The Reality of Failure

I see failure as a lesson learned in my eyes! You have to stay positive. Ask yourself why something failed and you are one step closer to success - not one step further back! Like Confucius said "a man who never makes mistakes, never makes anything".

The failure rate for the tryouts to NBA is something like 99.6%. Maybe IM is not as hard as professional sport ?

As long as you learn from your failure and not repeat it, can you succeed. If you keep failing at the same thing over and over, that's the definition of insanity.

Very good reasoning Caliban!

And we fail everyday from the smallest to the biggest and most significant goals we put ourselves in front of. I think of every goal as a challenge with a prize in mind.

It gives me the drive to face failures with a smile. If I fail I have a good reason to get up, make adjustments and go at it with everything I've got once again.

People don't fail. People just quit trying to win.

I don't think that's necessarily indicative of failure. Many people I know earned their degree and did have opportunities in their field of study but for various reasons chose to work in different fields.

A college friend of mine for instance earned a degree in restaurant & hotel management. He had his hopes set on running a big restaurant after graduation. But just a few years after graduating I caught up with him and he wasn't working in a hotel or a restaurant. He was selling Peterbilt trucks and doing very well at it. His interests changed, but that's not failure.

We can look at your college example and ask ourselves whether some of these graduates got jobs in other fields.

This may not be a failure if those jobs are higher paying than a job they could have taken in their field.

Many people use education as a signaling tool to tell prospective employers that they have the ability to commit to something for 3-4+ years. Or that they have the intellectual capacity to learn.

Failure is for those who do not try hard enough!

Failure is falling seven times and getting up six.

Never give up!

Personally, I always tell people the same thing -- failure is a part of success. If you are willing to fail and accept that you'll fail at times then ultimately you will succeed. Most people just aren't willing to stick to it long enough to get past the failures.

Where did you get your statistics from?

I have seen statistics from my mentor Alex Jeffreys and he shows that most people drop out of internet marketing within the first 6 to 9 months. This is really incredible to me as how can you expect to make and grow a sustainable business and expect it to work instantly. If i would tell everyone the amount of time and money i have wasted i'm sure i'm not alone here. The main thing is to learn from the msitakes and work out where to improve. If you feel you need more than this then do what i have done and pay for a mentor like ALex to assist you in your goals. The only thing that can hold you back overall is not taking action and giving up!

I like your take on things CDarklock.

You always have great insight and great perspective.

Currently, I do not make a living with IM, but at the same time, that is not my goal.

I consider IM an essential skill-set, just like SEO is a skill-set to IM.

I have a day job and coming here and learning IM principles I feel has given and continues to give me an advantage in the non-virtual world.

These two world are coming ever closer and those of us who learn the technology and psychology of IM and can use them in virtual and non-virtual settings stand out.

Whenever we have meetings, conference calls, or what have you, all of these principles gel and change the way you talk, the terminology you use and as I am now learning how people look at you.

I work for a major chemical company and I feel that IM principles have given me a big advantage.

Excellent post!!!! I have an MBA and it only gives me access to bankers and lawyers and who really wants to hang out with them?

If you follow Thomas Edison logic, failure is just a successful way NOT to do something.

The shampoo bottle says lather, rinse, repeat. In life, its try, fail, don't repeat!!!!

There also seems to be a semantics problem. I'm still not exactly sure what this sub-culture means by "internet marketing", but it sure isn't what the words mean. This sub-culture teaches a lot of things that are just plain wrong. Once people realize that and leave this sub-culture, they attain success.

They don't call themselves "internet marketers" anymore because they rejected the sub-culture in order to attain success. They now call themselves entrepreneurs, small business owners, dot com founders and all of the other labels that successful people doing almost the exact same thing do.

That doesn't mean that "internet marketing" has a high failure rate. It simply means that those who find success who were once on this path don't use that label anymore. It's a self-defeating label since it associates you with newbies who practice some pretty dubious tactics at times.

Great Post!

Having walked away from IM 4 months ago to establish an 'offline' service based business, I initially considered 'walking away for awhile' as a HUGE FAIL. But looking back on all that I gained (knowledge wise) concerning internet marketing, affiliate networks, site design, mindset, etc... IM'ing still remains a major part of my offline business and the future expansion thereof.

Perhaps that 'newbie' mindset (*as was my mistake) was/is to enter the IM world 'guns-a-blazing' and fuels the misconception that 1,000's of dollars will instantaneously flood our PayPal and bank accounts.

Whilst it is possible with the right niche and experience, it takes a ton of time, effort, and money 'most' people cannot afford to invest. I wasn't afraid of the hard work, learning curve, nor did I quit per se... Instead, I ran out of time to achieve a level of success, and well; I needed MONEY!

