Wherein I Alienate 197 Decent, Hardworking People
I noticed a difference between two groups of people. A difference so startling, I was compelled to tell you about it. This video might alienate 197 very specific people, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about for two weeks and can’t hold back.
After seven years of observation, I can say that this is the biggest difference between people who are successful with their businesses and those who are not: Being a do’er.
| Click to tweet –> |
Shut down the excuses, be someone that produces. |
If you think you are one of the people I’m talking about – or very similar to those people – that’s something to think about in and of itself.
I’m guilty too sometimes.
So let’s make a pact, even if you’re mad at me for having the audacity to post this video, to look at our excuses for what they really are: a pack of lies. And start saying the truth behind them instead.
When you’re honest with yourself, “I’m really busy” turns out to mean “Oh, that sounds neat but I’m not willing to set aside Real Housewives for it.” Sometimes the the excuse for not doing something really means, “I’m afraid I’ll fail,” and other times it means “I’m afraid I’ll succeed.”
But the sooner you stop blaming outside factors (excuses) for your choices and priorities, the sooner you take control of your life.
This stuff is hard and it doesn’t get fixed with one blog post.
And that’s the beauty of growth – we’re never done. But we must always push on to do better and to be better.
It worked!
By browbeating me (and I dont even know if I signed up for that 200 people thing) you got me to actually sign up for your month long series
Its not life changing but its a start!
And now to actually DO something!!!!
Hee hee
Great point, I know some really busy, millionaire/billionaire type people – they get a LOT of stuff done – and if I really needed something done quickly, they are who I would turn to
And I should have added, I’m guilty of it too at times!
Michelle, great video! This is great news for the doers in the internet marketing space… we will never truly have much competition. I have spilled my guts to groups of “marketers” in the affiliate marketing space/ home business niche etc… and if one of them takes successfully action and scales their success… I lucked out. They’ll pay you great money for your time, purchase, the needed products/services… and totally flake on taking ongoing action. Blows my mind!!
I trust that more of those ‘good game talkers’ will become doers. Keep up the good work… rock on!
“This is great news for the doers in the internet marketing space… we will never truly have much competition.”
That’s an EXCELLENT point Antonio!
I didn’t sign up for this but I will say that it’s way more fun to do stuff than watch from the sidelines. Even if you suck it’s fun, I know cause I pretty much suck at everything but I enjoy moving. If I wanted to improve my dance skills I’d buy Dance Central and practice on easy.
“A bad decision on Monday is better than a good decision on Friday”.
I find withing my own experience of training people to create kick ass content is that they expect to produce great stuff too quickly and without the pain.
And people are way too failure averse, as if failure means proof that you should not attempt anything, when it actually means laying the foundation of success.
I say, expect to fail (even if expert) learn from it, don’t make the same mistake again and move on.
Embrace failure, it’s the only way to move ahead. You rarely learn from success.
I wish I could knock a few people I love dearly in my personal life with what you said Lyndon!
I guess that you have been in role of guru/teacher to your list and we 40,000 are students. You have stepped aside and said step up here and teach aswell and to me you will still know more about a lot of stuff than us so it’s no surprise that the only ones who felt confident enough to step up are already teaching and have lists etc.
Realistically if I am on your list to learn from you even though I have studied IM elsewhere it is unlikely I will know stuff that you don’t already know so therefore I stay in student position. If you are already on the cusp of teaching then here is the platform to do it.
This kind of fear and rationalization of excuses is exactly what holds people back from greatness.
We are our own worst enemies.
A good reminder to myself as well, just a different issue, same problem though.
Gotta get outta my own way!
Michelle you so pretty …
Are u married ?
I’m a doer, spit em out like this, “Michelle, you look sexy on this video
”
Guilty as charged. I’m an overcommiter. I really wanted to contribute, and I hope to soon, but I really just have too much going on right now.
Great video Michelle!
I have found that over the last few months that many businesses have just stalled all their efforts online because they are afraid to do ANYTHING after Penguin and Panda.
Thanks for reminding us to keep going anyway and not being afraid of what may happen next…just produce greatness anyway!
Thanks for sharing it!
