Young and Hungry: The New Entrepreneur

Monday, March 5, 2007 at 12:20pm by David Askaripour in Life

Forward

I remember sitting in the principal’s office sometime during 6th grade; Mr. Palmore, my principle, was looking across his large wooden desk sternly starring at me as he spoke to my mother on the phone. He was passionately explaining to her that I was being warned for the final time for selling candy to my classmates. Though he respected my entrepreneurial spirit and effort to make my own money, it was against school policy to conduct business on school property and I didn’t think that it helped that I was only 10 years old.

For as long as I can remember, selling candy to my sugar-hungry classmates was my first stint at entrepreneurship. I remember throwing on a few layers of clothing in the brisk cold winter and jumping on my mountain bike to take the 3 mile trip to the local supermarket.

Armed with my school backpack and roughly $10 in investment capital, I headed directly to the candy section to pickup my inventory for the upcoming school week. Jolly Ranchers, tootsie pops, lollypops, and Now n’ Laters were a part of the usual candy assortment to be sold.

Upon returning home, the first thing that I would do is take out my notepad and calculator and start playing around with the numbers, figuring out how much money I could make that week if I sold all my bags of candy. It was very exciting. I usually sold each piece for 25 cents, making a profit of 5 – 10 cents per piece of candy.

When Monday came around I walked the halls with a lunch box packed with candy. I walked with such vigor and moxie that it was hard not to notice me. Head high, shoulders square, and determined, I was on a mission to sell as much candy as possible. I was on a journey to sell candy and make some cash.

Whether it was in lunch period, math class, or gym, there I was, making transaction after transaction—25 cents here, a dime there —my pockets were filling up with change and crumbled dollars as I walked to and from class with a merry jingle as if I was Santa Clause. I felt like I was on top of the world. If I was selling stocks to students, I would have made millions by the end of the semester… or at least that’s how I felt.

Within a few weeks of selling candy to students, I began to expand my operation by purchasing even more candy. I went from bringing home a few dollars in profit per week to over $10 which handsomely augmented my $1 dollar allowance at the time. I became the Gordon Gecko (from the movie Wall Street) of my middle school, but instead of selling securities, I was selling trips to the dentist and immense sugar highs before the bells rang for lunch period.

You see, even as a young child I’ve always wanted more out of life. I would spend hours staring out the window of my suburban home in the middle of Long Island, East Patchogue, New York.

Mom would constantly ask: “What are you thinking about while you stare out the window, Dave?” I would respond with: “Nothing mom.” But it wasn’t nothing. As I stared out the window and observed the squirrels running across the lawn and the leaves effortlessly blowing around the sky, I would be thinking about possibilities.

Possibilities of what I could become in this world and how I was going to get what I wanted. Possibilities of how much money I could make and how many lives I could change one day. My mind filled with ideas and looking back, these were the blueprints for everything that I have accomplished thus far as a young entrepreneur.

And now there I was, months into selling candy and greatly expanding my business with more clients (well, my classmates) than ever before, now sitting across from my principal – ex-Jets player Harvy Palmore—as he was crushing the world around me as if I was one of his teammates on the field. “How dare you tell me that I can’t run a business in school” I angrily thought to myself as he was wrapping up the conversation with my mom.

Soon after a few more attempts to stay in business by running a clandestine operation and possibly one or two more calls back home requesting that I close down shop “or else…,” I finally closed down the candy selling business and my first entrepreneurial experience came to an upsetting end.

Little did I know that it was just the beginning. It was the spark that put me on a road to entrepreneurship that I would never divert from. I was destined to become a successful young entrepreneur and I wasn’t about the let anything or anyone stop me.

Over the next 10 years I continued my entrepreneurial endeavors by constantly thinking of ways to make additional money whenever I could. I became very opportunistic in my ways. I saw myself growing as a young entrepreneur as I continued to develop ideas and formulate plans to turn what was once nothing into something real. Something that I could call my own.

Around 1996 I was playing around with new AOL hacking tools called “progs” that allowed me to create computer viruses and hacking tools that I sold for a few bucks in school. Years later, I found myself going with my mother to neighborhood garage sales to purchase large quantities of cheap books among other items to resell on ebay—that was fun. I was an Internet entrepreneur in training.

Now all of a sudden I was 20 years old and on Christmas break during my sophomore year of college. For the past 10 years since I started the candy business in 6th grade, I had a few brief affairs with entrepreneurship but I never really jumped back into creating a business with full force like I did with the candy selling venture. I was back on the drawing board and knew that it was once again time to start something official. Something big.

I’ll never forget that cold winter day, Jan 1 2004, sitting on my desk at home and thinking, thinking about how I can start my first business as a college student. Looking back to that day, that was my real spark into becoming a young internet entrepreneur and you’ll soon learn all about how I started that business and the experiences, failures, and successes that I endured and still currently face as a young entrepreneur on the journey to success.

Through my experiences as a 23 year-old internet entrepreneur and the experiences 23 year-old entrepreneur William Quisenberry, you’re about to go on a journey through the up, downs, and real-life events that young entrepreneurs face on an ongoing basis as we share our lessons and insights gained from being real entrepreneurs who wakeup every morning and take steps to growing our businesses and ultimately changing the world.

Whether it’s talking to your parents about becoming a young entrepreneur instead of getting a 9 to 5 or balancing your time between your company and your friends, it’s all covered in this book. Written just for you, the young entrepreneur.

We believe that young entrepreneurs are the future. We are the ones who will set the tone for the latest technology, the latest advances in commerce and finance, and the services that will revolutionize the world as we know it.

And, by the ways things are looking, we are on course to creating the new Internet. With entrepreneurs such as 21 year-old Mark Zukerberg creating the social networking site facebook and 18 year-old Kristopher Tate creating one of the most popular photo sharing sites, Zoomr, the future is looking bright for young entrepreneurs around the world. We’re doing big things and we aren’t slowing down!

As we continue to solidify our position in the world business and continue to breakthrough into the world of entrepreneurship while disrupting existing business models and creating services never before fathomed, we are becoming a force that can not be ignored. This is just the beginning and we’re just getting started. Watch out world, we’re coming head on.

To Our Success,

David Askaripour
Founder
Mind Petals

Chapter 1

Overcoming Your Fears: The Fear of Failure Produces Failure

Fear has haunted many individuals in the past and continues to ravage throughout the lives of many today. Fear clouds creative minds, quenches talents, and destroys destinies before they’re fulfilled. The fear I’m speaking of isn’t horror movies, but it’s the fear of failure that plagues young entrepreneurs daily and never allows many to pursue excellence.

As a young aspiring businessperson, I would be telling a complete lie if I mentioned that you would never face fear along this chosen journey. When you step into a level of unknown territory or stretch yourself past the limitations of your comfort zone, then fear is certainly going to appear in the equation in some form or fashion.

When I say “stretching yourself past the limitations of your comfort zone,” I mean pursuing dreams and performing actions that are contrary to the norm. For instance, think about who we are for a second; we are most definitely different whether you want to admit it or not.

The fact that you’re young, ambitious, and want more out of life at such a young age is a complete abnormality alone. However, the sheer fact that you surpass strictly wanting more out of life and decide to seize the moment, step out on faith, create a venture, and take destiny into the palms of your own youthful hands is nothing short of amazing!

Really, shouldn’t you be at home playing video games and watching movies all day? Better yet, shouldn’t you simply want to go to college for four years, get out and get a safe and secure job at a company with a 401K plan and just ride the tide on out for 25 plus years, retire, and live happily ever after? What exactly is wrong with you?

The fact that your mind doesn’t comprehend and react similar to these miniature perceptions and thoughts is great, but unfortunately these thinking patterns are the norm in our culture. So whenever you strike out to press towards the majority, fear will set in because you’re challenging and forcing yourself to persevere to new heights where not many grown adults over 40 have gone, let alone youthful young adults.

Reverting back to my own experiences I was a person who was terrified to take steps when I initially became an entrepreneur and fear is something that I still face on a regular basis when dealing with business. There are more opportunities that surpassed me or projects that were not completed to full potential due to my fearful tendencies and thought patterns.

One area that I struggled with when I first started out in business was picking up the phone and making calls! When it came to making business related calls, whether they were cold calls, warm calls, or even hot calls, I just couldn’t get it together.

I would put the task of making phone calls off throughout the course of my day, because procrastination is a subliminal way of releasing fear. What your mind is doing is trying to create excuses to avoid tackling the task that needs to be done most, but instead you consciously avoid getting them done because you’re either afraid of performing them or don’t feel comfortable with carrying them out.

So even if I was able to eventually force myself to pick up the phone to make a business related call, when I did get a prospect on the phone I would experience excessive breathing, shortness of breath, my brain would draw a blank, and I would stumble and stutter through words in a horrible manner. Basically I was awful and the people I was talking to on the other line usually could sense my fear and inexperience and never took me seriously.

One of the strongest, if not the most powerful, forms of fear has to be the fear of failure. The fear of failure basically attacks people to the point that they would much rather avoid doing something that they feel they MIGHT fail at, rather than trying it to see what the results really will be. As a business professional you have to learn to accept failure, plain and simple.

As crazy as that may sound failure teaches you a lifetime of lessons if you’re willing to be mature enough to recognize the knowledge hidden inside the mistakes and shortcomings.

For instance, before creating my first venture I read a lot of books and information on entrepreneurship. I would purchase all these books on how to start a business, think about it and strategize, but I would never jump out there because of fear. So what I would do instead is make excuses and procrastinate just like I mentioned earlier. I would say things like, “Well right now I don’t have the money for a business, so I’m going to wait another two months until I get some capital.”

Two months later when I had the capital I would say, “Well now I got the money, BUT I have some hard classes this semester, so I’m going to wait until next semester when I have more free time.”

So after the semester ended I would say, “Well now I got the money, the semester is over, BUT things are going so well on my job and I think I might be getting a promotion if I work real hard the next three months, so maybe I should wait another three to four months once things settle down at work.”

I went on like this for over a year, maybe even as far as a couple of years! I was just making lame excuses, reading books so I could still convince myself that I was pursuing entrepreneurship when in reality I wasn’t pursuing anything at that point. It was actually quite the opposite, I was being pursued! You see fear was chasing me around my own life; I was a prisoner of “F.O.F” which stands for the Fear Of Failure!

At the pace I was on I would be a senior citizen before I ever got my first venture going, and I would be the world’s smartest and most educated non-entrepreneur due to all those books and seminars I was investing in.

You see, until you get out there on the pavement and start falling down, making mistakes, talking to people, making calls, getting smarter, having to fight for your life and learning as you go, all the education in the world isn’t gong to be doing anything but taking up mental vacancy space.

When I finally overcame my fears of failure and jumped into the game of entrepreneurship, guess what happened? That’s right baby, I failed! My first venture went belly up in a terrible way and while my business failed, in all actuality I WON. I learned more in a week than I ever could from attending seminars, reading books, and taking college courses on business.

