Guerrilla Marketing Job Escape Plan

The Ten Battles You Must Fight to Start Your Own Business, and How to Win Them Decisively

Jay Conrad Levinson, Andrew Neitlich

• Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9781614480143
• eBook ISBN: 9781614480150
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Small Business

Yes! You Can Escape Your Job---If You Win the 10 Battles Required to Go Out On Your Own! Yes, you can do this. You can quit your job, start a business, and never have to work for anybody else ever again. You can do this regardless of whether you feel confident or afraid, your age, your family situation, your education, where you live, and how much time and money you have. You don't have to tolerate a crummy job, lousy boss, long commute, tedious tasks, annoying co-workers, limited control over how you spend your day, no clear path to a promotion, worrying about the next round of layoffs, dealing with corporate scandals that have nothing to do with you, reporting to an executive team that you don't like or trust---You can leave all this behind! "Guerrilla Marketing Job Escape Plan" shows you how. It gives you practical, step-by-step advice about the ten battles you must fight to make the leap, and how to win them decisively, including: overcoming fear, finding the right idea for you, getting family to support you, picking the right strategy, starting your business up with minimal financial or personal risk, getting the first profitable customer, building momentum, and leaving your job without burning any bridges. In addition to step-by-step guidance, over 150 entrepreneurs---people who have successfully made the leap---share their wisdom and insights. Plus, the book includes an exclusive password for you to take the Job Escape Challenge, including additional FREE resources to start a successful business and quit your job forever. What are you waiting for? Start planning your escape right now!

Chapter One

BATTLE NUMBER ONE:

Win the Mental Battle

ntrepreneurs think differently than people who are content to be employees. Their mindsets give them the courage and fortitude to create a business from scratch, to overcome significant obstacles, and to handle issues that most employees never have to consider. Before you escape your job, you need to embrace the attitudes of the entrepreneur. Once you do, you have won your first and perhaps most challenging battle on your way to self-employment.

Following are twelve attitudes for you to win the mental battle.

THE TWELVE MINDSETS REQUIRED TO WIN BATTLE NUMBER ONE,

The Mental Battle

One: Get rid of any misperceptions about owning a business.

Two: I can do this.

Three: Be open to advice and help.

Four: See lucrative opportunities when others don't.

Five: Tolerate imperfection.

Six: Improvise with finesse, especially in the face of limited resources.

Seven: Minimize risk and downside while maximizing upside.

Eight: Influence others.

Nine: Develop thick skin.

Ten: Keep moving forward, regardless of how you feel at the moment.

Eleven: Think critically about the business, without drinking the Kool-Aid.

Twelve: Take 100 percent responsibility.

MINDSET ONE: GET RID OF ANY MISPERCEPTIONS ABOUT OWNING A BUSINESS.

There are many myths about running your own business. If you believe them, you will quickly become frustrated and perhaps even quit. Here are a few:

• Business is a glamorous, romantic adventure. When you first start your business, nobody is going to ooh and ahhh simply because you have a business card with a prestigious title like CEO or Principal. Investing in fancy furniture and office space, getting health insurance, and taking a long vacation may not be possible for a while. Local and national media probably won't be lining up any time soon to interview you for a frontpage feature. Instead, expect to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty while you make a name for yourself and your business. Until your business gets momentum and you can afford to hire people, you are chief salesman, product shipper, IT guy, shipping clerk, administrative assistant, intern, bookkeeper, government liaison, and janitor all in one. You handle mundane issues that most employees never have to worry about. For instance, my wife Elena is a stay-at-home mom with a successful etiquette training business, and she often takes phone calls in the car outside our house, with our baby nursing on her lap, while I watch the older kids inside the house. There's not a lot of glamour in that!

• You have more time. Timothy Ferriss' The Four-Hour Work Week offers a wonderful aspiration after you get your feet on the ground as a business owner. However, most entrepreneurs I interviewed repeated the same theme: When you quit your job and start a business, you trade a 40-hour workweek for an 80-hour workweek. Don't start a business if you aren't ready to dedicate your full time and attention to it.

