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5 Business Lessons I Learned From Launching 5 Businesses

In this post, I share 5 business lessons I learned from launching 5 businesses. What are some things that you have learned along the way on your journey?

 

In the last 4 years, I’ve launched 5 different business. Some of these businesses have been massive failures while others have actually been successful.

 

 

The one thing that I can say about all of these businesses is that I learned a lot. When I first got into entrepreneurship, I was only 17 years old. I didn’t have a degree or any experience in what it took to a run business.

 

 

Coming from there to where I am at today, I can say that I’ve grown a lot as an entrepreneur. In this blog post, I’m going to share the 5 business lessons I learned from launching 5 businesses:

 

 

1. Solve Real Problems

 

One business that really failed was Vintelli. The reason why was that we weren’t really solving a problem. Nobody had told us it was a problem, instead we went out seeking a solution for a problem that we created ourselves.

 

 

As you can imagine, it become a nightmare. We made money, got customers and had sales, but the truth of the matter was that we weren’t solving a real problem. As a business, your job is to create value. The more value you create, the more successful your company will be.

 

 

2. Just Get Started

 

I like to say that impatience is a virtue for me. Thanks to my impatience, I’ve been able to come as far as I have in 4 years. If you think about it, 4 years isn’t really a lot. After 4 years in college, you barely get a bachelors degree in a specific field.

 

 

If I would have waited to get a degree or more money in my bank account, I wouldn’t have come as far as I am today. When you build your own company, you don’t need all the right answers. You just need to be willing to go out and find them at all costs. Get started as soon as you can.

 

 

3. Focus On The Team

 

Out of my successful and unsuccessful businesses, team has played a crucial part in each of them. The companies that failed didn’t always have the best teams. In the meantime, the companies that have succeeded have had exceptional teams.

 

 

If you can’t put together a team of passionate individuals who believe in a common goal, it’s going to be a struggle to succeed. Many people don’t focus on building a team or bringing on partners, but it is crucial if you wish to be successful as an entrepreneur.

 

 

4. Ignore The Naysayers

 

When I started out as an entrepreneur, people always told me that I was too young or that my ideas were too big. I ignored all of them and it has taken me this far in life already. As long as you are passionate about solving a problem, you don’t need to worry about much else.

 

 

Develop the vision and keep plugging away at your ideas. Starting a company is never an easy journey. If it was easy, everyone would be successful. Show people what you can do and ignore the negativity that you will hear along the way.

 

 

5. If At First You Don’t Succeed, Try Again

 

5 business in 4 years is quite a feat on its own. The one lesson you can clearly see is that I don’t believe in giving up regardless of what happens. I may have had failures along the way, but I’ve always embraced the experience and came back stronger each time.

 

 

If at first you don’t succeed, gather your lessons and try again. For me, I knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur ever since I started my first business. The question for me was finding a business that not only works, but makes me extremely happy.

 

 

Conclusion

 

In this post, I shared the 5 business lessons I learned from launching 5 businesses. What are some business lessons you’ve learned in your journey?

 

 

photo credit: paul bica via photopin cc

 

 

6 Things That Make Entrepreneurs Work Harder Than Ever

Starting your own business involves very little luck. It’s all about working your ass off to achieve the results you desire. In this article, I share 6 things that make entrepreneurs work harder than ever.

 

Every entrepreneur has to work hard if they want to be successful. If you’re looking for luck, you need to play the lottery. Entrepreneurship is a brutal lifestyle that only a few people in the world can really handle.

 

 

If you’re having trouble find the motivation or inspiration you need to work hard, then this post might be able to help. I’ll share 6 things that make entrepreneurs work harder than ever:

 

 

1. Tough Times

 

Mark Cuban has often said that entrepreneurs who have had a tougher time end up being more successful. Why? Well, the answer is rather simple. When you are going through times, you have extra motivation to change your situation. Someone who has a good life has to seek outside motivation to really succeed at something specific.

