People are always looking for the best money-making opportunities. Those that say money doesn’t make you happy, are probably skint. I believe that, if you sort your financial situation out like, the rising of the tide lifts all ships. I believe that your health, your overall wealth, which actually means, well-being and your personal life and your business life, I believe that having a wealthy environment mindset, and having good money will attract and create positive steps in other areas of your life.
I mentor a lot of entrepreneurs. Often, they are struggling the most. They may be the most lost, somewhat beaten down, depressed, struggling, feeling like they’re really not making any progress at all, where not one, maybe not even 2, but 3 areas of their life are a bit in disarray and chaos. It might be that they’ve got a broken relationship. It might be that they’ve got serious health challenges. It might be that they’ve just made redundant from their work, et cetera.
And I say to them all the time. If you’re making 20 grand a month net, would all your other problems all of a sudden get better? And they all chuckled and go yes. Yes, it would. I don’t want people to be naïve about the fact that money does enable, and accelerate, and exaggerate, and increase other areas of your life, which may not be good, or even your internal happiness and well-being. Because of course, you can invest in your wealth and well-being. You can invest in health. You can invest in education. You can invest in things that make your life easier, having a driver, or a housekeeper, or having some really good education for your children.
We’ve just invested in some pretty expensive outside of school education, just to help my son catch up in a couple of the subjects he’s maybe a bit behind on. He’s like top in his whole year at spelling. He’s really good at some things. But naturally in some other subjects, he’s not quite as good. We really want him to get into the Senior School. At the moment, there’s a couple of areas he needs work on. So, we’re able to invest in that. We’re able to invest in a really good school.
I am the most productive when I am in the car, in the back of the car. And so, I’m able to invest in a driver, which actually, brings a great return on investment. Because I’d probably get 2 to 3 times as much done in the back of the car. Anyway, just getting that out of the way, because a lot of people have these sorts of issues that money isn’t linked to happiness.
I believe money is an enabler and an exaggerator. I believe, money will make you more of what you already are. Whatever you’re addicted to, money will increase those addictions. It’s certainly fair to say that money in and of itself, just money doesn’t solve all your other problems. But of course, anything that’s good in your life, it enables and exaggerates that too.
I’ve had a weekend hanging out with the kids, because it’s Bobby’s birthday weekend. Can you see that little cut on my forehead? They were doing all the shooting with the guns. And I said to the guy, oh, can I have a go? And he didn’t do a safety briefing for me, because I’m an adult. And I put my eye too close to the side, and I cut my head. What a didi dad I am!
People always looking for the best business opportunity.Is there a business opportunity with this virus going around? Is cryptos really big at the moment? All the markets are crashing, maybe we can short the markets. I want to get into property. I want to get into ecommerce. I want to leverage social media. I want to be an influencer. I want to be a YouTuber. I want to be a podcaster. I want to be an e-sport gamer. Do you know what? All of those business models could easily make you wealthy, and easily lose all your money too.
This is not the get-rich-quickest, the naïve, unrealistic as one to hear. But it’s the truth. And I am a purveyor of truth when it comes to business, entrepreneurship and money.
The best ways to make money, the best business model to be in, is, the one that you have, enduring passion for. That’s an important statement. Because I see so many entrepreneurs who start, stop, start, stop, start, stop. We all get allured somewhat by new opportunities that are exciting. They call it the shiny penny syndrome. If you’re an entrepreneur, you’re going to love new ideas, new business models, new opportunities, creating new things, taking, jumping on these new exciting technologies and markets.
But he downside of that, is, you could start, stop, start, stop, start, stop. Snakes, ladders. Snakes, ladders. Actually, if you’ve tried a couple of business models in the past. By the way, it’s okay to try. It’s okay to test a few business models. It’s okay, if you’ve been in a job for 20 or 30 years to try a couple of side hustles. It’s not like you’d necessarily go into, or have to get your first tested business opportunity completely right, that’s the thing that makes you millions for the rest of your life.
Actually, there will be good an argument to say that, if you look at really successful business owners, entrepreneurs, millionaires, billionaires, the one that they succeeded in, probably wasn’t their first business model. But of course, they’ve learned from testing some business models. But anything that you know, and you could not just enjoy, because anyone can enjoy anything for 6 months. But can you enjoy something for 6 years or 60 years? That’s the key.
The first thing to consider, is, yeah, what have I got passion and enjoyment for? But on a long-term basis, i.e., I wouldn’t be flighty on. I wouldn’t get distracted from. A lot of people who have entrepreneurial personalities are great at starting. We’re terrible at finishing. We’re great at getting excited. We’re not good at having that consistency over decades. We’re great at creating and coming up with the ideas, pushing through the initial, getting things started. But are we… what we can do, is, we can create this cyclical.
