Transcripts
1. Introduction: So we live in a really busy and slightly overwhelming world. And when we're trying to start or even grow our passion and our creativity into a businesses, supports our lifestyle and supports our life. It can become a little bit confusing and a little bit overwhelming. But we're about to have some fun and also learn how to turn this process in this journey that you're on into something that's really simple and really enjoyable and something that's inevitable. We're gonna give you the five top tips and tricks and mindsets and strategies that you can start using today to quickly grow your creative pursuit no matter what niche or what field that you're in. So I'm looking forward to seeing you in Tip number one. Well, we can stop our journey.
2. The Compound Effect: Awesome. So the first tool that we're going to use is sort of a mindset shift. Because a lot of artists and creative people, we get stuck in the short-term focus things and it's really hard to sort of plan long-term. And this is one of the biggest things that really helped me and helped me turn my businesses around and help me tell my brand around, is seeing the power of compounding. Now, compounding, it's normally spoken in like the financial sense, compounding interest, actually making money. But I want you to think about a snowball or an avalanche. It starts at the top with just a small bit of snow rolling down. You can see this little snowball up here. And as it goes down the hill, it builds momentum, it gets faster and also the snow sticks to snow. So it starts picking up and getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And then all of a sudden you have this massive avalanche where half this hill, half this mountain is sliding. Now. That is the same with your business where they are creative, whether you run a small brand, whether you sell jewelry, every single niche, it's going to take initial momentum to get started to show you a good example of this. This is our YouTube channel, which it's not, it's nothing crazy at the moment. We're going to go about 9 thousand subscribers. But I want to show you the speed as that it's growing because we're being consistent over time or taking advantage of this compounding interest when it comes to out business. And this is going to be the same as u. And this is why most people get this Hutton because you can see at the start when we started posting videos about seven months ago, we really weren't getting much traction. You can see back here, we had a couple of videos go up a little bit ago, but we didn't really focus and get consistent until here. And we weren't really doing extremely well. We're just going to have few views per video, but we're just stayed consistent because this is after I'd learn that you need to be consistent. Consistent is the most powerful thing. And I was always like, oh, that's what everyone always says he's already made if they just use this little hack over here instead. And I didn't realize that the more assets you're putting out there, the more videos that I'm putting out here, the more chances People are gonna come and see it. And they almost become like little employees. So if you're a graphic designer, for example, you need to consistently be putting out your work, showing people consistently overtime. Don't depend on one piece of content to take off that be like, How do I put out five pieces of content on Instagram a day showcasing my work. And as soon as you can become consistent, now show you how to do more of that. Breaking down the processor, you can create more and produce more in the next step. But for now I want you to see because we're being consistent, you can see our snowball and now avalanche is building up and up and up and up and up to the point where you can see we're at about 3400 views a day now, where just a couple of months ago we almost half that. And then a couple of months of for that half that. And because we're just doubling every couple of months, we are going to have a very, very big channel in just about a year. But lot of people can't see that long-term and they want instant results. And that means that competing with everyone who wants instant results and then give up up three months. Because the trickiest part about this is the most work and the most friction is done here, getting into the process, learning how to produce your content, learning how to consistently create in a way that you enjoy, in a way that you're actually passionate about. That's the hardest part. And learning all the software, the tools had to make thumbnails or whatever, whatever outlet I'm going to help you choose the best outlet or best distribution for your creative craft. But for us it was YouTube. And these were the hottest videos to make. And then all of a sudden, we got into a routine. We know how to make it, we know what the audience likes, and we can make him a lot. Crickets are taking three days per video. Now we only about an hour, so it gets easier and easier. And you can imagine basically the inverse of this graph here where this is the hardest one and it gets easier and easier and easier and easier as you get more and more results. And it's this lag time on results that's holding you back and holding Most people back. And if you can overcome the need for immediate results and know that if you pick the right platform where demand is and I'll get to that in a minute. Get the right process and routine for you to be uploading and putting your content out there in the world for people to actually discover, you're gonna get results exponentially over time.