 

 

2. Partners Holding You Accountable

 

The great thing about starting a company is that you have a team of individuals who are just as passionate about an idea or business as you are. With that in mind, everyone on the team should have one common goal. When someone sees one of their team members losing sight of that goal, it’s their job to put them back on the right path.

 

 

3. Investors, Mentors or Advisers

 

If you are lucky enough to get an investor in your business, you’ll have all the pressure you need to make sure you’re getting your shit done. For those businesses that are still in an earlier stage, bring on a mentor or adviser that will help you become successful. They can offer insight to your business while also keeping you on track as an entrepreneur making sure that you’re always working hard.

 

 

4. Chasing Passion Instead Of Money

 

If you love doing something, you don’t have to worry about working hard. There’s a reason why entrepreneurs can work 80 hours happily without getting paid while people can barely get out of bed when having to work 40 hour weeks. It’s all about loving what you do and allowing your passion to push you to the top.

 

 

5. First Signs Of Success

 

When I first started out as an entrepreneur, I was working hard but it wasn’t to my full potential. It only took me a couple months to get my first pay day and to see some signs of success for me to take it to a whole another level. Everyone sometimes needs to see that what they are doing is actually going to work before they make their work an obsession.

 

 

6. Positive Feedback

 

If you’ve ever launched a mobile application, the most exciting thing in the world is seeing a positive review. The same goes for a service business or product-driven business. Getting positive testimonials or feedback from others is a great motivator. Seeing that your work is creating value and making a difference is one of the greatest feelings in the world.

 

 

Conclusion

 

In this article, I shared 6 things that make entrepreneurs work harder than ever. What are some things that have pushed you to work extremely hard?

 

 

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My Guide For Building Your Own Brand

In this article, I share my guide for building your own brand. Check out my top tips for successfully building a personal brand that can make an impact.

 

Personal brands are extremely important, but many people tend to overlook them. They tend to forget all about themselves and focus on branding their business only. Don’t worry, I was the same way until I learned a valuable lesson.

 

 

After founding my first company, which was a multimedia agency, I focused solely on the marketing efforts of my business. After just over 2 years of running the company, I had to sell that business. After doing so, I was unknown in the world.

 

 

It was like I had just lost all my credit cards and ID cards before I got dropped off into a whole new world. It was at this time I realized that I had to build a personal brand. No matter what I did in my career, my personal brand would come with me.

 
In this article, I share my guide for building your own brand:

 

 

Find Your Unique Angle

 

To really have a personal brand that stands out and is as effective as it can be, you need to find what makes you unique. For me, I decided to go along with the angle of how I was a young entrepreneur trying to set the bar high.

 

 

That perspective really worked for me. Everything from my social media profiles to my presentations included my age and the fact that I was a ‘young entrepreneur’. It allowed me to quickly separate myself from the tons of other entrepreneurs.

 

 

Create A Personal Website

 

You are currently on my personal website. It simply has my first and last name while it features a variety of different pages. I chose to include a blog to share my thoughts, some pages that show the various services I offer and a couple of other pages that help you get to know me better.

 

 

Depending on what you aim to do with your personal brand, you can do any of those things or even do something completely different. However, if you have a website with your name locked in…..it establishes you as a presence on the web.

 

 

 

Find Ways To Create Value

 

Whether you’re branding a human being or a company, you always need to be giving some kind of intrinsic value to your audience. My personal brand’s value proposition is really the fact that I’ll share my experiences and lessons with you while trying to motivate you to do big things.

 

 

Everybody is really good at creating value in one way or another. You need to find a way to tie your strength to your personal brand. The more value you create, the better chance you have of converting individuals to loyal followers.

 

 

Be Socially Active

 

Social media is extremely important for any brand nowadays. Not only that, but it’s highly important that you connect with your audience through social media.

