Today I have a guest post from Luke Thomas, a friend whom I've known since way back in 2012 when I first got started online. I think he was one of the first people who I bounced a niche idea around with.
Luke and I hit it off quite quickly, and I have a lot of respect for him as a person. When it comes to working online, he understands what works as well, and taught me a thing or two in the beginning. He knows what it takes to succeed, and he knows how to do things the right way.
What's interesting though is that in those 2.5 years since we first met, I've been on a crazy Internet Marketing journey and achieved some wonderful things, yet Luke has still not really got started.
I'm not blowing my own trumpet here, I'm setting up some context for his post. I suffer from procrastination a lot too, and I definitely don't work as efficiently as I should do.
The difference is that I'm always doing something though. I'm a big lover of starting new websites, (probably why I made HPD). While I may procrastinate on things, I'm still always making progress, one step at a time.
Luke on the other hand has procrastinated in the worst possible way, he never even got started. OK, so he has a pretty good excuse, he traveled the world for over a year.
Still, it's been nearly 3 years, and he's now back in the saddle and raring to go. He's prepared a post for you all which should hopefully give some insight into what he's been experiencing since we first met.
The following is from Luke Thomas.
Procrastination Is The Killer Of All New Businesses Folks
All because you’ll end up getting nothing done. There’s nothing worse for a new business than the founder being distracted with SOS, Shiny Object Syndrome, or lacking focus.
And I know. I spent 4 years putting off getting started online. I wish I just did something when I first found out about the online world and that I could start something that can become something extraordinary.
Let’s turn back the clocks for a moment whilst I tell you my story.
2010 – 2011 Is When I Should’ve Kicked Myself In The Ass
I first found out about “internet marketing” back in 2005 when I purchased a course by a guy named Corey Rudl. This was a massive 2 binder course that had to be shipped over the pond from the US to the UK.
Back when digital products was in it’s infancy really.
I read through the entire thing and was completely overwhelmed. I put the binders away and never looked at them again. A waste of $250.
But the idea of owning my own business had been burning in my mind since I was 16 and it didn’t flare up again until 2010–2011.
I started looking around for how to get started as the information in the binders now seemed completely outdated.
In late 2011 I found Wealthy Affiliate and this was also when I met Bryon too.
I started building a few websites but I never really got stuck into anything. Bryon and I, along with a few others, bounced ideas back and forth about what our plans were with our online businesses. But the fire in me wasn’t burning bright still.
This continued for several years.
Then I Went On An Adventure
May 2013 I left ”sunny” ol’ England and headed to Australia. I had to get out of my country and travel. Traveling was something else I had been wanting to do since I was 16 and I was finally doing it.
I ended up becoming a scuba diving instructor working and the Great Barrier Reef became my office.
This was when I met Rob. Rob ran a travel blog. After taking him out on a dive we spent 3 hours on the boat heading back to the port talking business. We talked about blogging, traveling, twitter, email marketing…
The fire began to burn again.
Something Changed Inside Me
I wanted to get back into the online business game. I kept in touch with Bryon and I told him that I had to do something about traveling for my business.
I have always been set on helping others so I thought ”Hey! Why not show others how to start their own blogs/businesses whilst traveling OR help them set up their blogs/businesses so they can travel?”
The idea stuck and That Marketing Dude was born.
I began creating a few blog posts but never really stuck to it. I got distracted with everything else going on around me. The diving and partying became a huge distraction.
I found myself wasting my free time when I could have been writing a blog post, reaching out to other websites, starting an email list! All these things would have been more productive than sleeping in late recovering from the previous nights antics.
Then I went to live in Fiji for 6 months and nothing happened to my websites.
The Burning Desire Disappeared When I Arrived In Fiji… Until It Was Time To Leave Again
The internet connection in Fiji was terrible. I was living on a tiny little island in the Yasawa group.
I say the internet connection was terrible but that’s just an excuse I made. I was still able to mess around on Facebook and YouTube.
When I eventually came back to England I wanted to leave again. I had to make this online business stuff work… No more excuses.
I met so many people whilst I was traveling who wanted to travel a lot longer but they had no way of funding their trip without having to head home.
Ding! I could help! I could show them how to start a blog which they could eventually earn some money from to fund their trips. Living in a place like Thailand wouldn’t require a lot of money so people wouldn’t have to create businesses that brought in 6 figure incomes for them to travel.
I found my audience, I found a group of people I care about, I have been in their shoes… I found my passion again.
Now it’s time to get myself off my ass.
