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Client: Can you do this for us?
You: Yup! (with much enthusiasm)
Client: How long have you been in business again?
You: Uhm…
That’s not the answer your client wants to hear but you don’t want to lie either, lying might just get you into trouble. Should this send you back to applying for a job again? NO, it shouldn’t! The message you want to get across is “Yes, I’m fairly new BUT I CAN DO IT!” Now the problem is that the message doesn’t get across through words like “uhm…”. Solution? Embed it inside your product.
You might not believe it but the rate of success is almost a hundred percent. And as far as my experience is concerned, nobody turned my proposal down… but only when I brought the product first.
When I was at Pilita’s Restaurant in Greenhills, I saw that their menu board was quite a design disaster and not a really good match for the cozy place. I’m not an expert but I’m sure I could do better design than that so instead of going straight to Carlos (Pilita’s husband, the chef and owner of the resto) I planned my way to get the menu board design project. Normally you’d go looking for supplies with the lowest price, see how much time you’d spend with it and compute it against your rates, and draft a good looking proposal… to hell with that! First of all that’s too much time just to get rejected, trust me it’s quite frustrating. Secondly, a well-drafted proposal doesn’t get your real message to your client and it’s “I CAN DO IT” and you even lose the chance to say it when they see your price! By this time I was busy with other projects I was working with so I gave this opportunity to my wife who happily accepted it (take note, the project is still not ours by this time). It took two days to produce the actual menu board and guess what, we got the project instantly! His only comment was that the food photos was not his, now that’s so minor for a revision! We are just waiting for the photo shoot and we’ll be done with it.
This was actually the second time I applied the idea, the first time was with Tim Bennett’s motivational books collection CD which gave me the idea actually. When I attended one of his seminars, He gave us a free CD which looks crap! (Sorry Tim). However, when I opened it, I was blown away by the content. Some of it I was actually looking for. But it didn’t show in the packaging. I suddenly saw an opportunity, I can improve it in a way that it would sell. So I went producing the cover, the cd interface and the case. And the response was instant, “If you want the project, you got it” he said.
These are just some of the results but I used this idea several times and it hasn’t failed me ever as of this writing! If you still doubt it why don’t you give it a try? Competition? There are no competition, not much people use this approach.
This would take a lot of effort on your part since you have to work as if the project was already awarded to you. Added to that is the risk that you might still not get the project. But based on results, it’s worth all the effort. Now you have their actual product right before their eyes as if saying “I’m fairly new BUT I CAN DO IT and I’ll do it like this!” There are two major components of this approach, seeing the opportunity and action.
Seeing The Opportunity
You have to look at things differently. Whenever you see something and you hear yourself whisper, “I can do better than this”, you are actually seeing an opportunity, you just have to add “and I’ll prove it” on the whisper and it’s almost complete.
Action
As Steve Pavlina would put it, “It’s only action that produces results” so unless you do something about your statement earlier you won’t get anywhere. So shut your mouth and let your product do the talking.
I hope this with all the other tips get you started soon!
ONWARDS!
Most people are trying to catch the big fishes, there’s nothing wrong with that, but the problem is you aren’t big enough to catch them yourself because you are just starting out. And the chances that you’ll get a big fish is very slim right now. Just imagine a few hundreds of guys like you going for the same thing. You must really have a name first before the big fishes starts to notice you and how do you do that? FIND SMALLER FISHES and eat them, trying bigger and bigger fishes when you get the chance until you grow bigger yourself. This is how strong companies grew!
Keeping this in mind you’ll avoid the competition. While everybody else is trying to catch the big fishes, you just sort of wait for smaller fishes along the way that you can take. And before you know it, you’re big enough to compete with the others. With the experience you’ve had, you’ll have a better understanding of your clients increasing the likelihood of doing business with them.
One disadvantage of this idea is that it takes TIME. You have to be patient and consistent enough in order to grow. Slowly but surely as they say.
