Tags: #literature/books/implemented Links: Finished-Implementing List
Chapter 2
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Fame or physical talent is not a prerequisite to wealth.
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Fast wealth is created exponentially, not linearly.
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Change can happen in an instant.
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Wealth eludes most people because they are preoccupied with events while disregarding process. Without process, there is no event.
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We may hear various stories about people owning multi-millionaire businesses, but not the struggles that led to such success
Wealth Road Trip Formula
Roadmap
- Your preconceived notions about wealth and money (slowlane vs fastlane)
Vehicle
- Our own maintenance and efficiency
Roads
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The various financial pathways you can take
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Day trader, e-commerce entrepreneur, software developer
Key Points
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Wealth is a formula, not an ingredient.
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Process makes millionaires. Events are by-products of process.
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To seek a “wealth chauffeur” is to seek a surrogate for process. Process cannot be outsourced, because process dawns wisdom, personal growth, strength, and events.
Roadmaps
-Our roadmap guides our actions and has formed the basis of our financial life
-To change our financial status, we must change our beliefs and choices
There are three roadmaps we can take:
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The Sidewalk >- Poorness
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The Slowlane >- Mediocrity
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The Fastlane >- Wealth
Each roadmap has key mindsets that guide our actions:
Debt Perception: Does debt control you or do you control your debt?
Time Perception: How is your time valued and treated? Abundant? Fleeting? Inconsequential?
Education Perception: What role does education have in your life?
Money Perception: What is money’s role in your life? Is money a tool or a toy? Plentiful or scarce?
Primary Income Source: What is your primary means of creating income?
Primary Wealth Accelerator: How are you accelerating your net worth and creating wealth? Or are you?
Wealth Perception: How do you define wealth?
Wealth Equation: What is your mathematical plan for accumulating wealth? What wealth equation defines the physics of your wealth universe?
Destination: Is there a destination? If so, what does it look like?
Responsibility & Control: Are you in control of your life and your financial plan?
Life Perception: How do you live your life? Do you plan for the future? Forsake today for tomorrow? Or tomorrow for today?
Key Points
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To force change, change must come from your beliefs, and your roadmap outlines those beliefs.
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Each roadmap is governed by a wealth equation and predisposed to a financial destination-Sidewalk to poorness, Slowlane to mediocrity, and the Fastlane to wealth.
Sidewalk
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Having a sidewalk roadmap implies that you are one event away from financial ruin
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You have no plan, and instant gratification consumes you as you spend all the money you make
People who have a sidewalk roadmap have the following mindsets:
Debt Perception: If I have no debt, I can spend my money to my heart’s content!
Time Perception: Who knows how long we live, so spend as much as we can!
Education Perception: After school ends, you don’t need to learn lmao
Money Perception: Show others how rich and successful you are :D
Primary Income Source: Focus on the highest paying revenue source
Primary Wealth Accelerator: Not-reliable
Wealth Perception: Whoever has the most stuff
Wealth Equation: Wealth = Income + Debt
Destination: The only thing I care about is today
Responsibility & Control: Anything bad that happens to me is out of my control!
Life Perception: Live today, die tomorrow.
Symptoms of a sidewalk roadmap:
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Not learning after school
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Frequently changing jobs
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Think people richer than you were born rich
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Easily impressed, seek to impress
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Poor credit
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Focus on how others can help change you, rather than yourself
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Live paycheck to paycheck
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Negative net-worth
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Gamble
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No insurance
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Distract yourself through media
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Failed when trying “get quick rich” schemes
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You ask for loans often
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A sidewalk roadmap only focuses on the short-term rather than the long-term
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Their lifestyle is based off of their income, and they lack financial discipline
Key Points
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A first-class ticket to the Sidewalk is to have no financial plan.
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The Sidewalk’s natural gravitational pull is poorness, both in time and money.
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You cannot solve poor financial management with more money.
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You can be income rich and still ride the Sidewalk dirty.
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If wealth is defined by income and debt, wealth is an illusion, because it is vulnerable to potholes, detours, and “bumps in the road.” When the income disappears, so does the illusion of wealth.
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Poor financial management is like gambling; the house eventually wins.
The Wealth Trinity
Family (relationships)
- Relationships with family, friends, God, and those in your life
Fitness (health)
- Health, passion, and energy
Freedom (choice)
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Being able to pursue your own dreams, and are free from alarm clocks or bosses
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It’s important to not “pretend” to be rich by buying things that you can barely afford; instead, continue to work on further improving your foundation to achieve even greater heights
Key Points
- Wealth is authored by strong familial relationships,
fitness and health, and freedom-not by material possessions.
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Unaffordable material possessions are destructive to the wealth trinity.
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True affordability is when you are able to buy something without thinking about the price; if you have to convince yourself that you can afford something, chances are, you can’t
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Money doesn’t buy happiness because money is used for consumer pursuits destructive to freedom. Anything destructive to freedom is destructive to the wealth trinity.
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Money, properly used, can buy freedom, which can lead to happiness.
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Happiness stems from good health, freedom, and strong interpersonal relationships, not necessarily money.
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Lifestyle Servitude steals freedom, and what steals freedom, steals wealth.
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If you think you can afford it, you can’t.
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The consequence of instant gratification is the destruction of freedom, health, and choice.
Luck
- Others may perceive rich people to be “lucky”, but in reality, that luck is a result of the effort and situations the rich people put themselves in. When comparing the lifestyles of the two, of course they will claim it is luck since they have no clue such thing is possible.
Sidewalkers have the three following beliefs:
Belief 1: Luck is needed for wealth.
- Luck is needed, but you can increase that luck by trying to improve your chances
Belief 2: Wealth is an event.
- Gambling is an event, but a lifetime of learning and improving yourself is not
Belief 3: Others can give wealth to me.
- Your wealth is largely determined by your own efforts
Key Points
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Like wealth, luck is created by process, not by event.
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Luck is created by increased probabilities that are improved with the process of action.
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If you find yourself playing the odds of “big hits,” you are event-driven, not process-driven. This mindset is conducive to the Sidewalk, not the Fastlane.
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“Get Rich Quick” infomercial marketing is a Fastlane because savvy marketers know that Sidewalkers place faith in events over process.
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Moneymaking “systems” are rarely as profitable as the act of selling them to Sidewalkers.
Responsibility and Accountability
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Responsible people have control over their bad decisions, even the bad ones. Accountable people learn from their mistakes, and try to not repeat the bad choices responsible people may tend to keep repeating.
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By being responsible and accountable for your actions, mistakes turn from “bad luck” into a learning lesson
Key Points
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Hitchhikers assign control over their financial plans to others effectively introducing probabilities to victimhood.
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The Law of Victims: You can’t be a victim if you don’t relinquish power to someone capable of making you a victim.
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Responsibility owns your choices.
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Taking responsibility is the first step to taking the driver’s seat of your life. Accountability is the final.
Slowlane
-Although the people in the slowlane have a plan to become wealthy, it follows a lifetime of work and suffering just to enjoy the luxuries before death
Perceptions
Debt Perception: Debt is evil. It must be religiously attacked, even if that means working overtime for life.
Time Perception: My time is abundant and I will gladly trade my time for more dollars. The more hours I can work, the more I can pay off my debt and save money for retirement at 65.
Education Perception: Education is important because it helps me earn a bigger salary.
Money Perception: Money is scarce and every dime and dollar must be accounted for, budgeted, and perilously saved. If I want to retire by 65 with millions, I have to ensure I don’t squander my hard-earned money.
Primary Income Source: My job is my sole source of income.
Primary Wealth Accelerator: Compound interest is powerful because $10 invested today will be worth $300,000 in 50 years. Oh yes, and don’t forget about mutual funds, home appreciation, and my employer’s 401(k).
Wealth Perception: Work, save, and invest. Work, save, and invest. Repeat for 40 years until retirement age … 65 years old or, if I’m lucky and the markets return 12% yearly, maybe 55!
Wealth Equation: Wealth = job + market investments.
Destination: A comfortable retirement in my twilight years.
