Business Mistakes You Must Avoid (#FIREHOUR S3, E20)

Wow, this is good. Okay, welcome back to Fire Hour. On last, last week's call, what we did was we went over, you know, transformation starting with you, the Be, Do, Have, right? And really going deeper into that. And today's topic is gonna be, it's actually inspired by, um, our nanny. And it was also like, um, It was also reflected off of last week's call as well. Like the question of what mistakes as entrepreneurs can we avoid, right? And I was talking to our nanny yesterday and I was asking her a question and to share some, just her advice to our kids. And the advice that she gave was based off of this frame. The frame is what advice Did I not take that I wish I took before, right? When I was a child. So the same thing is like for, as an entrepreneur, right? For you, what advice as entrepreneurs have you received before, but you are not taking? And in 2024, how are you going to move forward and actually do it differently? What advice are you actually going to implement in 2024? And what list of mistakes can we avoid, uh, from this past year? And bring it into next year. So that's the, that's the frame of today's call. And I want to just get a list, like, going, a list of, you know, mistakes that we need to avoid, mistakes that we did this year that, you know, someone can learn from. It could be valuable to someone. So let's start with that. And if you have, if you have a mistake, right? If you know that you for sure made a mistake, just one mistake, it's a lesson, right? Can you share that in the chat? That way we can list it off.

So are we going through mistakes in life or mistakes in business or mistakes in general?

Business, business. Well, okay, like mistakes can be, you know, like business and personal get mixed in like very, Very easily as an entrepreneur.

Yeah.

So, uh, I think that if there is, I know that there's some, like I can, I'll share some, but I think we should focus for sure, like on the, the business side of things. And then we'll get, we can go into the personal because the personal does mix in, uh, to the business. And that's why there's mindset. That's why there's personal development, leadership development, et cetera. New camera setup. I don't know. I think it's just the—

No, I think it's, it's just his MacBook. It just looks a lot more clear today for some reason. I don't know why.

I think it's the lighting.

Maybe we, we switched the lighting up because we were doing something the other day. Um, okay, so here's a mistake that I noticed, um, most entrepreneurs make over and over again, and it's because for the most part in a lot of the businesses that, that we are in, that I'm a part of, that I've been in, right? Businesses that I've started, that I've sold, that I've bought. Most of the time it's the money. Okay. Like, I can't stress how important it is in your personal life and in any businesses that you have to really watch the money because money can be spent very quickly and very easily in the wrong way. And so for me, when I look at businesses, when I look at financial statements, I always look to see, okay, if I'm going to spend money on a business, in a business, or doing anything, am I getting the best value for what I'm purchasing? But not only that, um, It's more so when you're in a business, you're in a business to make money, right? Because money can be spent very, very easily. Like, you can spend it on thousands of things, but are those thousands of things that you spend money on going to actually generate a return or a profit in a certain amount of time for you? So typically, my, my role is the money, right? And so if you're going to spend a dollar in this business, I need to know what's going to happen with that dollar? Is it going to make us more efficient? Is it going to generate back a dollar, $2? What is the return on the investment that we're creating? And so in business, even in life, the biggest thing you always need to watch over is where's the money coming in from and how sustainable is it, and then where is the money going out towards, right? Um, so that's the number one mistake that I see businesses and entrepreneurs over and over and over again make. They spend more than they make or they spend in the wrong direction. It's not giving a return and, you know, it just goes to waste.

That's so true. Like, that's very true.

That's the biggest mistake. It's make or break.

Yeah, that's actually— yeah, I think that's very, very true because in a business, if you don't have like, if you don't have money, then you can't, you know, you don't have a business.

You can't operate.

You can't operate.

Can't keep the lights on.

Yeah. Yeah. So where, you know, that, that's one mistake for sure. So how can we, and I think that we should create a list, like, this is going to be really good. I mean, there's already lists out there, like, if you just Google, right, or ChatGPT, but like, this is going to be a list specifically for you, right? Specifically for us, because, uh, Charlie Munger, so Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett, right? The billionaires. Charlie Munger, he just, He literally recently passed away, right? Charlie— and that's Warren Buffett's investor partner, right? And, and friend for, for basically life, right? Lifetime. And, you know, they, they talk a lot about avoiding mistakes, right? And really just doing, like, making the right decisions, just a few, like, right decisions throughout your life, because those right decisions, those small right decisions consistently go a long way. And that's one of the reasons why they're so successful with investing. And so if they're thinking about that, you know, Charlie Munger, he talks about how you should reverse, like, you should reverse, uh, the decision-making process and thinking process where you actually think, like, you know, you think about everything, you think about all the downside, and then from there you start to think about the upside because it naturally reveals itself. And so when it comes to like mistakes, this is why it's so important, especially because we, we can think, we can use our mind. If you're able to simulate mistakes and have a list of mistakes and avoid them at all cost simply because someone else has made that mistake, then why wouldn't you do that, right? Why wouldn't, why wouldn't you save yourself some time and energy and then also money by avoiding mistakes in the first place? Being able to do things the right way the first time, right? And that's the whole entire point of, you know, this, like today's session is to make sure that we have a list of mistakes moving forward to avoid and to se— and if you really think about it on a deeper level, right? If you look at all the books, like The One Thing, the 80/20 Rule, like the, you know, Atomic Habits, like the every, The Compound Effect, especially every single one of these books, they talk about you know, the future and about how good decision-making can lead to a lot of rewards. And I'm reading right now the 80/20, uh, the 80/20 book, uh, and it's by, it's by, uh, Richard Koch, I think. I forget. I don't know how to say his name, but, uh, I am reading like that book right now. And because I wanted to just dive deeper in the 80/20 rule because I want to work smarter, right? I want to, I want to work smarter. That's my desire. That's my intention. And especially going into 2024, I, it's a must for me to work smarter because time, as I continue to bring on more things, I continue to focus on just, I'm, I'm just getting busier. Everyone's getting busier. So because everyone's getting busier, because I'm getting busier, how can I work smarter? How can I alleviate that? What mistakes can I avoid when it comes to like getting more done in less time? What can I do to improve myself? In my skillset, my knowledge, my, my expertise, like the work, the workload I can do, like the workload I can take on, like the efforts I can make, like how can I do this without burning out? How can I get more done in less time? What do I need to focus on that's going to help me compound the results so that way I can decrease all input to increase all output, right? The 80/20 rule is doing, is exactly that. It dives deep into all that and it goes into business. Goes into relationships, goes into family, goes into your, your mindset. It goes into your skillset. It goes into all that stuff. So I'm focused on that stuff right now. And one of the things that I'm going to avoid next year for 2024 is working harder. I don't want to work even harder than I'm already working. I want to work smarter. So that's one of the mistakes I'm going to be avoiding. And when it comes to finances, going back to what you're saying, like the money, right? The money portion of it. Every single business is attached to money. So what do we need to, what do we need to avoid when it, what specific, I'm going to ask you, what specific lessons do we need to avoid when it comes to money?