Also another inevitable transition took place once I pursued my dream; I conquered my fear and emotions of the unknown, because I found out that it wasn’t as scary as I had made it appear in my mental depictions of anxiety. I compare this feeling to the feelings of fear that an athlete faces when they go out on the field or court to compete during a sporting event.

I played football for eleven years of my life and I actually was a pretty good ball player in high school. Well when I was playing football every single Friday night when you came through those stadium tunnels and walked onto the field you had an unexplainable fear that stroked your heart and a knot or inner-bewilderment that would strain your stomach.

Your mind would be on edge, you had a ton of different emotions all racing at once through your body and the combination really gave you the feeling of intense nausea.

Then after all the waiting, after all the excitement, fear, aggression, questioning, and mental drain, it was finally time to get it on. So when you go and get that first hit off on your opponent, all the emotions, drains, and best of all, the fear leaves your body almost instantaneously and now the fun begins because instead of carrying around all the unnecessary baggage of emotions, you can let loose and just play ball!

This is the same thing with your venture. You can be like I was and keep postponing your destiny and the future of freedom and greatness that awaits you strictly because of your fear. You can make excuses and intentionally direct your attention and efforts elsewhere or even just quit and pursue a lifestyle that is more fitting and simple for somebody within your age group.

However, if you buckle down and take the fear head on and attack your dreams of entrepreneurship with undivided attention and passion then the real learning process can begin to take place. After you go get your feet wet and all the anxiety departs, it will be like those football games I described, you will be ready to start playing some real ball.

Treading through business with fear will not only strain your growth, but it will also cause you to get hurt! Going back to what I was mentioning about playing football, my old high school coach would constantly say that “when you don’t go full speed and half step with a fearful mentality on the football field, then you will soon get injured, because everybody else is flying around trying to nail you with all their might.”

The same notion can be applied to the gridiron of enterprise; when you’re reacting and performing with fear you are not going full speed and so others out there who are doing all that they can, consistently without limitations will end up winning the game, because they have learned to reject fear and embrace challenge.

Also fear may steer you in the direction of more mistakes, because instead of using logical business thinking, your judgments may become clouded based upon avoiding your most feared results. The outcome of this behavior may indeed be failure, because fear was the underlying value of your decision instead of strictly business.

Another area that you must recognize and learn to defeat is the fear of rejection. So many times throughout life people refuse to ask for something due to their phobias surrounding the two letter word “no.” It is absolutely ludicrous to avoid entrepreneurship or your full potential within this realm due to the fact that you don’t want to be turned down.

If you avoid taking risks or doing things out of the ordinary then you’re thinking with a “loser” mentality. You see when you look at an uphill task or obstacle as a potential loss or something that may lead to rejection, then you have already lost, because your level of thinking is centered around failing and losing, so most likely that will be the end result.

Rejection is something that really isn’t that major, but it is a reaction that many take seriously. Rejection is simply being told, no not today, but maybe tomorrow! This is how you must view rejection; it is just simply a delayed yes.

However so many people, sometimes myself included, think rejection is a testament to permanent failure or a death sentence. They sometimes think that there is no coming back after hearing the word no and also I believe many question themselves as a person mentally after the process occurs.

When you choose a life of entrepreneurship you must also choose a life of resolve and perseverance, meaning that you almost have to become mentally insane! I say this because you must create a radical way of thinking and perceiving things much differently than the general public does.

That’s why I say that having somebody tell you no is really just a delayed yes. For instance let’s say that I go in and try to close a business transaction and a person says, “You know I’m just not going to do nothing, I’m not interested.”

Then in reality he’s saying no to the transaction, but in my mind I’m thinking, “Okay, I didn’t close this deal today, but you better believe I will close it one day!”

You may never close that deal or even one like it, but you have to think with the psyche that you will, because this mental perception keeps you going, keeps you hungry, and denies the vulnerability of falling victim to the fear of rejection. Creating this mindset will also keep you from being afraid of fearing what others will say about you and what they will say to you.

You can’t go through life with a fearful mentality and attitude. Fear is a complete state of mind, it has no material value and doesn’t equate to anything physically. Learn from your mistakes, embrace so called “failures,” and stay in the game by fighting tooth and nail with every inch of strength.

Don’t worry about stumbling and falling, don’t worry about what people may say to or about you, and don’t look at “no” as rejection, but learn to view it as a delayed yes.

Chapter 2

Parents + Young Entrepreneurs: “Dad I don’t want to get a job, I’m an Entrepreneur!”

Let’s face it, as a young entrepreneur you’re likely to encounter some form of opposition from your parents one time or another. If you’ve always had constant support from your parents from the beginning of your venture until now, then consider yourself lucky. Most of us young entrepreneurs didn’t have that luxury.

In order to understand why so many parents have problems with their children starting businesses, you have to understand how your parents were raised and the way entrepreneurship was viewed in their times.

Most of our parents are not entrepreneurs and that’s mainly due to the direction that they took starting from the time they were young adults growing up. The typical situation goes as follows:

1. Our parents were raised to go to school and study hard, not to question things as much as we do.
2. They were taught to get a stable job and begin working for someone else from a young age.
3. Upon graduating school they immediately sought out a career of working for someone once again, but this time for around 40+ years, not just a part-time job.
4. After completing a career spanning over 3-4 decades, they retire and live off of other means of income such as: pension, 401K’s, and/or social security.

You see, our parents were taught this way of life from a young age by their parents, so it’s only natural for them to want to instill those same rules of life unto us, their children. For the most part, our parents are looking out for our best interests and want to see us succeed in life and surpass anything that they have ever accomplished.

Our parents were groomed into living a play-it-safe sort of lifestyle. Over they decades they have grow extremely risk adverse and have only taken on risks when they were absolutely necessary for survival; other than that, they were just content coasting through life by following the status quo and never attempting to disrupt the norms of society.

But the harsh reality of the matter is that the things that our parents learned growing up simply just don’t work in this day and age. The play-it-safe-get-a-job-and-work-for-someone-for-40-years plan simply won’t hold up anymore. That equation is broken and it’s time for a new one. One for a generation of young entrepreneurs.

We see it every day as more and more people lose security and comfort in their jobs as they are fired and “let go” for reasons unknown to them. Insurance plans being destroyed and compensation packages being divided by two are becoming so commonplace throughout the workforce that the good old feelings of “security and comfort” are turning into the dreaded feelings of “anxiety and fear” as the years go by corporate America grows uglier and uglier.

Security in a “job” is no longer the same. Many of our parents are caught in a “Rat Race,” of trying to pay the mortgage, college tuition, and an endless avalanche of expenses that they simply can’t stay ahead of anymore. They are being crushed under a pile of debt and bills and they never saw it coming.

Over the years of playing it safe, our parents have emotionally and financially overextended themselves by blinding their minds with a false sense of security from their jobs. They purchased big homes, expensive cars, and loads of stocks when they thought that everything was going so well.

Then all of a sudden they are called into the manager’s office one Monday morning and they are being told that their pay is being cut “temporarily” or that their services are no longer needed.

Now what? I’ll tell you: all of those bills and expenses that were aggressively taken on due to the illusion of security and safety have now become a harsh reality when there isn’t that same stream of money coming in anymore. Consequently, beginning the perpetual rat race of scrambling to pay the bills and living a life of filled with anxiety and financial hardships.

So should we listen to our parents when they tell us not to go down the entrepreneurship route? Frankly speaking, NO. Sure, we should respect our parents and heavily consider their concerns for us, but when all is said and done, only you can make the decision to follow your dreams of becoming an entrepreneur or not – not your parents. Listen to yourself first. Always.

The year is 2007 and we’re living in new times. We are living during an age where there is more security in being your own boss than having a boss. Being an entrepreneur has become the new safety net; not being an employee whose life solely depends on the decisions of a boss.

Who knows, if your boss is angry about his daughter smashing his Mercedes last night, he may come into work and fire you for absolutely no reason. You call that security?

Our parents talk about risk, but our current times are showing and proving that it’s riskier to be an employee whose sole mission is to make someone richer and increase bottom-line, rather than an entrepreneur who has complete control of their finances and future.

As an entrepreneur you have complete control of your destiny; you call the shots. The sky is the limit and you are only bound by your own imagination.

Sure, there may be a long period of time when your friends and peers are making much, much more money than you. That’s perfectly normal. In fact, that’s usually the case for most young entrepreneurs starting a venture during college or upon graduating.

You see, it isn’t exactly hard to go out and get a
$30,000—$60,000 a year job if you graduate from a decent college and have some sort of intelligence. Upon graduating from college with a degree in English I was easily able to land a $40,000 / year job as a project manager for a multimedia firm in NYC. It was as simple as searching around on Craigslist.com and going on an interview.

But do you want to know what’s really hard? The real challenge. Being an entrepreneur who has set out to change the world is one of the hardest things that anyone can ever set out to do. It’ll also be the most rewarding thing that you ever do in your life.

So when you see your friends boasting about making $40,000 a year and spending cash like they are Donald Trump, don’t worry and don’t be discourage. Scoff it off. Being an ambitious entrepreneur with a focused mind on what you want out of life will put you in a position to make more money than your friends could ever image. You’ll have the chance to build an empire that’ll continue on for centuries after you die.

You have to understand how important and precious your time is as a young entrepreneur in your twenties. Those 10 years will be the most crucial 10 years of your entire life. This is the time to take all the risks that you can; the time to put everything on the line; the time to start the company of your dreams and put your heart into it!

By not pushing forward with your dreams now, you’ll be setting yourself to wakeup in bed one day – 20 years later – and say to yourself: “Boy, I wish I was 20 years-old again. That way, I could start that company that I always wanted.”

So the next time your parents ask you what it is that you do all day long when you aren’t working a 9 to 5 like the rest of your peers, paint them a picture of your future. Explain your desire to change the world and build a name for yourself that won’t be lost in history. Tell them that you are the Achilles who went off to fight in the Trojan War and conquer the world.

Show them that your heart is set on entrepreneurship and the things that you are doing now – though they may not seem like much – are simply pieces of the puzzle leading up to building an empire to change the world and the lives of millions of people. Such a task doesn’t happen overnight.

Over time, your parents will become more accepting to your ambitions and even become one of your biggest supporters if they already aren’t. But no matter what, you have to stay on your course and not allow anyone – parents included – to divert you from your journey as a young entrepreneur.

Our parents are thinking about our future, indeed, but many of them can’t see that we simply don’t want to play it safe—we want to play it risky. We know that as a young entrepreneurs, there isn’t too much to lose and the entire world to gain. This is our one and only shot and we aren’t about to throw it away for the sake of getting a petty paycheck every month.

