What Have You Learned From Your Mistakes

2 major mistakes I've made:

#1. Working with loser clients. People that don't have a lot of money make bad clients.

#2. Products with no back end. There is nothing worse than building up a list of a dead end product that you can't follow up with.

As a note, the book Desperate Buyers Only talks about going after markets which have "desperate, in pain, buy now traffic" which is all good and true. One of my niches in those areas earns me up to and over $9,000 a month...but its a dead end. There is NOTHING to follow up with. I tried everything and got almost no conversions. So don't just go desperate markets, they are usually dead ends.

Zanti,
I want to thank you for starting this thread. People underestimate the importance of reflecting on our failures and/or mistakes which can end up doing a great service to ourselves.

Personally... Not taking action would be my biggest mistake. I've 'missed the boat' on numerous occasions (I'm also a procrastinator of sorts).

Right up there with not taking action would have to be not going through with an idea because I though it was dumb or fear others may think it was dumb (thus wouldn't purchase). There have been a couple ideas I've had over the years only to be made by others and I believe all but maybe one has been hugely successful.

Thanks,
Brian

We should learn from our and other's mistake so that we won't do it again. We must always remember that sometimes, mistakes is what makes us a better person but sometimes it don't. Take care.

I'm a really slow worker at first, I also usually run from problems..
Everything is changed when I worked in a professional company in my country.
I was stressed at the first time, maybe they were stressed too because of me XD
but now I've changed a lot ^^

1. Not backing up the hard disk data....until it stopped working! :-(
2. Starting too many website on too many topics.....

To make more mistakes...

The more mistakes you make the more action you take the more you learn the more experience you get the more results you see the more confident you feel the more... it goes on.

well...the whole way to success is basically cluttered with "mistakes"...its what actually gives us knowledge by learning from them - how else would you become better?

When i started out i was so naive, i thought that you can just make some low quality site and put some clickbank ads on it - and the money will flow in automatically. Things like that. I wouldn't call this mistake, but rather "not experienced".

Other mistake: Bidding too high on PPC where the math just doesn't add up.

I agree with several posts: no backend.

But (for me) it goes to creating long term clients and becoming an authority in a niche, instead of just going after one frontend sale at a time.

I don't just want backend sales, I want clients for life.

I had a successful info product that sold well from the original sales page for 5 years, but I was so happy making a full time income from 2 hours of work per week, that I completely dropped "the" ball.

One of the things that I have learned in business and I'm sure it applies to IM'ing is, when I have the courage to speak and share of my mistakes, especially the one's where I lost money or where just so embarrassing or dumb I made them into something that was unspeakable.

When I have opened up and shared the unspeakable, I found I was not alone in making that mistake. In doing this I have found that I have not only helped others learn from my mistakes but learned even more about myself.

Thank you for sharing.

My biggest mistake in the past was not being able to focus. I was really good at having ten ideas in development and making very little progress on any of them because I was trying to implement them all over the same period of time. Focusing on one project until it is done and ready can be hard, but it is much more effective in my experience.

It sounds like the key element between what TheAngelGuy and Brian have shared is balance between action and preparation.

Wow John, those are some great mistakes to learn from, thanks.

Thanks Stacey,

That really hit home. I had a client who once told me "I've put a lot of bricks in others peoples building, but I don't have any bricks of my own." What he meant was that I had made millions for other people but none for myself. I've spent a lifetime of gathering information to help others, but I didn't use that information to help myself. That's all about to change.

Thanks for sharing your mistakes, I've learned so much from all of you and so much about myself.

Keep the mistakes coming, I have so much more to learn.

At first I would rather tell them to be physically ready and mentally.
2. Be prepared for their skills.
3. Don't look to much work if you have already let the buyers find you if you are very good.

I easily get distracted when working at home. So I now have a set plan and stick to it with one hourly rewards - biscuit, cup of coffee, read chapter of favorite book.

Getting involved in too many projects...
Thus not being able to complete many or any of them...
Information overload...
Allowing myself to be distracted by the next best thing, lol...
Biggest lesson I am learning to trust my instincts, believe in myself and choose wisely who I align myself with online and offline.

I have learned that as long as I learned something from my mistakes it wasn't really a mistake

I see at my mistakes as closer steps toward success - Thanks GOD I did not give up!

TanB

So nicholasb, what have you learned that if you were starting today you wouldn't repeat?

One weakness is Procrastinating and not materialising ideas. I have been trying to overcome this and seeing results.

Craig, your #1 is spot on.

Chalky, I'm trying hard not to fall into that trap.