So I know that money can solve a lot of problems and most people are always like, okay, if I have a problem, like let me, and I have money, like let me solve it, right? Like, um, you know, my dad once said that If you have, you know, if you have a problem to be solved and it can be solved with money, then you don't have a problem, right? So, but there are problems that exist and it has nothing to do with money, right? Like it could be something where you're leaking out money, but at the same time you can't put in more money in order to recuperate what's going out. And so Another, like, a big mistake that I see business owners make is that they're like, well, if I spend more and I like hire on more people, or if I like buy this equipment, buy that equipment, um, spend money here, spend money there, like it's going to solve the problem, right? But it's not because they don't even realize what the problem is. They think that they know what the problem is, but they don't because they're not paying attention to what is really happening in the operational side of their business. And so I feel like that's a top mistake is just throwing money at something that you think is going to help you stop bleeding it out. Um, and it's like you have to take a look in the operations, right? Because money can't solve all problems. And if you continue to throw money in a certain way and it's not solving the issue that you have, you still have the same issue. The numbers are going to tell you at the end of the day, like your expenses are growing, your profit's shrinking. It makes no sense. Like, you have to be very aware of what is going in, what is going out, and the operational side of things.

That's really good.

And so, and another thing besides that, right? So now we're— I'm only talking about really like what's going out, right? But the next biggest mistake that I see entrepreneurs and business owners make is marketing. They do not do enough marketing. And if you do not market, your business is dead. It's not growing, it's not going anywhere. It's stagnant. You're not marketing, you're not getting your product or your service in front of new people, or even for your old customers to see that you're moving and shaking and doing something. If you do not market your business, your product, your service, whatever it is, you're not putting yourself out there, you're not putting, you know, whatever out there, like you're dying because how are you going to get new business? You know, how are you going to get new business? You know, like how many people does your product or service depend on, like purchasing or returning in order to grow, in order to scale, right? So if you do not market, like your business is going to— it's pretty much going to go down soon.

Yeah, it just, it, you know, and that depends too on, uh, like the quality, right? So we can actually unpack all that stuff because that's really, really good.

That's your, that's your lane.

So let's go, let's go to operations first, right? Like money doesn't solve all problems simply because it really, like in truth, you know, that's true, right? Because it just depends on the problem. So let's talk about operations real quick. Why is, you know, why, how did you frame it? It's like if operations is breaking, um, and you just add more people on, then like there's no point because that's not even the, that's not the solution, right?

So if your operations is breaking, but it's like you don't know why it's breaking, like adding more people or adding more money into like upgraded systems or like purchasing things to like help alleviate when you actually don't know the issue is not going to help.