We can be wrong a million times, but we only have to be right once. And that “once” can change our lives, our parents’ lives, and the lives of every single person in the world, forever.

Chapter 3

Networking Part I: Networking Is Like Gasoline, Stop Using It and the Flame Goes Out

Networking with individuals both locally and in other areas away from your community is an extremely important factor in your business’s success and growth. Your business just isn’t going to automatically begin to grow and flourish without you planting the proper seeds and fertilizing it daily with nutrients and supplements.

Your mouth or verbal marketing works as the “seeds” for your business. This method is totally effective, it’s free, and with practice this resource will become totally natural and a daily performance. You see every single person that you come into contact with is somebody regardless of their title or position and every person knows somebody who in turn happens to know others.

When you start getting the word out about your new venture or as we said earlier, “planting the seeds” then people knowing about your business and telling others will begin to act as a catalyst, ultimately spurting growth, and providing your business with the proper ingredients to grow.
The art of networking is very similar to the snowball effect. When you first get started your business is nothing more than a spec of snow, then you begin networking and making a few contacts and suddenly your business increases into a baseball-sized snowball.

Suddenly with a lot of hard work and business mingling your baseball size bundle of snow has developed into a basketball full of icy contacts and so on until you have a huge mesh of snow with other professionals, contacts, clients, and associates.

Many infant business owners are sometimes fairly gun shy about speaking with others about their newborn venture. I think it’s usually a combination of fear, anxiety, and the feeling of inferiority that provokes this tension and tendency of silence. Because let’s face it as a young entrepreneur, many times there are going to be loop holes within your company and frankly everything isn’t going to be perfectly constructed and complete with your new business.

However, one factor that I think most young entrepreneurs either don’t recognize or tend to forget is that nobody has all the keys or answers with their business and even the greatest and most successful entrepreneurs had to one day start somewhere and most of them started from nowhere just like us.

Don’t be intimidated by other business professionals who may be further along than you with their companies. The more you begin to express your venture to others and rub shoulders with those in your community, the quicker the whole process will soon become second nature and seem less like work and a lot more fun, because networking is really nothing more than getting out and meeting people. How hard can that be?

So just how important is networking? Extremely. It’s a must for any individual planning to make it in business. You need to have the opportunity and ability to have individuals you can contact immediately when the need arises to conduct business and you also need others to know who you are so they can properly get through to you for the same reasons. I’m sure you’ve heard the saying, “It’s not what you know, but it’s who you know.”

Well, whether you want to admit it or not, this statement carries a certain level of truth to it. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to succeed in business; you need the right connections, a strong product or service that is in demand, and the proper supporting cast in some form or fashion. These abilities and qualities will stem from your networking abilities. Let me give you a few general examples of the importance of networking.

Did you know in order to really succeed on Wall Street as an Investment Banker you need to have a strong book of contacts? That’s right, you can know all the in depth accounting and financial equations, have top of the line investment strategies and leveraging capabilities, and be able to analyze and value a corporation in less than five minutes, but if you don’t have a strong book of executives, bankers, traders, consultants, brokers, analyst, and others, then you would never make it on “The Street” (Wall Street), because the industry thrives around networks, contacts, connections, and “who-do-you-knows”.

How about this one: many of America’s largest and most successful Chief Executive Officers have all agreed that attending a top tier business school for your M.B.A. (Masters of Business Administration) is truly a waste of time, energy, and money. Many have claimed that the same fundamentals and advanced business topics covered at these universities could be obtained from practically any small college, online university, or from reading the materials on your own.

However, all these same executives who criticize business schools and claim that they are overrated also said the major factor that made the whole M.B.A. process worthwhile and meaningful is the networking and lifelong contacts that these executives received from their fellow classmates who all eventually moved into the business world.

One more example: think about Asian cultures and how they conduct business. In places like Japan and China, the normal business hours in the office are spent crunching numbers and doing the legwork on deals. The real accomplishments pertaining to business transactions occur after hours at bars and nightclubs in these areas.

Their business culture is built strongly on personally knowing people before moving on to conduct business with them. As a result you must be a “mega-net worker” in order to succeed in these countries. Well I’m here to tell you, while deals aren’t closed in karaoke bars nearly as much in America as they are in China, it still remains a fact that networking is a must, especially for new entrepreneurs even here on domestic soil.

So who should you network with? EVERYBODY! Like I mentioned before, everybody is somebody and it takes “bodies” to help your business grow. Even if the individual’s title or profession seems like it doesn’t directly match your firm’s purpose or focal area, indirectly that person could be an absolute gold mine waiting to be dug and discovered. You never know who the next person knows or what that person has to offer you and your firm, or more importantly, what your firm has to offer that person.

Strive to fuse with Doctors, Attorneys, Janitors, Teachers, Mail Carriers, stay at home mothers, Military Personnel, Sanitation Workers, Certified Public Accountants, Students, whoever it is get to know them, get acquainted, and get them introduced to your business, product and/or service. Always have business cards handy and pass them out constantly!

Think of it this way, if somebody told you they would give you $500 for every single business card that you passed out, you wouldn’t be able to get those things printed quick enough — you would be running out so fast. Well, ultimately every time you pass out business cards you’re indirectly receiving money, because that’s another element and link in what could structure into a very powerful and lucrative chain!

Don’t forget to network with possible mentors as well. When you seek mentorship from other well-established professionals, ultimately you’re networking but on a different scale.

Contact business professionals in your community and notify them that you’re interested in having lunch with them just to learn and study their entrepreneur skills and knowledge. You may be fairly surprised at how many people out there will be receptive to reaching back and feeding a “Young and Hungry” aspiring entrepreneur who’s seeking wisdom.

Remember to always respect others time while networking and it is imperative that you always present yourself as a professional. This is especially important when you’re dealing with very successful and well-established businesspersons, because when they go to spread the word about you and your company, you want to make sure that they have nothing but positive viewpoints to express; this way, you’re more likely to develop a positive reputation in your local community.

Now that we’ve covered some of the basics concerning why networking is so important for young entrepreneurs, it is imperative to discuss this art form a bit more in depth to get you off to a quick start. So in Networking Part II we will journey into more details about a couple of specific techniques you can use to help get the word out about your new venture and begin constructing that strong network of contacts.

Networking Part II: Using Networking Incentive Programs and Understanding The Rule of 1:10

One idea to keep in mind when you’re just starting your business is to learn the 1:10 rule. Many authors, entrepreneurs, and self-proclaimed business specialist have created several theories very similar to this one, but this is the variation that I’ve created for my own perceptions and refer to on a normal basis. I believe this rule can help explode any business venture if it’s constructed and used properly and also if your business is solid and backs-up the offers that it proclaims to the public.

Basically my 1:10 rule concludes that every individual person that you network and talk to about your business will hopefully talk to at least ten other people about your venture, who in turn will do the same creating a solid web of prospects and clients. Now obviously this rule isn’t engraved in stone because some people will forget about your business in less than 10 minutes, never to think, let alone, speak to anyone else about it ever again!

The 1:10 rule is truly beneficial and successful when you offer what I call “networking incentives.” These networking incentives could be free products, special service offers, or better yet, even monetary rewards.

When you’re trying to get the word out about your new startup, offer individuals a reason to pass on your business information to others, because otherwise unless they are just really good friends or family members, they are not going to bother to do it. Many refer to this type of networking as offering “bird-dog” or “finders” fees for helping you to expand and discover more deals.

I’ve experienced some great success with networking incentives in the past and lately I’ve been aggressively trying to construct a networking web with one of my current ventures. An example of how networking incentives have personally worked for me is when I was self-employed as a “straight-commission” automotive sales consultant.

I knew I had to quickly come up with a creative way of getting my name out, not just to other people that I’d previously done business with or was networking around, but also that lucrative web of 10 people that each of those individuals could help me locate according to the 1:10 rule.

So the plan that I came up with was to create special flyers and business cards with my name, contact information, and place of business on them while openly expressing, “If you refer a customer to me and they purchase a vehicle FROM ME and ONLY ME, then I will pay you a finders fee of $150!” Now at this particular time other sales consultants within my organization were paying finders fees, but only $25 to $50 at the most. So I offered more of a networking incentive compared to my competitors.

Also many of the other sales consultants where I was located were often one-track minded, meaning that all they wanted to do was crowd the lot waiting for a customer to pull up so they could pounce on them like a lion hunting prey. So what I did was make phone calls to people that I already knew and told them about my sales position and how I would also pay them $150 for passing the word onto someone who conducted business with me.

When I passed out business cards I wouldn’t give a person just one, I would give them a whole stack and tell them to pass out some to their co-workers, family members, and fellow associates at church and social clubs as well.

When I sold a car to a new client I would sit them down in my office and thoroughly explain my networking incentive plan and tell them how they could make money in their spare time simply by referring other people to me. When they left the dealership in their brand new sparkling car feeling very upbeat and happy about their purchase, in their new vehicle on the back seat they would also find a lovely stack of business cards and flyers to pass out to others about my services and of course my networking incentive plan!

My incentive and rewards plan worked well, people loved it, because they really didn’t have to work hard to make some good extra cash. The plan offered an absolute win-win-win, because all they had to do was tell somebody about my service, send them to me, and let me do the rest. So after I sold the car, my associates got their networking bonus, their contact got a new car, I got a new potential networking associate, and potentially 10 more contacts according to the rule of 1:10 and of course a commission off the transaction. Everybody leaves happy!

My clients trusted me and knew that I wasn’t a crook and I made certain that I never lapsed or was late on paying an incentive reward to any of my associates, so this added credibility to my program.

However, I ran into a brief issue with my dealership President who was way too old school and didn’t understand that the car business had progressed and new tactics were needed to succeed. He was a multi-millionaire but was one of the cheapest people I had ever met in my life. When he found out from the budgeting and accounting department that I was passing out such large finder’s fees he went bonkers, because the dealership always agreed to pay the finder their fees on behalf of the sales associates.

He came to my sales manger going nuts explaining how he wasn’t going to endorse handing out more than $50 in dealership money to cover these expenses and for me to either lower my incentives or start paying them myself! So what do you think I did? That’s right; I paid them out of my own commissions. You see even though my President was very wealthy and obviously intelligent enough to acquire a lot of money throughout his life, he still wasn’t smart enough to understand the difference between Value and Money and how the concept applied to networking.

Here I had stumbled upon a brilliant network that was a true value and asset. All my President seen out of the incentive network was the loss of a measly 150 bucks instead of realizing the true potential and growth that the program offered in repeat customers and contacts!

I didn’t fall victim to his ignorance though, I continued to network and use the law of 1:10 while applying incentives and rewards to my networking program. The end result was many more sales than I would have found if I had continued to chase cars through the parking lot like a world class Olympic sprinter making myself look like a complete idiot and unprofessional jerk.