Responsibility & Control: It’s my responsibility to provide for my family although for that plan to work I have to rely on others, including my employer, my financial adviser, the government, and a good economy.
Life Perception: Settle for less. Give up on big dreams. Save, live frugal, don’t take unnecessary risks, and one day I will retire with millions.
Symptoms of the Slowlane Life
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Go to school
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Get good grades
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Graduate
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Pay yourself first
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Overtime
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Corporate ladder
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Save X% of your paycheck
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Contribute to your 401(k)
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Invest in mutual funds
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Buy and hold
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Paychecks, pensions, benefits
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Diversify
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Raise your insurance deductibles
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The stock market
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Say “no” to expensive lattes
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Be frugal
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Get out of debt
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Clip coupons
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Cancel your credit cards
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Dollar cost averaging
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Get an advanced degree
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Pay off your house early
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Your home is an asset
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Individual retirement accounts (IRAs)
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Live below your means
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Understand compound interest
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Having parts of the slowlane is okay in a fastlane plan, as long as it doesn’t completely comprise it.
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Instead of working 5 days a week to enjoy 2 days, try to aim for a reversal.
Key Points
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The Slowlane is a natural course-correction from the Sidewalk evolving from taking responsibility and accountability.
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Wealth is best experienced when you’re young, vibrant, and able, not in the twilight of your life.
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The Slowlane is a plan that takes decades to succeed, often requiring masterful political prowess in a corporate environment. For the Slowlaner, Saturday and Sunday is the paycheck for Monday through Friday.
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The default return on your time in the Slowlane is negative 60%-5-for-2.
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The 5-for-2 trade inherit in the Slowlane is generally fixed and cannot be manipulated, because job standards are five days a week.
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The predisposed destination of the Slowlane is mediocrity. Life isn’t great, but it isn’t so bad either.
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In a job, you sell your freedom (in the form of time) for freedom (in the form of money).
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Experience is gained in action. The environment of that action is irrelevant.
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Wealth accumulation is thwarted when you don’t control your primary income source.
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Slowlane wealth is improbable due to Uncontrollable Limited Leverage (ULL).
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The first variable in the Slowlane wealth equation evolves from a job that factors to intrinsic value that equates to your nominal value for each unit of your life traded.
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Intrinsic value is the value of your time set by the marketplace and is measured in units of time, either hourly or yearly.
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In the Slowlane, intrinsic value (regardless of its time measurement) is numerically inhibited because there are only 24 hours in the day (for the hourly worker),and the average lifespan is 74 years (for the salaried worker).
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Like the Slowlaner’s primary income source (a job), the Slowlaner’s wealth acceleration vehicle (compound interest) is also pegged to time.
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Like a job, compound interest is mathematically futile and cannot be manipulated. You cannot force-feed the market (or the economy) to give you phenomenal returns, year after year.
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Wealth cannot be accelerated when pegged to mathematics based on time.
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Time is your primordial fuel and it should not be traded for money.
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Your time should not be an expendable resource for wealth because wealth itself is composed of time.
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Your mortality makes time mathematically retarded for wealth creation.
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If you don’t control the variables inherent in your wealth universe, you don’t control your financial plan.
Education
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Although getting an education will increase your income, it will still be set to time, and student debt can become a pain later on
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Slowlaners attempt to manipulate intrinsic value by education.
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Indentured time is time you spend earning a living. It is the opposite of free time.
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Parasitic debt is debt that creates indentured time and forces work.
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Take advice from people with a proven, successful track record of their espoused discipline.
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Many money gurus often suffer from a Paradox of Practice; they teach one wealth equation while getting rich in another. They’re not rich from their own teachings.
Dangers of the Slowlane
- Health
- You might not be able to live long enough to reap the rewards
- Job
- The slowlane plan won’t work if you’re unemployed
- Home
- You will lose lots of value if your home sinks in price
- Company/Others
- You are depending on others to bring you financial wealth
- Lifestyle
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You must miss out on fun things for the “long-term” plan
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Delayed gratification > no gratification
- Economy
- If your stocks drop or the economy crumbles, you are fucked
- Sidewalk
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One might feel hopeless and resort to instant gratification to make them feel better
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Even if a slowlaner were to notice the problems with their plan, trying to further enhance in the slowlane will barely result in any progress due to the predisposed numbers
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By being fine with saving money instead of enjoying life, you succumb yourself to mediocrity
Personal Net Income = Intrinsic Value - Personal Expenses
Slowlane vs Fastlane
Slowlane millionaires make millions in 30 years or more. Fastlane millionaires make millions in 10 years or less.
Slowlane millionaires need to live in middle-class homes. Fastlane millionaires can live in luxury estates.
Slowlane millionaires have MBAs. Fastlane millionaires hire people with MBAs.
Slowlane millionaires let their assets drift by market forces. Fastlane millionaires control their assets and possess the power to manipulate their value.
Slowlane millionaires can’t afford exotic cars. Fastlane millionaires can afford to drive whatever they want.
Slowlane millionaires work for their time. Fastlane millionaires have time working for them.
Slowlane millionaires are employees. Fastlane millionaires hire employees.
Slowlane millionaires have 401(k)s. Fastlane millionaires offer 401(k)s.
Slowlane millionaires use mutual funds and the stock market to get rich. Fastlane millionaires use them to stay rich.
Slowlane millionaires let other people control their income streams. Fastlane millionaires control their income streams.
Slowlane millionaires are cheap with money. Fastlane millionaires are cheap with time.
Slowlane millionaires use their house for net worth. Fastlane millionaires use their house for residency.
Key Points
The Slowlane has seven dangers, five of which cannot be controlled.
The risk of “lifestyle” is the one risk Slowlaners will try to control.
The Slowlane is predisposed to mediocrity because its mathematical universe is mediocre.
Slowlaners manipulate the “expense” variable because it is the one thing they can control.
Exponential income growth and expense management creates wealth-not just by curtailing expenses.
You can break the Slowlane equation by exploding your intrinsic value via fame or insider corporate management.
Successful Slowlaners not famous or in corporate management end in the middle . . . middle class and middle age.
Slowlane millionaires are stuck in the middle class.
$5 million is the new $1 million.
A millionaire cannot live a millionaire lifestyle without financial discipline.
Lottery winners fall into the millionaire trap and go broke because they attempt to live a “millionaire” lifestyle, not understanding that a few million doesn’t go very far.
Fastlane
Components
- Controllable Unlimited Leverage (CUL)
Whereas the Slowlane is defined by uncontrollable variables with no leverage, the Fastlane exploits the opposite conditions: maximum control and leverage.
- Business
Your own business, self-employment, and entrepreneurship are centrist to the Fastlane, much like a job is to the Slowlane.
- Lifestyle
The Fastlane is a lifestyle choice: a commitment of blended beliefs, processes, and actions.
- Rapid Wealth Creation
The Fastlane is about creating large sums of wealth rapidly and beyond the confines of “middle class.”
This story epitomizes the Fastlane. A business was created; a lifestyle grew the business, which opened up the expressway, and the expressway led to extraordinary wealth, which led to freedom. And yes, it isn’t for everyone.
Mindset
Debt Perception: Debt is useful if it allows me to build and grow my system.
Time Perception: Time is the most important asset I have, far exceeding money.
Education Perception: The moment you stop learning is the moment you stop growing. Constant expansion of my knowledge and awareness is critical to my journey.
Money Perception: Money is everywhere, and it’s extremely abundant. Money is a reflection of how many lives I’ve touched. Money reflects the value I’ve created.
Primary Income Source: I earn income via my business systems and investments.
Primary Wealth Accelerator: I make something from nothing. I give birth to assets and make them valuable to the marketplace. Other times, I take existing assets and add value to them.
Wealth Perception: Build business systems for cash flow and asset valuation.
Wealth Equation: Wealth = Net Profit + Asset Value
Strategy: The more I help, the richer I become in time, money, and personal fulfillment.
Destination: Lifetime passive income, either through business or investments.