3. Your Vision: The second biggest tip that I can give you that's really, really going to help you, is you don't need to read this book, but I've read it for you. It's called Breakthrough advertising by Eugene Schwartz. Now it's a terrible looking book because it was written a long time ago and actually it's out of print now and is very well sought after. And I believe I've had about $300 for this book just because it is so sought after and and one of my mentors recommended it to me. I'm like, okay, I'll invest that money to get the information. And I can give you the information that you need from that book. And basically, the biggest thing that I learned is you can't manufacture demand. So any company in history who's tried to create a demand has always gone out of business. And if you are trying to manufacture some form of demand for your content, manufacture some form of demand that doesn't already exist in the market for your product or your service. You're going to be trying to swim upstream. Instead, you need to understand what demand is already out there in the market. For example, if you sell jewelry and you're selling these really big chunky bracelets and he like, I love these bracelets. And I want to put these on Etsy and I want to put these on Pinterest back to my Shopify store. And for some reason that just not being solved, no one's actually picking up and no one's actually pushing that buy button. You need to know what are they pushing the buy button, not because people are buying bracelets, but they just don't want that sort of bracelet, even if you're passionate about it. So you need to go out there and you need to find on Amazon, for example, what are the most sold pretty feminine looking bracelets for these women who are out there shopping. Or you can go to Etsy and he can do the same. Let's go see how many sales these things have. And what you need to do is you need to understand, oh, actually they liking really thin ones at the moment. These women and shopping for thin bracelet says the fashion ends like, you know what? I can make some thin bracelets as well. And you switch from swimming upstream trying to sell things that people don't necessarily want at the moment. And you switch that to selling them something that they really want, but that they find it hard to get and think of how much easier things are going to be happening. So if you're, for example, a photographer and you're selling head shots, and people aren't really going off to head shots at the moment because there's not that much things going on in the professional industry as things have slowed down because of that coronavirus, for an example. And just still trying to sell these head shots. When maybe another photography niche has picked up. Maybe people want product photos now because they're starting to sell their own products because everyone stock Herman, they're trying to sell things online. So maybe you want to switch to I can take photos of your products for you. And instead of swimming upstream, just a small pivot will get you into that demand that's already there. And that's really just going to Tenex your results because you're listening to what people want and delivering that to them. A really good example of this and a almost like a zoomed out example because it's what we need to do is we need to find what people want and the format that they wanted in for u. And a good example up here is my friends at Charisma on Command. They teach people dyes and girls and everyone had to become more charismatic. How to become more persuasive and more confident. And they use, they started as a blog and they wrote a blog post about it. And they did okay, I lived with them at the time. They made okay money. But all of a sudden, my friend set of putting out videos showcasing the confidence that came with the result. And they started a YouTube channel called Charisma on Command. And now they have at the moment of a 4 million subscribers growing very, very quickly. Because you can understand what when you're teaching charisma. You want to be able to see the results. You wanna be able to see what you're teaching. And instead of reading the words about how charismatic you can B, they use people who are celebrities, people who are charismatic and showcasing the results that you get by doing these exercises to become more charismatic and people absolutely loved it. There's a lot of demand for this and it's in the right format. So you need to make sure whether it's pinterest, whether it's Etsy, whether it's eBay, Amazon, whether it's YouTube, which platform already has demand for what you want, for what you're giving, for what you're teaching. So go and see if someone's already doing well, charisma as well. You can come and see that this channel is doing great on YouTube. So you know the demands already there, but you need to use this thing called modelling by finding someone who's already got the results you've got and then replicating that, but putting your own unique artistic twist on it. So whether YouTube's working with Etsy, is working with a Pinterest is working what's working for you and your niche out there. Go and double down on them and then combine that with the first step of consistency and exponential growth. And you're well on your way.
