Motivation For Entrepreneurs | Finch Sells

Take Amazing Courses for Free with Leading Universities

Jun 19 2012

What price do you put on your education? I’m not talking about the remnants of factoids you may – or may not – stumble across on this blog. I’m talking about real education, the kind handed out by meticulous professors with sagging beards and white coats.

Thanks to the Internet, learning new skills and advancing your expertise has never been easier. It’s as simple as point, Google, click and digest.

How I Became an Internet Scumbag

Before I evolved in to an affiliate marketer, I was a sloth-like web developer.

Admission: I say evolved, in reality it was more like a Big Bang. A collision between entrepreneurial dreams and the revelation that money truly did grow on trees. Google Money Trees, to be precise.

Before I was a web developer, I was a high school drop-out with too much time on my hands.

I wouldn’t exactly say that I’ve trailblazed my way in to self-employment. A better description would be that I’ve fumbled through the darkness, made a shit ton of mistakes, but ultimately managed to teach myself just enough to make a good living online.

One of the websites that made it all possible was VTC. Now, when you look at VTC today, it may seem a little outdated and slightly tattered around the edges. But back in 2005, VTC was my primary source of education for a career in web development.

As a drop out with a handful of GCSEs and no further education, I relied solely on VTC to teach me the basics of coding; from PHP to JavaScript and basic HTML. I used the site to get an understanding of tools like Photoshop. And it was through that limited binge of squirreled self-teaching that I managed to land a job as a web developer.

I watched video after video after video for a period of at least six months. It was the ‘almost-free’ alternative to a fortune spent attending physical classes.

Looking back, the site has probably shaped why I’m so dismissive of the academic route in to any career that involves a computer. You can find the information online for a lot cheaper than what it costs to attend University.

Sites like VTC and Lynda gave me the platform and the vital skill-set to move seamlessly in to affiliate marketing. I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time. The industry was booming, and I merely had to hold on to the gravy train to steal my first break.

The point I’m rather ambiguously trying to make here is that education is always on your doorstep, and it doesn’t have to cost a fortune. While I used sites like VTC and Lynda to inadvertently guide my career towards Internet Marketing, there are now even greater courses available. And those courses are the reason for this post. They are too fucking awesome to miss out on, so you need to hear about them.

The Rise of Open Courses

A few weeks ago on StackThatMoney, my attention was drawn to a selection of online modules that mark the next great advance in distance learning. These are high quality courses, taught by world-class professors with full integration of the modern digital web.

Take Coursera for example. Coursera offers free courses from some of America’s most renowned Universities. You could learn computer science from Stanford, or model thinking from the University of Michigan, or how about an introduction to genome science from Penn? That’s genome science for Christ’s sake! You’re not supposed to try that shit at home. But now you can.

It’s clear that high quality distance learning now extends far beyond the grainy PHP tutorials I used to watch. You can get an introduction to just about anything if you shop around.

Even Harvard is getting in on the act. The closest I ever thought I’d get to a Harvard brainfart was in those two hours I spent living vicariously through Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network.

Another site that offers a great interactive learning experience is Udacity. While Coursera takes the traditional route of heavy lecturing, Udacity places the priority on getting you to build workable solutions.

One course walks you through the building of a search engine from scratch, while another covers the complete development of a web browser. Udacity is rightly praised for turning the learning experience in to a practical examination of your skills. It forces you to build and develop. So if you can’t handle endless theory and lecture, it may be worth a look.

Apple Smells the Opportunity

If you needed any further evidence that distance learning is about to evolve spectacularly, look no further than Apple’s showcasing of iTunes U.

Having such a wealth of information on a phone or tablet in your pocket should be great reason for excitement. It certainly is for me, and I don’t even have an iPhone (although this is the sort of technology that could make me sell out).

The age old excuse of “I don’t have the skills to move my career forward” is finally being tarred as the bullshit it always was. There’s truly no excuse for accepting defeat and spending a lifetime in a career that you’re unhappy with.

Admittedly, there are some career choices that are always going to require the traditional road through Academia. A surgeon should never qualify to tamper with somebody’s guts by virtue of watching a few video streams. Even if they’re in HD.

But for most people reading this blog, all the information you could ever need to increase your expertise and broaden your prospects is sitting in the cloud, waiting to be tapped. What are you waiting for?