Responsibility % Control: Life is what I make it. My financial plan is entirely my responsibility and I choose how I react to my circumstances.
Life Perception: My dreams are worth pursuing no matter how outlandish, and I understand that it will take money to make some of those dreams real.
These mindposts are what formulate the Fastlaner’s lifestyle. It drives action.
Examples
The inventor who creates a gadget and sells millions of them to 15 wholesale distributors.
The guy who builds a cell phone application and sells it 50,000 times.
The guy who formulates an energy bar to help him stave off hunger and later is offered $192 million for his company.
The guy who builds a blog and three years later sells it for $4 million to a big pharmaceutical company.
The woman who invents a mop and sells 500,000 of them on QVC.
The teenager who builds a Web site that profits $70,000 month and later sells it for millions.
The guy who patents a product process and then licenses it to a Fortune 500 company and goes on to make $14 million.
The guy who creates a Web site to help him listen to his favorite basketball team and later sells the company for $5.5 billion.
The guy who builds a software company and later becomes the richest man on the planet.
The doctor who researches anti-aging treatments and sells them to a drug company for $700 million.
The author who writes a book about a teenage wizard and goes on to become a billionaire.
The gal who manufacturers and sells 20 million undergarments that help women fight body gravity.
The Internet marketer who earns $150,000/month selling ads.
The infomercial marketer who remakes an existing product and sells 4 million of the “new, improved” version.
The guy who creates an energy drink to help him stay hydrated and then sells the company for $530 million.
- While the slowlane only allows you to earn money for labour, the fastlane still requires effort and labor, but eventually can lead to a self-sustaining system that is automated
Key Points
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The risk profile of a Fastlane strategy isn’t much different from the Slowlane, but the rewards are far greater.
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The Fastlane Roadmap is an alternative financial strategy predicated on Controllable - Unlimited Leverage.
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The Fastlane roadmap is predisposed to wealth.
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The Fastlane Roadmap is capable of generating “Get Rich Quick” results, not to be confused with “Get Rich Easy.”
Producer Mindset
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Instead of being a consumer, become a producer
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After being a successful producer is when you can become a consumer
Key Points
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Producers are indigenous to the Fastlane roadmap.
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Producers are the minority as are the rich, while consumers are the majority as are the poor.
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When you succeed as a producer, you can consume anything you want.
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Fastlaners are producers, entrepreneurs, innovators, visionaries, and creators.
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A business does not make a Fastlane-some businesses are jobs in disguise.
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The Fastlane wealth equation is not bound by time and its variables are unlimited and controllable.
Equation
Wealth = Net Profit + Asset Value
Net Profit = (Units Sold) X (Unit Profit)
Asset Value = (Net Profit) X (Industry Multiplier)
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By being your own producer, you have absolute control on improving your system for making money, and your paycheck.
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To weaponize the Fastlane wealth equation, you must engage in a Fastlane business that has the potential for leverage or high speed limits.
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Retarded numbers retard wealth!
Key Points
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The key to the Fastlane wealth equation is to have a high speed limit, or an unlimited range of values for units sold. This creates leverage. The market for your product or service determines your upper limit.
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The higher your speed limit, the higher your income potential.
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The primary wealth accelerant for the rich is asset value, defined as appreciable assets created, founded, or bought.
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Wealth creation via asset value is accelerated by each industry’s average multiplier. For every dollar in net income realized, the asset value multiplies by a factor of the multiple.
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Your industry of specialization will determine the average multiple that determines your wealth accelerant factor. If the multiple is 3, your WAF is 300%.
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Liquidation events transform appreciated assets (“paper” net worth) into money (“real” net worth) that can be transformed into another passive income stream: a money system.
Systems
Rental Systems
- Real estate, royalty systems, patents
Computer/Software Systems
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Computers and software can run 24/7, and can be tailored to your liking
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The internet helps you connect your product to millions around the world
Content Systems
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Systems of information
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Fundamental content will survive over time and will still attract customers despite it’s age
Distribution Systems
- Advertising, methods for distributing content
Human Resource Systems
- Managing others to do stuff for you, which can be difficult to manage
Key Points
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To divorce yourself from the Slowlane’s transactional relationship of “time for money,” you need to become a producer, specifically, a business owner.
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Business systems break the bond between “your time for money” because they act like surrogate operatives for your time trade.
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If you have a passive income that exceeds all your needs and lifestyle expenses including taxes, you’re retired.
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Retirement can happen at any age.
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The fruit from a money tree is passive income.
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A Fastlane objective is to create a business system that survives time, exclusive of your time.
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The 5 money-tree seedlings are rental systems, computer systems, content systems, distribution systems, and human-resource systems.
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Real estate, licenses, and patents are examples of rental systems.
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Internet and software businesses are examples of computer systems.
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Authoring books, blogging, and magazines are forms of content systems.
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Franchising, chaining, network marketing, and television marketing are examples of distribution systems.
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Human resource systems can add or subtract to passivity.
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Human resource systems are the most expensive to manage and implement.
Money
-Having money is important in creating more by lending the money you already have
-By starting with more money, interest rates produce more money earlier
Key Points
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One saved dollar is the seed to a money tree.
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A mere 5% interest on $10 million dollars is $40,000 a month in passive income.
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A saved dollar is the best passive income instrument.
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Fastlaners (the rich) don’t use compound interest or the markets to get wealthy but to create income and preserve liquidity.
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A saved dollar is a freedom fighter added to your army.
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The rich leverage compound interest at its crest, applied against large sums of money.
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Fastlaners eventually become net lenders.
Law of Effection
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The more lives you affect in an entity you control, in scale and/or in magnitude, the richer you will become (affect millions and make millions)
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Net Profit = Units Sold (Scale) x Unit Profit (Magnitude)
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Scale or Magnitude by themselves create millionaires, while the combination of both create billionaires
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Retrace the source of millionaire money and you will find millions of something
Key Points
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The Law of Effection states that the more lives you affect or breach, both in scale or magnitude, the richer you will be.
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Scale translates to “units sold” of our profit variable within our Fastlane wealth equation. Magnitude translates to “unit profit” of our profit variable within our Fastlane wealth equation.
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The Law of Attraction is not a law, but a theory. The Law of Effection is absolute and operates exclusive of a roadmap.
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All lineages of self-made wealth trace back to the Law of Effection.
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The Law of Effection’s absoluteness comes from direct access and control (you are the athlete) versus indirect access (you are the athlete’s agent).
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To make millions you must serve millions in scale or a few in magnitude.
Your Vehicle
- You need to own yourself before you can pay yourself
Business Structures
C Corporation
- Splits income to owner, then to business, lowering tax bracket
S Corporation
- Tax is based off of owner’s personal tax return
Limited liability corporation
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Tax is based off of personal income tax
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An LLC or S corp is recommended for small startups.
Selecting an Entity
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Exit strategy (Go public, sell to investors)
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Growth strategy
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Liability exposure in the worst case
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Raising capital now or in the future
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Hiring employees?
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Take on new partners?
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Earning profits now or later on?
Key Points
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“Pay yourself first” is fundamentally impossible in a job.
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To own your vehicle (you), start a corporation that formally divorces you from the act of business. Your corporation is the body of your surrogate.
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The recommended Fastlane business entity is a C corp, an S corp, or an LLC.
Your Steering Wheel (Choice)
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Instead of masking the symptoms of being poor, we must make choices to improve our situation
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Instead of masking the symptom, we need to solve the underlying problem
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The fastlane requires a magnitude of choices that form perseverance and determination
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By stringing all these choices together, you begin to make progress
People don’t choose to be poor, they make decisions that indirectly lead to it:
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Cheating vs studying
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Lying or being honest
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Watching TV or reading books
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Playing video games 110 hours a week
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Treasonous choices are actions that do irreparable harm to your life, dreams, and goals, changing your life forever.
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Keep in mind the butterfly effect, and how one small change you can make right now can dramatically impact the course of your life. However, as you progress in life, such choices will start to decrease in impact (think of the trunk vs thin branches of a tree)
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Even the smallest choices can develop habits and lifestyles that form process
Key Points
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The leading cause of poorness is poor choices.