Things to do:
1. Identify your niche
2. Sort the big and smaller fishes and try to catch the smaller ones first
3. Do it consistently, regularly setting the bar higher each time (quantity)
4. Try a bigger fish next time (quality)
Don’t get disappointed thinking that you are under utilizing your capacity. It might look as that but what really happens is that you get stronger and more efficient each time you do it, what I mean is, you don’t lose in the process.
If you can, try to make up in quantity instead, to bring up the challenge. See how far you can go. When you’re boasting each time “hmmm, this is going to be easy…” try getting more and more of the easy stuff and you’ll be surprised of how complex and hard it will get. Time management and allocation of resources are skills which would improved at this point.
It’s really hard to get started. And trying to reach for something big at this moment might blind you from the opportunities around. Remember, you can only eat smaller fishes today but soon you’ll be big enough to catch the big ones. However, it is POSSIBLE to catch bigger fishes when you’re small… How? That I will discuss in another post, so check us out often.
ONWARDS!
May 20, 2008 (tuesday) Millionaire Anonymous (MA) had their weekly meeting at the Radisons Building in Aguirre St. in Makati city. This is where our quest for a Million Pesos started and this is where we will start once again.
Tim Bennett, the man behind MA, started us off to a race to 1 million. We had different ways of getting money or earning that income to add on to our current status. Different members of the group had different levels. Some were already at 32 thousand pesos, while others who have been with the group since the beginning were stuck at 2 thousand. Tim wanted to shake things up a bit and on May 20, 2008 he announced to the group that everyone will go back to ZERO and will be broken up into teams. He told everyone that the money that we have saved in the previous race is already now open to spending. He said we can do anything we wanted with it because it is not included in the new race. Some might want to spend it, save it, or give that money away. But I decided to pursue my own race. I will continue on the path that I have already started on my own but I will also actively participate in the new race with my team members.
The rationale behind this was Tim wanted to instill change in the current set up because some of us are just not progressing the way it should be done. The race started to become a crawl to 1 million pesos instead of a fast paced climb to 1 million as it was intended to be. The Team game follows the basic rules but this time we are responsible for everyone in the team. No one can advance until everyone reaches the level that we are currently at. We were broken into teams and I am part of Team 2 ( EMERALD CITY) and was selected to be team leader. Emerald City team members consists of Amiel and Joanne and Me. Other teams are RISK TAKERS, GOLD RUSH and GREAT ENERGY. As an added feature to the game Tim has put up a point system for all the teams. 4 points is awarded to any team that first finishes the level, 3 points to the 2nd team and so on and so forth. The points will be tallied in the end of the race and which team finishes will the highest point total wins a prize.
Notes: It was Tim’s birthday last May 20,2008 “happy birthday Tim!”
I will be doing 2 races. 1 personal race to a Million and a team race to a Million Pesos
Team Race entails that everyone in the team has 1 million pesos EACH!!!
It has been a known fact among our countrymen that the most consumable product in our country is not food nor is it any household items but cell phone credits. We are the texting capital of the world, Im not so sure if we should be proud of that but it is a fact that we can not just disregard.
I still remember when I started this race to 1 million. Walking in the streets of Makati asking for 1 peso was the turning point in all of this. I thought what if I could ask 1million people 1 peso each, I would still be a millionaire. The telecommunications network (globe sun smart) did that. Asked 1 peso from every filipino and it made them rich. All Im asking is just a piece of the pie that globe, sun, and smart have.
The SMS market is a multi-billion peso industry with 40 Million cellphone users. There are 240 Million texts per day and 98% of cellphone users are pre-paid subscribers. What if we can get a small piece their pie? what if we can also earn from ready users and potential users? We can because there are services that offer this to us. SMART and Globe offered their eload business to the sari-sari stores but you need seperate phones to provide both because you cant just cater subscribers of 1 telecommunications company that’s like turning away a customer who is already intent in buying a product (credits).
