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50 Tidbits of Advice
The following was a wad of small business counsel I offered to a group of fine gentleman elsewhere on the internets who specialize in internet marketing in general. Twas divinely orated and translated to human tongue on 11/29/2012. It concerns itself with not only business but psychology, discipline, self-development, and more. It shall now be archived here for the ages and expanded upon on a future date. But for now…
Tidbits of Advice from Trickle Cheddar
1. Don’t get into SEO if you don’t like rollercoasters.
2. Wake up early. 5:30 - 6:00 AM seems perfect and creates the most productivity before noon. Have a structure to your day, including periods of reflection and planning.
3. Don’t work in your pajamas. Get dressed like you have a high-profile job. Like you a bowse.
4. Delegate. If a job requires little thinking, outsource it. Even if you could save $50 a day doing it yourself. Spend your time on high-cognitive-functioning type work. Other people can’t do that for you.
5. Diversify. And I don’t mean put four methods of monetization on your one site. Have many projects of many kinds.
6. Compartmentalize your projects in your mind. Have a visual diagram of your business. And make progress on each one every day if possible.
7. Don’t spread yourself too thin too early. Focus by saying no to your 100,000 ideas. A thousand ideas with no execution equals no money. One idea with perfect execution will make you ball out of control.
8. Do not become attached to your projects. You will become inefficient and wasteful. Flip them if the opportunity arises if they are at their peak, and start the next one.
8.5 Put pictures in long posts to break up the visual monotony.
9. Don’t be anal-retentive about details. 80% perfection is good enough if you can do that 5 times a day, rather than only once nailing 100% perfection. The price and time ratio to getting that last bit of perfection only satisfies your anal-ass brain, and not anyone else’s or your wallet.
10. Organic traffic converts like a mo-fo, but is inconsistent. Social traffic is consistent in proportion to your efforts, but doesn’t convert worth crap. It’s all about intention. Social users are dicking off, not looking to buy. Retain them and convince them to buy later.
11. Passive income is a psychological trap that will cause you grief and suffering. Only hustler’s succeed. So when your “passive” income projects are no longer passive, scoop your nuts up and get back to work.
12. Don’t neglect life. Watch that dumbass gymnastics show with your wife. Take the dog to the dog park, and don’t take your laptop with you. And for god’s sake, read something of worth.
13. Align your internal compass with high intentions and the universe will gladly step out of your way. Not in some stupid “The Secret” way either. You create your luck, and with the proper “ends” in mind, you will find the best “means” to achieve them. Think about how you will contribute to society, friends, and family once you succeed. Not about that fancy car you want.
14. Get your funky ass to the gym. Sitting for 15 hours a day will kill you. Get up and stretch every once in a while. Take the dog to go pee. Jerking it doesn’t count as exercise.
SEO’s playing the new gym simulator MMORPG
15. If you are going to sit for 15+ hours a day, do it in the best chair possible. $2,000 for a chair isn’t stupid as people like to think. It’s not for a chair, it’s for your health. Same thing with your mattress. You spend a 1/3rd of your life on it. Get the best. You don’t accept mediocre air and water, so don’t sleep and sit on bullshit.
16. You’ve read it 100 times. The money is in the list. That is how you get free of the tyrannical algorithm. Choose a vertical that you are passionate about and start building your list and offering quality. That is a business. Churn and burn ranking is not. That’s child’s play.
17. Being an affiliate for someone else’s product… not bad. Having affiliates for your own product… bowse. Sending CPA submit’s to someone’s network… not bad. Having people send submits to your own network… bowse. Position yourself as the king. Don’t claim you have an empire if you are still working as the peasant.
18. Don’t ride someone else’s coattails and don’t let anyone try to ride yours. You will have a million people show their true side to you along this journey. Detachment is key. Let it all go. But detachment isn’t disengagement, so keep living life as well.
19. Risk equals reward, when done properly. You can minimize the risk of your risk if you do the proper pre-planning and choose the right risk. The largest fruit grows furthest out on the branch. Do you have the balls to go get it? Can you manage the risk to increase your chance of success?
20. Society’s consensual conformity will tell you that the most stable thing you can do is take the predetermined path of school to college to married with kids and a day job. That’s the bomb for some people. It’s good enough for others. For some of us, you might as well take us out in the woods with a Kroger sack and a shovel.