Learn From My Mistakes People!
It’s now 2015. I first found out about this online business world in 2005.
Imagine where i’d be now if i got off my ass 10 years ago.
Forget 2005. Imagine if I stuck to this when I build my first website back in 2011–2012. In the space of 3 years I could have build myself a massive blog with a dedicated following… I could be making a difference in people’s lives already.
But it’s best not to dwell on the past.
If you haven’t started building your own blog yet then I beg you to start today. Even if you don’t have everything figured out now you can figure it out along the way.
”I don’t know what to write” and ”I’m not a very good writer” should not stop you. Just write about your topic. You’re not going to write you best posts right from the start.
You’ll want to put your message out into the world and build an audience of people who’re interested in what you have to say.
Your writing will improve over time.
What To Focus On
I wish I took the advice I’m about to give you back in 2012. Heck I wish I took it this advice back in 2005! Anyway, here a are 5 things you should do:
- Create your blog now. Don’t leave it any longer and focus on writing content about the topic you’ve chosen. If you have no idea where to get started with building then Bryon builds custom sites for any niche you want. You can then focus on creating the content to build your ideal audience.
- Don’t focus on perfection. If you focus on trying to get your website, blog posts, images perfect you’re not going to get anywhere. I spent 2 weeks wasting time getting 3 images in my sidebar looking perfect when I could have written several blog posts which would have been more helpful to my readers.
- Don’t focus on the money, focus on your audience. If you’re only focused on making money it will come across to your readers. You should focus on helping your audience and building rapport because once you have it they’ll be more likely to purchase your products or the products you recommend.
- Enjoy the process. The likelihood of you making great riches early on are slim. If you enjoy writing about your topic and care about helping your audience the money will eventually come.
- Remember this: There is such a thing as ”get rich quick” but there isn’t such a thing as ”get rich easy”. So don’t try and make a quick buck. Focus on the long-term success of your business.
Talk To Me
I want to hear from you guys. I spent 10 years wasting time not started on my business or being distracted with other things. I’ve wasted time finding the “perfect plugin” or the “perfect theme” that I never wrote any content. Content is the most important part of any blog so this should be your number 1 focus.
How long have you been wanting to start an online business but never got started? Or have you started a blog but never stuck with it?
I’d love to hear from you guys down in the comments below. Maybe we can motivate each other to keep going. We can all do with a kick up the ass. And if you wanted to know a little more about me or what I do then you can come check me out over at my site.
Really good post with great advice. Off and on I’ve been interested in making money from home and online business or marketing since I was 18 or in 2008 when I found out that there’s such a way of making money and being your own boss. Unfortunately I have procrastination problem too, don’t focus on important things because either I get distracted and waste A LOT of time doing stupid things that caused me to lose my focus and piece of mind. I really want to save enough money that I can get started online. I found wealthy affiliate in 2013, later forgot about it and then found it again through a review site like under 5 months ago but now remembered it so I’m interested in it. I found something else too early this month and it’s DSDomination. I don’t know which one I should start with now but I REALLY need to make money online ASAP 😛 Thanks again for the great blog!
Hey Rose,
Looks like you are havingthe same problems Luke has had. One thing I’d say: be vary wary of DSDomination. It’s not what it appears to be, and is bordering on scammy.
Hey Rose!
We all suffer from procrastination at some point but at least you’ve noticed you’re doing it. That’s the first step.
I plan on putting together a guide to help show people what to do for the first 3 months online if you only have 1 hour per day to spare. Would this be something you’d find useful?
i’d love to see that piece. in fact i think i would even try that as a case study with one site just to see how effective it is for me.
Awesome John. I’m working on it now and I plan on making it something that I could potentially sell too.
I’ll make sure you get a copy when it’s complete.
awesome! i look forward to it. ill prove us both right, that i can do it and that you are right it can be done with an hour a day as a start. then you sell it, and ill affiliate link it!
Awesome! Sounds like a plan John! 😀
Hey John. It’s taken a while but I’ve created the first month’s plan is up if you still wanted to check it out: http://www.thatmarketingdude.com/the-first-month-online-what-to-spend-1-hour-per-day-and-100-per-month-on-for-maximum-results
You’ll find links to two previous posts about how you can find that one hour per day and $100 per month within the post I linked to above.
Hey John! I just remembered I said I’d let you know when the post serious was finished. If you still wanted to check it out you can find it here: http://www.thatmarketingdude.com/how-to-start-a-business-with-100-per-month-and-with-just-one-hour-per-day-starting-your-own-side-hustle
I’d love to hear your feedback dude!