Yes. Yeah. So here's the reason why. Okay. The reason why that, that solution is not going to work is because of the why. It's because the, the operator or owner doesn't understand why, like why it's broken, why operations is breaking. So we have to unpack that. Like, this is the goal. You have to have the 3 steps. Okay. Clarity, direction, and speed. Okay. This is what I learned from my mentor. He said, um, KSE, knowledge, strategy, and execution. And he said this, he told me that you cannot do KSE in any other order. It has to be KSE. So knowledge, strategy, execution in that specific order. And he said that intentionally. He taught me that because when I was running the operations, for him and his company, that, that's exactly like, I'm just, I'm shadowing him. He's train— he's training me, he's teaching me, he's mentoring me. And this is a multimillion dollar company, one of the top industry leaders in the world, uh, for the online space, online entrepreneurs. So it's very aligned with what all of us are doing and it's very aligned with what everyone is going into who's got like being the first time on social media, the first time building a business on social media online. Building a personal brand, et cetera. So KSE, right? Knowledge, strategy, execution. He said that if you come up with a strategy without the knowledge and then you execute, that's where it leads to mistakes. Does that make sense? If you execute, if you do E, you execute first without the knowledge and without strategy, you run into mistakes, right? Obviously, like you can learn, you can learn from like doing those mistakes, but the whole frame and intention of this call is how can you avoid mistakes, right? How can you avoid mistakes moving forward, especially if there is all this knowledge and resources and tools available for you to use, right? Available at your whim, like a, a, a Google search away, right? A social media search away, literally. Like, TikTok— you can search on TikTok, you can search on Instagram if you want, like on YouTube. So that right there Right? KSE, knowledge, strategy, execution. He, he really has taken, at least in my opinion, uh, he's taken a lot of these, the, the wisdom and frameworks and business philosophies from all these greats because he's read so many, right? He's studied them so, so many times and over a lifetime. And literally like the same thing, it goes back to the one advice, right? Avoid mistakes if you can, right? Avoid mistakes at all costs. Especially in business, because a business, again, it's just, it's a model, right? It's a model that is duplicatable. And let's say, for example, like here, right? There's like, there's Thrivers here. Well, how many Thrivers can you model? Like, who is successful in Thrive that you can model? Don't you think that like success leaves clues? If they, if someone is at, you know, a, a position in Thrive, that you want to achieve, or that they've achieved some goals that, that you want to achieve, don't you think that they have some clues left behind or that they can share with you? Right? So why do you have to go through your own journey and make those mistakes when they've already, they may have already done it, right? They may have already walked that path and been burnt. They, you know, they, if you didn't study Jim Rohn yet, right? The building your, your network marketing business. That audiobook, that's 101, right? If you are, if you're asking the question of like, how come these people are not, you know, replying back to me? It's because the birds got them, right? It's, if you guys don't know that reference, then that's it. That's a clue. That's a clue to pick up that book, right? And to like listen to it or to download it, to ask your, your, uh, your sponsor or, you know, or support team like, hey, where can I get that? Right? Jim Rohn, Building Your Network Marketing Business. Every single person, no matter what industry they should build, they should be bringing that book up. You know, that's one of the core foundations of business. So when it comes to like the, again, going back to like the, the whole entire frame though, like the operational constraint, why, why is the problem right? Not solved. It's because of lack of clarity, right? It's KSE. Okay. Lack of clarity first. You're making decisions without clarity. You're making decisions without knowledge. You're making decisions that— big decisions too. Okay. It's a big decision to hire people. It's a big decision because what does hiring people lead to? It leads to money, bigger payroll, a bigger payroll. It leads to overhead, bigger overhead expense. It leads to more problems because you're dealing with more people, right? So that also ties into leadership. Every single entrepreneur, every single business owner. Is a leader, whether they like, whether they like it or not. And if you are not working on your leadership skills, you're not developing yourself as a leader, then guess what? It will reflect because everything rises and falls in leadership. So just one thing, okay? The operational constraint, just by not even fixing, like not even understanding why it's broken and then making a decision, that's a mistake. To avoid. Does that make sense? Right? Is this making sense? So that, that's the reason why, like, that doesn't work, right? It's, you have to have the clarity first. Don't do, don't, there, there's some, uh, I forget what, who said this, but they said like, if, if you can't, if you don't, if you can't think of anything to do, then do anything. Basically, that's what they said. And I, I, I do agree with that because doing something is better than doing nothing, right? That's, I think that's true. Like, would you agree?

Yes. Um, but I also think that if you can take the time to slow down and really think about what you should be doing, it's better because if you're just running around in circles and you're providing, like, you're not producing any results, then you're going to continue running in circles, right? Like, moving is obviously better than not moving, but if you could just slow down to think, like, where you're moving, where you're going, or what you're doing, or why you're doing it. I think it's a lot more important, right? And again, like what he said, is there someone that you see very successful in your industry, in this business that you look up to? Ask them why. Like, what are you doing that makes you so successful? Like, how do you do it? Right? Because everyone here has been always very like— has always been very open in sharing like what they're doing, why they're doing it, and how they do it. Right? Like, Everyone here is pretty much an open book. You ask a question to this community and everyone's always willing and able to give you an answer, right? So just ask questions, ask questions, and also take time to think, because sometimes I think people haven't made a decision yet, right? And to tie it all back in, if you don't know what to do and you're in a business, You're in a business most of the time to, to make money, right? To change your finances, change your life. And luckily over here, you're able to be able to do that while creating an impact and doing something that you love with people that you care about, right? And so it just makes it a lot more fun. So I would always focus on the income-producing activities, which does tie into a lot of marketing. And then what happens, you know, after you start doing that. So if you can do anything or you're not sure what to do, income-producing activities. You're in a business, right? You have to produce income and not just produce activities that don't lead to income.

Yeah, that's very true. Very, very true. And that's what it's actually like. I agree with what you said. Like, if you slow down to think, slow down to like to actually think, then that's actually way more use of your energy, right? It'd be energy. Forget about time, but your energy. 'Cause energy is everything. So that right there, that's huge thinking, right? So if you don't know what to do, right, then, you know, obviously like there's many, there's many, like there's many clues again. Okay. Success leaves clues. If you're in this industry, if you're in any industry, if there's any business model out there, you can find, you can find someone like who you can find someone who is successful in it and connect with them, like study them, model what they did, and then from there, take action. But to tie it in with what Crystal said, like, if you don't know what to do, like IPA is always number one. Income-producing activities in business is always number one. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Right.

It's like, forget about it. Just focus on income-producing activities. And along the way of doing those things, you're going to understand why you're doing what you're doing and how this adds to your business. Right.

Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, the operational constraint again though, it's, you know, like how can, how can, let's say for example, there's a owner operator, right? Or there's just an operator in a business. And I mean, ideally it's an owner operator, but they are just, they're stuck. Like they have a constraint in the operations. Like that is a time to slow down and think because of clarity, because of knowledge, like clarity first. And how can, how can, if you're burnt out, right? How can you get clarity though? So that's a mistake to avoid too.

Yeah.

Right. Is burning out. Yeah.