 

 

Social media is great because it’s an easy way to connect with a wide variety of audiences. You can share your thoughts, comments and opinions easily with a group of loyal followers. Create profiles on major social media profiles and convey your brand through these networks.

 

 

Network, Network, Network

 

Networking is extremely important. Many people go out and simply want to hand out a business card about their company while sharing all of the ways their business can help. However, I highly recommend against that.

 

 

When I went networking, I had a business card of just myself. It was a business card for my personal brand. Instead of trying to sell them on my businesses, I sold them on myself. I talked about who I was, what I did and they would pick and choose the things they wanted to know more about.

 

 

Conclusion

 

Building a personal brand can never be done overnight. It takes a lot of patience and persistence to build a solid personal brand that can make an impact.

 

 

photo credit: Philipp Lücke via photopin cc

 

How To Get More Traffic To Your Blog

Getting traffic to your blog is a long and challenging process. In this article, I share my tips on how to get more traffic to your blog.

 

With the resources available nowadays, anyone can essentially start a blog rather quickly. However, starting your own blog is just the first step. The second and much harder step is driving a steady stream of traffic to your blog without spending a lot of money.

 

 

Without spending a single dollar on marketing my blog, I’ve been able to get hundreds of thousands of unique visitors to my articles.

 

 

In this article, I’ll share my tips on how to get more traffic to your blog:

 

 

Target Your Content

 

There are two types of readers that you will come across on your website. There are those that are constantly sharing your content and then another group of individuals who are just reading, but not sharing.

 

 

You need to narrow down the audience that is sharing your posts actively so that you can craft your content to cater towards them. I quickly found out that the younger audience on my site was more likely to share articles. Thus, I began crafting more content that would target them specifically.

 

 

Get Involved In The Community

 

Given the number of blogs that are out there in the blogosphere, you don’t have to worry too much about ‘competitors’. The reason is that the same person is very likely to read multiple blogs.

 

 

You can reach out to other bloggers in your sphere and ask if you can guest post on their site. It helps them because they are getting more content while you’re writing is being presented in front of a new audience. Find ways to work with other blogs to create mutually beneficial relationships.

 

 

Make Your Blog SEO Friendly

 

Most blogs are built on WordPress. There are numerous SEO tools available that help you get your content visible on the search engines. I personally love using Yoast SEO, which is a free plugin available for WordPress.

 

 

By installing these plugins, you are easily able to customize URL’s, meta titles, meta descriptions and keywords for your article. These are all of the vital elements that help you rank on the search engines.

 

 

Actively Share Your Posts On Social Media

 

Social media is a great way to promote your content through the web. It is vital that you have profiles created on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google + so that you can share your newest blog posts with your audience.

 

 

It’s not always about getting unique visitors to your blog, but rather getting a large base of loyal readers. Social media sites such as Twitter can help you keep your audience close to you so that they know whenever you post a new blog article.

 

 

Pay Attention To Your Analytics

 

I personally recommend using Google Analytics if you’re looking for a free solution that gets the job done. I use that on my blog and it tells me exactly how much traffic I’m getting, where the traffic is coming from and how long they are spending on my site.

 

 

These are three key metrics that everyone should focus on when trying to increase traffic to their blog. When you see a specific marketing strategy working better than the others, you focus more of your efforts on that specific factor.

 

 

Conclusion

 

Getting traffic to your blog is a long and challenging process. In this article, I shared some of my tips on how to get more traffic to your blog. What are some things that have worked specifically well for you?

 

 

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10 Helpful Tips For Using Twitter For Marketing

In this article, I share 10 helpful tips for using Twitter for marketing. If you’ve always wanted to unlock the potential of Twitter, this post is perfect for you.

 

Twitter is an underrated marketing tool that many people often tend to overlook. For me, it’s been one of the most successful ways to market myself and my businesses.