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The steering wheel of your life is your choices.
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You are exactly where you chose to be.
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Success is hundreds of choices that form process. Process forms lifestyle.
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Choice is the most powerful control you have in your life.
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Treasonous choices forever impact your life negatively.
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Your choices have significant horsepower, or trajectory into the future.
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The younger you are, the more potent your choices are and the more horsepower you possess.
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Over time, horsepower erodes as the consequences of old choices are thick and hard to bend.
Your View
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We have two types of choices: choice of perception, and choice of action
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It’s important to not distort your perception by underselling yourself, and to think and speak in a way that exerts confidence
Steering Strategies
Worse Case Consequence Analysis (WCCA)
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Keeps you away from treasonous choices
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When making a decision, run through the following:
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What is the worst-case consequence of this choice?
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What is the probability of this outcome?
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Is this an acceptable risk?
Weighted Average Decision Matrix (WADM)
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Make better decisions by facilitating good ones
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Used more for big decisions
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Think of factors you want to consider and give each factor a value from 1-10, giving a higher number cap for more important factors
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ex) When choosing where to live, consider the weather and living expenses
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Since you stay inside often, living expenses would outweigh weather
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Next, you rate the choice in relation to the factor, and do so for all choices
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At the end, you multiply your rating to the numerical value of the factor
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WADM is a great tool for taking everything into account, as long as you’re honest about
Rearview Mirror
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You should not be confined to your past; life goes on, and there’s no point in reminiscing what could have been
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Memories can be treasonous, muted, or accelerative, and it is up to us to define our memories
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As a result, we can manipulate our memories to our own improvement
Key Points
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Your choices of action manifest from your choices of perception.
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What you choose to perceive, or not perceive, will manifest itself to a choice of action, or inaction.
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You can change your choice of perception by aligning yourself with those who experience the perception as reality.
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Worst Case Consequence Analysis helps avoid treasonous choices.
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The Weighted Average Decision Matrix can help you make better big decisions by clarifying alternatives and their internal factors
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The universe has no memory, only you do.
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Your past can be accelerative or treasonous. You choose the classification.
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If your eyes are transfixed to the past, you can’t become the person you need to become in the future.
Headwind
- If you want to become above average, you will need to learn how to defy social norms and not listen to the average opinions of others; you will need to create your own expectations, and strive to achieve them
Sources for Headwind (Dream Stealers)
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Friends and family who just don’t get it.
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Educational institutions that preach Slowlane dogma.
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Parents who are conditioned to believe wealth is for other people.
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Slowlane gurus who claim your house is the best investment.
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Slowlane gurus who say $100 invested today will be worth $10 million in 50 years.
-
Your environment.
Escaping Headwinds
Environmental
-
Switch up the setting of your room, or wherever you spend your time
-
It’s important to identify your headwinds, and to turn your back on such winds
-
Evaluate people in your life as if you’ll need to go to war alongside them
-
To find new people, join entrepreneur clubs, attend networking events, find like-minders, the important thing is that you have the choice to find new people
Significant Others
- It’s important to have a SO that understands similar values and won’t act as an obstacle in your path to success
Key Points
-
The natural gravity of society is not to be exceptional, but average.
-
Toxic relationships drain energy and detract from your goals to be extraordinary.
-
The people in your life are like your comrades in a battle platoon. They can save you, help you, or destroy you.
-
Good relationships are accelerative to your process, while bad relationships are treasonous.
Your Fuel
- Know the worth of your time; time is deathly scarce, while money is richly abundant
Your Lifespan = Free time + Indentured Time
-
Free time consists of time you can use to do whatever you want
-
Indentured time is the time spent earning money and the consequences of that spent time, and free time becomes the payment for your indentured time
-
Money buys indentured time for more free time
-
Parasitic debt is things that weigh us down and creates more indentured time
When buying an item, take two things into consideration:
-
The actual dollar cost
-
The free time transformed into indentured time
Bad Valuations of Free Time
-
Sleeping until noon
-
Watches hours of TV
-
Drives 2 hours to save $20
-
Spends hours surfing social networks and gossip blogs
-
Spending hours on video games or consuming entertainment in general
-
It’s important to recognize how valuable time is so we don’t sacrifice it for diminishing returns
Key Points
-
Fastlaners regard time as the king of all assets.
-
Time is deathly scarce, while money is richly abundant.
-
Indentured time is time you spend to earn money. Free time is spent as you please.
-
Your lifespan is made up of both free time and indentured time.
-
Free time is bought and paid for by indentured time.
-
Fastlaners seek to transform indentured time into free time.
-
Parasitic debt eats free time and excretes it as indentured time.
-
Lifestyle extravagances have two costs: the cost itself and the cost to free time.
-
Parasitic debt has to be stopped at the source: instant gratification.
Your Oil
-
Just like how oil needs to be frequently maintenanced, we must continue to learn and improve
-
In the Fastlane, education is used to facilitate and grow the business system; instead of being the cog in a wheel, you learn how to build the wheel
-
ex) Reading about computer technology can help me apply such concepts
-
We learn more from oding more than simply hearing information
-
If we “don’t know how”, it’s because we haven’t tried enough to learn how
-
Hit the fucking books
Places to Continue Learning
-
Bookstores
-
Library
-
Internet Classes
-
Internet blogs/podcasts/screencasts/webcasts
-
TV
-
Educational classes
Time Efficiency
-
You can turn moments of boredom/unproductivity into learning experiences by multitasking
-
ex) while driving, exercising, waiting, shitting, at your job, watching TV
-
Begin learning about topics that you have interest in and can improve upon
-
Read at least one book per month
-
Instead of buying seminars, just find the information yourself for a fraction of the cost
Key Points
-
Fastlaners start their education at graduation, if not before.
-
A Fastlaner’s education serves to advance their business system and their money tree, not to raise intrinsic value.
-
Fastlaner’s aren’t interested in being a cog in the wheel. They want to be the wheel.
-
I don’t know how” is an excuse dismantled by discipline.
-
Infinite knowledge is everywhere and it’s free. What’s missing is discipline to assimilate it.
-
You can become an expert in any discipline not requiring physical skills.
-
Educational recharges can occur within time blocks already allocated for other objectives.
-
Organizers of expensive seminars take advantage of Sidewalkers and disenfranchised Slowlaners by marketing empty promises as “events.”
Redline
-
Know the difference between interest and commitment, and display commitment by doing things one step further
-
By being committed, you have to take risks and get uncomfortable and admit the feelings of fear associated with it. However, it is important to take intelligent risks over moronic risks
-
Instead of saying someday or waiting for something, take action and do it ASAP
-
Timing is rarely perfect
Key Points
-
Interest is first gear. Commitment is the Redline.
-
Hard work and commitment separates the winners from the losers.
-
Some choose short-term mediocre comfort over long-term meteoric comfort.
-
To live unlike everyone else, you have to do what everyone else won’t.
-
Arm your expectations to hard work, sacrifice, and other bumps in the road. These are the land mines where the weak are removed from the road and sent back to the land of “most people.”
-
Failure is natural to success. Expect it and learn from it.
-
One home run could set you financially secure for your life, perhaps generations.
-
Home runs can’t be hit in the dug out.
-
Moronic risks have unlimited downside (long term) and limited upside (short term).
-
Intelligent risks have unlimited upside (long term) and limited downside (short term.)
-
There is never perfect timing and waiting for “someday” just wastes time.
Road to Wealth
Five Fastlane Commandments
-
The Commandment of Need
-
The Commandment of Entry
-
The Commandment of Control
-
The Commandment of Scale
-
The Commandment of Time
Key Points
-
Not all businesses are the right road. Few roads move at, through, or near the Law of Effection.
-
The best roads and the purest Fastlanes satisfy the Five Fastlane Commandments: Need, Entry, Control, Scale, and Time.