Michelle, don’t give up on me. I have been on vacation and ate way too much ice cream and cake, now in a full detox (an innovate detox called “juice cleanse now”) and I promise I’ll get my content to you soon…
Interesting point and I appreciate your calling people out on their bullsh*t. One thing I would like to add is that the “gurus” who already contributed to CrowdMountain may have outsourced their projects. It’s kind of that chicken or the egg thing- does one become successful by outsourcing for great content or do they do it themselves first and outsource once they become too busy.
I’m sure you have a few good thoughts about that….
Ice cream and cake stop me from things too Reid!
Some of us “non-doers” have been on the beach on vacation recently pondering whether we should get a job or get a tan:
http://www.intellivisiongames.com/makingit/icons/job3.gif
http://www.intellivisiongames.com/makingit/icons/tan3.gif
My own thoughts on your post:
I think it’s important to address “overwhelm” in internet marketing. As you said, people who already have businesses already have the confidence, competence and general know-how and know-why to get things done. The can-do attitude comes from being able to manage one’s fears,anxiety and ignorance and having the ability to ask for help (and get it) when needed. It also involves knowing what to ask and whom. Further, those who are taking action already have the “checklists” in their heads usually.
Some of the people who are not performing may be subject matter experts in a given area and at the same time may very well be starting from scratch in some areas of social media. In addition to being overwhelmed by all of the internet marketing guru goodness that exists, newbies and experts also may have health challenges, financial worries, relationship problems or other distractions that impede their performance. If you’re already successful in your business, often those types of distractions can be managed, but when starting something new, or when dealing with large volumes of information, distractions can be overwhelming.
Further, the non-doers may also have factors in their personality or social style http://bit.ly/NjGWr3 that limit their abilities to take action in new situations and to simply get things done. Intimidation, fear and ignorance can only be conquered by taking thoughtful and positive actions and being able to ask for and receive help and support when it’s needed.
Things to non-doers to read:
http://timemanagementninja.com/2012/01/8-reasons-you-arent-getting-things-done/
http://timemanagementninja.com/2010/03/6-ways-to-protect-yourself-from-overload/
http://spinsucks.com/social-media/how-big-is-your-social-proof/
http://www.dumblittleman.com/2010/07/7-reasons-why-you-are-time-poor.html
http://timemanagementninja.com/2011/02/you-cant-finish-if-you-dont-start/
Michelle great video, and something I think we are all guilty of on some level. There are so many reasons for this that are unique to each individual, as I too have my own reasons “excuses, I know”, why my projects don’t get done as quickly as I would like. Creating QUALITY content takes time, allot of time when you consider that each piece of content needs to be “optimized” for search. It can take me 20 minutes to push out an article, no problem, but it takes twice that to optimize it for current (local) search trends… since my business is local in nature. I think the majority of people that “want in” don’t realize the time it takes to produce quality unique content. For the ones who are experienced we likely have a system of some sort down that we follow, yet the beginner quickly becomes overwhelmed with reality the moment they start…they have no system or guidelines in place to produce.
My 2 cents (got change?)
Hi Michelle, My brother-in-law really made me sit up and take notice when we were talking about procrastination! He said “There is no limit to the amount of excuses you can make to get out of doing something you don’t want to do – we can always find one. You will never make an excuse for something you want to do.
yes I am guilty, I know I should do it and that it will be good for me but guess what, yes I put it on the backburner until it goes away. ,sigh!
Hi Michelle,
I’m not sure if you included me in the list. I expressed interest upfront and asked what sort of commitment you were looking for so that I could see if I could contribute. I take no offense if you did include me in the list – I didn’t commit because I’m pressed for time. I know…it’s an excuse and I’m not going to give out the laundry list of things that consume my time at present. All I will say is that I don’t watch TV period, and I’m squeezing whatever time I can towards my online efforts. At the moment it’s not a video for crowd mountain – but I’m sure I can rectify that eventually…
All the best!
Awesome Mike!
That took courage. I think it is a “feature” of the current world that people have become more comfortable with intention than actions. The political diaspora probably doesn’t help, and for my time on the planet in meetings, on projects or any collaboration it seems the same kids are always actually making the posters. The internet gives more of us a forum and some different ways of contributing to a conversation, but we all need to know many of us still believe a commitment is a promise to some kind of action and more than words. Keep ‘em coming Michelle.
What is it that makes you so sure that the people who said they would contribute and did not are not successful?
Marketing has many different areas to work on and maybe they did not consider this project as good for their site as another one they have or want to work on.