You see, when you network in your community and generate business using techniques like offering incentive networking rewards, you generally will build a steady book of “clients” not “customers” as time goes on.

Clients are true business relationships where you help one another, often times with many types of issues, services, and problems other than your business’s major vocal point.

On the other hand, a customer is usually temporary and it’s a one-sided equation that leads to a selfish transaction. It is almost like you saying, “Hey you, come over here and buy this, give me your money and get the heck out of here!” You don’t want customers, because they are a quick fix, when you start finding and maintaining clients you will get repeat business and also those clients will absolutely love bringing other people to you, because they will trust you and have a stable business relationship established.

Going back to what I was saying earlier when I was describing my incentive program, I had one guy who almost was selling cars on my behalf! He was a great young man who was around my age and he actually ended up becoming a good friend of mine because I sold him a truck that he absolutely loved. He had pretty bad credit and another sales consultant in the office had previously worked with him before and tried to put a deal together for him, but was unsuccessful at finding a bank that would finance the deal.

So a couple of months later after getting turned down on financing this same guy comes in trying to buy another truck. He originally asked for the other salesman, but this rude and snooty salesperson didn’t want to work with him because he thought the kid couldn’t afford anything and would be “wasting his time!” Boy was that a major mistake!

At any rate, me and the finance department worked out an alternative plan and got the guys deal bought, right then and there I earned his trust and loyalty because he knew I treated people with respect and would do my best to help any individual out whether I knew them or not. So after that encounter I explained my networking incentive program to him and he loved it and ended up sending me a ton of deals.

If I was having problems negotiating with one of his family members or friends I would call him and he would actually end up talking his referrals into buying the car! Once he even drove down to the dealership and told one of his friends who just happened to be second guessing a deal, “Man are you crazy? You better take that deal, that car rocks man and the price is right there where you need it!” And of course his friend listened to the advice of his pal and purchased the vehicle.

This is not only a perfect example of how you must embrace the 1:10 rule and create your own variation of the networking incentive program that applies best to your business, but also how you must always operate with integrity and deliver on time according to what you promised to ensure that your web of contacts never collapses due to a lack of loyalty or service.

Chapter 4

Building A Team: “Search For the Super Hungry”

I’ll never forget the summer of 2004. I must have gone on a hundred business meetings that summer. I was living back at home on Long Island on summer break after completing my sophomore year at college and eagerly trying to put together a team to help me run my first Internet venture, Cashcampus.

Cashcampus was a business that I began production on during May 2004. It would be the first services that allowed students to purchase class notes and study material if they happened to miss class that day for whatever reason, i.e, hitting the bar, sleeping, or partying. I’m sure that you can add to the list.

The basic concept behind Cashcampus would be to allow students to type their notes and study guides into their online accounts and make cash every time their material was purchased and downloaded by another student at their school. You can read the entire history of this service here.

For now, I’ll focus on how I went about building a powerful team by sharing lessons that can be applied to your own business.

The first place that I began searching for business partners was Craigslist. Craigslist.com is the most powerful tool on the internet when it comes to finding people for your team. You’d be surprised how many extremely motivated and enthusiastic people that you’ll come across on Craigslist. But enthusiasm and motivation doesn’t always equal, hunger. I’ll speak all about that soon.

Before I started posting on Craigslist, I knew that I had to write an effective proposal in order to attract strong prospects. I began by taking the approach of giving up equity in the business in return for programming, marketing, design, and financial assistance.

I would write short and concise proposals that clearly painted a picture of who I was, what I was doing with my company, what I expected from a partner, and my future plans for the company. Without selling people on your vision, don’t expect to get any responses; especially if your selling point for the partnership is an equity stake in the venture.

I knew that I had to create a sexy and appealing proposal that would attract the type of people that I was interested in working with. So I boasted about how “this would be the first service to ever do this” and “we could be making tons of cash within a year.” Little did I know how hard it would really be and I mistakenly let my naiveté get the best of me when looking for partners to come onboard.

I started to get tons of responses due to the strong proposal letter that I composed, but I wasn’t filtering out the bad from the good and I soon found myself going on at least 5 meetings per week. Basically with anyone that seemed even remotely interested. I was overextending myself.

At first, I thought that the best team that I could build would be with engineers and designers who have been in the industry 15+ plus years. So I started meeting with people who were roughly 15 – 20 years my senior. It was the bulk of my response that came from this much older crowd.

It was definitely an awkward experience because I would be sitting there with these men and listening to them “tell me” how they wanted to run the company if they were to come onboard. They wanted to call the shots.

Sure, I was able to sell them on my idea very quickly and within an hour into the meeting, most people stated that they wanted to work with me. But as time went by and I began to meet with more and more of these “older” potential partners, I soon discovered that most of them didn’t really want to help me grow my business and change the way students got their class notes. They simply wanted to figure out ways to start making a few bucks and quickly sell the business so they could get their cut. Not cool.

Throughout that summer, I continued to go on these meetings to meet with various engineers and designers who usually worked for large programming and design firms and were trying to do something on the side to make some extra cash.

These men didn’t want to see my venture through to the end (for me, there’s never an end), they were in it to make a quick buck—in and out. After a few months of going on these meetings, I had enough and decided that I was making a big mistake by meeting with these certain types of people.

At the time, my logic was as follows: “If I work with older people who have been in the industry from the time that I was born, then they must know what they’re talking about.”

Oh boy was I wrong! I was going about building a team completely wrong. I was trying to build a team of people who knew absolutely nothing about the college market. Cashcampus was a service that catered to college students, and there I was, trying to put together a team of people who could have been my father or uncle. No, no, no.

Young entrepreneurs have to be very careful when trying to build a team of people who have been working for companies for the past 25 years of their lives. Many of these people will pretend that they are extremely interested in your business, but after a few weeks of trying to convince you that your vision needs to be more like theirs, you’ll soon realize they their motives lie elsewhere.

Additionally, this older crowd of “professionals” (not entrepreneurs) has become very jaded over the years from working for companies. Their risk tolerance will usually never match yours and they are prone to take a very conservative approach on entrepreneurship, which could ultimately lead to the demise of your venture.

Upon coming to this realization, I immediately began trying to put together a team of college students. Something that I should have done from the beginning, but like all new entrepreneurs, I was learning as I went along. That’s what entrepreneurship is all about.

I started tailoring my Craigslist proposals specifically for college students interested in becoming partners in my new company for an equity stake. Many students, as expected, jumped all over my proposal and I found myself going on more rounds of meetings.

It was now fall 2004 and I had begun my junior year of college. For the past 5 months I’ve been going on meetings after meetings trying to find the right people to build my business with. And though I started to find some really interested college students, I still didn’t have that solid team that I was hoping for.

You see, getting college students interested wasn’t the hard thing for me. But actually trying to “keep them interested” was the real challenge. The great thing about building a team of college students was that they understood the business that I was trying to create; they had an intimate understanding of how students took notes and used studying material, so I was definitely headed in the right direction.

For months I would build small teams of students. I had a student who was brilliant at programming. I had a student who loved to design and was very talented in that area. And I had a small team of writers who were going to write articles for the site.

For a while, things looked great as the team began to come up with new ideas for the service and we were meeting on a consistent basis. I felt like I’ve finally built my dream team of students. Each person had their respective stake in the company and progress was being made.

But as time passed I began to see the team members lose interest in the company, little by little. Because no money was being produced from the service at the time, they had to solely rely on future profits to keep them interested in the partnership.

That will never be enough for people who are truly not interested in your venture. That’s the real test: if interest begins to waver as the months go by with no cash coming in, then that person probably isn’t as hungry as you and most likely will never be.

We all know that college students have the most fickle minds than any other group of people and my team eventually succumbed to other interests and our once seemingly strong team fell by the wayside and I was back to running the business all by myself.

For some time after that I simply couldn’t understand why I couldn’t build a team that was strong enough to last the test of time. Every team that I built would last for a few weeks, possibly a month or two, and then fall a part like all the others before them.

I started to second guess myself as a leader; as a person who could effectively build a team for a common goal of growing a service. I was in a state of depression after seeing each team dissolve like ice-cubes on a hot summer day.

But this was all happening for a reason and if it wasn’t for these numerous failures upon failures, I wouldn’t have come to the realization that I did. The most important thing that I came to understand is that no matter how interested someone may seem or how exited they are about your business, it doesn’t mean anything if they don’t share that same hunger as you do.

Building a business team is all about hunger. No, not the type of hunger that makes you want to order 50 pizzas and eat until you pass out, but the type of hunger that makes you want to succeed more than anything in life.

Hunger that pushes you harder than anything ever before. Hunger that allows you to work on your business for 15 hours a day without becoming bored or uninterested. Hunger that makes you set goals so high that you’ll do anything to reach them. And hunger that keeps your business on the forefront of your mind no matter what failures you encounter or how much money you’re not making at the time.

Through my experiences, I found that building a team of people without that incredible hunger is meaningless and a large waste of time. You have to find people who are just as crazy as you are; people who will be willing to do anything to build something out of nothing. You have to find people who are confidant enough to believe that they can actually change the world.

But I warn you, these people are extremely hard to find and it’ll take some time to locate such special people. With constant networking through Craigslist, parties, events, and even your own school, you’ll increase your chances of finding the diamonds in the rough.

Don’t make the mistake of waiting for these to find you, that’s not how it works. You have to do everything in your power to seek these individuals. One way that is becoming increasingly effective is by creating a blog.

As you probably already know, a blog is different from a traditional website in the sense that it allows you to build a community around what you have to say – the information you have to share with the world. With roughly 3 million blogs being created a month, more people – especially young entrepreneurs – are sharing their insights, visions, and ideas with the world.

The great thing about creating a blog – actually, probably the best thing – is the interaction that takes place between you and your readers. So how does this help you build a team?

It helps the young entrepreneur build a team because it essentially dumps your thoughts into an open ocean of potential partners who may become very interested in your company’s mission. These are the people who are likely to reach out to you either through email or by commenting on your articles. With a blog, people can respond to every article you write, instantly.

Make sure to take the time to get to know each and everyone of your supporters. Over the past year of blogging, I have found several business partners and have founded many teams for various ventures. Teams that have been stronger than any other team that I have ever built during my time as a young entrepreneur.

I’ve also found another great way of forming teams, but this method is much different from the rest. It’s called the “Money Talks Method” (MTM). The MTM is defined by paying people to become a part of your team.

Ok…Ok… Ok… now you may be wondering how money could form real partnerships with people? No problem, I’ll tell you this method that I have been using quite effectively over the past year.

There are going to be times when you won’t be able to build a team based upon giving equity to members simply because most people aren’t patient enough to wait for anything good in life. And there will be even more times when you can’t find people who match your level of hunger to see your business succeed.