While my personal focus has changed regarding my 'business model' and marketing strategies, I can openly admit; it was easier for me to develop a service based business 'offline' with an instant return on my investment, then it was for me to earn consistent money online.

However, with the knowledge gained, IM still resides at the 'front lines' of my business focus to build upon and expand into multiple streams of income, global markets, and knowledge based sales (*i.e. eBooks, tutorials, videos, dvd's, etc..) in the future.

So in reality, I don't believe the time and money invested into IM was a failure at all.

In theory, I see it as; a short-term investment of knowledge with long-term 'potential' returns.

Are you sure about that?

Sometimes women have every intention of getting a job in their field, but kids have a way of changing that.

Just sayin'.

Of course, the ability to work from home and have a flexible schedule is one of the things that makes IM so attractive to moms. (Along with other work at home opportunities.)

Well, quiet motivating (or must I say discouraging?) numbers.

Am I glad I never made it into university! Now I totally prefer to work and create my own study in the IM than graduate in the real world. :-)

I've failed so many times with IM that it makes my head spin. But i continue to do it because of the reality of the situation. I hate a job, and i'm more likely to make $3,000 a month online than i would to get a promotion at work. So keep trucking on and dont give up.

The failure rate in Internet Marketing is highlighted because of the 'Get Rich Quick' mentality that is often hyped in advertising. A lot of people are attracted by the message but are not prepared to do the work, that is always necessary to achieve success!

Failure is part of every success, most successful entrepreneurs have many failures before encountering their breakthrough. I mean yeah it's not easy, but at the same time is a great journey and very rewarding as well. In the end, it's all about never giving up and persisting even when things don't look that well.

Hello,
how boring would it be if you were to succeed at everything that you do on the first try.

I actually see IM as quite "easy" thing to do. Most methods are not secret and they are publicly available (or behind some rather small price tags compared to "real" education costs), it's just the matter of if you are willing to actually WORK on those and fail a couple times.

It helps to remember that a "failure" isn't that unless you don't learn from it. Learn from your attempt and now you gotten smarter and more experienced to avoid it from happening again.

The reality of failure is real and powerful. It all depends on how you approach it. It is easy to say, failures make you successful, however if you are anything like me then you have failed fantastically at one point or another.

It is an extremely humbling experience, especially for type A's who's recognition of failure is hard enough.

However, once you recognize the failure and calling it what it is I've found that getting past it, and moving on to projects that can turn to success much easier / quicker.

Failure is very much real. Most people in IM will fail, but will they continue to live in denial that their venture failed? Or will the recognize it, re strategize and make another, more insightful go at it again?

Great Post, and a lot of interesting comments.

The headline: "The Reality of Failure" could only be written by a reflected person. One of the reasons, in my opinion, is that it "opens up"

Reality and failure, wow

I guess - response to the failure

In the book "How to sell anything" by Harry Brown, in my opinion – worth reading, he says in his Prologue: "If you’ve read other selling books, you’re probably tired of the false promises that never quite work out. You’re probably tired of being told “you can do it if you just believe you can.”"

Further down he says: "But I’m not going to guarantee your success. I’m not going to tell you that you can’t miss ~ because that would be unrealistic. For it depends on you and your willingness to reorient your attitude to see things as they really are."

A lot of people have heard this quote by Zig Ziglar: "If you help enough people get what they want, you will get what you want."

or


"When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don't
adjust the goals, adjust the action steps."
~Confucius

Personally I do not love failure, but I have recognized that I fail a lot. I'm sure failure has made me who I am, not scared – maybe a more listening person, and with that I have gotten more success. Aftermath, since we are into statistics: 78% failure and 22% success;-)

Failure or Fail U? Re (sponse)

Failure is self-defeat. If you knock yourself on the floor before you give yourself a chance to walk, then you've failed. If you've not learned anything from your experience at all, then that is failure.

Thanks Sofus... just how I see it more or less. If I didn't achieve the goals I set out to do, as long as I've learned from them, whether that meant trying alternatives, or going a different direction altogether, I've learned something so it wasn't really failure, just a lesson and experience. However, if I knocked myself down and said "I can't do IM, it's impossible" before even trying to put something into action, then yup, I have indeed failed.

@ Genycis This evening I have been coaching 25 young girls and boys in how to ski-jump. It was their first time "ski-jumping", but not skiing. Each and all of them had to start. They overcame fairs, individually. Falling - is a natural part of it, crying – up the hill, and then try again. What a wonderful two intense hours.

Failures are really part of success. The way you see it and take action on it is what matters most. Also, patience plays a big factor.

If we can learn something from failure, it's treasure for us.