Myself personally I look for the greatest benefit from everything I do. If there`s little or no benefit why should I?
I do not believe I said I would contribute but I may go check it out now to see the benefits (ROI) , actually return on time invested.
Great post ,
Thank you Michelle
Have a great day
I’ve made and sold a lot of software applications and systems over the years. It always bothered me that many would buy and yet not use my stuff, and my stuff isn’t cheap.
After talking to a number of the non-users, I finally concluded they actually felt the “act” of buying was in fact taking action. The act of using it, or doing something more, would mean having to take yet another action, and yet more after that. Too much energy required to take more steps and too much inertia holding them in place.
You know, when you send out that email asking for contributions to the project, I almost committed. But I stopped myself and went back to my priorities. It’s a cool project and I salute you Michelle for initiating it, but at this point in time, it has no place in my business plans (since I’m not in the IM space), so I didn’t commit.
You’re right, it is so easy to commit to cool projects or projects that you THINK will contribute to your business, but delivering on that commitment is something else altogether. Totally something else.
Interestingly enough, just read an article (by Craig Ballantyne) about the same theme in today’s issue of Early To Rise.
That’s something I’ve worked so hard on too – realizing when something fits into my current goals and saying “No” if it doesn’t. Good for you Andy!
Michelle, I am so busted on this one. But I’m not alienated. I was producing something else instead and your deadline took me by surprise. Maybe someday we’ll have another chance? Thanks for telling it like it is!
I’d love to work with you Andy when the time is right!
Hi Michelle,
My experience is in line with yours as well, but also on the flip side for me personally. I used to have a tendency to over-create, and then I couldn’t keep up with what I created. There are days I can run on superhuman mode (with enough coffee, lol) but I can only do that for a limited time and then I will crash… so from experience I’ve learned that if I can get 3 things of solid importance done in a day and keep that pace consistently, then at the end of the month I’ve accomplished 75 important tasks (not including weekends or let’s say up to 9 days to break up the month for those days when my brain has melted).
People just don’t seem to realize that forging your own empire is not a part-time commitment… they’ve had too much of the kool-aid. To me they are like people who really want to win the lottery but don’t even go buy the ticket.
So kudos for pointing out the big pink elephant in the room!
Great vid from Jeff Walker on baby steps. Start this way: http://jeffwalker.com/baby-steps/
Like it. Short, to the point yet powerful message I think.
Whilst I like most didn’t commit to the request would possibly have fallen into the 197. However, my saving grace is that I recognised that fact up front so didn’t dive in both both feet this time. A couple of reasons for this.
I find personally having the attention span of a goldfish at times and can get distracted easily………………at times ( although not by Ice Cream and cake tho
). I read through the Pop Up Publisher stuff again the other day and reminded myself about the Culling the Herd idea and this can be applied to not just websites but to everything else you do. The saying goes ‘Jack of all trades, master of none’, well if you have your finger in too many pies you cant expect to get good at everything without focus and practice (not easy to do when you have 50 things on the go) and IMO that goes participially for content writing.
Also, I find that another big handicap is the prospect of making a fool out of oneself, being able to put yourself forward and being able to take the knocks. To some having a thick skin is natural, to some it can be grown and unfortunately others are destined to be wall flowers.
If the bench mark for being a doer is a successful business, then I wouldn’t pass that one. If the test is being a trier, then maybe….one day, maybe.
So my contribution to the thread is focus and be thick skinned.
I am busted as well. I am having a record sales on amazon. I am spending most of my time filling and shipping the orders. Most of what I sell can’t be done as FBA.
i hope this keeps up the rest of the year.
I really like the the closing, “And that’s the beauty of growth – we’re never done. But we must always push on to do better and to be better.” I have been trying to come up with a way of doing things that benefit my business, around work (as in working for the man to pay the bills), family commitments and other stuff. Not easy. I make plans but often find myself back on the drawing board to modify those plans or make whole new ones. I now see it as part of growth, thanks to you. I will not be beating myself too much when I have to go back and re-plan, again.
Michelle do you design your own webpages ??
Nope!
I LOVE it and need to hear this on the days when it goes down the drain fast with errands and family events that can’t be missed. But the beauty of what we do is we CAN do it anytime (even in the middle of the night) if need be, to make up the time we spent elsewhere. Love your down-to-earth style! Thanks for sharing!