There are other services that offer eload businesses to the ordinary folk like us. Wi-Max is a company that provides the opportunity for us to earn the way big telecommunications company earns their money. I know there are a lot of other companies that offer the same services as Wi-Max but this is the company I chose because after talking to Wilson Ng, Vice Chairman of the company, I was convinced that they are a legitimate company and they are offering this service to us. And they had a lot of other things to offer aside from eload. Which I will elaborate more in the future (meaning I still need to study it hahaha)
After seeing their presentation and a long discussion with Mr.Wilson Ng, I immediately bought a 2,200 package for the business. This is the reason I deducted 2,200 pesos from my progress report. It is a small investment for me since I’ve made the money from nothing.
For those who might be interested in the E-load business I will let you know how to do it in my next post called “The Ken-Max project” Earning 1 million pesos through eload.
I hope the first part already got you started. Having a mentor at your side really gives you the assurance that you are on the right track and you’re giving the best you could.
Part two of this series says, you have to give it away for free first. Now this idea has been around for quite a while now. This idea gave birth to “free taste“, “free sample“, “free trial“, and all sorts of free stuff with the major purpose of having the market TRY IT OUT. The same thing goes for your skill, if you are too afraid to know if your market will put less value to your skills/products, give it away for free and let them decide how much is it worth. Everybody nowadays wants it for free, so you can be sure that your market will warmly welcome your offer. Now you might think, “they might give me an even less value now that they know I gave it away for free”, the answer is that THEY WON’T, they might even give you a higher value than what you expect. Of course there are these type of people who really abuse the offer because of their “poverty mentality” but these people are not your market. You’ll offer this to those you know will pay for it if it has value. And the value is very important and it has to be there because this would chart your course of your future relationship with a particular client.
When you give something away for free, it doesn’t mean that what you’ll be giving doesn’t have value. All the more that it has to have a value because this should be a very good example of what you could offer them. When you give a free taste don’t let them have the excess, when you give a free sample don’t let them have the reject, when you give them a free trial don’t give them less features. The free you give away should represent the whole thing you are offering so it should be the best that you could offer. And as long as the value and quality is there, you are assured of return customers, now that’s what we are after. What is the first-time-for-free worth compared to a regular client that comes back every month? You’ll recover your investments in no time.
The idea takes the fear away. You don’t have to worry about what they’d say because first and foremost it is them who’s getting the favor (but i’ll tell you later how they could return it back to you). So even if the client doesn’t like it, it is very unlikely that they’ll reject it (it’s very rude for them if they do, and if they did, these are the type of clients you wouldn’t like to be around, “hard to please rude clients”). It could also be a source of feedback (this is where you get your investment back). You do not take off with a perfect product, especially when you are a start-up, there’s always room for improvements. Be sure to know if they liked the product, what else do they want with it, how can it be improved, etc. The answers should be considered in order to recreate what you offer into something that your market will really value. And doing this regularly, you’d be amazed of how far you could go in perfecting your product that it actually sells itself. Lastly, before you part with the client, ask for a referral, somebody who might need your services or product, somebody who thinks that what you offer has a value.
Things to do
1. Define the particular thing you are trying to give away
2. Define your market and locate them
3. Get to them and make sure to give it to those who have the capacity to pay
4. Get their feedback
5. Ask for a referral
Again, this is a very good idea to get started. you’d learn to improve your product along the way and you’d know if your product really has value. It is hard for a customer to buy your product especially if they still have the “fear of the unknown”. Let them have a good taste of your product first, let them have a good feel, let them take a look closer and if your product really has value for them, THEY WILL BUY IT the next time.
But don’t take this too far or you’ll end up piled with weeks of work without any pay. The following are good points to consider when giving free services:
1. Make sure something will come back - it won’t be in the form of money but potential future business deals, referrals and connections.
2. Limit the alloted time - maybe a day or two in a week might be a good place to start. If this will work well with you, you’ll have enough referrals from these people that could generate a week’s worth of work. But limiting it is very important so keep a record of your schedules and avoid saying YES immediately without planning.
3. Finish it quick - you should always remember that your hour here are being consumed without pay so the quicker you get out of it without sacrificing quality, the better.