When that happens, you can still build a powerful team by using the method I call MTM. By paying people to do what you need done on a continued basis, you are compensating for the qualities that you are lacking. As a young entrepreneur, your aim should be to steer the direction of your company and get the wheels rolling, not spending your entire waking hours searching for team members. That’ll surely slow you down.

When you find yourself spending more time “team building” than actually “business building,” it’s time to start using cash to build your team. As a young entrepreneur, your funds may be limited but don’t let that discourage you. Even on a boostrapping budget, you can find people who can do amazing work for your business.

Some people may call this being a solo-entrepreneur, but it’s really not. Sure, you’re using money to build a team, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t a team just because you’re paying people to do what needs to be done.

If you find the right people, you’ll soon realize that even though you are paying these partners to get what you need done, many times they will go above and beyond what you are paying them and offer invaluable advice that will help steer your company in directions that you’ve never imagined.

Money is one of the greatest motivators in the world, so don’t feel bad about using it to build a team. Money can push people to do amazing things, especially when people know that they have a future with your company and can trust on you for continued business.

So as you can see, building a team is no walk in the park. I’ve had plenty of trouble with team building, but have learned a great deal during the ups and downs. It’s a trial and error process that will reward the persistent and the determined.

But at the end of the day, you can’t let ANYONE hold you back from pushing forward with your business – team or no team. You’re a young entrepreneur and you need to realize that the person you can always depend on 100% of the time is yourself.

Don’t become stagnant trying to build a team when you can be pushing forward by doing everything in your power to make things happen in the meantime.

If your heart is set on building that master team, then it will happen. Be patient. Keep your eyes and ears open for those hungry people. And continue to network like a mad man. If you put the necessary work in, you’ll have that team in no time.

Chapter 5

Time Management: Time Is Money, So If You Waste Your Time, You’re Wasting Your Money!

It is 7:00 am on a Thursday morning and I’m up enjoying the company of my best friend, which happens to be “Coffee with two creams, one sugar.” The night before I was up until 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning working on a Sales Management project for my Marketing 334 class and I’m exhausted.

To make matters worse I know that I have a full schedule lined up where I will have to wear several different hats throughout the course of the day. Yes, it is the life of a young entrepreneur who also happens to be a full-time college student and a full-time employee. Even though it’s so early in the morning I’m anxiously and eagerly browsing real estate websites looking for properties in my local area.

I’m hoping to find potential investment deals that I can acquire on behalf of one of my real estate clients that I consult with. When I notice a good potential property I make detailed notes, get the address, owners name and phone number so I can contact them and schedule an appointment for a property viewing. Also I send the seller a quick email to introduce myself and gain further information about the property, which will hopefully open up the lines of communication.

At 10:00 am I have a meeting with an office manager to do a walk through and submit a competitive bid on an open cleaning contract for my cleaning service. I know that it is a very good contract and I also know that our company is up against many others who have already placed bids and who happen to have many more years of commercial cleaning experience.

Despite the odds against our small cleaning firm, I go and give the potential deal my best shot, even if it means receiving another rejection letter in the mail. Later that day around 12:00 pm I will be cruising around town, not looking hotties, but once again searching for potential properties that look abandoned, distressed, or FSBO (For Sale By Owner) prospects to call on.

After a couple of hours of looking for potential property deals to pursue, passing out business cards and making calls trying to put deals together, it’s time to turn into a student again and finish my Business Policy Case Study which is due tomorrow. These projects are very detailed and challenging and they usually require several days of work, luckily I knew the project would be demanding so I started working on it earlier in the week. However this is one of the last times before going to class tomorrow that I will be able to diligently work on the project, so time is of the essence!

To make matters worse I have to go to work in a couple hours where I will have to remain until midnight. By this time the sleepy beast is setting in, along with frustration after a long day of pursuing leads with no closed deals. I’m stressing over the project I must complete and I’m definitely not in the mood to go to work.

After getting off of work at midnight, I know that I must stay up another hour or two in order to finish my case study which is due later that day (since it is now officially a new morning). Once I finally get to bed it is approximately 2:30 am and I know in five hours, at the very most, I will have to get up and go through another action packed day that is filled with business, academics, and employment.

Maintaining a schedule similar to this one becomes very demanding, stressful, and overwhelming at times, but it is a very typical depiction of young entrepreneurs all across America. When young business dealers are balancing so many tasks and projects, stringent time management isn’t an option, it is an absolute necessity. How you manage your time as an entrepreneur definitely can become the difference between success and failure.

When you’re starting out in business you will have to decide how you want to delegate your time on a daily basis. One of the most exciting factors of owning and operating a venture is the spontaneity that often comes with everyday tasks. You may plan for the events of your day to unfold and transcribe in a certain manner, then suddenly you received one unexpected business related call that changes the course of your day completely.

So since things are constantly changing throughout your day at a moments eye, it becomes much harder to construct a very detail-oriented schedule too far ahead of time. However, I generally try to plan my day out the night before according to what I have to do. For instance since I’m an entrepreneur and a college student, I know to schedule meetings, appointments, and prospecting times around my classes, study groups, and other school related activities.

Since I also have many expenses that I am currently incurring with other entrepreneurial pursuits, I also choose to work a full-time job, usually at night or on weekends to increase my cash flow, offset fees, and avoid debt. Many choose to pursue loans to decrease expenses, however since I’m striving to keep my debt levels as low as possible I avoid debt instruments whenever I can even if it means holding down a job on the side.

The down side to working another job while multi-venturing and being a fulltime Double B.S.B.A. Finance and Marketing student is that more of my time is tied up, which can cause many problems IF I don’t properly delegate my tasks and activities.

Leading into my day I create an agenda of my tasks and divide them into “Must-Do’s” and “Would-Like-To-Do’s.” This helps me separate the more important tasks from the less drastic activities that don’t necessarily need to be handled that day, but if I could get around to them and finish them up it would be great.

For instance some examples of some must-do’s would be taking an exam, attending a business meeting, going to a real estate closing, having to go to work, completing a school project, writing an article or another writing project for a client, placing a bid, sending an important email for a deal or any other important activity that must be completed before the days end.

On the other hand some would-like-to-do’s would be making some cold calls, riding around town for properties, attending an unofficial study group, attending a social function, and writing an article to post to my personal blog. While the second group of tasks is important, they may not outweigh the necessity of the task I mentioned previously.

So I will place my must-do’s into stone and make sure that whatever happens that day that these tasks get done at all cost and through the course of completing tasks, if I find time in between performing must-do’s and I get the chance to complete some or all of my would-like-to-do’s, then that is just icing on the cake. This helps me create some sort of structure and organization to a very chaotic day and understand not only what needs to get done, but it also allows me to understand the value and importance of my task.

As I write this chapter my mind reflects back to when I initially ventured off into entrepreneurship. I created a business brokering discounted notes and factoring cash flows. Due to the intense level of excitement and curiosity, my business quickly became the center of my life. All I wanted to do was make grown man strides without going through the maturation process of crawling first.

So instead of making a strong business plan I started spending what little money I had immediately on expensive office equipment and other unnecessary items so I could feel like a big time businessman.

Instead of networking and trying to get my name out to other professionals in my community, I started trying to contact prospects and I really didn’t even know what to say to people once I actually got them on the phone.

So as a result I usually ended up stuttering and fumbling through an unscripted or unrehearsed pitch, and I almost always would at the very least get rejected and usually hung up on.

On top of all these stupid rookie and inexperienced mistakes, I began devoting ALL my time to my failing business I had structured and wasn’t taking care of my “Must-Do’s,” to which the result was more chaos and failure in other areas of my life.

For instance I began staying up late at night trying to improve my venture avoiding homework, projects, and even morning classes because of my lack of time management and organization, so my grades quickly started to drop.

I started calling in sick to my job because I no longer felt like going because I was constantly exhausted and I thought that I would soon be making big bucks from my venture, so I wouldn’t need the money anyway; boy was I wrong!

I should have kept my day job, because in all actuality my first business did just the opposite of pulling in major dough; it went belly up due to the lack of planning, inexperience, and poor structure, which included horrible time management.

A very important aspect of time management is the ability to prioritize. You must make decisions as to what projects are important, what activities relate to your venture, your personal life, and school and prioritize them into a proper structure that is conducive to you and what you want to accomplish.

So many times we, being young and exuberant entrepreneurs, want to accomplish a whole host of things within a five minute time period. Actually, this very problem is one of the major destructions that are currently ruining the American society and overall culture, the loss of the will to work and see a project through. Many people today want immediate and abundant ratification, meaning they want their rewards instantaneously without the hard work that is required.

If you start your business with the hopes of getting rich very quickly, then you’re traveling down a road of self-destruction and disappointment. Don’t misunderstand what I’m saying, there is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting high levels of success, achievement, and even great wealth involving financial freedom, but you must manage your endurance and learn to respect the time factors involved in process.

If you can learn to embrace this time management process as a young entrepreneur, then I guarantee you will succeed at whatever you pursue. You see, the individuals who mange their endurance and practice solid time management are the ones who don’t mind putting in blood, sweat, and tears.

They are the ones that won’t forget to prioritize their life and refuse to run themselves in the ground attempting to get rich overnight. These are the same individuals who don’t get frustrated a week after creating their business and soon begin talking about quitting their venture pursuits simply because things are not working out according to the millionaire-in-a-week-plan!

The art of time and process is how you learn to sense a good deal from a bad one. Time and process is what allows those three extra layers of skin to develop that you will most definitely need as a businessperson. Time and process is what will teach you how to make money in other specialized business areas and to operate more than one venture successfully, simultaneously.

Think about instant potatoes compared to homemade potatoes that your grandmother makes. The process of pealing and cutting the potatoes, mixing in secret ingredients, beating them all together, then gracefully and carefully cooking them makes them taste much better than the potatoes where you throw them in a bowl, add water, and toss them in the microwave for two and a half minutes. This is an example of the positive effects and results of process, and my friend, process takes time.

Also since we are young we have to fight many more “time snatchers” than adults do. Time snatchers is a term I use to describe anything or anyone who comes to steal, distract, or undervalue the full maximum potential of your time.

However, time snatchers aren’t always necessarily negative things, but they do snatch you away from your venture, so you can’t get carried away and overdose on them. That’s right, we are faced with time snatchers like hanging out with friends, partying, clubbing, dating, boyfriend/girlfriend drama, athletics, social clubs, fraternities/sororities, and other youthful extracurricular activities that young people experience and enjoy. So how are you going to balance work, school, entrepreneurial pursuits, and still have the time to maintain a social life?

Well the first thing to remember is that choosing to become a successful entrepreneur isn’t a sentence to accept the death penalty within your social life. However I think that a certain level of commitment and sacrifice naturally will need to enter your lifestyle after creating a venture.

The main thing to remember is to always establish your Must-Do’s and your Would-Like-To-Do’s to ensure that you are maximizing your time and accomplishing what needs to be done.