4. Your Archetype: Awesome. The third tool to get more out of yourself and more out of your brand and your business is a quiz next sequence by Tony Robbins. It's called, What's Your Business identity? And 90% of us are going to be artists. But I want you to come and actually do this quiz because it's going to highlight your strengths and also highlight our weaknesses. So where are we not good at? And as an artist were normally very passionate about our work. We put our identity and our pride into it, and we're creative. We'd like to create things, but we also have the manager and the entrepreneur inside of us. And we have to realize that to get our business going, to get a brand going and be able to monetize our craft and our passion. We need to tap into some of the aspects of the manager and the entrepreneur which we all have. And the biggest one that we can do. And also make sure you come and do this quits because you may find that you may be actually be erring on the side of a manager or an entrepreneur. And you'll be able to realize what weaknesses you actually have. And as soon as you recognize them, as soon as they're like, oh, you find it hard to stay consistent. You like i do find it hard to stay consistent. And you wanna make sure that you know your strengths and your weaknesses. And he played to them. I'm going to assume that, that we're all going to be Odysseys artist at the moment. And the thing about an artist is we need to make sure that we are consistent in our work and that we're viewing things on a long-term perspective. There are a couple of our weaknesses. And when we start to do this, we can actually start to tap into some of the entrepreneur and some of the manager who's going to keep us consistent is going to keep us to be able to get those long-term results. And he's going to be able to get us to move something that's just a passion and a side project that we're not currently getting paid for were not currently getting paid enough to live our lives yet. And it's going to turn it into something that is going to be something we're passionate about doing something we love something that's an expression of ourselves that also is going to pay for our life. And it's going to pay for our life on a level above where we currently are. And when we can make all three of these archetypes and identities come together. That's when we can really achieve this. And we can do this in a way that's enjoyable the entire way without feeling like we are going to be selling out. So definitely come and do this quiz. And then I'm going to be showing you in the next lecture exactly how we can combat one of our biggest weaknesses as an artist.
5. Routine: So this fourth strategy is a powerful one when we really can harness it. And it actually makes everything that we're trying to achieve really, really easy, especially when we combine all of these things together. Now it starts with Benjamin Franklin and everyone has a background on the sanding Benjamin Franklin. He was a early American settler and really helped establish the USA as a start of a powerhouse and the start of a democracy. And he's very well known for his daily schedule and he's routine and something that a lot of people on doing or not doing as well as they could be, is established, establishing a very concise routine that's going to keep us responsible for ourselves. And a lot of people get into entrepreneurship and a lot of people get into having a small business or a brand or a passion project so that they don't have to have our routine. They don't have to wake up and go from nine to five of 9700 PM and work for someone else and make somebody else rich. But they actually get to live life on their own terms. And for me, when I said with entrepreneurship, this is really what I strove for. And I was all over the place because I wanted to work on I wanted to work and actually found myself a little bit more confused and a little bit less motivated just because I didn't have a set routine. And I found one I had a set routine in at the moment, I worked for four hours a day. This is i went from nine AM to one PM because that's what gets me motivated. That's what keeps everything concise and doesn't overinflate the toss that I haven't like Handel, I just slept those into my four hours of work and then I can be free and live and do whatever I want in the hours than nine AM to one PM and the other 20 hours a day. And that's what I really strongly advise that you do is that you get clear and concise once you know your goal, maybe it's to make $8 thousand a month by creating graphic designs for people. Maybe it's make $8 thousand a month by creating YouTube videos. And once I like we've already gone over, you choose your platform. That's going to work in your craft. You choose the platform where the demand is, say YouTube. You need to be consistent. Remember tip number one. So the best way to be consistent in your output is to be consistent in your input, could be consistent in the work and the schedule that you have. And I recommend setting it up in the morning unless you're not alanine, like working for the night, which a lot of people are. So if that's you definitely go for that. But for me I like to get up, I like to eat. Sometimes I like to work out, but things have changed since being locked down and I've put that to the end of the day. But normally and get up, workout, eat, sit down at my desk. And here I have the studio and this environment that is optimized. The best defaults, meaning I come in here and my computers, the setup, I have a little iPad over here on my keyboard and mouse rated go have this light and this microphone so I can jump on record and I've optimized it to create the output that I need to create. And it's very systematic, and it's very almost becomes automatic in my brain knows what it needs to do and it's activated that those hours. So I highly suggest whatever needs, whatever brand, whatever creative pursuit that you're creating that you do, schedule it, and you stick to that schedule and you will find that your output will become more and more consistent. And that is when you'll tap into those exponential long-term results.