4. Pick the ones with a good action plan - when practicing this idea, be careful of those who asks help out of whim, there’s a big chance your work won’t be put to good use. avoid these type of people who just want waste your time.
5. How much value does your work have for them - evaluate if they really need your services. what we are trying to establish here is a relationship. if you think your services would not in any way improve their lives or has no value to them, you have a slim chance of getting the bonds you need for a stronger relationship.
So there you go, I hope this helps!
ONWARDS
When you are self-employed, you look up to somebody greater in your field and say to yourself: I’m going to be like him someday. You are inspired by his works and actions. Everybody in your field talks about him. You can’t think of anyone else that motivates you like he does… so what are you waiting for? talk to him, tell him you like what he does, and is it possible that i work under you for FREE! ok, before you comment on the “free” part, just read on.
You can never imagine how busy these great people are (you’ll know when you are in their position) and they are really looking for guys like you who are enthusiastic about working with them. Don’t be shy to ask because they love to hear from you (you’ll know that too when you are in their position). Who knows? you might end up a part of his team!
Most people are really just shy to ask. Opportunity favors the BOLD, so as far as i’m concerned if you can’t meet them face to face and ask, you can forget your dream of becoming like them because it’s never going to happen. If you still don’t believe me, check out this article about Felix Dennis, a publishing tycoon.
If you are following this blog, I wrote the first thing I did towards a million pesos in Genesis, and to tell you briefly about it. I was walking in Makati trying to figure out how to get one peso for my race to a million pesos. And the first thing I thought of was to ask for it… got turned down several times but i did manage to get one… and another… and another… and finally that thing was getting easier every time (that you’ll get bored after). But not many people would have the courage to do it… I know because I was scared myself at first. But if you can’t pass this stage of fright and move to courage, you’ll never get so far in life because your whole life is based on this principle of ‘asking’. When you were born your mom used to feed you (giving) when you cry (asking), when you grew older your dad will buy you a toy (giving) whenever you have tantrums (asking) at the mall, when you grew older your teacher would praise you (giving) when you do well in school (asking), and this goes on and on to almost any scenario you can think of. even now if you are still employed you are given a paycheck every month (giving) whenever you work for your company (asking). The only thing different in what I did was IT IS DIFFERENT. This is not how the society thinks of how you should get it. But the society will not feed you if you get hungry, so forget about what it thinks and concentrate on what YOU THINK!
I had the same experience once with my mentor in the post production field. He’s Avid Liongoren of Rocketsheep. I had no way of reaching him except directly so I gathered all the strength I have for that day and emailed him. And he did reply, with much excitement I told him my story and he offered help and train me under him. Much of my work flow improvement in post production came from him and I dramatically increased my productivity and efficiency (but his art was totally out of my reach, it’s a different story). Later on he employed me on several sequences on his Saving Sally project, some of his computer needs, and he is a very close friend now. Talk about getting close to your dreams! This wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t ASK!
The advantage of this principle is that you can get so much knowledge in your field and you can literally skip all the pitfalls that you have to go through and head straight to your success!
So what I’d like you to do right now is:
1. List all the BIG players in your field
2. Try to figure out the shortest way to get to him (a personal email address, a friend that might know him directly, etc.)
3. List all the things you can help him with (your skills and specialties) and come up with a very nice way to present your story
4. ASK!!! don’t hold back, remember, Opportunity favors the BOLD!
You can never go wrong with volunteering under a mentor. You can get up close (and personal in my case) with the great people you look up to, you can learn so much and further you career, and you will have the opportunity to work WITH them. Of course it will be hard (nothing’s easy nowadays), I was working my day job from 9am-6pm and work for free from 7pm-2am and the cycle goes on. I’m only home Wednesday nights and Sundays. But it all paid off…
There you go, I hope this helps you get started in your field. By this time all you have to conquer is your fear.
ONWARDS!!!
You think you can do it?
