Business Ideas - HUSTLE while you wait - #EvansBook ep. 19

Stop waiting on other people and instead hustle while you wait. Hey guys, welcome to the book update video. And one of the things that I find to be super common with entrepreneurs is we hate waiting. In general, we hate waiting. We're hustlers. We like to get stuff done. I think it holds a lot of entrepreneurs back from getting into partnerships or hiring a team because you want to do everything yourself because you know you're competent, because you know you can get it done. And we're generally frustrated with people who don't work at our pace, who can't give us results when we want results, because we know that we could do that better. And I think one of the things that you have to deal with as an entrepreneur, one of the most frustrating things, is there'll be times we have to wait for people. Whether it's a customer who's, you know, waiting to sign a deal, whether it's a partner who you're waiting on getting some work done, whether it's an employee waiting to finish a project, it's media who said that they would get get an article up and it hasn't launched yet, you're going to have to end up waiting for people. The key thing though is going to be how you react to it. You can't control other people's times, other people's schedules to a certain extent, and how you react to it is going to be the important part. And so, you know, as an entrepreneur, you got to hustle while you wait. While you're waiting on this project to happen, if you can't do anything else to make a move, you're not just sitting around twiddling your thumbs doing something else. You're You're making action happen, right? Maybe in a different part of your business, but you are hustling always, not just waiting for something else to happen from somebody else, right? And so how this relates to the book, it's raining. My book got postponed. Instead of wanting in October, they want it in January. Fine. You know, I made a video about that. And if they want it in October, be ready. If they want it in January, be ready. And instead of just waiting for January now to come along, I'm making it better. I'm hustling. I'm looking at adding an illustrator. To join the team to help create some awesome graphics for the book. I'm looking at adding an extra story to the book that I was on the fence of whether I should add somebody else or not. Now I have the extra time, so I'm going to go and do that. And so I'm adding to make it better. I'm hustling while I'm waiting, right? I'm not just waiting for January to come along. And you have to do that for your business. Again, you cannot control most people's schedules. The only thing you control is your reaction to the wait. So stop waiting and start hustling while you wait. Let's get to your questions. So last week I asked you guys a bunch of questions and you delivered with a ton, so I'm gonna go through them quickly. First up, Tamara Weeks: It seems impossible to get 8 chapters done by October. How long does it take you to turn a rough draft into a chapter? Are the 10 chapters about the same length? That's a great question, and I think each chapter has taken different amounts of time. It really depends on how much external research I need to do. A lot of the concepts I've already had in my head for years, and it's therefore easy for me to just put it down on paper. But when I need to go out and find examples to kind of prove the point, or, you know, I have an example in mind but it doesn't quite fit, or I need to go and do more research— basically, if I have to rely on other people, if I have to do an interview and I'm waiting on that, it takes longer for the chapters to come together. Each chapter is not all the same length. I haven't really been monitoring that. I don't know how much that matters. Each chapter is basically as long as it needs to be. Just like how long should a YouTube video be? How long should your web copy be? How long should your newsletter be? It should be as long as it needs to be to get your point across, not more, not less. And so each chapter in the book, in my view, is as long as it needs to be. Next up, New Future Builder, great video. In terms of setting your schedule, how do you like to manage your energy, especially while writing and editing? Where does your time energy management balance fall? So that's an interesting question. I think in the morning I tend to do the stuff that I do for the day. So I like to get that done first. I start off my day where I'm doing the comments I like from you guys. I'm reviewing my videos that are going up for the day. The kind of main stuff that I have to do for the day. And then from about noon on is whatever project I'm doing for that day. So as an example, it's just past noon. I just left. I'm walking to Whole Foods. Now it's my book writing day. The morning I have my routine, everything I do in the morning, and now it's noon. On, and that's how I kind of manage. And I go until about 5, spend some time with Hayden, and then depending on what's happening during the night. So I guess I do the routine stuff mostly in the morning because it's before the day might explode on me or something might happen. And then the daily things, each day is a different day, that happens from noon on. Next up, Rishi Cup TV. Hey Evan, great hearing your updates and with acquiring the new company. I wish you the best on adjusting to your schedule. I'm happy you're cooking breakfast for Nina in the mornings too. She deserves it, haha. Followed up by Tamara who said, yeah, Nina deserves breakfast and a packed lunch. Okay guys, I agree, I love supporting Nina, I'm going to do it more, but don't give her encouragement, okay? I don't need the extra aggravation, but thank you for the support. Next up, Chris: we know a printer locally and they do a good job. My question is, is it wise to skip the normal publisher? We don't have money for