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Glenn Mattson
Well, Hey everybody, welcome back to Building Blocks of Success. Last time, we talked about the five stages of entrepreneurial growth and how very difficult it is for individuals to actually become successful as entrepreneurs. I know we see all these things on TV and how easy it is, how successful you can be, and how you can make hundreds of 1000s of dollars in 30 days. Hopefully, the last couple of podcasts you've heard me speak through are really talking about the difficulties, trials, and tribulations that it does take to start one. Now you have to realize that 50% don't make it, a couple of years later, another 50% don't make it. If you make it after, you know, a handful of years then, you're in. But there is a period of just an insane amount of work stress, and this is why many don't make it out of it, but the emerging entrepreneurial. So what we're going to do spend some time today is really taking a look at this phase, this phase that they're in.
Okay, so let's take a journey. I really love this phase with these individuals, because if you really think about it, some of these individuals, have a job, and they're secure in a job. They're competent in what they do. They're actually really good at what they do, but they decided to, all of a sudden say to themselves, I want to let it all go. I'm going to bet on me. I want to bet on building something that's bigger than me, that has really been something inside of them for a long time. So, I gotta give my hats off to and I think everyone else needs to also just have the respect that's needed for a really a small business owner, and the respect and honor that what they're doing and the amount of risk that they're taking to get to where they want to go.
So, today we're going to walk through some patterns and some characteristics. These are patterns and characteristics that entrepreneurs go through. I would consider these are patterns that I see within the emerging entrepreneurial. Now realize we talked about this last time. 90% of the people never get past the Rainmaker phase. But let's start talking about the first one. All right. Now realize that some of these individuals, if they decided to go on their own, decided to do it on their own, and they don't have funding, and this is an important piece to understand. So, many are self-funded.
Self-funded means that's their runway. If they do not produce a certain level of income, a certain level of money coming in, which basically, for many, was to pay our bills. That's the runway of how long they can survive. So what we're going to talk about is today, is with that emerging is, is, how do we understand and how do we get really past the restraints that this runway that we have, right? So let's talk about this, and talk about some of the patterns and some of the things that I see I realize I've helped well over 200,000 people develop and become their best versions of themselves, and well over 15,000 entrepreneurs.
So, I want to have you start taking a look at some of these things I'm going to be walking through. You may hear yourself in these maybe you're someone who works for somebody else. Maybe you're someone who's looking to be your own boss. Maybe you want to get your own book of business. You could be a 1099, I don't know, maybe you have owned a territory, but when we first started, and I use the word entrepreneurial, it's really the characteristics and patterns that make someone up, that decide to go out on their own. When we start to look at this, I have lots of clients in lots of different areas, so let's take a look at what we have to prepare for to get into this phase, and what we have to do to make sure that we can get out of this phase. So, the emerging, let's get into it.
The emerging is when most people have very high motivation, exceedingly high motivation, and low knowledge. What I mean by that is they really don't know everything they need to do to start a business. Yeah, they have the knowledge of the competencies they need. It is for the expertise that they came from, right? Ie maybe they're an accountant. They have the knowledge of being an accountant, but they have very little knowledge of how to run a business or how to be a boss. So think of all these plates that are spinning non-stop. It's crazy, right? You realize that they are spinning very fast, and your job is to keep them all spinning. It's just not one issue. It's not the old world where you focus on one thing, get it done, and move on to the next. You have 8,10, 12 plates constantly spinning, and you have to make sure that you spend the right time, energy, and effort on each of these plates.
A lot of the plates, by the way, you never even thought of so individuals that are dealing with these are just massive, right? So they have a lot of things that they have to get done. You're talking about contracting. You're talking about legal stuff. You're talking about the banks, going to the bank, getting a bank, getting your bank numbers, making sure that you can receive money coming in, how do you deposit it from online sales? Are you going to have IT security? What are you going to be doing from a non-compete standpoint? How you're going to have legal agreements done? What about the legal agreements you're going to have with your clients, etc? So, there's just a lot of things spinning at you. Never mind, what are you going to do with the website? How are you going to make sure that the website looks right? What are your marketing pieces? Etc? So there's just an enormous amount of stuff flying at you at critical points, and they're all over the place.
Part of the shift to remember is the time needed in the focus needed in this phase. One of the biggest mistakes that people make in emerging is they focus too long on too many of the wrong things. That guy was talking to someone the other day, he spent five months making sure he had a really good website, yet he didn't do anything from the standpoint of learning how to actually get people to show up and or how to sell. So he spent pretty much 80% of his nest egg and time with his runway creating what he thought was a monstrous website. See, part of the individuals who get into emerging are exceedingly good at what they do, but they're not good at selling. They started their own business. They weren't salespeople, and when they look into this emerging hat, or, excuse me, emerging phase, they have to put on this thing they called sales, the sales hat. Many, if given an option, would prefer not to do that. So, all of a sudden you have on your left hand things that have to do with selling, and on the right hand is all the other stuff.