RIP SEO… 1990 – Whatever algo update just happened
21. You will die. Not in some morbid sense. But don’t play it safe all of the time. Enjoy that pizza. Smoke your cigar. Have the coffee. But do all of this in moderation. The stupidest thing you can do is make it “safely” and “heathily” to death. Makes no sense. The end is the same for us all. Take risks and live life.
22. Deny all negativity in your life. Cut people off, including family and friends if needed. Watch your inputs, such as television and music. The media sells violence and sex to adults and children alike. It’s poison for the mind, and it will affect your business, wallet, and life. But you have control. Only choose high quality entertainment.
23. If you hear people talking about cutting expenses as a way to solve their money woes, internally, feel sorry them and do not accept that for yourself. Our business doesn’t have salary caps. Hustle harder. Cutting expenses doesn’t fix a revenue problem. Selling your belongings isn’t going to help you pay the bills beyond this one time. Hustle harder. But don’t be a retarded spend-thrift.
24. Don’t find link building opportunities. Create them. Don’t find properties to place your links on. Build them.
25. Sell gold-picks AND mine for gold. Don’t succumb to these false dichotomies everyone throws around.
26. We are still in the unregulated Wild West. We are cowboys. There have been ages to our history have changed the world beyond recognition. Agriculture, the domestication of animals, industrialization, etc. Welcome to the beginning of the digital age. Recognize this and take advantage. Not many people are born, relatively, in these fortunate times, so take advantage and ball out of control.
27. The digital age offers you two means of leverage: global outsourcing and computer automation. Exploit the ever-living shit out of both as much as possible. Pay your outsourcers great wages, and enslave your bots like the automatons they still are. Soon we will have to start considering morality issues with sentient bots who think and feel.
28. Have a psychedelic experience once in your life. If you have a good one, once is all it takes. You will mature psychologically and spiritually leaps and bounds if you approach it with reverence and respect, and not as some recreational toy.
Adults Only! (Must be this tall to ride)
29. Everyone gets on the level they are capable of getting to. We need manual laborers, and they need us. Show them the utmost respect. Religion is perfect for some people, so don’t get down on it if you intellectualize beyond it. Move to spirituality and respect everyone’s path. Rich and poor, smart and stupid, healthy and sick, it is all relative on a scale that itself moves constantly. These are meaningless terms. Don’t get caught up in labels. Just, in everything you perceive, give respect.
30. Find your sense of authenticity, integrity, dignity, and honor, and stick to it. You can then lie down on your death bed and exhale a breath of relief and peace, rather than fear and terror.
31. Cash flow is what makes your business snowball into a full on avalanche. Reinvest some revenue into your business. If you have to, go take a part-time job. Cash flow will accelerate your vehicle to freedom like nothing else.
32. Your external environment is a reflection of your internal environment. But you can influence the internal by cleaning up the external. So keep your desk clean and organized. Keep your computer desktop clean and organized. Your work flow will be far more efficient, and so will your brain. Train your brain.
33. Develop a self-awareness and transcendent aspect to your cognitive framework. This is called meta-cognition. Be able to be “the watcher” who perceives himself from a distance. Then being to train that monkey-mind and monkey-behavior and refine him into a gentlemen, scholar, and successful business man. Self-discipline may be the most valuable attribute to your business.
Tame the Monkey Mind. (removed joke about spanking)
34. If you use social networks for any other reason than driving traffic, you should quit your browser, and then quit yourself. What an enormous waste of time. Don’t do things that turn your brain off. Turn on, tune into your goals, and drop out of the nonsense.
35. Going full time: Best move – Have six months of expenses or more in savings before making the jump, and have surpassed your day job’s income. Second best move – just do it. You’d be surprised at some of the stuff you’ll come up with to make it work when your back is against the wall. Limiting choices and tightening parameters gets the creative juices flowing like no other.
36. Want to get inspired and understand outsourcing and removing yourself as the bottleneck? Read the Four Hour Work Week. Want to get inspired and understand when to liquidate as an exit strategy and how to leverage automation? Read the Millionaire Fastlane. Want to take a quick crash course on copywriting? Read Cashvertising.
37. Want to read the best in mythology and religion? Read Joseph Campbell. Want to read the best in sci-fi? Read Arthur C. Clarke. Want to read the best in fantasy? Read J.R.R. Tolkein. Want to read the best in horror? Read H.P. Lovecraft. Want to hear the best music available? Listen to Jon Anderson and Yes.