Need
-
A successful business is one that suits the needs of your customers, whether it be by helping them, educating them, solving a problem, or other things that can add to their life
-
Surrender your own selfishness and address the selfishness of others
-
Instead of chasing money, chase needs, problem, pain points, service deficiencies, and emotions
-
Even if you’re an expert in an area, ask yourself to see if there is a specific need for that niche in your area that you could cater towards
-
Is there a need?
-
Is there something similar companies are doing that I can do better?
-
What value do I offer my customers?
-
What assets do I bring to this company?
-
Entrepreneurs who are solely in it for the money are money-chasers, consumers who want to be producers but selfishly think like consumers
-
Money is attracted to businesses that solve problems
Ideas for Impact
-
Make them feel better.
-
Help them solve a problem.
-
Educate them.
-
Make them look better (health, nutrition, clothing, makeup).
-
Give them security (housing, safety, health).
-
Raise a positive emotion (love, happiness, laughter, self-confidence).
-
Satisfy appetites, from basic (food) to the risqué (sexual).
-
Make things easier.
-
Enhance their dreams and give hope.
-
If you do want to “do what you love” you need to make sure that your love solves a need and that you are exceptional at it
-
People may either replace their loves
-
Then other people negotiate with “do what you love” into an alternative, or a derivative. For example, Pauline loves to knit, so she sells her knitting online. However, these don’t make money fast, and they endanger the love
-
Instead of using love for something as fuel, use passion instead
-
Passion helps give you the ignition to do stuff because you desire to do it
-
Ask yourself why you are doing this; passion for an end goal, a why, drives fastlane action
-
When our dreams die, so does our passion
-
When unmotivated, re-energize your dream and align it with a road capable of burning a trail to its reality
-
Fastlaners work unlike everyone else so they can live unlike anyone else
-
Passion stems from extreme excitement and/or discontentment
-
Wanting to afford an expensive hobby, witnessing the hard labour your parents have to endure
Key Points
-
The Commandment of Need states that businesses that solve needs win. Needs can be pain points, service gaps, unsolved problems, or emotional disconnects.
-
Ninety percent of all new businesses fail because they are based on selfish internal needs, not external market needs.
-
No one cares about your selfish desires for dreams or money; people only want to know what your business can do for them.
-
Money chasers haven’t broken free from selfishness, and their businesses often follow their own selfish needs.
-
People vote for your business with their money.
-
Chase money and it will elude you. However, if you ignore it and focus on what attracts money, you will draw it to yourself.
-
Help one million people and you will be a millionaire.
-
For money to follow “Do what you love,” your love must solve a need and you must be exceptional at it.
-
“Do what you love” sets the stage for crowded marketplaces with depressed margins.
-
When you have the financial resources, you can “do what you love” and not get paid for it, nor do you have to be good at it.
-
Slowlaners feed “do what you love” with “do what you hate.” Five days of hate for two days of love.
-
“Doing what you love” for money can endanger your love.
-
Passion for an end goal, a why, drives Fastlane success.
-
Having a passionate “why” can transform work into joy.
-
“Doing what you love” usually leads to the violation of the Commandment of Need.
-
The right road for you is one that will converge with your dreams.
Entry
-
Higher entry barriers into a business result in stronger, more powerful roads with less competition and less need for exceptionality
-
Lower entry barriers result in high competition and traffic, resulting in little room for advancement
-
Real business startups are processes, not events
-
When “everyone” is doing it, it’s time to get out
-
For an alternative, you can short the other side and profit from the downfall
Key Points
-
The Commandment of Entry states that as entry barriers fall, competition rises and the road weakens.
-
Easy access roads carry more traffic. More traffic generates higher competition, and higher competition creates lower margins for the participants.
-
Businesses with weak entry often lack control and operate in saturated marketplaces.
-
Exceptionalism is required to overcome weak entry barriers.
-
Access to a business road should be a process with a toll, not an event.
-
“Everyone” consists of the general populous and is served by the mainstream media.
-
If everyone were wealthy, “everybody is doing it” would work. And if everyone is wealthy, then no one is wealthy.
-
“Everyone is doing it” is a signal to overbought conditions and the entrance of “dumb money.”
Control
- When you control your business, you control everything: organization, products, pricing, revenue model, operational choices. If you’re not controlling everything, you’re not in complete control
Examples
-
Drivers create MLM companies; they don’t join them.
-
Drivers sell franchises; they don’t buy them.
-
Drivers offer affiliate programs; they don’t join them.
-
Drivers run hedge funds; they don’t invest in them.
-
Drivers sell stock; they don’t buy stock.
-
Drivers offer drop-shipping; they don’t use drop-shipping.
-
Drivers offer employment; they don’t get employed.
-
Drivers accept rents and royalties; they don’t pay rents and royalties.
-
Drivers sell licenses; they don’t buy them.
-
Drivers sell IPO shares; they don’t buy them.
-
Hitchhikers may still make good money, but drivers make the most money
-
Good money is 20k/month, and big money is 200k/month, and legendary money is 1mil+/month
-
If you’re a hitchhiker relying on the driver, if the driver crashes, you are screwed and have no control over it
-
Don’t have your business and life rely on someone else’s
-
Multi-level marketing strategies may seem entrepreneurial, but in the end of it all you’re doing someone else’s labor; you’re not the one making decisions or any business activities
Key Points
-
Hitchhikers relinquish control of their business to a Fastlaner.
-
There is a difference between “good” money and “big” money. Hitchhikers can make good money while Fastlaners make big money. Sometimes legendary money.
-
In a driver/hitchhiker relationship, the driver always retains control and the hitchhiker is at the mercy of the driver.
-
Hitchhikers are party to someone else’s Fastlane plan. Make the world your habitat of play in an organization you control.
-
Network marketing has little to do with entrepreneurship but more to do with sales, networking, training, and motivation.
-
Network marketing fails both the Commandments of Control and Entry, and sometimes, Need.
-
Network marketers are soldiers in a Fastlaner’s army.
-
Network marketing is a powerful distribution system. As a Fastlaner, seek to own one, not join one.
Scale
Consider the scale of your business:
-
Local/community (pool)
-
County/city (pond)
-
Statewide (lagoon)
-
Regional (lake)
-
National (sea)
-
Worldwide (ocean)
-
It’s important to run a business that is capable of scaling
-
To achieve scale, magnitude (price/cost) or reach (massive numbers)
Ask yourself the following questions:
-
Can the net income of this business scale limitlessly, say, from $2,000 per month to $200,000?
-
Can the asset value of this business scale into the millions?
-
Can this business impact millions? Or does it impact hundreds? Is its customer pool the world or a small community in the city?
-
Can this business be replicated and expanded beyond the local trading area by franchising, chaining, or additional units?
-
Best-case scenario, what is the units-sold potential? One hundred or one hundred million?
Law of Effection Barricades
Scale
- You can’t make millions if you can’t serve millions
Magnitude
-
You can’t make millions if you can’t increase your profit margins
-
To access the law of affection, drive a road that can break through scale and magnitude while controlling it’s source
Key Points
-
Your total pool of customers determines your habitat. The larger the habitat, the greater the potential for wealth.
-
A business can be a singles or a home-run-based business. Its strength is determined by scale, which is derived by habitat.
-
The Fastlane wealth equation is disarmed when you violate the Commandment of Scale. Scale is achieved in reach (units sold) and/or magnitude (unit profit).
-
The Law of Effection is the primary conduit to wealth, which can be road blocked by scale, magnitude, or source.
-
Effection consequences trickle up to owners and producers. Breaking scale or magnitude indirectly in an uncontrolled entity is not a guarantee of wealth.
-
To gain access to Effection, you have to break the barrier of scale or magnitude in an entity you control.
-
Scale, magnitude, or source deficiencies create governors on the speed of wealth creation.
Time
-
Try to create a business that can be automated and systematized to run even while away (passive income)
-
Do I make enough to hire other people to work for me
-
Can my operation benefit from the introduction of a money tree seedling?
-
How can I get this business to operate exclusive of my time?
-
Failure can result from not having access to the seeds because your road started with a deficiency, or because the seeds won’t grow in infertile soil
-
A business attached to your time is a job.