a publisher. So I've addressed this issue a couple times. Should you get a publisher or not? I think really it depends on what your motivation is for the book, what your goal is for the book. If your goal is just to have a book out, you know, you cross it off your bucket list, then great, you don't need a publisher. Just go and self-publish it yourself. If your goal is to have a big impact, to reach a big audience, then you might be able to do that yourself, but that's where a publisher could be handy. So for me, My goal has never been about the money. It's not about how much money can I make from a book, because if you get a lot of sales, you'll probably make more from self-publishing than you would going with a traditional publisher. But I want the reach, I want the awareness, I want the impact. My goal is to help a billion entrepreneurs, and so being able to leverage a publisher, I find, will help me get to that goal faster than if I just tried to do it on your own. What are your intentions, right? If you want to make more money and if you want just to have a book out, then don't go with a publisher. But if you want to have impact, you want to have reach, you want to be able to, to make a connection with a lot of people, then I would go with the publisher. Next up, Cardigan Jane: Do you plan on diversifying with an audiobook on Audible since they are owned by Amazon Kindle? There are great resources to cross-promote and expand your audience. By the way, I have some awesome marketing ideas if you want to connect. I'm always open to awesome marketing ideas, so let me know. Audiobook I would say probably. I'm totally open and down to reading an audiobook version if that comes out. I haven't honestly thought that far ahead. It's right now more about just creating the book, making it something awesome, making something that I'm proud of, something I want to show my grandkids, make it something that I think will impact a lot of people, putting all my heart and energy into that. And once that part is done, then I'll be focusing on how do I market this. And so thank you for the suggestion. Definitely open to opportunities right now. It's just book writing mode. Next up is a backstop pace. How do you balance your family and your business? I've chosen a path of a professional footballer and this requires a lot of time and energy, all while I'm finishing up my school. My mother keeps complaining that I don't spend enough time with her. Maybe she's right, but she's so negative and always complaining about something. I can't deal with that negative energy. What should I do? Your book will be great, by the way. So thank you for that book plug there at the end. It's a tough one. I think as entrepreneurs, we need to— there's always an issue about work-life balance. And when somebody is negative Man, I hate having negative energy in my life as a general rule, and you need to cut out the negative people around you. I would honestly, if it were me, try to have an honest conversation with her and say why you're doing this, why it's important. Help her be a part of your dream instead of feeling like she's on the outside. I think a lot of parents obviously want to see their kids be successful. A lot of them have given up on their own dreams, stopped thinking that they could do anything powerful and meaningful in the world, and so they get to live vicariously through your life. So you becoming successful, you reaching your dreams, you doing something big makes them feel happy. And if they're not a part of that, then they're going to feel left out. They're going to complain. They're going to be feeling like they're on the sidelines and they're not important. And so I would try to be involved and have her feel like she's a part of your success. Thank her and tell her what you're doing. Tell her what you're up to, even if it's not visiting. Maybe you don't have time to visit in person. Maybe it's a phone call. Maybe it's an email. And in return for that, she's got to be positive. You can let her know you don't need negativity in your life, you don't want this to be part of what you're doing because it's holding you back from reaching your dreams. And I think that honest conversation would help. I hope it does. But again, I am not the family expert necessarily. It's just how I would manage things personally. The light is turning orange and I need to run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run. Okay, next. The Legend for All: What's the new business you're opening? I will let you guys in on that once everything is official. It is taking up a chunk of my time and it's coming soon. I promise to let you guys know. Cardigan Jean with another question: Are you publishing? Also, what is your marketing strategy to reach your niche once published? What do you expect your profit margin to be once it's completed? So I addressed that: not publishing, working with Penguin Random House. Marketing strategy is going to be using my network, using my YouTube audience, using my newsletter, doing interviews. Again, it's not super well planned or thought out because it's still a year. You go with a publisher, right? My book is going to be delivered to them in January now and won't be released till like the next January. So I've got a year to figure all of that out. What do you expect your profit margin to be? I don't care. Like, the profit margin is not why I'm doing this. It's the furthest thing from my mind. Will I make money? Yeah, probably. Will I make a ton of money? If a ton of money is your game, then being an author is not where you want to be. A business model coming from writing books is typically from everything that comes around it, right? You get speaking gigs, you get corporate gigs, you can create products. It's building awareness for your brand and what you're doing. And so how much I make from the book? I don't know. It's inconsequential. It'll