'Doing it' VS 'Taking a stab at it'

16 replies
Hi Guys

This point was raised a while ago by Kevin Riley, but it is something very important and worth highlighting. It is something I have caught myself doing in the past and it can be a success killer.

Have you ever come across a technique, or a business model, a niche....and then thought "Yeah, looks interesting, I'll give it a go". Then there comes a point with that campaign where you realise to get it going, you would need to either spend money on PPC advertising, or SEO backlinkng, or a press release or whatever, but you don't because you want to see if it will make any money first before you invest in it? If so, you are 'taking a stab at it'. If you went in with the mindset of "knowing it is going to work", then you wouldn't think twice about handing over the money for what is needed.

Looking at the bigger picture, people that DO make a lot of money normally have something in common, they do something until it DOES make money. The problem with online ventures is it is so cheap to get started, so it is easy to drop the project and move on.

So, if you can see that the niche has real potential, or even better, has worked out well for others, you must either go in full steam, no holds barred, or not at all, as it probably won't take off.

Thoughts warriors???

Cheers
Phil
#stab #taking
  • Profile picture of the author TheArticlePros
    I know what you're saying, but I disagree. It's rare when I spend money on anything...it's in my nature to be a cheapskate. I'd much rather do the work myself and wait for the results, and it's not held me back so far.

    -- j
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    • Profile picture of the author phil.wheatley
      Originally Posted by JaRyCu View Post

      I know what you're saying, but I disagree. It's rare when I spend money on anything...it's in my nature to be a cheapskate. I'd much rather do the work myself and wait for the results, and it's not held me back so far.

      -- j
      C'mon J, you're supposed to agree with my posts lol ;-) Actually, I agree with you that in some cases people would rather do it themselves. Maybe I should clarify by saying they should do what I suggest if they want to get their test results faster, to prove if the niche is either viable or not. Some people never get to that stage because they give up before they've had enough traffic to tell.

      Cheers
      Phil
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    • Profile picture of the author CDarklock
      Originally Posted by JaRyCu View Post

      I know what you're saying, but I disagree. It's rare when I spend money on anything...it's in my nature to be a cheapskate. I'd much rather do the work myself
      The principle still holds, though. If you're just taking a stab at it, then when the time comes for you to buckle down and do some hard work, you'll go "meh" and not bother.

      What separates success and failure in pretty much any industry is tenacity. And if you're just trying something out, you don't have that. You need to settle on what you're doing, identify how you're going to do it, and then forge ahead until you make it happen.

      There's a lot of room to dick around before you settle on anything, but don't mistake all that dicking around for actual work.
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      • Profile picture of the author phil.wheatley
        Originally Posted by CDarklock View Post

        The principle still holds, though. If you're just taking a stab at it, then when the time comes for you to buckle down and do some hard work, you'll go "meh" and not bother.
        Agreed. You know, I even considered once going to an NLP practitoner so that he could create an anchor deep in my brain to find doing hard "fun". Actually, I think to some degree they can actually do that????
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  • Profile picture of the author helisell
    Definitely you need to test if a project is viable before investing too much time in it.

    Get a bare bones framework ready and write the best sales/squeeze page you can.

    Buy some clicks on google search/display and let's see if anybody votes...by signing up or parting with their cash. If they DON'T then you have saved a fortune in time/money by either finding out what is wrong with your new venture or learning very quickly that there is no market here.

    Much better to spend $50 to discover your product/concept sucks...than to spend 3 months of hard work before you find out.

    I think this is fundamental and should be taught to all newbies. If you haven't got $50 to invest then 'get it'...borrow/beg/sell some junk possessions/steal....!!...but get the money to find out.

    You'll save a lot of heartache later.
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  • Profile picture of the author Suzzithe1
    Originally Posted by phil.wheatley View Post

    If you went in with the mindset of "knowing it is going to work", then you wouldn't think twice about handing over the money for what is needed.

    So, if you can see that the niche has real potential, or even better, has worked out well for others, you must either go in full steam, no holds barred, or not at all, as it probably won't take off.

    Thoughts warriors???