Because the harder you work doesn't mean the more income that you make, right? If you're, if your energy is not going towards the correct, um, the correct steps, right? So for me, again, my role has always been so heavily tied into finances. And for me, it's, it starts with, I always follow the money. Right? If there's something wrong, it's usually financially related. I see it in the financial reports and I'm like, something's wrong, right? Because most of the time I would say that people lie, but numbers don't, unless people lied about the numbers, right? So if you look at the numbers and you notice that there's something wrong, it doesn't matter what someone tells you. Like they can give you lots of stories, a whole book, a whole novel. I don't care. Yeah, there's something wrong. Okay. And what is wrong, right? Like, you need to understand your business and you need to understand what's happening so that you can solve what is going wrong. Because most of the time, some people, like, they just don't have a clue about how the business operates, right? Um, and so how could you fix the problem? You can't fix the problem if you don't understand the operations. And the numbers don't lie. If the numbers aren't there, there's something different, right? So what was happening before when the numbers were there? Who was the leader? What was happening? How was the operations running, right? And when the numbers start going down, then it's like, well, what's happening? Like, you know, is it the economy? Is it, you know, outside things? Is it you? Is it, you know, what, what's happening?

It goes back to like operations though, right? So I, I really love what you said, right? Understand the numbers so that way You can solve the problem, right? In a business, it's the same. Business is numbers, basically. It's just data. And so when it comes to like a, a business not producing the amount of money it can produce, or like a, let's say for example, like you can make a million dollars, but, and you know for a fact that your business can do that, yet you, your current situation is not that, or the business's current situation is not producing a million dollars. Yeah. So what is the problem, right? Well, think like, look, just look at the numbers first. Step 1 is look at the numbers and understand it. Step 2 is look at the operations. Why? It's because operations leads to the money, right? Operations, you know, if you think about an umbrella, operations is what?

It's funny because in your, in my mind, I was thinking about an engine. Oh, I was thinking about an engine and you're thinking about an umbrella. So when you said umbrella, I started, um, I started laughing because I was wondering, go ahead. I want to hear the story.

Yeah, no, engine is the same thing, but okay. I just wanted to say like operations is like the, like it's a top, right? Think of it as like a, yeah, an umbrella. Okay. Underneath this umbrella, like you have income producing activities. You have staff, you have yourself, you have, so you have managers, you have yourself, which is the leader. Okay. Um, you have just oper— you have operations, you have everything. Okay. You have all the things are, yeah.

Yeah.

You have all the things that, yeah, the systems, you have all the things that are happening that are moving the needle forward. Right. And so if you're not producing the revenue that you want, it's because there's something wrong with operations. Right. And then this will tie into marketing as well. Yeah. Because, and, but here's the thing. Okay. Again, because when I, like, I, I want to, this is what I really want to encourage you all to understand. When it comes to marketing specifically. Okay? Like, good marketing happens because of word of mouth. Social media is just the amplifier to word of mouth marketing. We're just living in a very unique and interesting time where we have access to social media, where everyone has access to social media and can start to just, you know, market themselves, to brand themselves, to unlock word of mouth at scale. Does that make sense? And so I really want you to understand like that social media is kind of like an illusion. And here's why. It's simply because if you didn't have social media, if let's say we're not on Zoom and we're not on social media and, but we're in a room together talking, we're literally doing the same exact thing. But who would stay in the room? Okay, I'm gonna ask you guys a question. Who would stay in the room with us if what we were talking about wasn't valuable to you? You would leave the room. If fire hour wasn't valuable to you, why would you stay? You wouldn't. You would leave. It's the same exact thing with your business, your product or service, okay? Whatever you're offering to the market, if it's not valuable, and if they— if your client or customer that you're seeking to, to add value to, to their life, you're selling them a product or service, if your product or service is not valuable to them, Why would they buy from you? They wouldn't, right? So I want you to understand that, okay? When it comes to marketing, marketing is just helping you get more attention on your product or service. If your product or service is not the best and everyone else is marketing, right? Marketing for the same exact, uh, customer, same exact client, then chances are that client is gonna go to them just simply because of the fact that they found out about a product or service that is the best, is best suited for them, their needs. Okay? They value that over yours. Does that make sense? So this is the point I'm trying to make is that when you, when it comes to marketing, marketing a business, it's just about like, how can you make the product or service the best of the best where it's a no-brainer for someone that you're, you're trying to, you know, offer to, trying to add value to their life. What can't, they can't say no. They have to say yes. It's that, it's like just that simple. It's that necessary for them. It's a need that you're fulfilling in their, in their life, right? If you can do that, then marketing is taken care of. Does that make sense? Does that make sense to you? Or am I going in circles? Basically make your product or service the best of the best if you can. Okay.

Add value. I would say add value, right? Like if you're in the marketplace and you're selling the same product or you're delivering the same service. Add value. Where can you add value? How can you be different from other people? What makes you different, right? So not necessarily being someone that you're not, but being who you really are and attracting the right people and understanding that sometimes people don't want what you have, they don't want what you're selling, and that's okay, right? And this is where marketing also comes into play because who are you marketing to? Because if you go somewhere and you're presenting to the same people over and over again and they don't want it, like, you can't, you know, you can't beat them down with your product or your service. They just don't want it, which means you need to find another audience. You need to find another market, right? You need to go marketing yourself, right, somewhere else.