I was a very active person in college when I decided to choose entrepreneurship, I knew a lot of people, hung out all the time, was involved in many social activities, and was a very active member of my fraternity. I was used to getting together and hanging out with friends pretty much every single night of the week.

But when I became an entrepreneur I was really no longer able to just hang around doing nothing but laughing, joking, and kicking it with friends because that time obviously was needed to help complete other responsibilities. Despite the fact that I was unable to get together every night or attend every single campus function, didn’t mean that I had to shut myself into my home forever either.

You need to be sure to constantly and consistently give yourself some type of personal enjoyment and self-time. How you choose to spend that time is up to you whether it is hanging out with friends, fishing, reading, working out, or whatever, just make sure it is something that helps you relax and takes you away from the stresses of work, school, and your business.

This time will begin to become very therapeutic to you and allows you the opportunity to escape. This is a very mature action, one that successful business professionals who understand time value and time management practice continuously.

As I mentioned before, embracing the time of process is highly important and managing fun and relaxation into your busy schedule helps your endurance levels grow and develop stronger, because every living organism must have the chance to rest.

So remember to embrace the time values of process, mange your time very carefully, and learn to establish your daily list of Must-Do’s and Would-Like-To-Do’s. Remember that time really is money and if your new venture isn’t producing loads of revenue, which is usually the case for a brand new business, then time will become your greatest and most powerful asset, so be sure to manage it wisely!

Chapter 6

Don’t Forget About Family and Friends: “Hunny, get off the computer!”

Young entrepreneurs are some of the most devoted and focused people in the world. It’s our devotion to our businesses that separates us from the pack, from the masses. However, that same diehard and relentless devotion can cause problems when we are split between spending time with our friends, family, girlfriends/boyfriends, and with your business.

Let’s face it, some of us are downright addicted to running our businesses. We spend most of our waking hours talking to clients, making deals, innovating new services, and simply spreading the word of our ventures. Our days are quite busy which can lead to little or no personal time.

When I first started my business, I found it extremely hard to balance my time spent with my girlfriend and my business. There would be many nights when I opted to stay on the computer instead of going to a movie or a walk in the park.

I felt that I needed to spend as much time on my business as possible in order for it to succeed. Spending too much time with my girlfriend made me feel that I was wasting time – time that I could have been using to expand the business and think of new ideas.

Sadly enough, I can honestly admit that I spent most of the summer of 2004 in my room on Long Island. That summer I spent countless hours thinking of ideas for my business, sketching out images for the website, and taking meticulous notes of every single thought that entered my mind.

I would wake up, have some breakfast, possibly watch a bit of TV, then basically lock myself in my room in front of my laptop computer for hours. I turned into a zombie that summer. When the girlfriend would come to visit, she usually sat on my bed begging me to stop working while giving me the evil eye.

I think her eyes actually glowed red, it was scary. My business was becoming more than just a business, it was becoming a huge obsession for me. I would walk, talk, and eat business all day long.

When I did happen to escape the confines of my room from time to time that summer, I would still have business on my mind. I remember sitting around a few friends at a party who happened to be casually speaking about entrepreneurship. I must have spent hours explaining to them
(re: exhausting them to death) how entrepreneurship was one of the best routes that any young person could possibly take. It’s all I wanted to speak about.

Now keep in mind, I’m naturally a person who enjoys going out, having fun, and spending time with my friends, but when I started my business things changed for the worse (in my social life).

I couldn’t realize that I needed more balance in my life. I began to separate myself from the world and everyone began to wonder what was happening to me. My mom begged and pleaded for me to get off the computer. My girlfriend would literally drag me out of the house. And my friends continued to call and ask me to join them to party.

Something in my mind made it so easy for me to just say “no.” I kept on telling myself that I was doing the right thing by isolating myself and continuing to work on my business, but I was wrong. So wrong.

That summer I must have gotten sick four times. And I “never” get sick. At most, I may get a slight fever every 2 years or so, but that’s about it. But not that summer. I believe I had two fevers, a strep throat, and one or two stomach viruses that summer.

These ailments were a direct result of what I was doing to my body. I was burning myself out and my body was crying and begging for a break. Your state of mind is directly connected to your immune system, so when your mind gets overworked it results in making your immune system more susceptible to sicknesses. It’s not rocket science.

The balance of work and play was completely disproportionate. Sure, I was making progress with my business, but the more and more time I spent in that room, the more wear and tear my mind and body endured. No entrepreneur can truly succeed with a burnt-out mind and body. You’re bound to run out of gas at some point.

As a young entrepreneur you have to make it a priority to not only work on your business hard, but to also play hard. You’ll only be young once, so don’t spend all your time working on your business without enjoying yourself from time to time.

Look at the legendary Richard Branson – founder of Virgin Group – who has always believed in having fun no matter what. Branson knew that it was important to live life to its fullest extent and to live each day like it was your last.

In fact, once you start enjoying yourself and having fun with your friends on a consistent basis, you’ll see how much you’ll improve with your business. By taking your mind off of business and downright partying and relaxing more often, your mind will grow in new directions and you’ll start to see things in a new light.

And let’s not forget about all the possible networking opportunities that are bound to arise when getting out of the office. I have met some of the most interesting people who have ended up helping me with my business while at parties, events, and various social gatherings. Getting out and taking a break is a must for the young entrepreneur.

As the founder of a company, it’s your job to get out and meet people. It’s your job to have fun and spend time when your friends. It’s your job to live life like every day is your last. Don’t get caught up in a cycle of business… business… business…. It’s not healthy and will lead to the ultimate demise of your venture.

Too much of anything isn’t good. You don’t want to wake up one morning and have a successful business but without friends and family to share it with. That wouldn’t be fun.

That’s exactly what happened to Howard Hughes, one of America’s first billionaires – possibly the first. He lived a life of fame, luxury, and with great friends by his side. But he eventually succumbed to a life of reclusion and separation from society at large.

Though his bank account continued to grow, he literally locked himself in one of his hotel rooms for the latter years of his life. He spent his days writing notes and theorizing about how he could control the United States government (which he succeeded in doing, but that’s another story).

The friends he once had were no more. The days he once spent playing golf and flying his planes faded away. And his fame and recognition as the most brilliant aeronautic entrepreneur in the world was easily forgotten due to his reclusion.

Now do you want to end up like that? I think not. What you want to do is build the best business that you can and at the same time, have the best relationships that you possibly can. You must find that balance, because without it, you’ll be leaning too much in one direction and you’re bound to eventually fall off. Always seek that balance.

So they next time your girlfriend or boyfriend asks you to go to a movie, go. The next time your buddies call you up to party, say “sure!” The young entrepreneur who is beyond socializing and spending quality time with friends, is the entrepreneur who is destined to fall apart.

It’s perfectly fine to be devoted to your business, but keep things in perspective. Without friends and family, you aren’t going to get far in life. Having fun, going out, and enjoying life outside the realm of your business creates an environment of fertile soil in which your business can grow to new heights.

Chapter 7

Bouncing Back After a Venture Fails: Like Beauty, Failure Is In the Eyes of the Beholder

All throughout life I was a person who excelled at whatever I did. I made it a point always to not only win, but to try and win in a major way. Even if I didn’t succeed at something I made certain that I always went down fighting like a mad man.

In school I always made excellent grades. When it came to football I was considered a good ball player. When it came to most activities I usually was considered a winner without a doubt and, I succeeded to great lengths!

This excellent track record that I’d developed seemingly disintegrated when I stepped off into entrepreneurship. My first venture not only failed miserably, but it’s almost pointless to even consider the attempt an actual business, but I still do call it just that anyway.

When a venture burns to the ground before it even gets the opportunity to take off or at least hit the runway like mine actually did, it can be a heart-wrenching and devastating event for any human being, especially a young entrepreneur who is giving it their first shot.

Despite the feelings of disappointment that may stem from a failed attempt, you must blossom from this event and realize that your attempt at venturing wasn’t a failure at all. My first business was a discounted notes and cash flow factoring brokerage.

It sounds very fancy, but ultimately the underlying value for the business was to basically locate holders of notes, whether they were seller financing notes for real estate property or businesses, annuities, casino/lottery winnings, account receivables, or just about any other form of revenue payment streams that a person and/or company was receiving and giving these individuals a large lump sum that was discounted in return for their note.

The business seemed genius to me, all I had to do was make contacts with large financial institutions that were willing to purchase these notes and work out a brokerage agreement with them so I could find note holders on their behalf. This was the easy part of the business, because most large and small firms are always willing to have another established relationship with a broker because they know that they don’t have to pay any fees and salaries until the broker produces a deal on their behalf.

So after working out two arrangements with a couple of good trustworthy firms, I was all set to move forward. I had an agreement with a very large firm in the cash flow industry that I knew could just about purchase anything that I sent them and I also created a contract with another smaller, but still solid and rapidly growing firm that I felt would also conduct business in a favorable manner. I knew coming in that I should have at least two firms to send deals to, so I could increase my chances of having alternative options and having more exit strategies available.

Now after doing some initial research, I found that there were not many other operations as far as I could tell that were performing the same business functions as I wanted to in my local area, so I thought this was a very positive aspect on my behalf because I would have a niche market in my area. So after a couple more developmental things were out of the way, I quickly started pouring all my funds into my business.

I found myself purchasing expensive office equipment and other less important items so I could feel like an important businessman. I started bragging to family and friends about how I was now an entrepreneur and that I had my own business. I had succeeded in the automotive sales industry for the brief period that I worked in it, especially as someone who came in with no prior sales experience. I was successful in football and I was extremely successful in academics so I had an attitude coming in that I just simply knew that I would succeed with this venture.

I performed my research, I wrote a basic business plan, I located competitors, I made contacts, I created a strong exit strategy, I told friends and family about the venture, and I even had the expensive office equipment that made me look and feel like a premiere entrepreneur, but there was one itty bitty tiny problem; I didn’t have no freakin’ customers or clients!

Like an idiot, I didn’t research my target markets, create a solid marketing plan (which should have been included in the business plan) and I didn’t have a sales approach to closing deals. I made no attempts at contacting potential clients; I didn’t network with anybody besides my immediate family and friends, which defeats the purpose of networking altogether! I guess I thought clients were just going to come and start knocking my door down because I placed a couple of ads on the internet. Um, No!

I did nothing to accumulate clients and then when I started realizing just how difficult it was to put deals together in this industry, I was starting to panic very quickly. So my next move was to try and cold call individuals who were For Sale By Owner’s (FSBO) or sellers who were advertising to sell property and take back a note on the land or provide seller financing. This was a solid attempt, but deal after deal fell through, so in essence I had tried to do too little too late. I was approaching my one year anniversary and things were definitely looking down in the dumps to put it lightly.