 

 

Many businesses and personal brands have been thriving for the last few years when they have unlocked the tricks behind using Twitter. In this article, I share my 10 helpful tips for using Twitter for marketing:

 

 

1. Create A Professional Profile

 

The image for your profile picture is 81 x 81 pixels. The image for your header is 520 x 260 pixels. Make sure you get a graphic designer to professionally create these images for you so that you reflect your brand properly.

 

 

2. Post More Than General Messages

 

Everyone wants to sell more merchandise or get more customers using Twitter, but it’s not that easy. Don’t bore your followers and potential customers by sharing the same boring stuff. Look for unique content or posts that you can share with your audience.

 

 

3. Actively Check Your Mentions

 

Speedy responses are a great way to stay connected with your audience. If someone has a comment, question or concern….they should be able to tweet at you. Check it every few hours and make sure you provide helpful answers to your mentions. It’ll make your brand look a little better.

 

 

4. Use Hashtags The Right Way

 

Hashtags aren’t a way to spam random words or phrases into each of your posts. That’s the easiest way to look like an amateur. If you want to use hashtags properly, search for different phrases. Go through these phrases that are relevant to your business or brand and see how you can make a splash.

 

 

5. Tweet Consistently And Regularly

 

The more you tweet from your profile, the healthier your account is. I try posting 3-4 times a day on my personal Twitter account. The key to Twitter marketing is to ensure you have a high level of engagement with your audience. The more tweets you put out, the better your engagement numbers will be.

 

 

6. Follow The Trends

 

Twitter has a trending section on the left that shows you the most popular things that are taking place at a specific time. If you put your brand or business in more of the trending topics (relevant ones), you will have more people looking at your business. If you tag your posts with trending hashtags, you can raise awareness for your brand easily.

 

 

7. Images And Videos Convert Well

 

No matter what social network you are on, you’ll find that images and videos tend to convert better than anything else. Twitter works just the same even though most posts are driven through text. If you can find images or videos to mix in with your posts, that’ll get more eye balls to your page.

 

 

8. Integrate Twitter With Your Other Marketing Methods 

 

If you have a blog or website, make sure you are finding a way to connect your site with your social media profiles. For example, I have a “Follow Me” button and a Twitter feed showing my latest posts on my website. If you can get your visitors to convert to followers, you are putting your potential customers closer than before.

 

 

9. Action Words Have Higher CTR’s 

 

If you’re looking for a higher click-through-rate, you need to include action words that feature verbs and adverbs in your posts. Marketers have analyzed over 200,000 links that have contained tweets and they quickly found out that verbs and adverbs had much higher CTR’s than tweets that were heavy with adjectives and nouns.

 

 

10. Be Authentic 

 

The key to Twitter is that a ton of different personalities are active on it. You need to be original and authentic with the way you post your content on that network. Showcase your brand through your tweets, don’t be too focused on putting up a fake front. Authenticity always win at the end.

 

 

Conclusion

 

In this article, I shared my 10 helpful tips for using Twitter for marketing. What are some tips that have worked especially well for you?

 

 

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How To Become The Person Everyone Wants To Do Business With

In this article, I share my tips on how to become the person everyone wants to do business with. If you aren’t well-liked, it’s going to be really hard to close deals in the business world.

 

If people don’t like you, they won’t do business with you. As crazy as it sounds, it’s a statement filled with honesty. People always say, “Well Mark Zuckerberg was an asshole and look how far it took him.”

 

 

The truth of the matter is that people hated doing business with these guys. Many people actually pass on opportunities with people like that. The ones who did business with him were skeptical and had to put up with a lot of stuff.

 

 

In this article, I share my tips on how to become the person everyone wants to do business with:

 

 

Give A Shit

 

I respect people that are honest and actually give a shit about their craft. You don’t need to be the smartest or flashiest person in the world, but you need to give a damn about what you do.

 

 

So many people go around not giving a damn about their job and will do anything to make some money. I call those individuals sleazy and that is an automatic reason for me not to do with business with them. If you’re actually honest, care about other people’s best interest and put your 100% in on every deal, people will be more than happy to work with you.

