safety net. I had to focus. I aggressively marketed my Web site. I sent out emails. Cold-called. Mailed letters. I learned search engine optimization (SEO). Because I couldn't afford books, I visited the Phoenix library daily and studied Internet programming languages. I improved my Web site and learned about graphics and copywriting. Anything that could help me, I consumed.
Then one day I had a breakthrough; I received a call from a company in Kansas that raved about my Web site service and wanted me to design its Web site. While my focus wasn't web design, I obliged for a price of $400. They thought the price was a steal, and within 24 hours, I had built the company its Web site. I was ecstatic. In 24 hours, I had most of my rent payment. Then, coincidentally, not 24 hours later, I received another call from a company in New York asking for the same thing, a new Web site. I designed it for $600 and it took me two days to complete. I had another rent payment!
Now, I know this isn't a lot of money, but from poverty to $1,000 in three days felt like winning the 50-million-dollar Powerball. My first few months in Phoenix I gained traction and survived on my own for the first time in my life.
No flower boy. No busboy. No pizza delivery. No sponging off Mom. I was purely self-employed! I was momentous acceleration, a wind at my back that foreshadowed a directional change into a new universe of wealth generation. But something still wasn't right. Something was missing and I knew it. Most of my income was attached to my Web site designs and not my Web site advertising business. My income was tied to my time, the construction of Web sites. More Web sites jobs meant more time spent, and if I didn't work, my income would stop. My time was being sold off for money
this challenge and I was intent to solve it. Days later, I created a risky, unproven solution and I gave it a shot. What did I do? Instead of selling ad space I decided to sell leads. There was a problem though. This “revenue model” was new and groundbreaking. Additionally, I had to convince my customers that this method of business was beneficial to them, and I had no data to predict whether it could succeed. Remember, this was the late nineties, when “lead generation” in Web space was unfounded, at least until I went out and did it.
Nonetheless, I took the risk and implemented it. In the short term, I expected the change to kill my income and it did. I predicted its success would take months, if it worked at all. The first month the new system generated $473. Yikes. I built more Web sites to fill my income gap. The second month's revenues were $694. Third month, $970. Then $1,832. $2,314. $3,733. And it continued and
continued. It worked.
My revenue, my income, and my assets grew exponentially but not without issue. As traffic grew, so did the complaints, the feedback, and the challenges. Improvements came directly from customer suggestions. Within days, sometimes hours, I'd implement customer ideas. I was known to answer my
clients' emails within minutes, if not an hour. I learned to be receptive to the consumer, and business exploded.
The workdays became long and challenging. Forty hours was a vacation; typical workweeks were 60 hours long. Days and weekends blurred together. While my new friends were out drinking and partying, I was hunkered down in my tiny apartment, regurgitating code. I didn't know if it was Thursday or Saturday, and it didn't matter. The glory of the hard work was this: It didn't feel like work; in fact, I enjoyed it. I didn't have a job; I had a passion to make a difference.
Thousands of people benefited from something I created, which addicted me to
the process. I made a difference!I started to compile testimonials from clients.
“Because of you, my business grew ten fold.”
“Your Web site led me to my biggest corporate client.”
“Your company has been instrumental in growing my business.”
This feedback was wealth currency. I wasn't awash in riches quite yet, but I felt rich
I arrived in Phoenix with 900 bucks, no job, no friends, and no family-just 330 days of sun and a burning desire to hit the Fastlane. My possessions included an old mattress, a 10-year-old rusty Buick Skylark with no third gear, a few side businesses that made little cash, and several hundred books. Ground zero for my new life was a small studio apartment in central Phoenix that rented for $475 per
month. I transformed my studio apartment into an office. No bedroom set, no furniture, just a mattress that invaded the kitchen. I slept with Pop Tart crumbs, a side effect of laying a mattress next to the kitchen counter. I lived poor and without security, but I felt rich. I was in control of my life. One
of the many businesses I created was a Web site. While driving that limo in Chicago, sometimes I'd sit idle for hours and had plenty of downtime to read books. I didn't waste that time. While I waited for clients at the airport or while they got obliterated at the local watering hole, I sat in the limo and read. And read. I studied everything from finance to Internet programming to more autobiographies of the rich.
