Morning all. Happy Easter weekend! Here's what I've been reading and thinking about this week. It's pretty business and startup-heavy this week, so if that doesn't interest you, just check back in next week.
Books
Links
- Serial entrepreneur Jay Samit on the SellPersonal podcast: I'd honestly never heard of Jay Samit until I listened to this interview, but I was blown away. He clearly and concisely laid out how you can look around for problems that need to be solved, and go solve them, and build great companies in the process. I also picked up his book Disrupt You! after I'd listened to this interview.
- The only entrepreneurship reading list you need: my old boss Tucker Max continued his Asshole to CEO series with a fantastic reading list on startups and entrepreneurship. I'll give you the Cliff Notes: Paul Graham, good, Guy Kawasaki, bad.
- Paul Graham on how to get startup ideas: Tucker's list sent me down a bit of a rabbit hole on Paul Graham's essays, but this is one of the best. Just like Jay Samit said: look for problems that need solving.
- The Marc Andreessen Guide to Startups: again, one from Tucker's list -- I hadn't seen these essays before, but Marc Andreessen (Netscape, Opsware, Ning, Andreessen Horowitz) is basically the best there is when it comes to talking about tech and startups. He talks from a place of huge experience, and this is a great read. Pretty short too.
- 90 Day Goal Setting and Action Step Planning Template: this is one of the resources from my friend Taylor Pearson's book. Hugely useful and practical way to break down your long-term goals into 90 day steps, then monthly, weekly and daily. I'll definitely be using this.
- 10 Habits of Unsuccessful People You Don't Want to Copy: Taleb would call this "via negativa". Munger would call it "inverting the problem". Whatever you want to call it, you can really progress by just trying to avoid making mistakes. Here are 10 habits you should stay away from.
My hot streak of writing has continued. Now up to two weeks, every day, without fail. I like it -- I like the routine, and I like that it forces me to commit thoughts to paper. I'll continue with it.Last week I wrote that I had 3 main goals right now:
- Building a repeatable, scalable way to get leads for my copywriting business
- Getting back in the gym and in shape
- Finding a weekly goal review and tracking system to use
On 1) things are good. I signed three more clients this week, probably for longer-term work, which is great. I think the main channel of growth is going to be word of mouth -- and right now, I'm busy enough that the word of mouth engine is in full swing. My plan from here is to basically get enough clients that I'm working full-time, and if people are still wanting to work with me, I'll slowly increase my rates to manage demand. I know that a lot of people want to do the same, so once I have a little more time (and I'm sure I can turn it into a full-time business) I'm going to write up a full case study of exactly what I did, and the results I got. I'll include all the emails, spreadsheets, and other resources that I used as well.I didn't work out at all this week -- again -- but I did monitor my weight closely, and eat well throughout the week, so I still lost 1.5 lbs. But that wasn't the goal: exercise was the goal. I failed. MUST fix this next week, as a matter of urgency.And finally, I found a great planning and tracking system -- Taylor's90 Day Goal Setting and Action Step Planning Template that I linked above. Not much else to say here other than that it's fantastic, and I'll definitely be using it.Goals for next week:
- Get in the gym at least once
- Continue to grow copywriting business
- Publish on blog every day
- Begin 90 day goal setting and action step planning