 

 

Listen 

 

If you want people to hear you out, you need to reciprocate the same action to them. Active listening is defined as something where you respond to things that people say with timely verbal and/or nonverbal reinforcements.

 

 

If you can master the skill of actually listening and communicating that to your clients, they’ll be happy with what they have. Look at people directly while they speak and be prompt with your responses to their questions.

 

 

Don’t Be Too Serious

 

Being professional is important, but there is a line that you shouldn’t cross. I enjoy having the ability to deal with another professional who isn’t scared of talking about personal things as well. If you’re too serious, the relationship is strictly formal.

 

 

Well-liked individuals do a good job of getting personal without really getting too personal. You can break down some basic walls and barriers by starting some small talk. I’m always asking people how their day went, what they have planned after and I create conversation using those answers.

 

 

Be Hospitable 

 

If someone comes in for a meeting, I expect them to have some sort of decency and respect for me and the environment they are in. Don’t be a messy slob that comes in and makes a mess of the place before leaving.

 

 

Your manners, politeness and cleanliness are all things that others will look at. If you’re going to eat something, do it but don’t be a pig.

 

 

Reach Out

 

Lastly, this is something that many people never seem to understand. You cannot get a meeting or score a deal with someone unless you make the effort. Reach out to initiate the conversation and you will be surprised at what you can come up with.

 

 

Respect people if they aren’t interested and make sure you aren’t too pushy, but always make the effort to try. You won’t ever know unless you try.

 

 

Conclusion 

 

In this article, I shared my tips on how to become the person everyone wants to do business with. What are some things that you have done that have made you really likable in the business world? Share them in the comments below.

 

 

photo credit: Nguyen Vu Hung (vuhung) via photopin cc

 

How To Create Content For Your Blog

In this article, I share my tips on how to create content for your blog. Whether you just launched a blog or have had one for years, this article will help you.

 

After a couple months of blogging, many people lose their consistency due to a couple of reasons. The most popular one I’ve heard is because they run out of things to blog about.

 

 

That’s a reasonable problem, but it doesn’t mean you should throw in the towel for your blog. Over the years, I’ve been able to consistently maintain the number of times I blog while still producing content that has been worthwhile for my audience.

 

 

In this article, I share my tips on how to create content for your blog:

 

 

Start With Your Personal Experiences

 

When I started having a tough time thinking of content to write, I knew I had to plan weeks ahead. I lived my life and if I experienced something that I felt would be a great blog post, I quickly pulled out my phone and wrote it in my notes section.

 

 

The best blog posts come from your personal experiences. If you witnessed something or experienced it firsthand, you can definitely share that with your audience. People love when you get personal so it’s a great way to create compelling content!

 

 

Look At The Competitors

 

The first thing I did when creating my blog was look at what similar bloggers in my niche were writing about. There are also tools such as BuzzSumo.com where you can enter a domain and see what the most popular pages on that website are.

 

 

When you find out what your competitors are writing about and which of their posts have done the best, it doesn’t mean you go and replicate that exact content. Instead, you use their successes to give you creative inspiration of your own.

 

 

Ask Your Audience

 

Another really great way of creating content is asking your audience what they want you to write about. Do an email survey or a short pop-up questionnaire on your website to get submissions from your loyal readers.

 

 

See what they want to hear about and chime in on the topics that you can provide a great perspective. That’s an easy, but effective way to create great content that will resonate with your audience.

 

 

Look For Trending Topics In Your Niche

 

Depending on what your niche is, you can find a lot of things to write about depending on what is trending. If you keep your eyes open and look for specific topics that are trending, you can voice your opinions about it.

 

 

You can use social media sites, major publications and even talk with others to figure out what topics are hot in a specific niche. Then, figure out your perspective on it and share it with your audience.

 

 

Conclusion

 

In this blog article, I shared my tips on how to create content for your blog. What are some things that you have done that have helped you quite a bit?