The Yo-Yo dieter. They lose their health, well-being and their fitness, maybe because they get comfortable. Then they get to a point of probably self-hatred or long-time being single. And they get down to the gym, and they sort their health and eating out. And soon they get comfortable again. They get to a state of look or even a relationship, where the honeymoon period is over, they get comfortable. Then they relaxed. And then they lose their health and fitness, well-being. They get overweight or unhealthy. Then only when the pain gets too much so then they start to diet again. So, they have this cyclical motivation in waves.
And I see that with start-up entrepreneurs a lot. This is something I want to help you try and get away from. I’m quite lucky in the business for me. Entrepreneurship in general for me, is, something I want to do for the rest of my life with enduring passion, even when it’s hard.
You’ve got to find that thing. It’s okay to test a bit. Just test on low risk. Test without burning all of your money. You know, when people say, go all in. Well, actually, I think if you’re starting some entrepreneurial ventures, it’s probably wise not to go all in. You should probably only go all in, when you know. When you’re all in, and the thing that you want to be all in on, you know, you’re all in on it. You know it’s decided that you’re going to be there for decades to come.
Warren Buffett, if you’ve seen his that meme going around of his wealth growth curve. 14 years old here and 50 years old here. And it looks like he’s hardly moving up in wealth, even though that’s 10 million. And then when he’s 85, he’s got this massive acceleration. And that’s like 85 billion or something like that. Because he’s got longevity compounding, consistency over decades of sustainability. Okay, so, enduring passion is definitely one of the best business models.
The second thing, is, something that can scale, either reasonably well, or nationally or globally. You could do something that you enjoy. But it’s not scalable. Maybe, you’re just baking cakes at home, doing them for your friends and family. Well, that’s not scalable. It’s okay, if you want to do that. But you’re not going to be able to make really good money out of it.
Be a scale-up entrepreneur, become very wealthy. Whether it’s leveraging the internet, and social media, and being able to reach the masses online, or whether it’s something that can spread through referrals, but you need to have low to no friction of scaling up.
Of the 3 main commonalities of the titans of wealth, of the biggest billionaires, pound for pound over the last thousand years or whatever, serving vast numbers of people, that is right up there as one of the 3 commonalities of the most rich people in history. You need to make sure that you are scalable, that you’re not reducing your reach. Because you could end up just hitting the ceiling, where even though you enjoy what you do, you can’t go beyond a few grand a month or whatever sort of financial ceiling you’re hitting, that you want to break through.
The next thing then, is, it can’t just be passionate for you. You’ve got to have a passion to serve. So, is this business model that you’re doing, something that you could really see as service? Because, if it’s just really for you and you enjoy it, but there’s no real major marketplace, or you’re not really that interested in serving others. You’re only interested to do it yourself. You could have a little business for sure. But you’re not going to scale. You’re not going to have enduring wealth. And if clients and customers don’t feel like you care and want to serve them, they’re probably not going to use you on an ongoing basis.
There’s plenty of sort of one-man band entrepreneurs that say, ah, I just want to be free. I just want to have some freedom. I just want an easy life. I don’t want to work too hard. When I hear that, I go, okay, I understand. But then you can’t say that, and want to be really wealthy, and scale, and successful. You’ve got to want to make a difference to other people as well as yourself.
I know some business models, where I’d be keen to be in on it. But I wouldn’t be keen to really do it to vast numbers of people. And I wouldn’t be really keen on doing it as a service. It would just be something that I could enjoy for me. My art was like that. I really enjoy doing it for me.
But I had this really weird relationship in showing it to the world. I was scared of it being judged. I kind of felt like I didn’t want to be restricted by people making me do commissions, which were what they wanted, which were popular or fashionable instead of something that I really believed in. And I struggled with that dichotomy, that paradox, when I was an artist. I think that’s why I didn’t make much money out of it. unless you’ve got to have this balance of meeting your own needs. But it being commercial. It being a service.
Here’s the thing. There are some business models that a lot of people think are not worthy. Ah, billionaires there’s no use in the world for a billionaire. They’re just greedy. They take all the money. These people who do these payday loans, all these people who do gambling, et cetera. Well, I personally would love to interview a billionaire who owns a payday loan company or into gambling company. Because I would like to know what their personal ethics are, and how they see their business as a service. Because I bet you, what they would say, is, well, it serves millions of people. It’s what people want. You give people what they want. That’s called a free market.