Or yeah, or just gotta get better as well, right? It's— and it's skill set. It's like, why is everyone— like, let's say for example, okay, I like what Elaine said, right? I always choose the provider who has better reviews. I need the social proof. Like that is, that is a criterion value for you to, in terms of your purchasing decision, right? Every single person here, everyone in the world, every single other person, they look at that. They look at social proof. And that's actually one of the cognitive biases. Like we actually make decisions based on other people sometimes. Right? If you are not aware of social, of the social proof, like bias, then that's probably what you're doing, right? You're looking at what everyone else is doing and then making the decision. Well, everyone here is a leader, so I know that like you do that, but you also don't, right? But again, in your business, if you think about it, like this is a mistake to avoid, right? This was really great that you brought it up. Social proof. Are you like, is there social proof in your marketing? Is there social proof in your branding? Is there social proof in your product or service built in? Is there social proof? Are you, how are you showcasing social proof? Right? It's a mistake. It's a mistake to, uh, to avoid in 2024 to not add social proof to everything that you do. Okay. It's a mistake. Why? Because again, the world is social, right? Angela says the goal is to deliver results so you can use for credibility. That makes a lot of sense. Right? And it's, and you know what, like there's nothing wrong with that. Why? Because it's a disservice. If you have a, the best product or service for someone in the world, they don't know about it yet, right? But they, it, you already know it delivers the best results possible. Why would you not use more credibility? Why would you not help them understand that, you know what, this is going to be good for you, right? As, and you're in business to make money. Again, the byproduct of being in a business that has the benefit to help other people out, to deepen the impact, to help other people empower themselves, that's the, that's a bonus. You know what I mean? At the end of the day, the core thing of a business is to make money. And then the byproduct of all that is to expand the ideas, to expand the impact, to deepen all that. Okay. Uh, customers and promoters. Yes. Yeah. Use. So she's saying to use, you know, the credibility of customers and promoters who, you know, who got results, right? Why not use that? That is activating social proof in your Thrive business. If you are not activating social proof, that's a mistake to avoid in 2024, right? That's really good.

Uh, I think the cognitive biases was good. I think that you should go over that on another call.

Okay. We can go over it.

Frameworks and cognitive biases were like two of the things that you taught me that I didn't know that I knew before. Right. So like there's probably a lot of frameworks and cognitive biases that you guys know and you guys live by, but you didn't know that there was like a title to it. You just knew that you do this because of that, right? But when you actually have a framework or a cognitive bias associated with the action that you do, it's a lot easier to teach people that word, that verbiage, and for them to be able to understand what they need to use and when they need to use it.

Yeah, you know what, like Charlie Munger, he, so he talks about the 25 cognitive biases. That's something that, um, I'm not sure if it was in his Almanac, but it's, it's something that's referenced a lot from a lot of entrepreneurs. And I learned it from my mentor. And so I just, again, use chat, use AI. If you are not using AI, okay, right now, start to use that. Don't, like, don't be the entrepreneur that doesn't use AI. Okay, be the entrepreneur in 2024, starting now though, be the entrepreneur in 2024 who uses AI. Okay, leverage all the tools that you can, leverage your resources that are available to you. And again, like using AI, it's a learning curve, right? It takes like some time, but that's part of leadership development. That's part of operations. Okay. You, if you're operating a business, then you have to develop the leader. Okay, no matter what. And so part of that, part of upping your skillset is learning how to use AI if you don't use it already. Who here doesn't use AI yet? And who here does use it? Right? So I just, again, ChatGPT, one of the simplest things to use. And when it comes to just AI, right? It can be like your personal assistant, but type in the 25 cognitive biases, right? The 25 cognitive biases, these are things that They, they help you make decisions. Okay. They help you make decisions. And if you are not aware of these cognitive biases, then they can either help you or harm you in your decision-making process. And when it comes to business application, there, it's, it's all related because again, psychology is in people, right? Psychology is how people think, right? It's how they make their decisions. It's how it, like the world affects them. It's the same exact thing in your business. It's no different. Right? And as you, as the leader in your business, there are cognitive biases that are working for you and against you. If you are not aware of them, why not? Why not get better? Right? Why not add that skill and that knowledge to your, your skillset? Right? Again, it goes back to this, like clarity, direction, speed, KSE, knowledge, strategy, and the execution, right? Get the knowledge, get the K, get the K. That's what my mentor would always say. Like, get the K. Where's the K? Get the K, the knowledge, the knowledge, knowledge. You'd always go back to this knowledge, knowledge, knowledge, knowledge, knowledge, right? So literally that's, that's the one thing. Okay. We have access to it. So why not use it? Right. So 25 cognitive biases, just real quick. Um, we can, we can go over this on the next call.

Yeah. Cause it ain't going to be real quick to go over 25 different biases.

Yeah.

And it's going to have to be broken down. Yeah.

It's a lot, but it's true. There's, there's really, this is really like a lifetime's work. But, um, going back to, you know, like the operational constraint, right? If you have a constraint in your business, if you're not achieving the revenue that you want to achieve, it's an operational constraint. Okay. It's an operational constraint. We haven't even gone into marketing yet. It's an operational constraint. So you need to get the knowledge, increase your K, increase your knowledge, and also slow down and think so that we have You can achieve clarity. When you achieve clarity, then you can move to step number 2, which is direction. Direction is just action. It's, it's execution. It's like, go, go, just move. Okay. Does that make sense? And then this, the speed is a bonus because if you're, if you have the clarity and you have the direction, you automatically unlock speed because you're doing the right things the first time in the right way, in the right order at the right time. Does that make sense? That right there is speed. And with KSE, knowledge, strategy, execution, when you have the knowledge, the knowledge gives you the clarity. And because you have the clarity, you get the strategy. And because you have the strategy, you have the direction. And because you have the direction, you can execute a lot faster. Does that make sense?

Yeah.