6. Comparison: So the final tip that you need that's really going to help accelerate your results. Is this Court by Theodore Roosevelt. Comparison is the thief of joy. Not only is it the thief of joy, which we'll get into in just a second. But it is the thief of actual result, is the thief of you achieving whatever it is that you need to achieve. So capacitance, the thief of joy is the normal curve. Meaning if you have an amazing day, you know, you get up, you have a great breakfast, you go to work, you make a $100 thousand a year. You have a coup family that you really love and then you get spent time with the loved one. And I'll maybe your kids, and then you go to bed and all of a sudden you're on Instagram and you want someone who has a slightly nicer house. It looks like they have a slightly nicer family. It looks like they have I'm slightly nicer relationship. And even though this may not be true, because Instagram obviously it's just the highlight reel of people's lives. You all of a sudden start to feel a little insecure. You all of a sudden, instead of feeling grateful and appreciative of the things you've got. You start to think, oh, I don't have enough yet, I'm Not enough yet. I need to achieve this before I can feel joy. And obviously we know that that's not true intellectually and we've gotta get there emotionally as well. But it's the same in the business world, are same in the brand world, especially as a creative, a lot of people are going to look to the left, to the right and what's in front of them. They don't look at the goals that they set and their ability to achieve it. They look at people with far different results and they don't even know the insides on the inner workings of their businesses and their brands and if they're even profitable, but they just look better and therefore, you get disheartened. You work a little bit less. You don't do your routine. You start switching lanes, you start investing in bitcoin because you think that's going to be the next best thing and you're not consistent and you're gonna get less results. When I read Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon annual letter to shareholders, I read them all from the start to the finish. I found that even when Jeff Bezos wasn't the biggest in his market, still doing extremely, extremely well. Like when he introduced, he obviously he was a bookstore and they need branched out into web hosting and then he branched out into selling physical products. And then he, he, he branched out into Prime Video. And in my head I'm like, no one uses Prime Video. Everyone uses Netflix ever and uses every other platform, YouTube, even to watch movies and videos. And I've read his annual letter to the shareholders and in the first year, he was like, Oh, we've had, I don't remember these numbers but I'm just gonna make it up. But we've had a 100 billion streaming hours across our new prime video platform. And I'm like, I remember when that came out and everyone was just laughing at it. But he was just looking at the metrics. He didn't care about what people felt and it, and it's the same for me. Like I have a, we have a new YouTube channel which you should go and follow its entrepreneur Academy on YouTube. And we are not a massive channel. But instead of me being like a god, we're burning. At the moment, less than 10 thousand subscribers are only getting a few dollars a day in an ad revenue. It's not where I want it to be. Instead, I'm like, where are we and what is our goal for it? Who we wanted to be at $10 thousand a month. We want it to have a 100 thousand views every single day Cu where at the moment about six or 7% of where we want to be. So instead of being like, regardless, this is, this is hopeless. I'm now starting to double down. I'm now Lai Qu. How can I have more consistent inputs have going to have better value and better quality videos on there to get us from 6% to a 100%. But you can see it's all internally focused. I'm using my own goals. I'm not like, oh look at this mess of channel who gets more views and whole channel does in one hour. I'm like we're on our own path. We're looking internally and I'm measuring yourself against my own goals. And my goal is that coming from something that I'm passionate about it. This is, this is where my business seems to be to make as much money as, as, as we need to make. And you need to use your own goals as a measuring stick. So make sure you get clear new goals. What do you need? What do you need to actually pay for your lifestyle to find your dream lifestyle? Get really reasonable, bat I get clear about it. How much money do you need from that? And then how do you turn your passion into that much money? And remember, you don't wanna do it instantly. You don't have it in the next two months because then you're really going to be selling yourself short, but you want to be doing that in the next one to two years. And then you can stay consistent and then you can have that for the rest of your life. So do not compare yourself to others at you. One last story I'll tell you that I just heard before I recorded this. We had my brother's girlfriend's cousin, I believe, or some something like that, follows our stuff and we talk about, you don't need a 100 thousand followers. You just need a thousand followers who love your stuff. And we'll purchase all of your odd or purchase all of the products that come up with because they provide so much value to them. And this guy had 40 followers and he's a artist, and he sold a piece of art to a guy in the US for a considerable piece of money with 40 followers, just because he targeted the right people. So don't go for what is the biggest nice, What is the biggest thing you can do, but do what you love, do what you're passionate about, and those people will find you and you'll be extremely an account that has 1000 follows that all really passionate about the person is way more powerful than account with a million followers that just post cat means. So don't look at the numbers unless you have measuring them against your own goals. I hope you found this really helpful. Once again, if you do want to follow us on YouTube, go to entrepreneur Academy and you'll be ever see our growth so far since I've made this course. And I really appreciate you bringing it. If you could leave us a review, if it could take 30 seconds, it would really be helpful. And also we have a lot of other really cool content here on Scotia. So make sure you go and check out an entire course library where you can choose your next class to learn together. Thank you so much and the best of luck.
Benji Wilson, Social Media & Entrepreneurship