By this time I had accumulated a lot of expenses, many that were monthly and reoccurring; money was no longer coming in because I had prematurely quit my job in hopes of making this venture work. I had not performed one single transaction and I felt like a complete loser!

Here I had gone out on a limb, thinking I would become rich overnight. I blasted my mouth off to all my friends and family proudly like I was the next Trump or something. I had a bunch of useless fancy business stuff and nothing more than a failed business attempt on my hands, so I thought.

After consulting with my Tax Advisor/C.P.A., I realized that I would be able to claim a loss for my venture, because I was a legally registered and licensed business entity in my city and state. At least I had actually done something right with my first venture when I consulted proper professional help for my legal filings and taxes.

However, despite the fact that I would be able to recover some of my incurred losses, my self-esteem and confidence levels had suffered a drastic blow that I thought would never heal. I didn’t know where or who to turn to and I thought that my only hope was to stay in college, get a degree, and go into corporate America, but I was wrong about that as well.

My point of giving you such a descriptive account of my first venture is to allow you the opportunity to recognize some of my silly mistakes that seemed correct back when I done them, but now looking back on them, appear to be extremely foolish. I also want to let you understand that failing with a business is not failure at all, but it is insight and education that doesn’t come from books, seminars or professors in business school.

When I ventured off into my first business, I made many mistakes that would ultimately help me grow as an entrepreneur, person, and business professional. It is imperative that you always keep your head held high, shoulders back, nostrils and mouth above water, and live to fight another day. It is only when you make mistakes without learning from them that make you foolish and it is also foolish to go through the process of venturing into a business that doesn’t succeed and not allowing yourself the opportunity to learn from the whole situation.

When I went back to the drawing board I quickly recognized many structural issues that were the ultimate demise of my failed discounted notes business from the get-go. I didn’t have to blame it on the fact that the discounted notes industry has an extremely high first year failure rate, close to, if not above 90%. I didn’t have to blame it on the fact that the market for the business was not very favorable and that the venture was better suited as a supporting subsidiary for individuals who focused on real estate investing, business brokerage, or other related fields.

All I had to do to find the underlying sources of my business’s failure was to look into a mirror and notice the image of myself! No, I didn’t think that I was ugly, actually quite the contrary if I may say so myself. No seriously, I noticed that I had become an entrepreneur for all the wrong reasons, picked a field that I knew little to nothing about, and also that I had picked an area that I truly had no real talents in or was exceptionally good at.

The first restructuring that took place in my life of business was that I changed my goals, my intentions, and my way of thinking. I made up my mind that no longer was I going to pursue monetary rewards over happiness and the drive for success. I realized that once I mastered a field through hard work, set goals that were not centered around just money, and found something that I not only was good at, but also that I enjoyed doing, then I would receive money and materialistic gratification indirectly due to my synergy and love for my business.

When things get tuff you can’t pack up and retreat, you have to develop the resilience of a stubborn fighter who refuses to stay down for the count. Coming off my unsuccessful start up, after I reconditioned my mindset, I was able to develop even more confidence than I initially had before my business failed. You see, I had now realized and experienced the worst that could go wrong with a business, also I had gained hands on knowledge, and I felt like I had a much better idea of what I was doing once I stepped on the field for the second time.

When you throw yourself into a project or venture and it is later unsuccessful, you are not a failure. The one who is a failure is the person who never gets off the couch or pulls their self away from the comforts of their ordinary life to pursue their dreams because they fear making mistakes or failing. Don’t let that be you, please! If you mess up huge and keep coming back for more, some would consider you crazy and maybe even a little stupid, but instead I think it is crazy and stupid to ignore greatness and avoid success due to obstacles and adversity.

So after my initial venture didn’t do so well and I changed my level of thinking, I decided to turn my discounted notes business which was called, “Net Empire Notes” into a consulting firm which is now called, “Net Empire Consulting.” I knew that I possessed a sales background, I enjoyed sales, and I felt that I was definitely above average and pretty good at it. I also felt that if I buckled down I could study and develop into an even better sales professional if I was willing to work at it and improve from my mistakes along the way.

As a result I decided to create a sales consulting firm where I would complete sales and marketing projects on behalf of corporations. Also I would broker a wider variety of deals, helping to bring buyers and sellers together in different industries. I’d basically look for needs and find others who can fulfill the needs and essentially I’d get paid for it. The idea was successful and I still work on independent sales and brokering projects from time to time to this day.

Eventually my love for the financial industry and also my sales abilities would open up other doors for me selling and also brokering financing instruments on behalf of large firms to other companies and also individual consumers as well. Today my major in college is actually Finance and Marketing, so I’m studying and also have a venture centered around two influential fields that I happen to love!

By creating a second venture that I enjoyed, I was able to find value and happiness performing functions that didn’t evolve around money. To this day, whether it is my consulting company, my commercial cleaning firm that I co-own and operate, or my property acquisition and locating business, I absolutely love all of them for what they are, not for what they can provide for me.

So when times are hard — and times do get hard — I’m still able to work my businesses with a great level of joy even if it means that large revenue amounts are not coming in. I know that as long as I’m happy and always progressing forward the monetary rewards will soon come with the territory.

I would have never found happiness if I had based my experience of entrepreneurship upon the misfortunes of my first business. The heartache, disappointment, and frustration that I felt when that startup didn’t succeed is irreplaceable and feelings that I honestly would not want to experience again. However, the information and process was one like no other and I wouldn’t change a thing that happened even if I could.

Always get back in the game, regardless of what happens. I don’t care if you strike out one hundred times, keep learning, keep changing and adjusting your batting stance, and keep stepping back up to the plate.

You will never be able to hit a homerun watching the game from the bleachers or even sitting on the bench. You got to get in the game and step up to the plate over and over until you get it right and smack that thing out of the park!

Chapter 8

Working With or Leading Those Much Older Than You: “Action Talks and B.S. Walks”

“Age is nothing but a number” is a great quote, but many individuals refuse to accept that notion as a reality. Working with or even leading adults much older than you can often times be a huge dilemma and cause many unnecessary conflicts due to the differences in age.

I’ve personally experienced situations throughout my business career which were not always favorable when working with older associates and I still face these issues very often during my plight towards entrepreneurship.

While I was a sales consultant in the automotive industry I experienced my first “age discrimination” from older individuals. My sales manager thought that I was a very strong addition to his sales team because he loved my aggressiveness and how I was a fast, eager learner. Even though I came into the business with no prior experience I was able to produce good numbers for the department immediately and on a consistent basis.

Well my quick success levels didn’t sit well with my other associates within the organization and also the fact that I was the youngest individual, not only within my department, but also the youngest in the entire dealership helped to stir animosity levels even more.

As a result, jealousy and envy quickly set in with others who were much older than myself and felt that they had earned their respect and I didn’t deserve the credit I was receiving because I was nothing more than a young-buck hotshot. During daily sales meetings if any associates were struggling with their numbers, mangers had no problem with jumping down their throats in front of others.

Many times my numbers would be good so my manager would always find himself in the meetings saying things like, “You guys need to watch William when he’s closing deals, he has less experience than any of you, but he’s doing things right.” You can imagine that this didn’t make me a very famous person to some of the “haters” who would much rather spend their time around the coffeepot complaining rather than getting things done.

However, with the support of my sales manager and also my mentor Paul who was the first person to really take me under his wing and teach me about sales, I made it through the adversity of older associates just fine.

My second run-in with associates older than me occurred when I was working on capital raising projects. All of my fellow associates were older than me, most were even in their early to mid fifties. These individuals had all experienced successful careers in real estate, finance, stockbrokerage, sales and marketing, insurance/ risk management, and many other professional areas. It was hard to earn the respect of these older individuals because I was only 22 years-old at the time and I wasn’t even finished with college yet.

They couldn’t understand why I was in the same position as they were at such a young age, when they had worked their entire lives to reach their positions. They looked down upon me like I was some rookie wet behind the ears, who couldn’t walk and chew gum at the same time. This frustration would cause a lot of friction while trying to complete projects, because our task would many times require collaboration from one another in order to complete deals efficiently.

Just as it had been when I was in the automotive industry, jealousy quickly began to set in and many individuals were pressuring me to show myself approved for the position that I had acquired. The pressure and stress eventually got to me and many times I found myself beginning to question my own abilities, thinking that maybe I was indeed out of place.

I was working on projects with individuals who had accomplished many things throughout their careers; some had accumulated millions due to their successful professions and also due to their entrepreneurial functions.

However the technique I used to deal with this growing conflict was to shut up and go to work. I would make many more cold calls than these individuals and I also would work nights, sometimes putting in extra hours at the office or at home after leaving my night classes just to prove them wrong. Eventually I was able to earn their respect, not by sitting around talking about what I could do, but by busting my butt and showing what I was capable of achieving if given the opportunity.

This is the same technique that I continue to use today. On a daily basis I find myself still collaborating and working with individuals much older than me and sometimes I might be in control of a specific project and find myself actually telling somebody older than me what to do. I try my hardest to always carry myself with professionalism and avoid letting my age get in the way of business.

A while ago I experienced an issue surrounding my age while I was submitting a bid for my cleaning company. When I walked in and introduced myself to the Office Manager at the Dentist office, she said, “Wow you’re young, I was expecting somebody much older, are you a salesman with the company?”

I calmly responded, “No, actually I’m the Co-Owner,” and I reached into my pocket and handed her my business card.

I blew her comments off and moved on with the business matters at hand. I could tell from the start that she found my age awkward and was used to conducting business with people more her age, which was approximately the early forties range.

Throughout the whole meeting she kept making references to needing a responsible company for the job and how missing deadlines wouldn’t be acceptable, as if she thought my company might not be very reliable, which was odd because she knew nothing about me or our company. It turns out that we were unsuccessful at acquiring the contract; I personally think the age factor played a leading role in the process, but who knows, I could be wrong by making that assumption.

I know for a fact that many individuals just find it hard to entrust and conduct business matters with somebody who is not closer to their age group and is young enough to be their own child. Some believe that we are still fairly irresponsible; some believe we don’t have enough experience and some just refuse to do it for other reasons that really make absolutely no sense.

Regardless of their reasons, your main objective is to always show them that you can get the job done. Presentation is always important. Upon first meeting with a potential client or associate they may feel that your age is going to be a problem. However, once you have presented your plans and show them that you do know what you’re talking about and you are more than capable of completing the project despite your age, these negative perceptions may cease.

You stand a much better chance of overcoming these premature, negative perceptions by carrying yourself with professionalism and confidence at all times. Many times you begin to question your own abilities or you allow fear to show while you’re trying to structure a deal or lead others. When this happens you instantly begin to lose the respect of those you’re working with, especially those who happen to be older than you are.

Since this is the case it is important for you to always truly believe that you know what you’re talking about, because if you don’t know then others will pick up on it and this factor could ultimately have a negative affect on your respect levels.