Much wisdom Tina, especially the last one. Thanks

Thanks nicholasb for the insight, I would agree with you.

Trying to learn too much, from too many, too soon.
Information overload!!!
I've stepped back...to square one...I'll go back to my sites and blogs...one at a time...and try to salvage what I can...get rid of what I can't.... and try to get it 'right' this time.

I have done many mistakes in my life which I wish I could erase from my life and set them in a proper way. I have learned never to look back for what I could have done rather to seek and take the right path not to do these kind of mistakes anymore.

Thanks...

I have done many mistakes in my life which I wish I could erase from my life and set them in a proper way. However, I have learned never to look back for what I could have done, rather to seek and take the right path for never to face these kind of mistakes anymore.

Thanks...

Mine would be planning. Without it you just end up going round in circles. Well I did anyway. In fact I spent two years doing that. There is so much info out there, so its easy to overload. However if you have a planned day ahead of you it becomes so much easier.
Also not follow too many people at once. We all end up on several lists and its easy to end up listening to too many ideas. Once I unsubscribed to a few and just followed those that I really trusted things began to fall into place.

Andy Beveridge

Learn from my mistakes... Well, one thing I learned is that when you are setting up the coffee maker to make a full pot of coffee, make sure you put the pot in place to collect the coffee before you run off to get a few things done while it is making. Serious mess.

And, test your backup system. Thought I was backed up once and then when I needed it found out I couldn't get the information off it. Fortunately nothing too serious and I wound up recovering more than I expected.

I made the mistake of jumping into a subject I was really interested in but really didn't have any plan for other than to blog my butt off just to find the affiliate products were hard to find, over priced, the affiliate companies were messed up - you name it.
I had a good time ranting for awhile, but made nothing from it.
I had a chance to start another in a JV recently and had the good sense to do some research and back out before we started when I found the work was going to be major and extremely difficult to monetize.

I also found out that for every mistake you make now, there are two more waiting just up the road if you don't watch your footing real well.

Mistake #1 : Outsourcing the creation of 'money making' website
I outsourced the creation of a site that was supposed to make $1000/mo after 6 months to a guy who disappeared after 3 months leaving me with almost useless site.
I paid him $4500 and he did a work worth $1500.

What I've learned? If someone promises $xxx or $xxxx earnings as a result of service, 'secret', expertize, coaching...whatever...I know it's a BS!

As someone just starting off each of your shares have something of value to me. Thank you. Even in just starting out the first mistake I made was not organizing. In another thread I started I asked for some advice in this area and received some great assistance that I have already put into action.

What has been important for me in this thread is, as I take my experience from other areas in business and begin to apply it to IM'ing there have already been a lot of holes that I have been able to walk around instead of falling in and wasting valuable time trying to climb out. I have no doubt that I will make mistakes, and I will learn from those mistakes, part of the process of being human. I will also share my mistakes with others to help them to avoid falling in the holes that I have. Which in turn helps me to heighten my awareness.

What your shares have given me is increased awareness. As a long time martial arts instructor, one of the 1st things that anyone can do to keep themselves safe is developing awareness of what is going on around them and avoid possible threats. The more one works on awareness, you begin to see the big obvious threats sooner than those who have not developed awareness. As you continue to develop awareness you begin to notice the small details of less obvious threats. You may not always be perfect in your avoidance, but you will react faster. If you become to caught up in the details of what my be a possible threat, you become stiff in your movements, you lose fluidity and weaken your ability to to take proper action. Increased awareness my not keep you from avoiding every hole, but instead of not seeing the hole at all and falling to the bottom, your quicker reaction will give you the opportunity to catch your balance, grab the sides and pull yourself up with less lost of energy.

Think about it, why have the great IM'er become great, because they have increased awareness that they put into action. They learned from their mistakes, their teacher's mistakes, and other's mistakes and were able to react faster to new niches, methods, techniques and ideas. And what do so many of them do, they share their information with a new course, new e-book, etc... and what do those of us who are also searching for success do? We buy the course or e-book, in the hope (either conscious or unconscious) that this information will increase our awareness, avoid some mistakes and move us on the path towards success.

So for me that is why this thread has been so important, it is allowing me to increase my awareness and enhance my actions. Awareness + Action = Success.

It takes courage to share one's mistakes with others, it takes a Warrior.

Thanks

Buy 1 ebook/ system and follow it. Not buy 10 ebooks/systems and use none or parts of them.

condoms aren't failsafe and now we are expecting number 3 - but that may be slightly off topic