• You make more money than you do as an employee. As the infomercial disclaimers say, “You could earn less or much, much more.” Eventually you can make more money, but initially you may not. When you quit a job, you lose a regular source of income and any health insurance and other benefits that come with it. Many entrepreneurs never make what they did while employed, and they don't care because they love working on their own. Others need to grow their business over a year or two before they match their former salary. Some exceed their salary within a few months of quitting their jobs, usually because they built up the business in their spare time. There are no guarantees.

• You have more freedom. As an entrepreneur, you have the freedom to choose your customers, how you spend your time, where you work, with whom you work, how you dress, and which initiatives get priority. However, freedom requires discipline, and some people can't handle all of the choices that freedom brings. You need to structure your day so that you do what needs to be done. Also, as entrepreneur Brianna Sylver shares, “You have freedom and flexibility as an entrepreneur but not predictability. For instance, you might decide to go on vacation, but if something comes up with your business, you either don't take the vacation or work during your vacation.”

• It's all sunshine and daisies. Some people are so miserable in their current jobs that they imagine only the upside of owning their own business. The truth is that most entrepreneurs face both extreme highs and lows before they get their business off the ground. Lows include struggling to pay your bills, getting rejected again and again, testing products and services that don't succeed, wondering whether you ever should have taken the leap, and worrying about what your family will think if you fail. The highs are great, but don't go into business if you can't handle the lows.

• You are not accountable to anyone else and you can do whatever you want. If anything, you are more accountable when you run your own business than when you are an employee. You are accountable to the IRS for taxes, to all levels of government and their regulations, to your customers for the promises you make, to any investors and lenders, to any employees and contractors who count on you for their paycheck, to your vendors for their fees, and to your own and your family's needs. My first boss used to tell me that everyone has a boss: “If you are the CEO, you still report to your board of directors. If you don't have a board of directors, you still report to your customers. And if you have a spouse and kids, you always report to them.”

• You have enough money to grow your business. Most people I interviewed for this book were clear: You will never have as much money as you really want to build your business. For instance, Eric Fosse of the Homemade Pizza Company said, “Everyone will tell you that you won't have enough money. They are right. You always need more.” In other words, prepare to be creative and resourceful. The Guerrilla Marketing series of books has made one thing clear: Most entrepreneurs don't have unlimited dollars to invest in their business, but they can use their unlimited creativity, innovation, and street smarts to succeed in business…and these assets can go much further than a big bank account.

• It is a pleasure to serve customers. In reality, some customers will drive you crazy. They will waste your time with questions and never buy. They will appear to want something for nothing. They will buy something from you and then complain about it, even if you gave them exactly what you promised. Some will sue you, or threaten to sue you, for what seem to you like frivolous reasons. If customers are even mildly dissatisfied, they might post complaints about you all over the Internet, rather than work with you to resolve the issue. Many will lie to you throughout the sales process and even after they buy, supporting the old salesperson's maxim, “Buyers are liars.” For instance, during the sales process, many people aren't honest about whether they have enough money to afford your products, whether they are really serious about buying, and whether they are serious about buying from you. They will tell you they are going to buy next week, and then delay or disappear. They will tell you they need to think things over, when they really mean, “Buzz off!” After someone buys from you and gets value from your products and services, be ready for some of them to try to get a full refund, claiming general dissatisfaction with no specific or valid reasons, or even breaking the merchandise on purpose. Expect bounced checks, identity fraud, and outright theft to take away some of your inventory. Again, most customers are wonderful, and legitimate complaints are important feedback about how you can improve your business. However, the most difficult customers can quickly suck your enjoyment out of the business if you don't have the right temperament. Don't go into business for yourself if you aren't mentally prepared for the reality of customer service, or if you aren't ready to use your best negotiating skills to avoid being a doormat.

• The best product or most competent professional wins. In a perfectly fair world, this statement would be true. But the world isn't fair. For better or for worse, the best product doesn't always win. The smartest, most skilled professional doesn't always get the job. Instead, the best marketer usually does. Therefore, go into business only if you are willing to spend your time marketing your business to attract new customers and sell more products and services to existing customers. If you think you can sit back and wait for customers to call, then employment might be a better fit for you.

