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So after 120+ posts, here is a summary in case someone wants to see it...
User: You should try X...
MTF: But I don't like X...
User: You should try Y...
MTF: Yea but, Y don't work because it has low probability...
User: You should try Z...
MTF: I don't like Z...
User: You should try A...
MTF: Yea, but A doesn't work in my experience...
User: You should try W...
MTF: But W requires me to be part of the Twitter country club...
User: You should try B...
MTF: I tried B for 3 days and it didn't work...
User: You should try C...
MTF: I don't like C because it involves X and I hate X...
User: You should try D...
MTF: I looked into D and didn't like it...
User: You should try E...
MTF: I won't dare do E because...
User: You should try F...
MTF: F is not an option because...
User: You should try G...
MTF: G requires A and B and I won't do A and B because...
User: You should try H...
MTF: I refuse to do H because....
User: You should try J...
MTF: My personality won't allow J...
User: OK, then how about JJ? ...
MTF: My identity is THIS and THIS won't do JJ...
User: You should try K...
MTF: I can't do K because I travel...
User: You should try M...
MTF: M is for low-wage 3rd worlders...
User: How about Q, could be fun...
MTF: Yea but, Q is saturated so my chances are really low...
User: How about R...
MTF: R is too slow and what if it don't work?
And this my friend, is why nothing changes.
In fact, I think we went through a similar conversation like this 5 years ago.
And here we are again.
It is very hard to change your results when you refuse to change yourself.
That's a very unfair summary and I don't agree with it at all.
I carefully consider each post and respond without trying to dismiss it (if anyone feels that I dismissed their post, let me know and I'll do better). I agree with most of what has been said in this thread so far.
The only thing I did dismiss outright is the idea of building a big business as suggested by Antifragile as well as his blockchain idea (which in a later post I admitted that it was due to my limiting belief).
I also did dismiss ideas that are more of the same of what I've been doing unsuccessfully (relying on one platform like Twitter) and the idea of building a business based on my hobby (which goes completely against your most important tenet).
There may have also been an impression that I dismissed some offline ideas. Me wanting the freedom to travel is the most important reason behind not wanting to have an offline business. But also, come to a country next door to a huge conflict that may spill over the rest of Europe and tell me how confident you are in launching a business in such circumstances. I don't want anything local as I need to be mobile in case they start doing something stupid like drafting for war. I know that the US doesn't care anymore but in Europe it's still a huge threat.
As a side note, I do avoid news about it but I have to keep following it every now and then in case the risk of the conflict spilling over increases (for which I have escape plans).
I took notes from many other posts and wrote down some rules I'll follow when I feel ready to start again.
As for the rest, I simply said I'm not looking actively for any ideas now. As pointed out by some people in this thread, I can't take any sensible action now in my mental state.
I acknowledge I need to fix myself and my mental state and that's what I've been doing the past few days:
- I decided to stop all current projects and take off pressure to reduce stress.
- I reached out to an old friend and went to a sauna together for the first time in 4 years. I took an ice bath as well and in general tried to relax and take my mind off any business-related stuff.
- I reached out to another old friend and went on a long walk together. It turns out that he as well has been dealing with burnout and other similar problems so we talked about that.
- I talked with another friend going through something similar and with a similar inner wiring as mine.
- I talked with three other people about it as well. This is all because of a suggestion from a poster or two about changing the environment/people and getting a different perspective.
- I'm prioritizing rest and recovery.
- Offline businesses - for reasons explained above.
- Businesses that rely on one platform - because this isn't a real business, as explained by BizyDad.
- Businesses that rely on content/writing - because I've done too much of that and it doesn't work for me anymore.
- Businesses that masquerade as businesses but are in reality passion projects - because I've done that already as well and it's stupid.
- Businesses that are "hot trends" or rely on arbitrage - as suggested by you to avoid.
Again, what's the freaking point unless its part of a content marketing strategy with a legit product/service?
If I post an article about goals at GoalSumo.com, its to attract visits which attract trials which attract subscribers.
Article = Visitors = Trials = Subscribers.
Posting articles for visitors with no end game other than hoping Google pays you 9 cents for a random click is the dumbest "entrepreneurial" idea ever.
Why does every business model you pursue involve some circuitousness business model where sales and profits become this nebulous concept?
What ever happened to creating value and selling it?
I have an impression that you misunderstood my post. I merely said that content marketing takes longer to work than paid advertising. That's what I meant by an ad - paying for an ad to get those visitors FASTER to a website rather than waiting for content marketing to work. I did not refer to ads as a monetization method.
I don't want to use content marketing for now because I want to test fast, as suggested by Andy Black. That's the only thing I said. This is exactly your advice as well as Andy's. Instead of writing content and waiting 1-2 years for it to work, test faster with paid ads.
So my point is that if I were to start a new business, I would NOT write any content for it. I would buy some ads and test this way and try to scale through ads. Content COULD become a part of the marketing strategy in the future. But my problem is that I take too long to test ideas so it makes sense to avoid marketing strategies that are slower to produce results.
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