-
business that earns income exclusive of your time satisfies the Commandment of Time.
-
To satisfy the Commandment of Time, start with a business that uses a money system seedling, or introduce one.
-
Thou shalt not invest in a needless business. Thou shalt not trade time for money. Thou shalt not operate on a limited scale. Thou shalt not relinquish control. Thou shalt not let a business startup be an event over process.
Potent Fastlanes
-
Internet
-
Innovation
-
Intentional Iteration
Internet
- Subscription-based
- Offers data, info, or software to user for a monthly fee
- Content-based
-
Blogs, news magazines about a certain niche
-
Affiliate programs
- Lead generation
- Providing a service to consumers that solve the consumer’s desire to save $ and time, as well as find new customers inexpensively
- Social Networks
- Bringing people into groups
- Brokerage Systems
-
Brings buyers and sellers together to facilitate transactions
-
Paypal, coinbase, etc
- Advertising
- Merges buyers and sellers, accepts advertising fees for transaction fees
- E-Commerce
-
Selling goods, services, and information over the internet
-
Amazon, eBay
-
Also includes e-books
Innovation
-
Involves the manufacturing and distributing of a newly invented product
-
Can range from food, household, health, information, personal, and automotive
-
Inventing isn’t always about making new ideas; sometimes, you just simply have to take something and improve on it
-
Writing a book is not a business, selling the book is
Intentional Iteration (II)
-
Repeating a process with the aim of approaching a desired goal or target or result
-
Instead of owning one restaurant, own 50
Key Points
-
The best Fastlanes satisfy all five Commandments: Control, Entry, Need, Time, and Scale.
-
Assuming a need-based premise, the Internet is the fastest interstate, because it overwhelmingly satisfies all Commandments.
-
Innovation can be any variety of open roads: authoring, inventing, or services.
-
Inventing success needs coupling with distribution.
-
A singles-based business is scaled to a home-run business by intentional iteration. With iteration, scale is conquered.
Opportunity
-
Opportunity does not imply some revolutionary break-through, but rather a solution to an inconvenience, simplification, a feeling, a better service, anything that brings you one level higher than already existing businesses
-
If someone’s already doing your idea, just do it better
-
It’s okay to use old ideas, as long as you can improve on them like never before
Finding Oppportunity
Find solutions to the following statements:
-
“I hate”. Solve the hate.
-
“I don’t like”. Remove the dislike.
-
“This frustrates me”. Remove the frustration.
-
“Why is this like this?”. Remove the why.
-
“Do I have to?”. Remove the have to.
-
“I wish there was”. Make the wish come true.
-
“I’m tired of”. Fix someone’s tiredness.
-
“This sucks”. Reduce/remove suckage.
-
Solve other people’s problems, and solve your own money problems
-
Know the difference between quitting and switching paths
-
Accept failure
Key Points
-
Opportunities are rarely about inventing breakthroughs, but about performance gaps, small inconveniences, and pain points.
-
Competition should not impede your road. Competition is everywhere, and your objective should be to “do it better.”
-
Fastlane success resides in execution, not in the idea.
-
The world’s most successful entrepreneurs didn’t have a blockbuster ideas; they just took existing concepts and made them better, or exposed them to more people.
-
Opportunity is exposed in your language and your thought processes, as well as other people’s language.
-
Failure cracks open new roads.
-
Quitting only happens when you give up on your dream.
Destination
-
Our destination is the lifestyle we desire that we can freely live
-
We can achieve our destination through a money system (dividends, interest), or a business system that generates passive cash flow, funding your lifestyle AND money system.
Define Your Destination
Define the Lifestyle: What do you want?
- Write exactly what you want, and the monthly cost for each item.
Assess the Cost: How much do your dreams cost?
-
Next, determine your monthly allowance and other unknowns (insurance, electronics)
-
Gross Living Cost = Lifestyle Cost + Allowances = 14000
-
Net Living Cost = GLC / .60 = 23,333/mo
Set the Targets: Set the money system and business income targets.
-
Set your business system income target and your money system target
-
Calculate money system target by multiplying Net Living Cost by 12, then divide by 5% ex) 5,599,920
-
Calculate business system by multiplying Gross Living cost by 5. ex) 70,000/mo
-
Create a business that generates $70,000/mo in passive monthly income. 40% will go to taxes, 40% to the money system, and 20% to lifestyle.
-
Being able to passively support this lifestyle through a money system would be 5,599,920
-
Five percent interest on this amount is roughly $23,000 monthly, which covers lifestyle and taxes.
Make It Real: Fund it and open it!
-
You will need to start of small, and work your way there
-
Start by dropping change into a container
-
Trains yourself to visualize your goal moving closer
-
Forces you to evaluate whether you’re making significant progress
-
Change your relationship with money
Financial Literacy
-
Interest rates
-
Taxable and non-taxable yields
-
Amortization of mortgages
-
The balancing of a check book
-
Basic percentage calculations
-
Calculating return on investment
-
Why stocks rise and fall
-
Why a guaranteed 15% return on a bank CD is screaming, “scam!”
-
How stock options work, such as calls and puts
-
Why insurance exists
-
How a mutual fund works
-
What bonds are and how they rise and fall
-
Global currency
-
It’s important to be financially literate so you don’t get scammed later on
Key Points
-
The Fastlane is the means to your end because dreams cost money.
-
Conquer big goals by breaking them down to their smallest component.
-
Daily saving reinforces your relationship with money; it is your passive system that buys freedom and another soldier added to your army.
-
A money system isn’t used to grow wealth but to grow income. Growing wealth should be left to your Fastlane road.
-
You will struggle to build a financial empire if you are financially illiterate.
-
“Live below your means” is relevant at any income level.
-
For the Fastlaner, “Live below your means” means to expand your means.
-
A financial adviser doesn’t solve financial illiteracy and literacy is insurance.
-
Financial illiteracy dilutes your control, especially when evaluating the advice of a financial adviser.
Speed
-
Most people will not take action and be like everyone else
-
Speed is not about thinking about a Fastlane business, but creating it
-
Play chess, not checkers
-
The King: Your execution
-
The Queen: Your marketing
-
The Bishop: Your customer service
-
The Knight: Your product
-
The Rook: Your people
-
The Pawn: Your ideas.
Execution
-
Potential speed is an idea, while actual speed is an idea accelerated and executed
-
Retiring early requires a relentless and dominant king
-
Execution > Idea
Key Points
-
Speed is the transformation of ideas to execution.
-
Most people let powerful information expire and become worthless.
-
Successful Fastlane businesses are run multi-dimensionally, like a game of chess. One-dimensional businesses focus on price only.
-
Execution divides winners and losers from their ideas.
-
In business, execution is process. Ideas are events.
-
Ideas are potential speed. Execution is actual speed.
-
Others share your blockbuster idea. He who thinks the idea owns nothing. He who executes the idea owns everything.
-
Real money and momentum is created when an idea (potential speed) is matched with execution (accelerator pressure).
-
An idea is neurological flatulence. Execution makes it smell like a rose.
-
The world will react how it reacts
-
Business plans aren’t too useful, since they’re merely potential speed
-
The value in the business plan is determined by the person executing it
-
Act on your business plan instead of merely reading it
Key Points
-
The world gives clues to the direction you should be moving.
-
Business plans are useless because they are ideas on steroids.
-
As soon as the world interacts with your ideas, your business plan is invalidated.
-
The marketplace will steer you into directions that were previously unplanned for.
-
The best business plan in the world is a track record of execution-it legitimizes the business plan.
-
If you have a track record of execution, suddenly people will want to see your business plan.
-
If you want your business to get funded, take action and create something that reflects tangible execution.
-
Investors are more likely to invest in something tangible and real; not ideas dissected ad nauseam on paper.