make money, but a lot more money will come from all the other stuff I do as a result of it. And of even greater importance to me is it being able to reach a lot of people and have an impact on lives. That's why I'm doing it. Otherwise, I'd do a million other things because writing a book is one of the longest, hardest things you're gonna do. And if you're focused just on the money, you're gonna give up. Next up, King J: Do you have things in your schedule you don't like to do? As my business grows, I notice I'm having more and more things in my schedule that I just I just don't want to do, but I know it's required for growth. How do I schedule it so I can get through the things I don't want to do? I personally have 10 things scheduled for tomorrow and I only want to do 2 of those things. Thanks. Looking forward to the book. Great question. And I would start at a higher level and understand and really absorb that if you are consistently doing things that you do not like doing, love doing, makes you come alive, there's no way you're going to be able to build a great company. You do not build great businesses by doing things that you are not or cannot become great at. That's just how it is. And so if you are doing 80% of the tasks that you're doing are things that you don't like, that you're never going to be great at, you got to get those off your plate. I think that's actually honestly most entrepreneurs. You only have 20% of your time, if that, focus on the big picture stuff, the stuff that you love, the stuff that you're great at, the stuff that will make your business soar. And you're spending 80% plus of your time doing the crap of just running the business. And so as quickly as possible, You want to eliminate, automate, delegate. Look at those tasks. Do you actually have to get those done? If not, eliminate them. Next, can you automate them? Can you get software? Can you get tools? Why are you still doing your books in Excel? Just get software to help you do it and then delegate. Get somebody to help you overseas. It could be $5 an hour. The first person I hired was to work 1 hour a day for me to alleviate some of the tasks that are on my plate. Get used to to hiring people, delegating tasks out, and so that frees up time for you to be able to focus on the big picture stuff to help you grow your business. Next up, Tahira. I haven't written an official book yet, aside from ebooks and fiction on the side, but I have a question for ya. I know you mentioned that Tuesday is your book writing day, but have you ever tried to set aside some time on a daily basis to write? Say an hour or two every day. I write daily, I'm a copywriter, and I find this helps keep me sharp and shields my scribe muscles from atrophy. #unforgettable #believe. This is And I think honestly you have to create a routine that works for you. One of the challenges that I find in writing a book as opposed to writing maybe a blog post or writing some tweets or writing for social media, it's a big project and it often will take me 30 to 45 minutes just to get back into it. To remember where I left off and what I was thinking and what I was talking about. It can take me 45 minutes to an hour just to get back into flow of where I was before and I left off. So if I was doing an hour a day I'd never get anything great done because my great work doesn't happen in the first hour, it happens afterwards. And so I find that's the same on any big project. And maybe that's just me, and that's maybe why I've made my schedule so that I have massive chunks of time to dedicate to important projects. Because if I only had an hour to do something, then I probably wouldn't get anything great done. And so that's what I find helps. I tried doing starting the day with breakfast and getting some writing done. And it just felt like I spent so much time reviewing and I never ended up writing anything that I love. And so that's why I moved it to the afternoon once a week and really chunking that out. So that works for me, but if you found something that works for you, do that. You know, you can experiment and play with it, but just because I'm doing something doesn't mean you have to. Next, Hassan: I want to be a writer, but procrastination is a big factor. Can you make a video on how to overcome procrastination? Really? First step is figuring out, do you actually love this, right? The stuff that you love doing makes you come alive, you can't wait to get out of bed and start doing it, you stay up late because you're doing it. Like, I would challenge, do you actually want to become a writer? Why do you want to do that? Is it because somebody said it looked good or because, you know, you see authors and you think they're living the life? Is this something that is actually who you are or something that you just pretend to want to be? I think that's a big difference because You can schedule things in, you can make a plan and say, okay, 3 times a week I'm going to schedule this time in to be a writer and work on that dream. But you can only force yourself to do something that you don't like for so long before you realize that this isn't working. And so if you've always wanted to be a writer but you've never taken action on it, I'd really examine like, what is holding you back? Is it a limiting belief? Is it the fact that you really just don't love it enough? Is it that you don't have anything else in your life that you want to do that makes you come alive? Is this what you defaulted to? You got to figure that out. Because it's not the scheduling. Because when you love something, when it makes you come alive, you will find the time to make it happen. Next up, Sherry, who writes in to say, "I wake up every morning and espresso keeps me going." I love that song too, it's awesome. By the way, what program are you using to write your book in? So I started off using Word, and that was super easy for me. I had