jimmyandtravis
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Scott: How did you guys decide to make the transition into business for yourself?
Jim: Ignorance. We really didn’t realize how hard it was going to be, so we just took the plunge. Six weeks before Travis’ wedding and six months before mine, we quit our cushy jobs, left our executive pay and went for broke. It was the best thing we ever did. (You can read the full Jim and Travis story at GravitationalMarketing.com)
Scott: What were the biggest challenges you faced as entrepreneurs and how did you overcome them?
Travis: Realizing that you need something to sell other than your time. If you are constantly exchanging time for dollars you limit how much money you can make and how many people you can help. Even at $500 or more per hour, which seems like a lot to most people, you are still limited. It’s not a scalable model. Everything you do should be created in a way that allows for growth. This is why systems are so important.
Scott: You mention in your story something I’m big on – mentors. Who was your mentor and what was that experience like?
Jim: We’ve had many mentors along the way, some on purpose and some accidental. Some who taught us the right way to do things and some who taught us what not to do. At the agency, Travis had a mentor that was a former executive for a major automotive manufacture and entrepreneur.
Travis: His experience in management, systems development, critical thinking and strategic vision helped lay the foundation on which we have built our own business.
At first, the relationship with him was difficult. He wasn’t a likeable guy. But through the development of mutual respect, ideas and ideals were exchanged.
Scott: One person’s 20/20 hindsight is another person’s foresight. What was the biggest mistake you guys made in your own business? How did you overcome it? What would you do differently if you had it to do over, knowing what you know now?
Travis: At the beginning, we created a product for the automotive market. We left without taking any clients which is abnormal for the industry. So we started with no clients, no leads, no prospects and no money. It was a non-competing product to our old agency and we had hoped that they might introduce it to some of their clients, but that never happened. Once we started selling the product it went pretty well. But we got discouraged because the people who bought the product were too lazy to use it even though we tried to encourage them to do so.
Jim: We got discouraged and scrapped the project. We gave up and moved along to something else. We were just too inexperienced to realize we were on to something. We see business owners do this same thing all the time. They start something and its works, it’s profitable and then they quit doing it. That’s a big mistake. You have to keeping pushing forward.
Scott: In your story, you also mention the Law of Attraction. What does that mean to you, and how do you apply it in your business?
Travis: We strongly believe in the power of positive thinking and embrace the words of Earl Nightengale’s Strangest Secret. Insecurity, lack of confidence and negative thoughts can poison even the best ideas and brightest entrepreneurs. You have to keep a positive mindset. Having a positive mindset will program your subconscious to work toward a positive outcome. A negative mindset will pit your subconscious mind against your success.
Jim: We don’t believe that if you think about a 52 foot yacht that a 52 foot yacht will show up, but we do believe that if you take time to have a vision of a positive outcome, and take massive, aggressive action based on the vision, you will see an overall positive tendency toward your desired result.
We also believe in another kind of Law of Attraction…the law of naturally attracting customers by discovering what’s unique about yourself and exploiting it.
Scott: What’s the question I didn’t ask, but should have?
Jim: What advice would you give for those contemplating starting their own business?
Find out what it is that you do better than everyone else. Highlight that element that makes you different. Find out what your customers want before you decide what to offer them. Then put your unique personality behind whatever it is you're going to offer.
For more information about Gravitational Marketing, including a simple 5-step marketing plan that you can implement today, see The Power of Gravitational Marketing, a free excerpt from the book.
Scott: How did you guys decide to make the transition into business for yourself?
Jim: Ignorance. We really didn’t realize how hard it was going to be, so we just took the plunge. Six weeks before Travis’ wedding and six months before mine, we quit our cushy jobs, left our executive pay and went for broke. It was the best thing we ever did. (You can read the full Jim and Travis story at GravitationalMarketing.com)
Scott: What were the biggest challenges you faced as entrepreneurs and how did you overcome them?
Travis: Realizing that you need something to sell other than your time. If you are constantly exchanging time for dollars you limit how much money you can make and how many people you can help. Even at $500 or more per hour, which seems like a lot to most people, you are still limited. It’s not a scalable model. Everything you do should be created in a way that allows for growth. This is why systems are so important.
Scott: You mention in your story something I’m big on – mentors. Who was your mentor and what was that experience like?
Jim: We’ve had many mentors along the way, some on purpose and some accidental. Some who taught us the right way to do things and some who taught us what not to do. At the agency, Travis had a mentor that was a former executive for a major automotive manufacture and entrepreneur.
Travis: His experience in management, systems development, critical thinking and strategic vision helped lay the foundation on which we have built our own business.
At first, the relationship with him was difficult. He wasn’t a likeable guy. But through the development of mutual respect, ideas and ideals were exchanged.
Scott: One person’s 20/20 hindsight is another person’s foresight. What was the biggest mistake you guys made in your own business? How did you overcome it? What would you do differently if you had it to do over, knowing what you know now?
Travis: At the beginning, we created a product for the automotive market. We left without taking any clients which is abnormal for the industry. So we started with no clients, no leads, no prospects and no money. It was a non-competing product to our old agency and we had hoped that they might introduce it to some of their clients, but that never happened. Once we started selling the product it went pretty well. But we got discouraged because the people who bought the product were too lazy to use it even though we tried to encourage them to do so.
Jim: We got discouraged and scrapped the project. We gave up and moved along to something else. We were just too inexperienced to realize we were on to something. We see business owners do this same thing all the time. They start something and its works, it’s profitable and then they quit doing it. That’s a big mistake. You have to keeping pushing forward.
Scott: In your story, you also mention the Law of Attraction. What does that mean to you, and how do you apply it in your business?
Travis: We strongly believe in the power of positive thinking and embrace the words of Earl Nightengale’s Strangest Secret. Insecurity, lack of confidence and negative thoughts can poison even the best ideas and brightest entrepreneurs. You have to keep a positive mindset. Having a positive mindset will program your subconscious to work toward a positive outcome. A negative mindset will pit your subconscious mind against your success.
Jim: We don’t believe that if you think about a 52 foot yacht that a 52 foot yacht will show up, but we do believe that if you take time to have a vision of a positive outcome, and take massive, aggressive action based on the vision, you will see an overall positive tendency toward your desired result.
We also believe in another kind of Law of Attraction…the law of naturally attracting customers by discovering what’s unique about yourself and exploiting it.
Scott: What’s the question I didn’t ask, but should have?
Jim: What advice would you give for those contemplating starting their own business?
Find out what it is that you do better than everyone else. Highlight that element that makes you different. Find out what your customers want before you decide what to offer them. Then put your unique personality behind whatever it is you're going to offer.
For more information about Gravitational Marketing, including a simple 5-step marketing plan that you can implement today, see The Power of Gravitational Marketing, a free excerpt from the book.