How the young entrepreneur chooses to handle the uncomfortable dilemma of working alongside and leading those much older than them could be the difference between a smooth and successful operation and a venture that is unable to grow due to personal friction or age barriers.

One thing that is important for young business professionals to remember is to always do less talking and much more walking, because this will allow you to overcome perceptions of age and allow others who are older than you to respect and judge you upon your abilities and talents instead of your age group.

What you don’t want to do is constantly talk about how much you know and can do or even worse talking about what you’ve been able to accomplish at a young age. This will only lead to more animosity and harsh feelings so avoid this behavior and simply put your foot to the petal and go hard to get the job done and lead by example.

Now jealousy is a totally different aspect to this conflict and one that many young aspiring professionals will undoubtedly face. When you’re accomplishing many things at a young age and in the same position as others who may happen to be much older than you, this will naturally make some people very uncomfortable.

When this jealousy sets in on those older than you, which accumulates mainly from insecurity and lack of self-esteem, then no matter what you accomplish these people will still have a certain level of resentment towards you due to your upward progression. It is imperative that you try your best to avoid working with individuals who have these ideas; however, in certain instances you may need to get things accomplished with or through those who dislike you for one reason or another.

If this is the case, always avoid personal small talk and focus only on business matters; this will help eliminate personal thoughts and feelings from being expressed or becoming the center of attention. As a result by concentrating on professional matters only, you allow your associates to set their attention on what needs to be accomplished instead of their personal dislikes and issues towards you.

Keep these ideas in mind the next time you find yourself working with or leading somebody who happens to be old enough to be your mother or father, or even worse, your grandparents. By representing yourself well you may be able to overcome negative perceptions concerning young entrepreneurs and you can get things accomplished despite age differences.

Just remember “Alexander The Great” was nothing more than a teenager during his prime of leading hundreds of thousands of troops. Some of the world’s greatest leaders of the past and numerous Kings and Queens were barely past teenage years.

Wisdom knows no years or age, and greatness is born within certain individuals at different stages in life. Always remember to stay true to your visions and who you are and if the individuals around you are worth collaborating with, they will soon recognize your incredible abilities as a young entrepreneur.

Chapter 9

Web Development: “Not Understanding Websites Will Cost You Big!”

Would you believe me if I told you that 3 years ago I didn’t even know what HTML was? Sure, I knew that it had something to do with creating websites, but that’s about it. Don’t worry if you don’t know how HTML works, you’re not alone. I’ll soon provide you with plenty of resources to get you started.

For now, sit back and listen to how my lack of knowledge for the Internet and websites cost me precious time and money during my first startup.

I’ve been online since the age of 12, but I never really took the time or cared to understand what was happening behind all the websites that I gladly visited everyday after returning home from school and fighting my brothers to see who would be the first to sign onto AOL.

Of course, I knew how to visit the sites, make orders, send emails, and the works, but I didn’t understand what tied it all together – how the sites were actually rendered onto the screen and how the forms that I entered information in worked. I guess ignorance is bliss, eh?

When I started my fist web venture in 2004 — 8 years after first signing onto the net — I was still completely in the dark about web development and how the internet really worked.

When I first began my Internet venture I had many ideas of how I wanted the site to look and function. I took meticulous notes and sketches of the entire site, basically putting my vision down on paper.

When it came time to actually hiring a team of programmers and designers, I was completely lost. Since I knew nothing about programming and design at the time, I really didn’t know what to expect in terms of pricing, timelines, and how the site would actually work behind the scenes.

I was a complete novice when it came to scripting (re: Internet programming) and design, so I was a prime target to be taken advantage of. Within roughly 2 weeks time, I blindly chose a web development firm from a long list of companies that responded to my online job request.

The prices ranged from $3,000 to $10,000 to build my site. I ended up visiting a company here in New York and signed a contract to have the site built for $4,300 after negotiating down from $5,000.

I was told that the site would take 4 – 6 weeks to develop and I would be in constant contact with the web development team on a daily/weekly basis as the job progressed.

The job began by me sitting down with a project manager and letting him know exactly what I needed done. Within a few days, I was sent a few design mockups (samples) of the site and gave them the okay to move forward in that direction.

But things slowly fell apart from there. Three weeks into the project communication began to weaken and deadlines for the various phases weren’t being met at all. When asked why work slowed down, I was told that “certain sections of the site would take longer than expected.”

Now 4 weeks into the project, I was being given the cold shoulder and my emails and calls almost came to a complete standstill. After some complaining, work picked up and communication resumed. But that only lasted so long.

Now 2 months into the project, I was being told that the reason my site wasn’t completed yet was because “they were busy” and “it’s going to take longer than expected.” After doing some investigation, I asked to have a meeting with “all” the people who were working on my site.

When I came into the office that day there was a room with one person in it, the project manager Jimmy. I asked Jimmy where all the programmers and designers were that are supposedly working on my site. He replied “they aren’t here.” When asked where they were, he said “They’re all in India.”

My jaw dropped. There I was with an incomplete site, over 2 months into a project that was supposed to last 6 weeks max, and having to realize that I have been lied to about the programmers and designers since the beginning of the project.

I was specifically told that my site was being built right here in New York, with people that I would be able to speak to in person if needed, and now I learn that the people working on my site are college students in India who are interning for this company. You can only image how frustrated I was.

Well, I knew that I had to keep on going no matter what. That’s what we hungry entrepreneurs do. So I tried to make the best out of a bad situation. Now 3 months into the project and spending countless hours online with people in India during 11 pm – 3 in the morning on a daily basis from my college dorm room, my site still wasn’t complete.

Furthermore, I was being asked to pay additional money to keep the project going. As stupid as I was, I dished out an additional $1100 for them to wrap up the site so I could finally get on with my life and launch the service before the semester ended.

Like the snakes they were, they stated: “due to the complexity of the site and the extra hours needed to complete it, we’re going to have to charge you some additional fees.” So I paid them and hoped for the best.

Now you’re not going to believe it, but we’re now 5 months into the project and the site still isn’t done! I finally caught on to what was happening: I was being taken advantage of and exploited. I’ve been had!

They knew that I had no idea of web development, so they capitalized on that and used me as a tool to cipher additional cash out of. Something any crooked business person would do. Upon figuring this scheme out, I began to threaten them by filing suit against their company, but even that didn’t work.

So I ended up having them send me all the code and design that was created up to that point and I left with my uncompleted site and paying over $5,000 with no company in hand. I was in trouble because there wasn’t any cash left to have someone complete the site. The $5000 used up to that point was all from my car that I sold that summer.

Luckily, I was able to raise another $5000 from a close family member. Now 6 months into the project, I hired another firm after doing some actual research this time. However, still not knowing how much things were supposed to cost to be developed, I paid the full $5000 almost instantly to this other firm to complete the site in roughly 2 month’s time.

Finally, 8 months and $10,000 later I had a completed site that was supposed to take 6 weeks and cost $4,300. And believe me, that’s not even the whole story… there was much more drama in between all of that but that fact of the matter is that my ignorance cost me thousands of dollars and countless hours in time. Time that could have been used to innovate and money that could have been spent to market my business.

Since that horrible episode, I made up my mind to learn as much about web development as I could. I wasn’t going to let anyone take advantage of me anymore and neither should you.

Sometimes the best way to learn is the hard way. It’s crucial that we young entrepreneurs use our failures as fuel to come back even stronger and do things even better the second time around. The best investment that any entrepreneur can make is one in yourself – an investment of constantly improving what you know and enhancing your intellect.

As a young entrepreneur – in this Internet age – you need to at least know the basics of web development. And if you’re in Internet entrepreneur, you should be constantly learning about the Internet and web development. There should be no excuse for that.

You’ll never be able to understand how much something is supposed to cost until you have an intuitive understanding of what it takes to create. By no means do you have to become an expert programmer and designer, but you have to be able to talk on the level of the programmer that you are hiring to build your site.

In order for that to happen you’ll have to practice. Yup, that’s right, you’ll have to dedicate some time each day to actually build small dummy sites for yourself or possibly a few real ones for your friends. And trust me, if you spend a month learning the basics of web development you’ll end up saving a lot of time and money in the long-run.

I won’t go into the details of web development in this chapter since this isn’t a programming book, but I’ll give you a brief overview of the technologies and point you in the right direction on how to get started:

HTML >>

The first technology that you’ll need to understand is HTML. HTML stand for Hyper Text Markup Language and it’s the language that enables you to see everything that you see when you visit a webpage. The images, content, form, ect.. These are all elements of HTML.

It’s an extremely easy language to learn once you get familiar with it. By using formatting properties know as “tags” with content or images nested in between them, you can control how content and images appear on websites.

For instance if you wanted to point something out such as a book title, you’d use the “underline” tags:

I absolutely love the book Young and Hungry: The New Entrepreneur

If you wanted to make the text bold you’d use the “strong” tags:

I am a big and bold entrepreneur that’s not scared to take risk!

And if you wanted to stress something you’d use the “emphasize” tags:

Please don’t underestimate the young entrepreneur.

Here is perfect site to get you started on your journey to learning HTML.

PHP >>

Now once you got HTML under your belt, you’ll want to at least learn the basics of the most popular scripting language on the Internet, PHP.

HTML is great because it allows you to display content on websites such as images, text, and other objects of choice, but what if you wanted things to happen without having to create a single page for every sequence of events that occur on your page? What if you wanted things to occur dynamically on the same page?

For instance, say you had form where you asked the user to input the amount of items they purchased from your ecommerce store and the sales tax from their state so that you can send them a total amount.

Well with HTML alone you’d probably create that form and have the information sent to you via email or a separate webpage so that you can calculate them yourself or use a third-party system and then email the total back to the user.

But that’s ridiculous and would take way too long. If you did it that way, you’d be out of business before you can calculate 1 + 2. Now with PHP, you could do everything in one shot, right of the same webpage.

You’d be able to allow the user to input the values then simply press submit and those values would dynamically appear on that same page without a new page loading up – that’s the beauty of PHP.

If you can gain a solid grasp just on the basics of PHP alone – combined with your knowledge of HTML – you’ll be in great shape. And you’d be in a position to talk to programmers intelligently and with the full confidence of knowing how difficult or easy something will be to create.

Sure, there will be other technologies that you’ll want to learn the basics of as well, like MySQL which is the technology used with PHP to create databases, but start with HTML and PHP, then go onto more in depth subjects like databases and possibly even CSS which is taking HTML a step further by controlling where the content and images are actually “positioned” on websites.

Here’s where to get started with this PHP tutorial.

A young entrepreneur that thinks that he or she is above leaning the basics of web development is in for a big surprise – a nasty surprise! The year is 2007 and the Internet has become the medium of choice for young entrepreneurs to launch businesses.

It’s never been easier to launch a successful business online and as a young entrepreneur it’s in your best interest t