In fact, stupid business ideas are the ones that you want, and people don’t want. The best business ideas, are, the ones that have the demand to the masses. People say, why do footballers get paid so much? Because people want to watch footballers. Ah, that’s not a worthy business. You can’t pay hundreds of thousands of pounds a week to dive on the floor pretending to be blah, blah, blah.
But actually, they serve millions or billions of people. Just look at all their Instagram accounts. And you get paid directly linked to the amount of people that you serve. Even if for example, you serve in a very small way like a Post-It note, that’s not going to change the world in terms of how it serves an individual. They’re just going to be able to write something and stick it on their desk or their laptop. But that one small little thing has served billions of people. Of course, 3M have made billions out of the Post-It notes. Tetrapak have made billions out of little packages for milk, et cetera and solving little problems for billions of people.
If you have a more bespoke or a consultative based product, then you would need to have an increase price strategy to increase your wealth, or you need to be in a niche, where you could almost own the brand, and be the go-to person. But then, if you want to scale it, you may need to look at online delivery or some kind of leveraged business model that can scale it from local to national, to intercontinental, to global. And then some of these people like, Richard Branson and Elon Musk, they’re looking to serve humanity intergalactic. So, you don’t want to restrict your sale.
I think that the best kind of business model to be in, is, somewhere where you can find who you really are. Sometimes, you model businesses, or you model entrepreneurs. I’m going to go to that business, because they’re successful and famous. That can make loads of money. I’m going to go into ecommerce, because Jeff Bezos is the world’s richest man. That’s fine, if you are the kind of person that you don’t mind modelling people. And you don’t really mind what the business model is, because you just love business, or you just love a certain type of business.
But for me, if I go to a business model, and it’s a “me too” business, or it’s an imitation business model, I wouldn’t be able to find who I really am, because an element of creativity, an element of individuality, an element of disruption and innovation. I don’t want to copy people. I want to find and be who I am. And be a little bit original, and a little bit unique.
How do you find who you are? And I know some people have got into businesses, because they thought the money was good. You know when these billionaires say, well, it’s not all about the money. They’re in it for doing something that they love, serving people, and being in something that helps them really find who they are. I’d always kind of thought to myself, well, that’s okay for you to say, because you’re a billionaire. I’m not doing it for the money, because you already have billions.
But I do think that, if you are in a business model or a job, where you’re selling your soul, and you’re losing the identity of who you are. You just know this is not you. In addition to you not being able to sell something that you don’t believe in, which is, of course, every salesperson would say. You’re just going to day by week, by month, by year lose the identity of who you are.
I don’t know why this is. But for me, I just know being an entrepreneur, is, who I am. There are these debates that say, you can’t call yourself an entrepreneur. Oh no, no. You’re not an entrepreneur, unless you’re a billionaire, or whatever. I don’t really care what they say. I know I’m an entrepreneur. I know that word was made for me.
Multiple businesses, innovation, disruption, experimentation, the desire to help, serve, fix, create, grow, evolve and figuring out the next market, the next amazing business opportunity, creating communities, doing stuff that’s different, expressing myself in my own unique and individual, and then creating a market around it, and monetising it, and getting that equal reward of value to the community, the end-users, the consumers, and then the fair profit margin to the producer. I just love that. That’s just me. That’s just who I am. As long as there’s an ethical business model or business model I’m interested in. Take those caveats away, and you could give me any business model, and I’m in. And I’m up for it.
I’m just about to sign a contract to get into, evolved in a drone technology business. I’ve been in discussions in a while with someone who’s got a cosmetics business. I’ve got a property training business. I’ve got a property investing business. Of course, I’m a paid keynote speaker for things like social media and entrepreneurship. I write books. I do podcasts. Got a social media agency, a podcast media agency, a publishing, an audiobook agency. Mentor, coach, rambler on social media. I’ve got my Supporters Programme, the Stars functionality. I’ve just launched my Patreon. I just love all these. It’s just creation. It’s evolution. It’s innovation. It’s service. It’s solving problems. It’s looking at new media, new outlets. Leveraging all the new technologies.
Well, of course, I say the internet, it’s like a new technology. But in terms of technology compared to say, telecommunications or any other form of communication, the internet is still really new. It’s the biggest enabler that there’s ever been. It’s a bigger enabler than air travel. It’s a bigger enabler than rail. It’s a bigger enabler than telecommunications. Because the speed of internet is the speed of flight. And the way it just connects everyone so globally, so quickly, it’s the biggest enabler that is ever been. It still has so much more that can be leveraged on top of it. All the new apps, all the new software, all the new systems, all the new social media. It’s so exciting.