38. Find the balance between networking with people and wasting time. 95% of Skype chat rooms are an enormous waste of time. Some are amazing for learning new ideas and gaining the view points of others. Allow some joking and playing in order to build rapport and friendship, but don’t let it detract from your work time.
39. Surround yourself with others who are ahead of you in some aspects you need help with. And be sure to be ahead of them in others so that it is a mutually beneficial relationship. Then everybody grows. Don’t let people leech off of you. Keep your secrets yours or among your inner most circle. Build each other up and leverage each other’s skills.
40. Concerning Internet Marketing Forums – I) There are more people lurking who ball out of control than those who post and claim to ball out of control. II) Once you go full time and are on Skype and Forums all day, you'll realize that 90% of the people who were claiming to be full time internet marketers are actually just in college on their parent’s bill, and that is how they have time to be online all day. Most of them live with their parents still. They like to play pretend online.
41. Don’t fret over spilt milk for too long. Go through the stages of grieving or whatever, then dust yourself off, scoop up your nuts, and get back on the horse/Herman Miller. You’re going to make mistakes, but the beautiful thing is you only need to make them once. It’s a tired cliche but failing fast and often shows you what directions not to go and how to not get lured off the path again later. Make your boo-boo’s. It’s part of the process of success.
42. Before you go to bed, plan the following day’s “To Do List”. Don’t worry if you can’t get it all done, just let it float over, but always prioritize. Have a moment of calm and quiet and plan the tasks you will do for the following four hours. Do them. Break for lunch and have another calm time where you review what you did, how you performed, what you could have done better. Then plan the next four hours and go crunch it out.
Don’t paint a target / tramp-stamp on your back.
43. If you want to survive into the future, abandon detectable SEO altogether. That means don’t do any obvious on-page SEO and don’t use your money term as an anchor text. Don’t get links on the 1000 social bookmarking sites and all the other crap that all of the “SEO’s” do. The game has changed. If you are an SEO, you will be punished. Become a marketer instead and flourish and have your skills be generalizable to a bigger market.
44. Rank and Bank, Churn and Burn, Spray and Pray, etc… it’s not 2003 any more. It’s been a decade. Time to move on. If you aren’t providing quality and contributing to the internet, then you are a leech and a detractor from society. Build an asset, or be a charlatan. Your call, but I like to have pride and follow values and whatnot.
45. Are you a knucklehead playing around on the internet, or are you a CEO building a business? You need to become a real leader, who can face reality. That means not getting attached to projects, so when Panda and Penguin smash you, you just let it go and start anew. Don’t waste resources trying to get back in the good graces of the Gorg. Just start new. Always, and I repeat, always be moving forward. If you are crying over spilt milk, you are attached somewhere.
46. Build the RIGHT team. Don’t just build a team. Don’t just get people onboard. Get the RIGHT people on board, in the RIGHT places on the team. That means you shouldn’t just be outsourcing to the cheapest ESL person. Pay the extra to get it done right and to drop communication barriers. Have a vision that can be communicated so everyone can push towards that end goal. But having the right people means that target can move without people freaking out. Because the RIGHT people aren’t committed to a certain target, they are committed to driving your bus to whatever the destination may be. They are committed to the bus and the road, not the destination.. to the journey.
47. For the love of God, please do not doing anything stupid publicly on Wickedfire (RIP, long live BuSo). Don’t lie about what cars you purchase, your income, or anything else that is tied to reality in which you’ve left a paper trail. And don’t make sites that exploit people and make a full-on attempt at harassing them, then come bragging as if we will think it’s cool. Just don’t. For the love of all that is good and holy. Don’t do it. Or pepper your angus.
48. To be successful, you need to know 3 things about yourself. What your passion is, what you are really good at, and how it can make you money. Find a common factor between all of those things and drive at it 100% and you will succeed.
49. Since you made it this far, I’ll tell you why most of you get smacked to hell by Google. You don’t have the traffic to support the links you are getting. You don’t have the social signals to support the veracity of the links you are getting. If you have a bad ass site doing well and want to help them understand it, install Analytics and shove it down their throat. But as soon as you put an imbalance, the scales of justice are going to tip for you.
50. Read the Digital Strategy Crash Course.
Originally Posted on November 29th, 2012 on