It all is important, and in their mind, that's where they spend a lot of their focus. So, all of a sudden, you're focusing on the website. You're focusing on the marketing material, yet you're not focused on revenue. The next thing you know, you're in trouble. See, a lot of people have the Fred Ryerson syndrome, which is they believe selling is ugly, it's rude, and therefore anything that goes with that is something in their mind, I don't want to be part of. So with that, they don't like rejection. They find that more about themselves in that phase, like, for instance, how come I'm uncomfortable calling someone I don't know? How come I'm uncomfortable talking about money? Why do I feel rejection?
Then, all of a sudden, what starts to happen people is they have this negative perception of what selling is. They don't like it, the rejection, everything goes with it. So what starts to happen is they start making excuses. They start making excuses and why they're hiding now, in their mind. Sometimes these excuses are valid, like, hey, I need to spend time on my website to make sure that when I do talk to people, I have someplace to send them. But again, they're using a lot of the other activities as places to hide because they don't like to sell. So, when we look at this, we have to make sure that you're focused on revenue-generating activities.
See, this is the big thing about emerging. You have a lot of stuff coming at you, and many people don't enjoy the sales part, so they do all the other activities besides the sales. What starts to happen is that you have ups and downs in your business. What I mean by ups and downs, it's inconsistent. You may have a sale here, then you go three months of being hungry, then you have another two sales, etc. So, I really want to make sure that we understand inconsistency in the emerging advisor, right? The emerging entrepreneurial level, inconsistency is really the beginning of death. See, when we have inconsistency, we start to get fatigued. Let me tell you what I mean.
You work really hard at something. You're doing pretty well. Then all of a sudden you focus on what you just sold, but you don't focus on filling the funnel again. But all of a sudden you get done with the project, and you have to go back and start all over again. So, instead of having consistency and momentum, which you've heard me talk about forever, they are unfortunately, start, stop, start, stop, start, stop, mentality. If you start understanding, start, stop with the fatigue that starts to happen when you're getting all that work, you're not getting the results that you're getting. You start to get fatigued. That fatigue again, as you're on fire, you're doing well. You take your eye off the ball of doing prospecting. Remember the rules. Do a little bit all the time, not a lot, some of the time.
The next thing you know, the business is starting to get wobbly. So, you focus back over on prospecting and selling the things you don't like to do, and the business picks up a little bit. You stay focused on the project you have to do. You get that project done. You get paid for the project. Next thing you know, you kind of start a little over again. So, I want you to realize highs and lows, inconsistency creates fatigue. Fatigue is the beginning of doubt. Doubt and fatigue absolutely erode your daily commitments. Share that with you again, the mental process. When you're in the emerging and you're going between what we call pay time and no pay time activities, and you work and you have the uncomfortabilities around selling because of that, you don't have consistency because of the inconsistencies, you start to have fatigue.
Once fatigue starts to set in, that's the beginning of doubt. When you have doubt that starts to erode your commitment to your activities. It's kind of the beginning of the end. Tons. That's why, you know, 20% don't make it, literally, in the first 678, months. So there are things that you can do to make sure that we get through this. I mean, look, I have an individual who came from a sales background. He was let go of his position. He came up with an idea. He created the vision and started mapping out the processes. Then it's funny, because he called me, and said, Do you know how much time it takes to actually get a business just up and running, just the legal part of it, the banking part of it, never mind going to the web and the IT side of it and the IT security. He goes, that's insane, on how much energy and effort has to be done. And I agreed with him, and I said, So what are you doing about it? He turned around and said, I outsourced it.
So he literally has three people, three different people, doing three different parts of his business to get it up and running. You know what? Sam spent his time on the vision and revenue. Now, when those plates are spinning, he is having someone else take care of some of those plates, so that when those plates start to slow down, ie, the project that is being done, his revenue is coming at a robust amount of time coming right at it. So they actually collided, which means that Sam, knock on wood, 18 months into his business, has an exceedingly successful practice. See, part of the gig is that you got to get out of the emerging as fast as humanly possible.
So let's take a look at some things, right? So like, for instance, if you're coming into being an emerging advisor, you didn't come from the world of sales. You're not competent in sales, but you're competent in what you do. These are what we call non-selling professions. You may not like sales but realize you are a salesperson. I want to just leave the use of this word over and over, you have to lean into the fact that you're going to be creating revenue. You have to lean into the fact that you have to sell. You have to learn how to sell. You have to learn how to sell the right way. You also have to overcome your fears, yourself, limiting beliefs around selling, stop wimping out, and stop hiding.