 

 

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7 Ways Successful Entrepreneurs Think Differently

Compare it to the way you think and see if you spot any noticeable differences. In this article, I share 7 ways successful entrepreneurs think differently.

 

Entrepreneurs are a different breed of people. Entrepreneurs don’t just live on their desires, they turn their dreams into realities. Thus, it allows them to be successful as an entrepreneur.

 

 

You cannot be successful as an entrepreneur unless you take massive action with your ideas. This is a proven fact. Nevertheless, making it out as an entrepreneur requires a lot of grit and persistence.

 

 

However, successful entrepreneurs don’t just work harder, they also think differently. In this article, I share 7 ways successful entrepreneurs think differently:

 

 

1. They Like Having Competitors 

 

Most people are terrified of having competitors. They shy away from the opportunity and decide to go into a different niche that has absolutely no competition. However, I love competition.

 

 

Why? Well, competitors give you something to study. If a company has been in a niche for 5 years, I can now study what they’ve done really well and what they’ve done horribly. After studying that, I can take that information and use that as an advantage when launching my business. Competition is great, always embrace it!

 

 

2. They Don’t Overlook Any Opportunity

 

We all have times where we are extremely busy or stressed so we let a golden opportunity slip right past us. However, successful entrepreneurs will look at every opportunity equally. They don’t discriminate towards an opportunity based on their current situation.

 

 

You never know when the next billion dollar opportunity is zooming right past you. Be smart and keep an open mind. You’ll be surprised at how many amazing opportunities you can find yourself getting involved with.

 

 

3. They Are Perfectly Fine With Making Mistakes 

 

If you think you have to be perfect to succeed, you won’t be successful at anything. Mistakes are great because you have the opportunity to learn something. Not only that, but mistakes humble you.

 

 

The most successful entrepreneurs have made some big mistakes along the way. They have kept a positive mind about it, learned from the experience and bounced back. As an entrepreneur, you need to embrace your mistakes and grow from them.

 

 

4. They Have Vision

 

Successful entrepreneurs always have a vision. When Steve Jobs started out at Apple, people thought he was a lunatic. Fast-forward to today and he’s a genius. Why? Because he had vision from day one.

 

 

Having vision is rather simple. Entrepreneurs are always driven by an idea that is a creative solution to a problem they see. Some people may agree and some may not. If you truly believe that it is the way to solve the problem, see your vision out.

 

 

5. They Can Adapt Quickly

 

Charles Darwin said it best when he said, “It is not the strongest of species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”

 

 

Entrepreneurs have the ability to adapt to any situation that is thrown towards them. They view obstacles as challenges and are constantly doing whatever it takes to overcome the next hurdle. If you want to be successful as an entrepreneur, you need to have open mind and a willingness to switch things up.

 

 

6. They’d Rather Work More And Earn Less

 

Many people feel that they need to earn a certain amount of money for every hour they work. If you’re that type of person, entrepreneurship is the wrong profession for you.

 

 

Entrepreneurs sometimes have to work 60 hours a week without getting paid a single dollar. It’s having belief that your hard work now will pay off years from now and allow you to make more money than you could have imagined. If you are obsessed with security in the present, entrepreneurship is the wrong career for you.

 

 

7. They Don’t Look Back 

 

The past is the past for a reason. Sure you could have made a better decision, but you didn’t. That story is over. You should only be looking ahead to see how you can impact your business and help yourself be more successful.

 

 

Many people have a tendency to have regrets that overwhelm them. Successful entrepreneurs have no regrets and understand that every decision made was the best possible option at the time. Never look back and think about what could have happened.

 

 

Conclusion

 

In this article, I shared 7 ways successful entrepreneurs think differently. Have you found any of these things to be true?

 

 

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8 Signs You’re Destined To Be Self-Employed

In this article, I share 8 signs you’re destined to be self-employed. Find out what characteristics the most successful entrepreneurs tend to share with one another.