If you were Dom’s procrastination friend of 2012, I’m his friend of 2014! I’ve started 3 sites and never got them off the ground past making £200 in the year.
After realising how the sites weren’t going to be bigger, or weren’t holding my interest – I’m now starting fresh again but this time I’ll be taking up Dom’s keyword research so that I can simply get on with the site content instead of wasting time on the researching tasks.
I think some of us take longer to get it going, but there must be a point where we realise how much time we have wasted by putting tasks off and mentally beating ourselves up.
Let’s hope 2015 is the year of taking action instead of talking and reading about it. Thanks for the great post, I’ll be sure to bookmark your site.
The trick is to find an audience you care about helping. No matter what stands in your way, you’re still going to help them.
Then you’ll figure out how to monetise it all by asking your audience what specifically they need help with.
Whatever the majority say, there’s your product. Then when that first $$ comes in you’ll be even more motivated to help them 🙂
Graham with the amount of knowledge you have you really have no excuse! Get on it man 🙂
Hey Luke great to see you are still in the loop. Its never too late and as long as people make steady progress they will get there.
Hopefully it will not take 10 years to do that but we all have different time to focus on our online businesses and some make it a lot quicker because of that.
For me personally I made the decision to focus on my eBay shop and built that with my niche and money making sites taking a back seat. They are still receiving traffic and I intend to work on them periodically to continue building them.
I think its now time for me to outsource and get help to build and write content as little ole me isn’t enough. 🙂
However thinking about it will not get it done.
Its time for action, procrastinating is now over!
Focusing on one project is important. I still struggle with that now.
But if you can break things up into small enough chunks that are manageable then you’ll see project.
The old quote “Rome wasn’t built in a day” is so true!
Great post guys! Thanks for the kick-it-in-gear opinion Luke and I have to agree that procrastination it the ultimate defeat in this industry.
Time and time again, we here of folks spending $1000’s on make money online courses and yet they never make any money. I truly have to believe that a lot of that is the failure to take action.
This industry has the potential to truly give people a life-changing opportunity, but they have to have the discipline to seize it and run as fast and as hard with it as humanly possible.
Thanks for having Luke create the post Bryon. I will be following up over at “That Marketing Dude” in the future.
You are totally correct Tony. The main reason why people fail to succeed online is because of their lack of action.
Or giving up too soon because they had the wrong expectations.
You don’t need to spend $1000’s on training. Put the hard work in and connect with people… You’ll definitely see results.
I look forward to seeing you over at That Marketing Dude Tony.
Take care bro!
I would have to say that 90% of online failures are not down to the process, but down to the person. If everyone could *see* the success first, and really believe it, they’d be a lot more likely to succeed. That first $1 online is huge.
I would definitely have to agree. I still remember where I was, what I was doing, and what the first $1 was made on lol.
Excellent post here. What’s the number 1 thing you are going to do to prevent yourself from procrastinating over the next 10 years?
I’m taking small manageable steps forward.
I’ve been listening to the Fizzle podcast a lot recently and they talk about stop looking at the big picture and focus on little steps that in the end make a difference.
Focus on one small task everyday and soon enough you’ll have something worthwhile.
It’s all about taking action. Knowing when to stop learning and putting things into practice is vital.
Lots of small steps add up!
Exactly!
There’s a fantastic metaphor I heard Will Smith say. His grandfather told him to build a wall and that you don’t focus on the entire wall… It’s too daunting. Instead focus on laying one brick. And you lay that brick as perfectly as a brick can be laid.
Keep doing that day after day and soon you’ll have that wall.
I think this is a great metaphor for business in general.
He needs an accountabilabuddy right David? 😉
Yeah, I mean, that’d be a great first step! 😀
This is my number one issue! I tend to either put things off, or worse start something new. Perhaps it’s a fear thing – certainly that’s what it is with my latest venture I think. Diving off into the unknown, outside my comfort zone. It’s scary.
And then there’s the tedium, especially if you cannot afford, or simply are to OCD, to outsource work to other people. Then it becomes a slog, and the things you find difficult end up getting pushed off with an “I’ll look at that later”.
Another problem for people with OCD is perfectionism. Something else I suffer from too.
I just like things to be pretty! 😉
Yes, that too though personally I’ve managed to overcome it for the most part.
Working with me helps anyone get over liking pretty things.
You can overcome it once you’ve changed your mindset. I’d put my mindset shift down to the guys over at Fizzle.