Evan Carmichael tells an international student that limiting beliefs, not lack of capital or connections, are the real barrier to launching a toy business in America. Study how Microsoft and Bill Gates built their company, find partnerships, and replicate what works instead of inventing everything from scratch.
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Can I make it in America? It's a question I got from a reader, Zuyan, I hope I pronounced that properly, wrote in to say, "Dear Evan, I read your website a few seconds ago. I want to create a toy for kids. I'm an international student. I want to know, can I have success as an entrepreneur in America? And part 2, how can I get my toy created? How do I get to a toy company?" I'm awaiting your response. So, great question. Here's the thing: if you believe you can make it in America, then you can make it in America. The biggest thing holding you back is your limiting personal beliefs. And this is for everybody. The biggest problem in your business right now is not your branding, it's not your marketing, it's not raising capital, it's not your employees. It's your own limiting personal beliefs. Every time I've had an interview where somebody says, "What keeps you up at night?" Really, if I look deep, it's my own limiting personal beliefs. And every time I've seen a major growth forward with my business, it's because I changed my story. I changed my beliefs, and my business took off as a result. So whatever you're telling yourself, there's something there. There's something— there's some little voice that's holding you back from being the entrepreneur, from being the person that you are meant to be, that you could be if you stopped holding yourself back, if you took off the chains and let yourself run loose. So yes, you can have success in America even if you're an international student. That's not a reason, that's not an excuse. It's never about your background, your resources, and it's always about your resourcefulness. And your willingness to do it. If you believe you can, then you can. You can— it's gonna be hard, it's gonna be a lot of work, but you can. For the second part about selling it to a toy company, the fastest way to learn something, the fastest way to accomplish any goal, is to model success. Find somebody who's already done what you're trying to do and put their strategies to work for you. So if you've never created a toy before, if you've never had any success in this business, I would start by trying to model someone who has. Research the stories of famous entrepreneurs. Look at toy companies who you look up to and respect and look at how they got started. Look at what steps they did to launch their company. In there, there's so many clues for your success. This applies to any entrepreneur, whatever business you're in. Stop trying to solve every single problem yourself. People have already solved it before. If you're trying to find your first customer, every single business in existence had that problem. They solved it. Learn from them. When I was struggling with my business, making $300 a month, unsure of what to do, thinking of closing down, feeling like a total failure, feeling ashamed and embarrassed and not, not willing to talk to my friends about what was going on because I was so down on myself, thinking I should be so far ahead than making $300 a month. What saved me, what saved my business, was modeling the success of another software company, Microsoft. And I looked at how they got started and looked at how they sold, and with them it was through partnerships. And I looked at exactly what Bill Gates did, and I modeled it, and I applied it to my business, and I made it work. And then I modeled more from Microsoft. I modeled how they did their advertising, I modeled how they did their press releases. Instead of me trying to figure out everything by myself, I took what was working for somebody else and applied it to my business. So whatever problem you're facing, go and do the same thing. I know it's hard and it's scary venturing out into something new, and it's easy to get down and say, I'm never gonna make it because I'm never gonna make it because I'm a foreigner. I'm never gonna make it because I've never built a toy company before. And that's what everybody's gonna tell you, by the way, right? Even with the best of intentions, your friends, your family, oh, that's a great idea, but you're never gonna make it because you don't have the resources, or you've never done this before, or XYZ. All the answers, excuses in the world. You have to overcome those. You have to believe in yourself. You have to believe that everything is possible. It's got to come from, from your heart that you really have an intense desire to build this business because there's a great cause, there's a great problem that you're trying to solve, and you could leave your mark and have an impact on the world, and you're not going to give up until you do it. If that's your mindset, everything is possible. Believe. Thank you everybody for watching. If you like this video, please give it a thumbs up below and please leave a comment underneath. I really appreciate those when they come in, even if you're just saying thanks for the video. If you have a question too, I'd be happy to answer it. Leave it in the comment section below and I'll do a video response. Thank you guys, I'll see you soon.