Another thing I want you to realize is that when you're in the emerging is. There's a huge difference between being poor and being broke. There's a monstrous difference. See, being poor. There's a there's a rule that we have right. Being poor is a state of mind, and being broke is a condition. Let me give it to you again, being poor is a state of mind, being broke is a condition. I remember when I first got started in my business, purely commission. Sure, there were times when the money wasn't coming in, and you're working 7000 hours a day, but you have to understand that that's being broke. That's a condition. Conditions are fixable. Conditions you can get yourself out of being poor is a state of mind.
So, if you're an emerging advisor, emerging entrepreneur, and you're listening in, realize when the money's not coming in, that's because you didn't do something, or you did something that you weren't supposed to. So, that's not reality. The reality is that you can change that if you do the right activities, you can get it back on course. So, being broke is a condition massive. Let's talk about a few other things that we can do to help with the emerging advisor. First, we talked about, obviously, making sure you lean into sales. Make sure that you really understand at the end of the day, regardless of what you're going to be selling, regardless of what your solution may be.
Again, whatever hat you think you may wait, may wear that could be financial maybe you're a CPA, maybe you're a financial planner, maybe you are a lawyer. Maybe you're someone who does AC. It doesn't make a difference. That's your expertise. Your expertise also has to be in sales. The second thing I would tell you, for an emerging entrepreneur, stop being busy. Be profitable. Stop being busy means that you're doing a lot of what we consider no pay time activities. These are activities like I told you before, with the plate spinning, there's a lot of stuff that needs to get done. A lot of that stuff, if it didn't get done, you can still have some revenue. If you don't have revenue and you get all the other stuff done, you're out of business.
So, realize in your back your mind, that spending time on revenue is important. Another one you may want to take a look at is, besides leaning in, understanding that selling, for most people, most of the roadblocks we have in sales aren't technical. Most of the roadblocks we have in sales are mental. So, if you're an emerging entrepreneur and you are what we call a non-selling professional, it means that your expertise is something else, and sales is the part you have to learn or get better at. Face your fears. You must have a purpose that's going to drive your commitment to follow your business plan. Remember your business plan is your cookbook. The cookbook is the behavior that you have to do to accomplish your personal financial goals through the business every goal must be converted to daily behaviors. So, if you understand what your cookbook is, there are things in there.
They're going to drive you to be fearful. You have to face your fears. You must understand how to fail. I see so many individuals who are terrified of failing, and because they're terrified of failing, they don't do their behaviors, and because they don't do their behaviors, guess what happens exactly they were terrified of failure.
The other thing I want you to take a look at, if you're an emerging entrepreneur, is that when we look at prospecting, and I know many of you shake your head and say, of course, Glenn, you've told us this 6000 times. We get it. But when you look at generating revenue, the rule is, to do a little bit all the time, not a lot some of the time. Again, the rule is, to do a little bit all the time, not a lot some of the time. Sure that you understand about being broke as a condition, poor as a state of mind. Lean into sales, face your fears, and learn how to fail.
You know, it's interesting when you talk about non-selling professionals, when I say to them, you have to learn how to fail, they will say things like, Yeah, but I need the business or I can't lose this one. I always find it interesting how are you afraid of losing something you don't even have yet. So, taking a look at those records that we have is very important. And one of the things that I find most important in emerging entrepreneurial is to get them out of that phase, get them out of that burning building right? There's so much stuff going on. There's so much stuff going on that they can easily hide in certain areas. You can blame it on a bunch of stuff. You can look at your spouse later straight in the eye and say, I gave it my best shot when you know deep down inside, that you hit.
So this one, I'd like you to really think about stop making excuses if you're going to choose to do work on the marketing. If you're going to choose to spend all your time on what font you want to have, yeah, you're going to convince yourself that you're doing that it's necessary when the world of reality is you're doing it because you don't want to prospect, you don't want to sell, you don't want to go out market, and you make excuses for it. Please remember this. Stop making excuses for not doing what should have been done. Excuse makers. 100% of people who fail make excuses. You have any chance of being the successful entrepreneur you have to have to get rid of, excuse me. For all of you out there who have made the decision to go out on your own, for all of you out there who decided to say, hey, I want to give this thing a shot and try it, I have the absolute utmost respect and honor for you to let go of what you know to be true, and literally letting go and trying something different, that is the definition of risking.
For those of you who take the risk and you're non-selling professionals, yes, there's a lot to do, and even if you're a selling professional, there's a lot to do, but realize your primary is revenue. Your primary is making sure that you're going to have the capacity to pay the bills and keep this business moving, and when you don't, or when you're inconsistent with that, that's really the beginning. So keep your momentum. Do your cookbook, and face your fears. Do not accept excuses from yourself, and remember when you get knocked down. All that is a test of your commitment to how badly you want to be an entrepreneur until we talk again. Glenn Mattson, building blocks of success you.
This is the Building Blocks of Success with Glenn Mattson.