• You need a brilliant idea to start a business. The mainstream media, business book market, and business school case studies tend to be biased in favor of the handful of businesses that aim to change the world. This bias might cause you to worry that your business isn't unique or ingenious enough. You do need to offer a valuable service and be able to differentiate your business while becoming visible in the marketplace. However, you can do this without inventing the next Dyson vacuum cleaner, Segway, DVR, or IMAX theatre. Every day entrepreneurs start successful businesses based on passion, competence, and hustle. You can, too.

• A brilliant business plan means that you will have a successful business. The entrepreneurs interviewed for this book didn't obsess over creating a thesis-style, brilliant business plan that would wow venture capitalists and get them a million-dollar investment. Instead, they roughed out some numbers and crafted a living, breathing plan—usually no more than a few pages—to get the business started, attract customers, delight those customers, and get enough cash coming in to get the business going. Entrepreneurs live in the real world, not in the world of book reports. Very few people ever need a fancy business plan ready for angels and venture capitalists; most of us have to bootstrap our businesses on our own. By all means, do your homework before you start your business. However, once you have 60 to 80 percent of the information you need, it is time to take action and test your business idea in the real world.

• You take huge risks when you start a business. It can feel scary to start a business, but you don't have to take huge risks. You don't have to put your life's savings or your family's wellbeing in jeopardy. In fact, as later chapters of this book will show, the smartest entrepreneurs don't risk much at all. There are many ways to test your business idea and get started without spending lots of money or quitting your job. Contrary to popular belief, it is more risky to have a job, because as an employee you have just one customer: your employer. When you own the business, you can spread your risk out over many customers.

• If the business fails, you are a failure. Wrong, wrong, and more wrong! If the business doesn't work out, you still have done something wonderful. You have taken a risk, lived on the edge, and had the courage to do something that most people only dream about. You can learn from your mistakes and start another business. You can always go back to work as an employee; in fact, employers might find you more valuable because of your experience. Meanwhile, chances are that you make all sorts of new connections while you work to start your business, connections you can't even imagine right now, and that these people will help you find new opportunities if things don't work out. You are not your business. Your business is one single, tiny expression of your passion, vision, power, and dreams. Don't get dramatic and turn it into something more than it really is.

MINDSET TWO: I CAN DO THIS!

The mindset “I can do this!” means that you create possibility, generate resolve, and remain inspired—even in the face of daunting fear, uncertainty, limited knowledge, setbacks, and potential failure. Entrepreneurs create something from nothing. They start with an idea and create a viable business based on that idea, but that is only the beginning. They have a sense of possibility, resolve, and inspiration that few employees can fathom, and that allows them to persevere no matter what comes their way.

It all starts with a mindset of “I can do this!”—a firm belief that they can make something good appear even though nothing exists now.

Here is a metaphor that might help make this mindset come alive for you. Have you ever gone scuba diving in cold, deep, dark waters—for instance, off the coast of Maine? As you descend down the anchor line of the boat, something eerie happens. About 30 feet down, if you look down, you see your anchor line disappear into the dark depths of the water. If you look up, you see the anchor line disappear above you, too. You are floating in nothingness, a strange nowhere zone. Inexperienced divers often can't handle this situation. Sometimes they can't even tell which way is up or down—even though their bubbles float up and clearly point to the surface. A few divers panic and freeze up or waste all of their air supply breathing too quickly. Many signal to the dive master that they want to quit the dive and get back to the boat. However, those who have the resolve to continue get to enjoy a fantastic experience. As they keep descending down the anchor line, foot by foot, eventually something amazing starts to come into view—for instance, the hull of a Colonial-era ship that wrecked hundreds of years ago, along with a couple of giant lobsters keeping guard.

Entrepreneurs are able to keep diving past the nowhere zone until they reach their destination. They know that if they keep going, one step at a time, something good will appear. They stay resolved and keep saying, “I can do this,” even though their anchor line has disappeared into the depths. Whatever the obstacle, they persist until they find a way over it, around it, under it, or through it.