Customer Service
-
Customer service should help, support and resolve any problems
-
Use complaints as criticism to further improve your business
-
Keep track of complaints and evaluate them to respond appropriately
Types of Complaints
Complaints of change
-
People are not always open to change, especially if they have grown accustomed to the previous
-
It’s important to allow for some complaints, but make sure that it isn’t excessive
Complaints of expectation
-
When your service fails to meet their expectations
-
Exposes operational issues, marketing misinformation, and/or product problems
Complaints of void
-
When your customer asks for something and you don’t have it
-
Exposes unmet needs
Complaints of fraud
-
Some complaints of void are done with the intention to screw over the business (hair in food)
-
You can’t please everyone; only solve the problems that will give you the most value
Sucks → Superior Unexpected Customer Service (SUCS)
-
Perform customer service greater than people’s expectations
-
Turns customers into lifelong clients who may even advertise your business for you
-
Answer emails ASAP
-
Make sure that the benefits outweigh the costs
-
Make your customer the boss and the #1 stakeholder to your business
-
Look big while act small to scare off competitors
Key Points
-
Complaints are valuable insights into your customers' minds.
-
Complaints of change are difficult to decipher and often require additional data to validate or invalidate.
-
Complaints of expectation expose operational problems in either your business, or in your marketing strategy.
-
Complaints of void expose unmet needs, raise the value of your product or service, and expose new revenue opportunities.
-
Great customer service is as simple as violating your customer’s low expectation in the positive.
-
Poor service gaps are Fastlane opportunities.
-
Satisfied customers can be human resource systems who promote your business for free.
-
Satisfied customers have a dual residual effect: Repeat business and new business via discipleship.
-
Your customer and their satisfaction hold the key to everything you selfishly want.
-
Looking big but acting small sets up customer service expectation violations in the positive.
-
Looking big can scare away potential competitors.
Employees
Make sure your partners have the same mindset as you:
-
Do you have the same work ethic? Will your partner skate while you burn the midnight oil?
-
Do you have the same vision? Or will they compete with each other?
-
Do you want to grow slowly while your partner wants to own the world and do it fast?
-
Do you want to sell franchises while your partner just wants one unit that pays the bills?
-
Do you trust this person with your life?
-
Do you have the same personality type?
-
Find accountants and attorneys you can trust
-
Pay attention to actions more than words
-
Trust, but verify
-
The only person you can truly trust is yourself
-
People will go to great lengths to screw you over
-
Instead of immediately trusting, give people the opportunity to earn your trust
-
A SUCS customer service philosophy must be delivered by your employees.
-
Spectacular product features can’t overcome poor service.
Key Points
-
A business partnership is as important as a marriage.
-
A good accountant and attorney will save you thousands, perhaps millions.
-
Accountants and attorneys have the keys to your castle; make sure you trust them fully because they have the power to right or wrong you.
-
Unmitigated trust exposes you to unmitigated risk.
-
Unverified trust can lead to uncontrollable consequences.
-
Your employees communicate the public’s perception of your company.
-
Fanatical customer service can overcome shortcomings, but fanatical features can’t overcome poor customer service.
-
Customer service philosophy is delivered from human interactions-not ambitious mission statements on a wall plaque in the CEO’s office.
Be Unique
-
Don’t get into a niche that is commoditized (when a product/service is homogeneous amongst providers)
-
If you’re paying closer attention to your competitors instead of yourself, you’re following instead of leading
-
Forget about your competition 95% of the time, and exploit their weaknesses and differentiate your business from theirs with that 5%
-
Force innovation
Key Points
-
Commoditization occurs when you get into business based on a false premise-“I want to own a business” or “I know how to do this, so I’ll start a business doing it.”
-
If you are too busy copying or watching your competition, you’re not innovating.
-
Use your competition to exploit their weaknesses.
Build Brands, not Businesses
-
Marketing can convince people to buy mediocre products and shadow incompetence
-
A brand is the best defense to commoditization
Unique Selling Proposition (USP)
- What makes your company different from the rest
We can develop a unique USP by:
-
Uncovering the benefits of your business that is unique
-
Be unique in your words (“Lose weight” → “Obliterate Fat”)
-
Be specific and give evidence (Earn $1000 or your money back)
-
Keep it short, clear, and concise
-
Integrate it into all marketing materials (ads, website, customer service, business cards)
-
You have to walk the walk, not just talk the talk
How to Rise above the Noise
There are five ways to get your message above the noise:
- Polarize
- Take on an extreme and uncommon viewpoint
- Arouse emotions
- Move your audience and make them feel something when they watch an ad or use your product
- Be risqué
- Sex sells
- Encourage interaction
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Make people think or talk about themselves to make them feel included
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Surveys, self-reflecting questions, provoking discussion
- Be unconventional
- Being unconventional makes you unique and grabs attention
Price
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Use price as an advertising strategy (discounts, value)
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Price implies value
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Sometimes being more expensive than your competitors will make consumers think you offer something that they don’t
Key Points
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Marketing and branding (the queen) is the most powerful tool in your Fastlane toolbox.
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Businesses survive. Brands thrive.
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Businesses have identity crises, brands don’t. Identity crises force business owners into price commoditization.
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Unique Selling Propositions (USPs) are the keys to your brand and differentiate your company from the rest.
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People have a natural disposition to be unique and unlike everyone else.
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To succeed in marketing, your messages have to break above the advertising clutter, or noise.
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Polarization is a great above-the-noise tool if your product targets a polarized audience-usually politics, minority opinions, and even sports teams.
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Sex sells and always draws eyeballs.
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Consumers make buying decisions based on emotions before practicality.
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If you can arouse emotions in your audience, you will be more likely to convince them to buy.
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People have a natural disposition to talk about themselves. If you can incorporate interaction into your campaigns, you will have better success.
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To be unconventional means to first isolate and identify what is conventional, then doing the opposite, or interrupting that convention.
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Consumers are selfishly motivated. Always target your messages toward the predisposition of “What’s in it for me?”
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Features are translated to benefits when you switch positions from producer to consumer, identify the feature’s advantages, and extrapolate those advantages into a specific result.
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Price implicitly conveys value and worth.
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Don’t allow your own perception of price direct your brand to mediocrity.
Monogamy over Polygamy
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Building one solid company is better than running 10 measly ones
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Focus on one thing only before expanding
Key Points
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Tekel Syndrome sufferers are polygamist-opportunists who opportunity hop.
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A weak business commitment commits you to weak assets.
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Weak assets do not accelerate wealth.
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The most successful entrepreneurs lived their business and were 100% committed to it.
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Successful business monogamy can lead to successful business polygamy.
FASTLANE SUPERCHARGER
1. Formula (Fastlane supercharger)
Wealth is a Formula and a systematic process of beliefs, choices, actions, and habits that form a lifestyle. Wealth is a process, not an event.
2. Admit (fAstlane supercharger)
Admit that the preordained path to wealth, “Get Rich Slow,” is fundamentally flawed because of Uncontrollable Limited Leverage, weak mathematics predicated on time (Wealth = Job + Markets). Admit that “Get Rich Quick” exists. Admit that “no plan” is not a good plan. Admit that luck is the residue of engagement.
3. Stop and Swap (faStlane supercharger)
Stop following the wrong roadmaps. Stop doing what you’ve been doing. Stop selling your soul for a weekend. Stop thinking that 401(k)s and mutual funds will make you rich. Swap ineffective roadmaps for the Fastlane roadmap. Swap your allegiances from consumer to producer.
4. Time (fasTlane supercharger)
Time is the king asset of the Fastlane-specifically, free time. Invest in activities that will grant free time. Avoid time thieves, such as parasitic debt that transfigures free time into indentured time. Invest time into a business system that can transform indentured time into free time. Make decisions with time as a key decision factor.
5. Leverage (fastLane supercharger)
Leverage controllable and unlimited mathematics to create wealth. There is no leverage within the Slowlane wealth equation, an equation predicated on time (hourly pay, annual salary, annualized return, years invested). If you can’t control the mathematics that predetermine your wealth, nor accelerate them into large numbers, you can’t control your financial plan. Leverage is harnessed by a system that does the work for you.