    Cheers
    Phil
    I think it all depends on how good the original product was and what is the potential. So not always acting on something that gonna waste your money is better than just forgetiing about it. Especially if the purchase was not that important to you in the firtst place.
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  • Profile picture of the author ryanman
    Originally Posted by phil.wheatley View Post

    Looking at the bigger picture, people that DO make a lot of money normally have something in common, they do something until it DOES make money.

    Cheers
    Phil
    Yes! But what makes them do all this? Why are they different from the rest? It all boils down to how your mind is programmed. Most folks are subconsciously doing the very thing which will keep them average all their life yet they will never come to a realization of it.

    They will have moments where they feel oh yeh...I should do something, I need to change but will eventually go back to their old habits. Because the sub-conscious controls everything at the end.

    Our sub-conscious belief system runs out entire life yet most find this hard to accept but it's the truth. So what one must work on is not the methods but their own internal belief system till the time they don't feel internal blocks when they think about doing something.
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  • Profile picture of the author Paul Guest
    I completely agree. To see if a product/project is worth further investment you need to test it. I give a product at least a $150 testing budget before deciding if it is worth it.
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  • Profile picture of the author alanbluecat
    I think the money aspect of this discussion is causing a distraction and is a bit of a red herring. Of course, finances are important, but the real issue here as far as I see it, is - if you go into a project with the attitude of 'taking a stab at it' you ar not fully committed to it and somewhere inside, even if you are not consciously aware of it, you have already defeated yourself.

    Once you have done your research and decided on a strategy that you are going to implement then you need to commit and decide that it is going to work for you.

    One of my favourite quotes might make what I'm saying a bit clearer -

    'Do or do not. There is no try.' - Yoda
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    • Profile picture of the author TheArticlePros
      Originally Posted by phil.wheatley View Post

      C'mon J, you're supposed to agree with my posts lol ;-) Actually, I agree with you that in some cases people would rather do it themselves. Maybe I should clarify by saying they should do what I suggest if they want to get their test results faster, to prove if the niche is either viable or not. Some people never get to that stage because they give up before they've had enough traffic to tell.

      Cheers
      Phil
      LOL! You're British, I'm American, therefore I can't support you at all. :p

      I agree that, for people who make IM the first business they ever try, way too many of them will give up right before achieving success. I have another friend who is an Internet Marketer (far more successful than I am), and we were having coffee at Barnes & Noble a few months ago and he said it like this:

      Internet Marketing, and most small businesses in general, is like running a marathon with no visible finish line. You run and run and run and run and run and try your best to get there, but you're never really sure where "there" is. Then that day happens. That day can be one of two things: it can either mean that you wake up and your Paypal is overflowing, or you wake up and throw in the towel.

      In his opinion, most of the people who throw in the towel are missing the finish line by 1-2 strides. Maybe they just needed one more .EDU backlink, or to change one sentence on their landing page, or heck, just to cut and paste the right affiliate code into the links (LOL!)...but they are just missing that one little piece and have no clue they're missing it.

      If the barrier to entry were higher, there would be a lot more success in this business, and there would be a lot less industry complaints. As it stands, a lot of people who miss that one last stride to success are giving this whole game a bad rap by going out and saying there's no way to make money in IM.

      I've had some coffee now, so I'm able to better give my two cents than I was with my earlier post.

      -- j
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  • Profile picture of the author fingers4hire
    For me, time is money. I manage a real estate office as well as working on building my transcription business, so I don't have a lot of free time. If I can spend $50-$100 to see if something works, that's actually saving me time and money because I place a high value on my time. I would rather find out sooner than later if something will work for me. Just my two cents.
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  • Profile picture of the author PPC-Coach
    Excellent point brought up above, there is no barrier to entry so people honestly believe they can do this without investing a single dime of their own money. They honestly think this is going to give them a shot at success. It's not. They're going to fail more times then not because they have not put enough resources into what they're doing.

    You cannot make good money without spending money. Free traffic does not exist.

    Sure you will get the odd sale once every 2 weeks from all those 102 backlinks you built to your ultra niche site on robotic flyswatters, but it's not going to pay the bills and it's never going to keep you interested in the project enough to do it long term.

    You get what you put in.

    You can start small, ($50 is fine), but make sure you keep dumping money back into it.

    If the barrier to entry were say $5,000 we'd have a lot more success stories and a lot more complaints about how the barrier is too high too I guess.