Read the following situations. If you want to strike out on your own and escape the world of employment forever, you have to be able to generate the resolve to handle these issues and keep pressing forward. You have to keep thinking, “I can do this.”

• You ask 20 people to buy your services or product, and all of them say no.

• You are ready to open for business, and the city building inspector refuses to grant you a certificate of occupancy until you make some costly changes.

• You tell people about your business idea, and they don't seem to understand it or know anyone who would become customers.

• You are short the cash you need for next week's payroll and have a week to figure out how to pay your employees.

• You spend six months training a promising employee in the business, and then he quits.

• Your biggest customer goes broke, leaving you with tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid invoices and reducing your revenues by 25 percent.

• You get a notice from the state telling you that you underpaid sales tax; now you need to come up with funds to pay what you owe, along with interest and penalties.

• Your China-based supplier, who requires payment up front before commencing manufacturing, sends you a shipment of defective products—and refuses to correct the errors unless you pay more money.

• You invest in a radio marketing campaign, and the results don't nearly pay back your investment; now you are stumped about how to become visible in your market and attract more customers.

• A competitor starts up and seems to offer the same products and services you do, but at lower prices.

You get the idea, right? As an employee, there are always other people around to handle these issues and motivate you to keep pressing forward. As an entrepreneur, you are the one who has to generate possibility and resolve so that these issues are dealt with. You are the first and the last to stay inspired, and that inspiration needs to be so infectious that it motivates others. When others have big doubts, you help them see a way forward. When things look bleak, you find a path to success. No matter how daunting the situation, you don't give up. You keep finding ways to move forward.

Here is another question to ask: When do you quit? Some would-be entrepreneurs quit after they hit their first minor obstacle. For instance, I met a woman who said to me, “I've really wanted to start a business for a year now, but I don't even know how to register my name or get the right licenses.” For a full year, she hasn't started a business because of what is a non-issue to any serious entrepreneur. How likely do you think she will be to succeed, even if she does figure out how to name her business and go to the local town hall to fill out a form, pay a few dollars, and get a business license? Never mind her. What about you? Do you quit before you should?

Real entrepreneurs keep going in order to create a viable business. They find ways to get over obstacles, get hard-to-find information to make smart decisions, and deal with uncertainty. Of course, they aren't crazy. They don't bring their families to financial ruin pursuing a dumb idea. They do their homework. They minimize their risk. They set limits on the total amount of time and money they will invest in the venture before doing something else. Within those constraints, they have a sense of possibility and keep going.

SPECIAL RESEARCH REPORT:

Advice from Entrepreneurs About Dealing With Fear When Starting a Business

Following is a summary of research conducted through interviews with a number of business owners about dealing with fear when starting a business. These entrepreneurs shared the many different kinds of fear they experienced whe...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Preface
• Introduction: Yes, You Can Do This!
• Chapter One: Battle Number One: Win the Mental Battle
• Chapter Two: Battle Number Two: Come Up with a Workable Idea
• Chapter Three: Battle Number Three: Get Strong Support from Family, Friends, and Your Network of Colleagues
• Chapter Four: Battle Number Four: Develop a Strategy That Gives You an Edge
• Chapter Five: Battle Number Five: Find a Path to Profits
• Chapter Six: Battle Number Six: Generate Enough Cash to Give Yourself a Chance
• Chapter Seven: Battle Number Seven: Master Your Time
• Chapter Eight: Battle Number Eight: Get Top Talent on Your Team
• Chapter Nine: Battle Number Nine: Achieve Quick, Low-Risk Successes To Get Your First Profitable Customer
• Chapter Ten: Battle Number Ten: Keep Going Until The Business Achieves Momentum
• Chapter Eleven: Declare Victory and Create Your Personal Job Escape Action Plan
• Conclusion: A Network of Entrepreneurs Wishes You Well and Reminds You that You Can Do This!
• About the Authors
• Introducing: The Job Escape Challenge