 

I often get asked, “Do you think anyone can become an entrepreneur?” I do truly believe that anyone can become an entrepreneur at any point in their life.

 

 

However, entrepreneurship isn’t for everyone. Even though everyone can do it, most people won’t succeed at it. However, other people are really well-suited for becoming an entrepreneur.

 

 

Here are 8 signs you’re destined to be self-employed:

 

 

1. You Like Doing Things On Your Own Terms

 

If you love having flexibility, being self-employed is great for you. Most people need discipline and someone looking over them making sure they’re doing the right thing. There are a rare few that are happy to get things done, but they would rather do it on their own. If you’re a self-motivated individual that likes freedom, self-employment is a great route.

 

 

2. You Are Filled With Passion 

 

In order to really succeed as an entrepreneur, you need to be passionate. If you aren’t passionate, your chances of becoming successful become a lot harder because it truly becomes work. However, those that are filled with passions and decide to pursue them tend to have a much higher success rate.

 

 

3. You Are Borderline Crazy

 

Steve Jobs said it best when he said that those who are crazy enough are usually the ones who change the world. That’s really true. If you aren’t obsessing over your ideas, you’re probably not going to be successful. Those who are filled with passion and crazy ideas are usually the ones that make it out in the world.

 

 

4. You Never Fit The Norm

 

If you’ve never fit the norm ever since you were young, it doesn’t mean you are weird. It just means you’re different and that is something that is embraced in the world of entrepreneurship. If you’re comfortable in your skin and you aren’t scared of what others have to say, entrepreneurship is the perfect route for you.

 

 

5. You’re Always Looking Out For Opportunities

 

Life is all about keeping your eyes open. Some people are really good at doing this while others don’t do so well with this. If you keep your eyes open and smell out the opportunity, you have a very good chance of being successful with your own business.

 

 

6. You Like Making Your Own Rules

 

If you’ve always had a tough time listening to authority or following the rules laid out by someone else, entrepreneurship may be a great route for you. Growing up, I was the biggest rule breaker. I hated rules and disregarded them like they didn’t matter. Turns out, that was an early sign showing that I was destined to be self-employed.

 

 

7. You’d Rather Control Your Own Destiny

 

Do you like taking accountability for your own successes or failures? Are you someone who would rather be in charge rather than following behind someone else’s advice? If so, being self-employed is a great route for you to take. If you want to control your own destiny and succeed on your own terms, entrepreneurship is a great path for you.

 

 

8. You’ve Never Done Well With Jobs

 

Believe me, I was the worst employee ever. I had about 10-12 jobs in a span of two years. At each of these jobs, I was either getting fired or quitting on my own because of how frustrated I was with things. Many other people feel the same way about their jobs. If you’ve never been one to adapt to jobs, entrepreneurship may be the ideal choice.

 

 

Conclusion

 

In this article, I shared 8 signs you’re destined to be self-employed. What other signs led you to becoming an entrepreneur?

 

 

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10 Big Mistakes That Bloggers Make With Their Websites

In this article, I shared the 10 big mistakes that bloggers make with their website. Are you guilty of making any of these mistakes on your website?

 

Starting a blog is probably one of the greatest decisions you can make. I see more and more blogs popping up on the internet, but they’re still making the same mistakes.

 

 

In this article, I share the 10 big mistakes that bloggers make with their website:

 

 

1. Attracting The Wrong Audience

 

The other day, I saw the most ridiculous thing possible. I went to a blog and the guy was a web developer, but his branding was targeting golfers. It’s fine to blog about something that isn’t your profession, but every third post of this guys had something to do with coding.

 

 

If you attract the wrong audience, your traffic numbers will be horrible. If you’re going to write about golf, keep it strictly about golf. I’m pretty sure the percentage of golf players to web developers is extremely low. There is no relevancy between the two topics.