Recommended This Week

Make sure you grab your copy of the newly released Premium Posts Volume 5. It’s the perfect tonic for anybody wanting to crack Internet Marketing on a shoestring budget.
Also be sure to check out Adsimilis, the official sponsor of Premium Posts Volume 5. Adsimilis is one of the most effective networks in the world for a CPA marketer to sink his teeth in to. They are particularly dominant in the dating vertical, with industry leading payouts. If you are a dating affiliate you need to be on Adsimilis. Simples.

Find The Bright Spots of Your Business

Mar 14 2012

I’ve just finished reading Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard, and there’s one point in particular that resonated with me throughout.

If a task is too daunting, or your goals too distant, search for the bright spots and focus on what’s already working.

This is a simple but powerful concept of great significance to Internet Marketers. We are notorious multi-taskers. Our greatest fault is traditionally that we spread ourselves too thin and don’t see projects through to their conclusions.

Think of an SEO project as an example. In your head, you have a starting point – it might be the Google Keyword planner, or an exciting new niche you’ve heard about. And similarly, you have a final destination – typically a highly trafficked, super profitable web property that earns money while you sleep.

The hard part is travelling the road that connects those two destinations. More specifically, it’s the feeling of “What in the hell am I supposed to do now that I’ve launched this shit and I’m sick to death of it?”

Somewhere between defining our vision, and reaping the rewards of its fruition, we face problems; twists and turns that deter us from completing the project. The middle part – the long open road – is always the hardest.

To use the SEO project example, our open road might involve endless backlink building, content creation and keyword tracking. Much of this is laced with dead-ends and hours spent unproductively. The only way to finish these projects, to realise our vision, is to keep searching for the bright spots.

Ask yourself, “What is working? How can I build on it?”

Maybe one of the pages on your site is whoring the majority of the traffic. In which case, can you isolate the variables that are fuelling its popularity? Is it being shared socially? Why is it being shared socially? How can you create more content that ticks the same boxes?

This flexible mindset of learning on the road is vital if you’re going to connect your launch foundations with the end vision of a prosperous money machine.

A fixed mindset rarely ever works in business, and certainly not where SEO is concerned. We are much more successful when we pinpoint the areas that are bringing us the most success, and adapt our work going forward.

This is a fault that has troubled me no end in the past. I have a habit of being too concrete with my processes, and not allowing user feedback or valuable data to manifest itself and shape a more productive strategy going forward. I’m a pretty stubborn bastard, and it’s probably cost me a lot of money.

Switch certainly struck a chord with my stubborn side. I’ve started to re-evaluate my career objectives and match them up to the bright spots of my current business model. It’s resulted in me culling two entire dedicated servers and dropping about 20 domains, but I’m pretty sure I’ve made the right decision going forward.

If you feel like your wheels are spinning in the tracks, and you can’t seem to inch closer to your defining vision, the easiest and most damaging attitude is to focus at what you’re doing wrong. It’s much more productive to find the bright spots and use them as a guiding light. Hinge your business around what’s already working. Focus on your strengths.

I really enjoyed the first half of Switch. It packs in a lot of useful actionable advice that I haven’t read in any other change bible (and I’ve read my fair share). The book loses its focus around the halfway point and descends in to more of a tribute towards the authors’ favourite social psychologists, which might go unnoticed and appreciated by some, but for others will feel like a Robert Cialdini overdose. Still, a recommended read.

Recommended This Week:

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Rich Dad Poor Dad Review

Feb 07 2012

This book, shockingly ranked #1 on Amazon for Personal Finance, might as well have been called Rich Dad Poor Dad Hopelessly Deluded Author. It’s so far detached from real-life wealth generation, that you should probably confine all future Robert Kiyosaki works to the Fiction section. He clearly specialises in talking out of his arse.

It’s five years since I was first recommended Rich Dad Poor Dad, a bestseller that I have always treated with skepticism given the murky nature of Kiyosaki’s upselling regime that sits behind the brand.

After reading the book in two pained sittings, I can safely say that anybody who recommends this slice of warble as valuable literature in the field of personal finance, is out of his damn mind, and knows jack diddly squat about personal finance.

Before we even get to the plot, it has to be said that Kiyosaki is a terrible writer. His storytelling unravels in scenes that would not look out of place in a poorly scripted infomercial. This, of course, is no coincidence. The infomercial is a perfect match for Kiyosaki’s primitive take on wealth generation. The rich are a collective, and the poor are a suffering crowd. It’s in such simple terms that Rich Dad Poor Dad thrives.