That's the entire framework broken down. You know, this, this took me, I learned this KSE from being mentored, right? By a multimillionaire, 9-figure entrepreneur, super successful. Okay? One of the top industry leaders in today's time right now. Clarity, direction, speed. This took me 3 years. Okay? 3 years to learn on my own after learning about all this to get this right here, like took me a decade to learn. Okay? And then the framework to put this all together. Now I understand it. Does that make sense? So I really hope that you, this is a clue for you as a business owner, as an entrepreneur. As someone who is going after ambitious goals, this right here is how you can do everything. This affects your personal life and your business life. This affects your life in general. Okay? This is decision-making process right here, right? So I'm not gonna repeat that, uh, but it's there. All right? So again, you know, going back to the operations, this is the framework for every single entrepreneur and, and owner-operator. Right? This right here is how you get the, the clarity. And then from there, you fix operational constraints. You fix the operations in general because now you have it. Uh, and then this goes into marketing, right? Like marketing, again, like I said before, the frame marketing is just, it's word of mouth. Okay? It's word of mouth amplified because of social media. If your product or service is the best of the best, word of mouth and marketing is just gonna amplify that. It's, they're going to, it's just going to echo that this is the best product or service. If you have a bad product or service, then that's what's going to echo. Does that make sense? So yeah. So when it comes to marketing, like again, if you don't have marketing in your business, if you, if you don't have like a department of marketing, you don't have an arm of marketing, a marketing arm, you don't have a, you don't have an asset that will help you do marketing, then you should acquire one as soon as possible. You should start to develop that skill as soon as possible. And the reason why is because we're going, if you don't believe this, then, you know, you gotta get with the program. Okay. We're going to go more into social media and not less. Everyone in the world, every business, even big corporations are going into social media, right? If you were to like ask big corporations 5 years ago, even 7 years ago, 8 years ago, should we be on social media? The answer was no. Why? Because they had all this paid advertisement. And, and, you know, news and everything working for them until new money came in, basically until social media was unlocked, until influencer marketing was born, until influencers were created. Right. So then social media starts to really affect all the other people because now it's like, it's, well, that's pretty early. It's brand against brand. Gosh, it's brand against brand, right? When there's no brand IG identity, people have no trust in legitimacy. Yes. Yeah. It's, it's so true because you can have like the best product or service in the world, but if no one knows you, the trust factor, the social proof, the biases, the credibility, the authority, all that stuff basically goes out the window because it's not seen. Right. That's, that's part of the cognitive biases.

It's huge. I mean, there's, yeah. Very, very like talented people out there, but because they don't market themselves and they're not online and they're not showing up, they're not getting attention. Right. And so attention pays you these days and it pays you very well on social media, right? Like if you aren't on now, if you're not moving, if you're not doing something to market yourself, there's going to be other people out there that have less knowledge, less skill set than you. But because they are the loudest in what they do and who they are in showing up, just simply because of that, they'll beat you. They will beat you time and time again. So it doesn't matter if you know more things, if you understand more things, what— it doesn't matter at all. If you're not marketing yourself and putting yourself out there, it doesn't matter what you know. There's so many people out there that have less talent, less skills, and— but because they put themselves out there and they market themselves, they're just they're just speeding up ahead, right? So don't think that you have to know it all. Like, you don't have to know it all. You do not have to know it all. You don't have to be the smartest person. You don't have to be, you know, the best looking person out there. You just have to be the loudest person out there.

Yeah, literally. It's so weird. Like in today's world. Yeah.

Like I see things sometimes and I'm like, how does this person have so many followers? Like they don't even know what they're talking about, and people think that they know what they're talking about, but it's because it's simply marketing.

It's because of social proof, right? If you see, like, that's why a lot of people fall for authority bias, right? It's, and this is something to avoid, okay? This is, these are all mistakes to avoid, right? If you don't have social proof added to your business, to your marketing efforts, then that's a mistake to avoid in 2024. If you are falling to authority bias, right, you're just like following all these people who are like just being loud, right? They're getting— because they get attention, they have a lot of followers and you're just following them like a sheep. Like that's a, that's a mistake to avoid in my opinion.

That's where the slowing down to actually think, what am I listening to? What am I watching? Like, do I know any better? Can I educate myself? Are there other resources, other people that I can look to that I can learn from that maybe have the same knowledge or different knowledge and then actually putting it together, right? Because We all have something internally that tells us which direction we should be going into. And if we know better, like when people tell you a lie, I don't care how well they mask that lie, you can feel it, right? Like you can feel it to your core that they're not being honest and that, you know, something's off. Listen to your gut, listen to your intuition and understand that there are other things, other people, but you have to like take the time to slow down, to educate yourself properly, you know?

Yeah. And that's, that's a mistake to avoid, right? It's lack of leadership development. It's lack of developing your skillset, your knowledge base. Are you reading books? Are you listening to audiobooks? Are you, uh, are you attending like Zoom calls like this? Are you, are you showing up to events? Like, what are you not doing that can help you achieve your goals? What are you not doing that you know better at? Like, if you know better, you must be better. So what are you not doing that you know better at? Like, are you like, so lack of marketing, social media marketing as well. Um, there's so much, but attention, that's a huge one, right? We are in the attention economy again, like what we said before on the another call, right? Attention is gonna be the name of the game because that's literally the name of the game of media, of social media. It's like, how can you, even if you don't have the expertise, even if you don't even know what you're talking about, even if Uh, you, you know, it, you're a beginner, right? You just started out. If you're marketing yourself and you're the loudest person in the room, like people are going to take notice and they're going to give you their attention, their energy. And guess what? You know, what you do with that is up to you, but that's the name of the game. That's why everyone is on social media. That's why, you know, everyone can start to build an online business. That's why everyone is trying to do social media and personal branding. And 2024, there is going to be like a huge, huge increase in social media. Okay. A huge increase in use of social media, huge increase of personal brands. Again, you know, like there's, there's competition out there if you're selling the same product or service. Okay. If you're selling the same product or service, you are naturally in a pool of competition, which is good. It's good because it's only going to help you get better, but that's where leadership development comes into play. If you are not committed to getting better yourself, right, to leadership development for 2024, then just say goodbye. Why? Because competition is fierce, right? Competition is, is out there and people are hungry. Okay. People are hungry. That's a mistake to avoid too. It's like if you lack hunger, right? You don't lack the drive.