The limo job did something special: it put me at the forefront of an unsolved need that needed a solution. One of my limo clients asked if I knew of any good limo companies in New York. I dropped the passenger off at the airport, but he left me with a seed of invention. If I lived in Chicago and needed a limo in New York, where would I go to find it? I didn't have a New York Yellow Pages handy,
and surely no one else outside of New York did either. Faced with this question, I concluded that other travelers would have the same challenge. So I built a Website that would solve this problem.Naturally, the Internet has no geographical limits, so this venture traveled to Phoenix well. But, like my prior businesses, it didn't make a lot of money.
However, now it was different. I was naked in a strange town with no money, job, or safety net. I had to focus. I aggressively marketed my Web site. I sent out emails. Cold-called. Mailed letters. I learned search engine optimization (SEO). Because I couldn't afford books, I visited the Phoenix library daily and studied Internet programming languages. I improved my Web site and learned about graphics and copywriting. Anything that could help me, I consumed.
Then one day I had a breakthrough; I received a call from a company in Kansas that raved about my Web site service and wanted me to design its Web site. While my focus wasn't web design, I obliged for a price of $400. They thought the price was a steal, and within 24 hours, I had built the company its Web site. I was ecstatic. In 24 hours, I had most of my rent payment. Then, coincidentally, not 24 hours later, I received another call from a company in New York asking for the same thing, a new Web site. I designed it for $600 and it took me two days to complete. I had another rent payment!
Now, I know this isn't a lot of money, but from poverty to $1,000 in three days felt like winning the 50-million-dollar Powerball. My first few months in Phoenix I gained traction and survived on my own for the first time in my life.
No flower boy. No busboy. No pizza delivery. No sponging off Mom. I was purely self-employed! I was momentous acceleration, a wind at my back that foreshadowed a directional change into a new universe of wealth generation. But something still wasn't right. Something was missing and I knew it. Most of my income was attached to my Web site designs and not my Web site advertising business. My income was tied to my time, the construction of Web sites. More Web sites jobs meant more time spent, and if I didn't work, my income would stop. My time was being sold off for money
The 90 seconds that changed my life
In the winter, a friend visited from Chicago. I showed him my web directory and he was amazed at all the traffic my service received. I'd get limo price inquiries from around the world, every minute of the day. How much for a limo fromBoston to Worcester? How much from JFK to Manhattan? We'd scan my email inbox and it had 450 emails. Ten minutes passed, click refresh, and then there would be another 30 emails. Emails were pouring in several per minute. He suggested “Dude! Turn those emails into money somehow.” He was right, but how? And how can it solve a legitimate need? He left me withthis challenge and I was intent to solve it. Days later, I created a risky, unproven solution and I gave it a shot. What did I do? Instead of selling ad space I decided to sell leads. There was a problem though. This “revenue model” was new and groundbreaking. Additionally, I had to convince my customers that this method of business was beneficial to them, and I had no data to predict whether it could succeed. Remember, this was the late nineties, when “lead generation” in Web space was unfounded, at least until I went out and did it.
Nonetheless, I took the risk and implemented it. In the short term, I expected the change to kill my income and it did. I predicted its success would take months, if it worked at all. The first month the new system generated $473. Yikes. I built more Web sites to fill my income gap. The second month's revenues were $694. Third month, $970. Then $1,832. $2,314. $3,733. And it continued and
continued. It worked.
My revenue, my income, and my assets grew exponentially but not without issue. As traffic grew, so did the complaints, the feedback, and the challenges. Improvements came directly from customer suggestions. Within days, sometimes hours, I'd implement customer ideas. I was known to answer my
clients' emails within minutes, if not an hour. I learned to be receptive to the consumer, and business exploded.
The workdays became long and challenging. Forty hours was a vacation; typical workweeks were 60 hours long. Days and weekends blurred together. While my new friends were out drinking and partying, I was hunkered down in my tiny apartment, regurgitating code. I didn't know if it was Thursday or Saturday, and it didn't matter. The glory of the hard work was this: It didn't feel like work; in fact, I enjoyed it. I didn't have a job; I had a passion to make a difference.
Thousands of people benefited from something I created, which addicted me to
the process. I made a difference!I started to compile testimonials from clients.
“Because of you, my business grew ten fold.”
“Your Web site led me to my biggest corporate client.”
“Your company has been instrumental in growing my business.”
This feedback was wealth currency. I wasn't awash in riches quite yet, but I felt rich
Source: The Millionaire Fastlane by MJ DeMARCO
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