It’s difficult to decipher the author’s exact message at times. But I think I’ve nailed it down to 3 key points:

1. Education is important, but always second to financial literacy. People turn out poor because they’re not taught financial literacy.

2. Real estate is a fastlane to wealth. Buy properties at discounted prices, flip them and bank the just rewards. He doesn’t give details on how to implement this ninja wisdom, or how to beat the market. He places the burden on ‘insider tips‘. Mmm, fruitful.

3. Pay yourself first. Even if the government comes knocking on your door, you deserve to be paid first. The best way to do this, in Kiyosaki’s opinion, is to hide under the umbrella of a corporation. The author fails to recognize the difference between business expenses and personal expenses. I’m sure at least some of his devoted readers will have taken the words to heart, used expense accounts to buy rolexes, and will have enjoyed the fist of the IRS lodged firmly up their arses ever since.

Early in the book, Robert explains how he and his best friend Mike became swept under the wing of Rich Dad, a fatherly figure hated by his employees but blessed with the secret of knowing how to generate immense wealth. What could it possibly be?

The boys, at this point, are only 9 years old. Rich Dad puts them to work every Saturday, paying a pathetic 30 cents for their time. One day Robert snaps and can’t take it any longer. “You said you’d teach me the secret of wealth! All you’re doing is forcing me to bust my guts for nothing!”

At this point, Rich Dad launches in to a mind-bending interpretation that he has actually done the boys a favour. He’s proven that the rat race is no way to spend a life.

Note: I’m pretty sure exploiting child labour in the manner of Rich Dad is considered illegal, even in America. Somehow, the madness only escalates.

What follows is a laughably contrived debate between alleged moneybags entrepreneur and inquisitive 9 year old Kiyosaki. I don’t remember how savvy I was at 9 years old, but I’d be amazed if I was able to remember even a fraction of the investment ‘wisdom’ that Rich Dad throws in the face of this kid. It’s clear that the encounter is entirely fictional and designed to portray a conversation between Rich Dad and the reader. But what does it say about the lessons to be learned that Kiyosaki has cast the audience as a hapless 9 year old child?

Just like that, Robert sets off on his adventure in search of riches and fame. Well, I suspect he achieved one before the other.

I could find only one bright spot in the entire book. It arrives out of the blue when Kiyosaki expresses the importance of investing in assets rather than liabilities. This is basic financial footing. Don’t spend more money than you bring home. Invest extra money in assets, and stay out of debt. I can see how the big reveal – Kiyosaki calls it the only rule of wealth that matters – might bring clarity and a sense of direction to those who have been doing it wrong. But for everybody else, it should be common sense.

Kiyosaki explains very little about where to invest money, nor what makes a good asset. But he does launch in to a tirade about the importance of paying yourself first. The argument can be summed up best with this stroke of genius:

“When I occasionally come up short. I still pay myself first. I let the creditors and even the government scream.”

Perhaps I’m missing something, but if this doesn’t tick the right boxes for ‘catastrophic financial tip of the year’, then I don’t know what will. More tellingly, it goes against every sound cashflow suggestion that he squeaks in to the first few chapters, removing any hint of a saving grace from the diatribe to follow.

How can you truly appreciate the importance of assets vs liabilities when you’re continuously battering your credit rating by refusing to stump up cash for your bills and debts?

Kiyosaki argues that it doesn’t matter. Paying yourself first is ideal, no matter how loudly the government screams, because even if you don’t have the money in your bank account, the over-commitment will inspire and motivate you in to making ends meet. It’ll force you to grow as a businessman. What?! No really, what the fuck? Does he have the slightest Scooby what he is ranting on about?

One could argue that attempting to blood financial wisdom from a Kiyosaki sales device is like watching a SmackDown divas’ pillow-fight in the hope of extreme pornography. Expectations need to be met by reality. Yet I was still left wondering how such a half-baked cocktail of metaphors and generalizations could ever be met with widespread acclaim. Then it tweaked. The Warrior Forum flashed before my eyes, and normality was restored. Common sense looks like genius when it’s viewed from a cesspit of stupidity.

Do yourself a favour. Don’t buy Rich Dad Poor Dad.

Recommended This Week:

A better read on the subject of wealth generation, although still somewhat flawed, is The Millionaire Fastlane, which I reviewed last month.
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