1) Take Massive Action
Seriously! I am not talking about creating a website is 4 weeks, adding content in another 5 weeks, then deciding to add traffic generation etc next year. I am talking about doing ALL that within a month! That is what i would call taking Massive Action. To do more in one month than you ever did before in a year. Is that possible? I bet my bottom dollar it is- I have done it before. If you take a series of Massive Action throughout your life, i dare say that it is IMPOSSIBLE for you not to succeed in whatever you sought to achieve.
Look at all succesful people around you, ask yourself, did ANY of them reach wherever they are today by just sitting around and taking minimal action?
2) Self-education
In the 1980s and 1990s, a college or university degree was all the rage. Parents would be so proud of children who completed their degrees, got a decent job, etc.
But this is now 2012. Degrees come easily. Univerisities keep sprouting up, offering countless degree programmes. There are now more graduates today, than ever before in the history of mankind!
Let’s use an analogy. If you were the only handsome lad in a village full of not so good looking people, your value was instantly elevated, and you had celebrity status, was treated better and got what you wanted, whenever you wanted.
But if you travelled to another part of the world, where good looking people are everywhere, your value was instantly deflated (at least in terms of looks) and you found it difficult to get what you wanted due to your looks only.
This is the same reason why degrees are less important now than before. Every Tom, Dick and Harry has some degree from some university.
Enter… self education.
The reason why self education is so appealing is that you get to choose EXACTLY what you want to learn, at your own pace, and is close to free of charge.
For example, if you wanted to create a wall painting business, all you needed to do were
1) learn how to create a website
2)learn copywriting skills to persuade customers to engage your business
3)learn website traffic generating methods to bring potential customers to your website.
4)learn all you can about labour laws governing salary, safe working conditions for your workers etc
5)learn about generating invoices, receipts and end of year reports.
6)learn how to attract painters to work for you.
Those are the 6 key steps to go from complete newbie, to small business owner, and I bet that could be done within 3 months or less, at cost of less than $2000.
Use pointer number 1 above (taking massive action) to make the 6 step process even faster.
Compare that to a general business degree, which has so much fluff and fillers.
Any day, self education could trump a degree. (Of course, this does not apply to specialised degrees such as law, medicine, engineering etc)
3) Specialised knowledge.
Do you know who earns more- the heart specialist or the general practitioner doctor in your neighborhood?
Who earns more, a general lawyer, or a lawyer specialising in divorces?
Who earns more, a skin doctor, or a doctor who treats only skin cancer?
The secret lies to specialisation. The more deeply you are embedded in your field of knowledge and niche, the higher your value to your market.
It has been said that for success, it is better to dig a deep, narrow tunnel 100 metres down, then to scrape the surface of the earth 1 metre deep, but 10000 metres across.
After all, where is the oil? Deep down under or just under the surface?