Mimi says this, when I first started showing up online, I had hella imposter syndrome. But I knew it's a marketing game and I have to put my— and I got to put myself out there. So if it's attention to help everyone know about Thrive, then it's attention that I want. Good or bad attention, it's all attention. Yes. Yes. You guys have also heard that like negative attention is still attention. It still draws people in, right? Unfortunately, most people, they look at the negative over the positive. Not this group, not this community though, but You know, um, maybe there's someone that thinks negatively of you or your product or the type of business that you're in. Great, doesn't matter. Be even louder because as they're speaking negatively of you and sharing your stuff with other people to say something bad, there's someone out there that's like, I don't think this is bad at all. I think this is really cool. Like, I— this is like, their mindset may be completely different from the person that actually shared it, right? So like what Mimi said, good or bad, it's all attention. And when you're starting something new in your network and you're starting to change as a person, it's going to be hard for people to understand that, right? Like, some people might be sharing your post and you might be really scared. So the one thing that you're scared of might be the thing that people are sharing your post and making negative comments to their group or to their network. But at the same time, it's still attention. And you never know, the person that they are sharing it to may have a completely different mindset and maybe be the person that hits you up and is like, What is that? I want to try that. Someone sent it to me and I want to know what you have, right? Sometimes it's not the closest people to you in your warm market necessarily that already know you that's going to follow you, that's going to purchase what you have, that's going to support you, right? In anything and everything that you do, as you change groups, you change businesses, you change communities, your old community, your old group, your old friends, they may not follow you. They may not support you because they don't know how to support you. They don't want to support you, maybe. Who knows? It doesn't matter. But what you have to do is get out there, be loud, good, bad, ugly. It doesn't matter. It's still all attention. And there's— the louder you share your message and who you are, there's going to be someone out there that's like, I like this person. I feel like I know this person. Like, I want to follow them because I know Mimi had the experience. As soon as she started putting herself out there more and more and more and more and got more comfortable, she started finding other people out there that were like-minded. That she, like, found out about online. Like, they became friends online just simply because she started to push herself and put herself out there. Right. And so good, bad, ugly, it doesn't matter if people are watching. People are watching. It's not for everyone, you know. And just like you yourself, you may not be for everyone and that's okay. But the people you are there for, they will hear your message. They will see who you are and they will want what you have.

Yeah, 100%. That's so true. It's really, really good. Thanks. So just if you're like, that's again, like that is something to avoid, right? It's if you have like imposter syndrome, you're experiencing that, or if you are facing like negative, like criticism for whatever reason, negative attention. Okay, let's just, we can label it like that if you want to, right? But it's just attention. Like all attention is good attention. That's the reframe, no matter what's happening. And again, what you reflect out there is what you attract. That's why I always like, I share for marketing. It's like when you reflect out your message, you're going to, you're going to attract back in whatever you reflected out. It may be positive or negative, whatever label you want, but attention, all attention is good attention. And especially in business, business needs attention. So if you're lacking attention, How can you improve your social media? How can you improve your business networking? How can you improve your branding? How can you improve, or how can you, like, what tools or platforms do you need to go on, right? Or who do you need to learn from? Or who do you need to acquire, right? All these things.

Lydia says, or like bloopers, people love relatability. I used to delete it if it wasn't perfect, but now I just roll with it. Great. Even better. Like people love seeing people, like, so if you fumble, if you say something and you just do say something, it's like, just brush it off, laugh it off. Like, you're still a person at the end of the day. Like, you're having a convers— if you act as if you're having a conversation with a friend and there's no takebacks, it's the same thing with like social media, you know? Like, not everyone's going to be perfect. Your first shot isn't going to be perfect. Like, you have to get used to the repetition of doing something over and over and over again until you're deadly good at it. But you can't get deadly good at it until you actually start and keep going and keep pushing, right? And making mistakes, it's a part of life. Like, it's okay. Like, just get back up and dust yourself off and keep going, you know?

Yeah. And not only that, but it's, you know, lack of, uh, it goes back to what you're saying, relatability, right? Lack of authenticity, right? In 2024, how can you be even more authentic? Or how can you start to, to start that process, right? And that's with comfortability. Like, that's with skill set. That's with getting, like, being consistent to raise the confidence to be on camera, right? There's going to be some people who are camera shy, right? That's right there. It's, it's something to not be in 2024 if you're building a business online. It's called secured attention. Good and bad attention is currency. Oh yes. Yeah. How can you engage that, the leads to converting sales? Yes. Yeah. It's, and that right there is in the sales process., right, in the operational process. So all attention is good attention. And attention is like, they say, some people say that attention is the new, is the new currency, right? And the thing is like, that is true though, because why are, why, why is social media booming? You know, like why are all these brands now using social media and actually using money to acquire influencers, using money to pay, uh, for influencer deals? And brand deals, right? It's simply because of attention. Attention. Money, like, attract you. This is what you taught me. Like, money likes money, or like, money attracts money. That's what you said to me before, like, 3 years ago. Money, like, like, more— it basically, it's like this. It's like, again, what you reflect out there is what you attract. So if you have a lot of money, then chances, then chances are, like, other people with a lot of money, like, will want to be your friend. It's like that. It's like like attracts like. That's basically the whole entire framework. Uh, I'm not saying it verbatim. I'm just saying that like, it's just who you hang out with is who you become, right? Who you associate with is who you become. It like attracts like. That's what I'm saying about the money side.