    Why do you think a Macdonalds franchise is now about $2,000,000+? Because it's a money printing system. That is the barrier and it allows the rich to stay rich. Then look at cheap-o franchises. Some have very low initial investments required but look at their potential return as well, minimal at best.

    This all translates back to doing it versus taking a stab at it. Most are not serious about making money online. They got suckered in by some scamming goofball who showed a screenshot and promised them the world, now they can't get out of that incorrect mindset. They want to believe they do it too and not invest a penny to get there. They half ass a method or put $2 into it and then quit moving on in their search for the "free" holy grail that does not exist.

    Please show me any real business offline that doesn't require capital to start. There aren't any. Well I shouldn't say that. My kids did a lemonade stand 2 weeks ago out front and made about $7 in 6 hours selling from the curb. Their product was free since I donated a box of freezies and provided the lemonade and cups. BUT their return directly reflected their investment into the business. They put in nothing and got minimal results.

    It's the same online but most refuse to accept this. They then flounder, (sometimes for years), until they either quit completely or finally get that you simply have to invest more then just your time to make a real go of online success.

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    • Profile picture of the author phil.wheatley
      Originally Posted by PPC-Coach View Post

      Excellent point brought up above, there is no barrier to entry so people honestly believe they can do this without investing a single dime of their own money. They honestly think this is going to give them a shot at success. It's not. They're going to fail more times then not because they have not put enough resources into what they're doing.

      You cannot make good money without spending money. Free traffic does not exist.

      Sure you will get the odd sale once every 2 weeks from all those 102 backlinks you built to your ultra niche site on robotic flyswatters, but it's not going to pay the bills and it's never going to keep you interested in the project enough to do it long term.

      You get what you put in.

      You can start small, ($50 is fine), but make sure you keep dumping money back into it.

      If the barrier to entry were say $5,000 we'd have a lot more success stories and a lot more complaints about how the barrier is too high too I guess.

      Why do you think a Macdonalds franchise is now about $2,000,000+? Because it's a money printing system. That is the barrier and it allows the rich to stay rich. Then look at cheap-o franchises. Some have very low initial investments required but look at their potential return as well, minimal at best.

      This all translates back to doing it versus taking a stab at it. Most are not serious about making money online. They got suckered in by some scamming goofball who showed a screenshot and promised them the world, now they can't get out of that incorrect mindset. They want to believe they do it too and not invest a penny to get there. They half ass a method or put $2 into it and then quit moving on in their search for the "free" holy grail that does not exist.

      Please show me any real business offline that doesn't require capital to start. There aren't any. Well I shouldn't say that. My kids did a lemonade stand 2 weeks ago out front and made about $7 in 6 hours selling from the curb. Their product was free since I donated a box of freezies and provided the lemonade and cups. BUT their return directly reflected their investment into the business. They put in nothing and got minimal results.

      It's the same online but most refuse to accept this. They then flounder, (sometimes for years), until they either quit completely or finally get that you simply have to invest more then just your time to make a real go of online success.

      Awesome post, hence why I'm in your coaching program


      Also, too many good posts in here to mention. I think it all comes down to mindset. Yes, maybe I didn't put it quite correctly when I was talking about the money aspect. However, I think sometimes, if you have the money, it is good to use it to get faster results, good or bad. It all comes down to how quickly you want to get there.

      The first IM product I bought was a piece of software which showed screenshots of adsense checks of $86,000 (or a figure around that amount). Haha, but that guy was ranked on the first page for the term Diet Pills!! So, that was what started me on the mindset of moving on if I wasn't make a 2 grand a day within a month lol
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  • Profile picture of the author Velant
    Originally Posted by phil.wheatley View Post

    Doing it' VS 'Taking a stab at it
    Taking action is of course of paramount importance, but I would reformulate it:
    'Doing important things you planned to do' VS 'Taking a stab at them'
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  • Profile picture of the author seobro
    People who despise wealth are many. However, few know how to generate any. Mark Z says find a need that is not being met and you be the supplier of it. That strategy has worked for me many years. It however requires HARD WORK so is not max pop. People want it easy. Like it is a lotto we need to win. Sadly, it is more like planting a tree - many years of hard work are necessary.
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  • Profile picture of the author vitadon
    Do - or do not - there is no try.
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