 

 

2. Being Really Inconsistent

 

Out of all honesty, I have had a lot of trouble with this aspect of blogging as well. Starting your own blog is a huge commitment and many people don’t realize that until a few months after they start their site.

 

 

I promised myself I would try posting 2-3 articles each week no matter what happened. In the last couple months, I’ve gotten extremely busy and have a hard time juggling my posting schedule. If you do start a blog, you want to be consistent with the type of content you post and how often you post it.

 

 

3. Focusing On Quantity Instead Of Quality

 

It’s not about how many articles you post. It’s truly about the quality of each of the articles that you do share. Many people think that if they spam the hell out of their site and share 40-50 posts a month, they’ll get a ton of traffic.

 

 

However, that’s a myth. Some of the most successful bloggers I know only post 3-4 times a month. When they do post, their quality is so amazing that they absolutely kill it.

 

 

4. Poor Writing

 

Before you can start a blog, you need to make sure that you touch up on your writing skills. Make sure that you brush up on your basic writing skills and have a strong focus on editing each of your posts.

 

 

Whether you hire someone to edit your posts or you do it yourself, you need to make your writing as strong as possible. An easy way to turn people away from a site is by having a blogger that can’t communicate their thoughts effectively.

 

 

 

5. Poor Headlines 

 

Your headline is literally everything. Think about it this way, if a movie trailer sucked….would you watch the movie? No chance in hell.

 

 

There’s a reason why production companies spend a large portion of their budget on just perfecting the movie trailer. Your headline is the same thing. I recommend writing down 10-12 different headlines for each article. Ask your friends and family which of the headlines would get them to click through to the post. Take those votes and make your final decision afterwards.

 

 

6. Selling Yourself Way Too Much

 

The one thing that I learned early on by starting this blog was that selling yourself is not going to make your website successful. Instead of focusing on how I can make money off of my readers, I just created a platform where I want to help people for free.

 

 

If people find my services helpful, they will take the next step on their own. Don’t start a blog just because you heard it’s a good way to sell yourself. It’s really not. Your audience isn’t going to like you for it. Focus on producing great content that will give people a stronger connection to you.

 

 

7. You Don’t Invite Engagement

 

Does your blog have a section for people to chime in on your post and write comments? Do you make it easy for your audience to share your post on social media? These are some key things that will help your blog be successful.

 

 

Many people disable the comments section on their blog or put a small share button at the end of the article. On my blog, you’ll notice I integrated Disqus (a popular comment platform) and I have a share bar that follows the user throughout. If they do want to share the piece or respond, it’s readily available.

 

 

8. You Don’t Have A Good Design

 

For some reason, I have gone to some blogs that have completely grouped up a ton of content in one space. If I can’t read your blog without being annoyed, I’m not going to read it. I don’t care how good your content is.

 

 

Make your content easy on the eyes for your audience and make it inviting. If you don’t, your bounce rate will automatically increase.

 

 

9. Not Optimizing Your Posts For SEO

 

Believe it or not, optimizing your posts to get search engine traffic is really possible. Content is still one of the easiest ways to get traffic from the search engines. However, many bloggers totally abandon this idea.

 

 

The first step is creating keyword rich titles. Go on the Google Ad Words Tool and see what things people are searching for, can you change your title to make it apply to that niche? Also, make your URL’s match the keyword you’re targeting. Last but not least, I installed WordPress SEO by Yoast on my blog to help with the SEO.

 

 

10. Being Fake

 

If you read about a blog making 6 figures in the pet industry, it doesn’t mean you go create a pet blog. Many people are guilty of doing this and it’s a horrible idea. If you try creating a blog without being authentic, people will catch on.

 

 

Someone else may be successful in another industry because they are passionate and knowledgeable about it. For someone else with no experience to come in and reciprocate that success will be extremely difficult. Don’t chase the money, chase your own passions.

 

 

Conclusion
In this article, I shared the 10 big mistakes that bloggers make with their website. What are some other mistakes you’ve seen others made?

 

 

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