it offline, I could take it anywhere I needed. And then as I started involving people on my team, we needed a more flexible solution, because if I edited it and someone else was editing at the same time, it wouldn't work. So we switched to Google Docs. That's what we're using right now. So a bunch of us have access to it and we can look at it. You can see who's editing what at what time. It updates you with alerts. At some point it's got to get to the publisher, and I honestly don't know what format they want it in, if Google Docs is even something they use, but it's usually pretty flexible to be able to export it to whatever we need. And so we've actually created a chapter. Each chapter is its own Google Doc, so we can go through and make changes and edits, and it's easy to keep on top of. And you can also download it locally, so if you have Google Drive, you can have a local copy. So if I make changes when I'm offline, it connects and automatically syncs. So that's what we're using, and it's working pretty well. Meepixer: Why not use this camera and microphone for all your videos? Quality is so much better and therefore more enjoyable to watch. So he's referring to my video from last week where I didn't have time to film on my iPad. And that was filmed with Jason, and he's my usual video guy. And we film most of the videos on my channel using that camera. I like having a little bit of variety, you know? I like being able to talk to you while I'm on my way to writing my book, when I'm in book zone mode, and you guys accompany me on my walk to Whole Foods. I don't know, I like it. On the weekend ones too, it's usually some personal video, Nina cooks, or some traveling video— oh, bike behind me— and I film those off of my other camera, my big camera. And I like the variety, man. I'm sorry you don't like these videos as much. The content is still there. It's still quality, and I'm gonna keep doing it as long as I like it. Which way is better to write daily, weekly schedules, on a computer and phone or on paper? Thank you. That's a really interesting one. I do both, and it really just depends on how I'm feeling. I'm a big believer in just going with your flow. I often find that when I'm thinking, I like to have something on paper. I just find it gives me a little more flexibility to be able to draw, create arrows and circles, and I find I'm just a little more creative when I'm on paper in terms of creating it, but then when it comes to actually following it, I put it on my computer because it's just so much easier for me to maintain, and I follow that calendar almost religiously, as religiously as I can. That's what I do, so I'm actually curious to know what you guys do. Do you do paper or do you do computer? Leave it in the comments below. Last question, NoName11: I'd like to ask you for advice if you can make a minute or two to help me out. I'm a blogger and my content goes out every Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I struggle a lot with writing new content, promoting it. Do you think it would be good if I would promote only those days when new articles go on the site and write on the other free days? I'm also writing a book, so I need a lot of time to write, but promotion is what I need for people to see me. Thank you in advance. This is a fantastic question, and more and more and more and more and more what I've discovered is if you're writing something that's quality, if you are creating quality content, whether it's writing a blog, whether it's creating videos, you don't need to do nearly as much promotion as you used to because people share it. It's never been easier to get your content to spread at any other point in human history. And so I look at my YouTube channel as an example. I do zero promotion on my YouTube channel. Zero. You know, I link it up so it goes to my Twitter when a new video comes out, and I might put a couple videos in my newsletter, but for the most part It just grows, right? A little bit of work thinking about what the title is gonna be to make it a little more search engine friendly. That's a really loud truck. But if I had to think about where to spend my time, again, you want to think about what are you really good at, and I love creating the content for you guys, and that's where I spend my time. I could make fewer videos and then spend more time on the promotion, but I'd rather spend the time in creating the content, and the channel is taking off, right? We've got 20,000-odd subscribers, growing at an insane rate, you know, over 10 million views on the channel, all without any real promotion. And so if your posts aren't taking off, honestly, what I'd start to look at is, are you actually creating stuff that people care about? Are any of your posts getting lift because of the quality of the content? And if they're not, instead of going out and promoting them, I try to think, how can I make my content better? How can I improve myself as a writer? How can I create stuff that moves people to the point where they love it so much that they have to tell their friends and share it? Because if you have some pieces like that and you're an amazing writer, I guarantee you people will share it. That's what I do. I take a hard look at myself and say, am I an amazing writer? And how can I improve and beat on my craft to get better so I don't have to worry about the promotion side? It'll take care of itself. Take care of itself because your content is that amazing. So thank you guys so much for watching. Tons of questions this week. Keep them coming. Let me know if you have a question that you want me to answer in next week's video. Ideally somewhat related to this video or my book or the book writing process or your book. Let me know. Leave a comment. Continue to believe. My arms are getting tired from holding this thing up high all the time. Getting the workout here. Thank you guys. I'll see you soon.