OK, you know your craft, you think you can do better than those who offer the same service AND for a lower price, you know you have what it takes to be successful and you are really inspired in doing your thing, but the problem is… you don’t know where to start. In this series, I’ll share with you the same principles I used to get started in my journey to a million pesos.
Many newly self-employed/freelancers or whatever you call them are having a hard time getting started. If they are stupid enough (me included) they’d end up resigning from their stable jobs and taking the leap of faith, but you can’t blame them! Seeing famous entrepreneurs earn big, talking to a freelance about how much more time they have after quitting their jobs, and coming over at your friend’s house seeing him still asleep while you are rushing to go to the office. They are fantasizing over these things. And if you are reading this, I know you are, too!
But at this point, I am thinking that you are reading this because you took the first step (resigned from your job, congratulations! if you haven’t I suggest you draft the letter tonight) but you don’t know the next step (i’m sorry to hear that, did you submit the letter to your boss already?) I won’t lie to you about it, IT IS HARD! And if you are not prepared for it, please do your country a favor and don’t be unemployed! I have a daughter and a wife who depends on me and it was really a big risk that we were up against.
Assumptions
I am assuming that you are self-employed by now. Some of the tips here may work for you if you are still employed but chances are, you will have a very hard time implementing it. I also assume that you already know your craft well or you already know what your passion is but don’t know where to go at this point. Lastly, I assume that you have no more than your skill to begin with, so no network, office or whatsoever to help you.
So here are the 7 Ways to Get Started:
- Volunteer under a mentor
- Give it away for free first
- Find the need below your capacity
- Product first before the proposal
- Build a network around you
- Don’t turn down any offer
- Proactively seek an opportunity
I personally learned it in that order (which you might want to follow) but each principle could stand on it’s own and could get you started. If it doesn’t, TELL ME, (and I’ll rip it off my list!) Or you can contact me and let me know, then we could work it out where you are doing it the wrong way.
Come back soon as I discuss each of the principles and logically explain how it worked for me and how it would work for you. Or you could already try it out and see for yourself!
ONWARDS!
Hermie Cabrito
if you need any help, please email me, kaimeerah@yahoo.com. I am always glad to hear from my readers!
I met up with Hermie (my co-author) at Gateway Mall in Cubao. We discussed a lot of things and one of them was this new business I wanted to pursue. Well technically its not “new” because everyone is using it but definitely we both agree that there is a lot of potential in this venture.
I apologize for the secrecy but we wanted to explore this venture further before we divulge any information. All I can tell you right now is that Hermie and I are closely looking into it and doing a study on its feasibility before we tell you guys what it is. We also wanted to set up a system of our own to maintain its sustainability but we will have to test it first.
Rest assured that we will keep you guys posted.
everyone knows that it is not easy to start a business. so please bear with us.
——————
other things we talked about…
Well we discussed how to further improve this blog so that everyone can gain from it.
we talked about a business problem of a friend in terms of marketing
maybe we should do a page for that sort of thing hmmm! Solving your business problems here in pathtomillion blog ! idea hahahaha
When we say starting a business, we are usually trapped in a particular mindset… In my opinion there are 3 possible mindsets to be trapped in.
1. That starting a Business is Hard
2. That it is expensive
3. What Business do i begin with?
An individual can be just stuck in one or all three mindsets. Well its been weeks since I’ve posted a significant entry in this blog and that’s because I was stuck trying to think of a business that I can do with 8 thousand pesos (the amount of money i have on this Million Peso Project) -check progress page.
I was racking my brain as to what am I supposed to do that can earn money, that only needs low capital,and that is not so hard to do. Well I think I have found such a thing.
I will not be writing about it just yet. I will be meeting Hermie (my co-author on this blog) on Monday and I will share with him this Business. Our discussion will provide us a chance where we will be able to iron out the kinks and scrutinize the details of this opportunity. After which I will gladly share this with you guys.
I am really excited about this and I just cant wait till it starts.
Will Keep you guys posted on this. I assure you that you can do it as well.
pathtomillion
klao8
yojismo