So, so it's, it's kind of also like the more you put yourself out there, the more you're going to attract your people, right? Like maybe the people you have right now that are watching, maybe they aren't your people. Right. But the more you start to put yourself out there, who you are, like, regardless if you think that you did it great, you didn't do it great, or you fumbled, or you're not sure, you know, if anyone's going to like what you say or if you have value to add, it doesn't matter. Just start putting yourself out there. Start getting uncomfortable, being uncomfortable, and do it until one day you're so comfortable with it, it just becomes instinctual.

Yeah. Yes. 100%. And that's one skill.

Okay.

So in 2024, right? Let's not, let's, let's increase like the authenticity, right? Or do your best to, right? Um, just have fun with it. That's part of the process too. It's here's a mistake. Okay. A mistake to avoid for all entrepreneurs is not having fun. You have to add fun. Always add fun. We're here to have fun. Why are we doing things that we don't want to have fun in? Like, why are you going to do things? This was my motto even before, like, you know, before I met you. My motto was, if it's not fun, then I'm not doing it. It's like that, literally. And I would literally, like, move away from all the people that were not having fun. It's like that because I'm just like, why am I here? I want to have fun. Angela says, I stand by this.

Yes. Yeah, I can hear you laughing right now.

If it's not fun, don't do it. Okay. And then if, if you have to do it, right? If you have to do it, then how can you add fun into the mix? Right? How can you add fun into the mix? Have that childlike mentality, right? Like just be a child. Everyone here is a grownup kid. Let's, let's be a, let's be grownup kids together. You know, let's have some fun. So that right there in 2024, like starting now though, everything we are talking about, start now. Start now, start now, start now. But in 2024, a mistake to avoid is everything that you do, right? If there's— if it's not fun, but you have to do it, try to add some fun to it. Okay. Add fun. I'm making a list. I'm sorry.

That would be a mistake to avoid. A mistake to avoid is not having fun, right? When you're having fun, you don't think, you don't overthink, you don't think, am I doing this right? Like, am I having fun properly? Like, you don't, you know. So when you're having fun doing what you do, things just start to flow naturally, right? And especially if you're doing it with people that are having fun in life, you know, that's where the creativity comes in. That's where, you know, you stop thinking so much. You're less in your head and you're more in your heart, right? So yeah, that should be a mistake to be avoided is not having fun doing what you do, especially when you love what you do with the people that you love right beside you.

Yeah, 100%. That's 100%. And then, you know, like, obviously, like, there are things that we got to take serious, right? So the things that are serious, take them seriously. Okay. The things that are serious, take them seriously. But that doesn't mean that you have to be like, like a robot. Like you can have fun still. Okay. Because that's part of the journey now. Now we're getting into like the intangible stuff, the journey and the process. But again, like there are times to be serious and there are times to, to really have fun. But if you can have like a mix of both and you can really add fun to everything, then why not? Right? 2024. In 2024, what have you been— so what have you been taking seriously, too seriously this past year that, you know, you can kind of like, you know, kind of be relaxed a little bit, but still take it seriously at the same time. Right? Nico says a class was split into two groups. One group was to take clay and make the perfect clay pot. Second group was to take the same amount of clay and make as many clay pots as they can. The group that made it a lot more ended up making the better day, the better, oh, the better clay pots. Wow. That's crazy. That's so true though. That makes a lot of sense. It's because like you're, it's, you don't have like that external pressure that matches that internal pressure within. So being able to like, just like set a goal, that, that's part of goal setting right there, Nico. It's like if you guys have been— so if here's a mistake to avoid, okay, in the past year, what goals were too small? What goals have you set that were too small? Because I'm going to tell you this right now, your imagination, your imagination is— sorry, your imagination, okay, is unlimited. Don't limit your imagination, okay? Do not limit your imagination. Why not dream bigger? If you were dreaming small this past year and you're playing small, that's a mistake to avoid in 2024. Start now though. That's a mistake to avoid in 2024. Don't play small. Don't play small. Don't limit your imagination. Dream bigger. Turn on that dream machine back on. Okay? Turn that dream machine back on. Turn that dream machine back on. I mean, yours is already on.

Keep poop. We gotta go.

Okay, sorry.

All right.

Well, that— we have 20 right there. Okay. Don't like dream bigger. Okay. In 2024, dream bigger. All right. This was— so we have a list of 20 things, 20 mistakes to avoid for 2024. I know that there's a lot more, right? I know that there's so much more. Angela says, if you can imagine it, you definitely can achieve it. Don't just imagine it once. Keep doing it. Thank you. Yes, 100%. Like, literally, it's, it's just, it's so, it's possible, okay? Everything that you think about is possible, 100%. Think and Grow Rich, that's the book. It talks about that, okay? If you can, if you can see it, you can, and you believe it, then you can achieve it, okay? So let's end it with that because we gotta go. So I hope this was helpful. 2024 business mistakes and life— we didn't even get into the personal, but business mistakes to avoid 2024. There's going to be a list I'll add it onto the website. We'll post on social media somewhere, but I hope this was valuable. Make a list of your own if you haven't already. That's a call to action. Make a list of your own and avoid them at all costs in 2024 and continue to add to that list so that way you can continuously get better and achieve your goals, achieve the dreams that you want to achieve, live the lifestyle you want. All right, you can do it. It's possible. All right, we love you. Have fun. Have fun. All right, have fun. Have fun, have fun, have fun. That's the most important thing. All right, take care. Love you all. Bye.