6. Assets and Income (fastlAne supercharger)
Wealth is accelerated by exploding income and Asset value via a business that can be systemized and eventually sold in a liquidation event. Live below your means but seek to expand your means by focusing on income while simultaneously controlling expenses. Exponential growth of income and asset value, not slashing expenses, creates millionaires.
7. Number (fastlaNe supercharger)
What’s your Number? How much money will you need to live a lifestyle of your choosing? Determine your number, break it down by the penny, and make it real today. Start saving your loose change, open a brokerage account, and put a chart on your office wall that continually monitors your number’s progress. Make your dream lifestyle real by posting photos of that lifestyle at your workspace. For example, if you want a cabin on a mountain creek, find a picture of that vision and put it on your computer so you have to see it every day. Make your visions of the future real and force them into your psyche so you’re constantly reminded. If your dream is a Ferrari, buy a die-cast Ferrari model and put it in your car or on your desk. Make those dreams real and inescapable!
8. Effection (fastlanE supercharger)
Grace Effection and you shall be graced with wealth. The Law of Effection states, “The more people whose lives you affect in an environment you control, the more money you will make.” Impact millions and you will make millions. When you solve needs on a massive scale, money flows into your life. Money reflects value.
9. Steer (fastlane Supercharger)
Life’s Steering is choice. At some point, you must commit to the Fastlane ideology, and that commitment forms your process. Wealth is not a choice of event, just like you cannot choose to lose 100 pounds and suddenly wake up 100 pounds lighter.
How you steer determines whether the Fastlane is a lifestyle or a hobby. To enforce good decisions at the extremes, deploy WCCA and WADM. Decision horsepower is strongest in youth and bleeds with age. Examine your past choices. Why are you where you are? What has been treasonous to your life? Why are you drowning in debt? If you don’t rectify the mistakes of your past choices you will be destined to repeat them. Behavior change begins with a reflection of your past choices and modifying them for the future to reflect a Fastlane mindset. Become responsible, followed by accountable.
10. Uncouple (fastlane sUpercharger)
Officially Uncouple from the Slowlane wealth equation by creating your business structure in a favorable Fastlane entity: a C- or S-Corporation, or an LLC. Thereafter, your entity is the body of your surrogate business system. It “pays itself first” and the government last. It survives time separate from your time. It is your first step at creating an asset.
11. Passion % Purpose (fastlane suPercharger)
With a business entity and a dollar figure that outlines your dream life, you will need a Passion and a Purpose to fuel you into habitual action. Don’t confuse “passion” with “do what you love.” Passion burns your soul and drives you to do whatever it takes. Passion revs you with excitement and enrages you with discontent. Some passions are selfish (I want a Lamborghini) and other passions are selfless (I want to help orphaned children). It doesn’t matter what it is, as long as the passion burns hot enough to burn a hole in your pants and gets you embroiled into process.
12. Educate (fastlane supErcharger)
Education begins at graduation. Pledge to never stop learning. What you know now is not enough to become the person you need to be tomorrow. Seek Fastlane knowledge that fosters the construction and operation of business systems in an environment that you control. Get to the library and get on the Internet. Information is the oil on your financial journey. Ensure daily reading in short bursts by leveraging existing blocks of time often squandered: the train, the plane, while exercising, on lunch break, an hour in the morning before work, or while waiting at the post office.
13. Road (fastlane supeRcharger)
Get onto a Fastlane Road. But don’t worry if you can’t decide which road to travel; the road can pick you. Train your mind to see needs and problems. Observe your thoughts and language, because they expose unmet needs, or needs met poorly. You don’t have to find the next breakthrough; just find a problem, a pain-point, or a service gap, and solve it. Many of the best businesses in the world are based on products that already existed; the owners solved the problem better. When you focus on needs, problems, inconveniences, and issues, roads open. Yes, the road chooses you.
14. Control (fastlane superCharger)
Control your financial plan as this refers to the Commandment of Control. Engage in an organization that you fully control, from pricing to marketing to operations. Fastlane entrepreneurs don’t cede control over critical business functions to hierarchical control structures, because they are the control structure. Swim as a shark, not a guppy.
15. Have (fastlane supercHarger)
HAVE what others NEED and money will flow into your life. This reflects the Commandment of Need. You can’t explode your income by chasing money. Stop chasing money, because it eludes those who try. Instead, focus on what attracts money, and that is a business that solves needs. Money comes from providing value. Cast aside selfishness and seek to HAVE what your fellow man WANTS. When you do, money flows into your life because money is attracted to those who have what others want, desire, crave, or need.
16. Automate (fastlane superchArger)
Automate your business and honor the Commandment of Time. Get your time detached from your business. The best passive-income money-tree seedlings are money systems, rental systems, computer systems, content systems, distribution systems, and human resource systems. The key to automation in any business lies in these seedlings.
17. Replicate (fastlane superchaRger)
Replicate your system and honor the Commandment of Scale. Get on a playing field where home runs can be hit. To make millions, you must impact millions. To impact millions, you must be on a field capable of affecting millions! Can your product, service, process be replicated on a global scale to tap the Law of Effection?
18. Grow (fastlane supercharGer)
Grow your business by treating it multi-dimensionally, like a game of chess. Build a brand, not a business. Treat customers like your boss and reposition complaints to opportunities. Listen to the world as they offer the best directional clues. Resist commoditization. Differentiate yourself from the competition. Get above the noise. Focus on one business and one business only.
19. Exit (fastlane superchargEr)
Have an Exit strategy. Full passivity accomplished by a money system is one Fastlane destination. Money systems are best funded by liquidation events of massive asset values. Know when it’s time to liquidate your assets, transforming paper money into real money. Know when it’s time to get off the horse and learn to ride a new one.
20. Retire, Reward, or Repeat (fastlane superchargeR)
After liquidating your asset(s), Retire or Repeat. Regardless of which, Reward yourself for milestones met everywhere along the journey. Sell your first product? Celebrate! Go to dinner, buy a cigar, drink a beer. Break $100,000 in net worth? Treat yourself to something nice. Book a joint-venture deal? Celebrate with an indulgence. Go over $1 million? Take a nice vacation. Break $10 million? Buy a Lamborghini.
Closing Thoughts
The fastlane is a lifelong journey. It doesn’t matter when you start, but how you proceed. Stop being like everyone else and take action.
Final Commandments
I SHALL …
1. Not dismiss “Get Rich Quick” as improbable.
2. Not allow the Slowlane to bury my dreams.
3. Not allow Slowlane prognosticators to contaminate my truth with their dogma.
4. Not ordain the Slowlane as the plan, but let it be a part of the plan.
5. Not sell my soul for a weekend.
6. Not expect nor seek a chauffeur to wealth.
7. Not trade my time for money.
8. Not put time in control over my financial plan.
9. Not forsake control over my financial plan.
10. Not demote time as abundant and effervescent.
11. Not assign faith to events, but to process.
12. Not take advice from gurus who preach one roadmap, while getting rich using another.
13. Not use compound interest for wealth, but for income.
14. Not disrespect the passivity of a dollar.
15. Not cease learning at graduation, but start it.
16. Not impose the burdens of parasitic debt into my life.
17. Not play on Team Consumer, but switch to Team Producer.
18. Not dismiss the plausibility of my dreams.
19. Not chase a path of money, but a path of need.
20. Not fuel my motivation by love, but by passion.
21. Not focus on my expenses, but on my income.
22. Not pay myself last, but first.
23. Not do what everyone does.
24. Not trust everyone, but allow trust to be proven.
25. Not relinquish control over my business.
26. Not hitchhike, but seek to drive.
27. Not operate within limited scales and in tiny habitats.
28. Not dishonor the horsepower of my choices.
29. Not swim as a guppy in a pool, but as a shark in the oceans.
30. Not consume first, but produce first, and consume later.
31. Not engage in barrier-free or entry-weak businesses.
32. Not invest in other people’s brands, but in my own.
33. Not give credence to ideas, but to execution.
34. Not forsake my customer for other stakeholders.
35. Not build a business, but a brand.
36. Not focus my marketing messages on features, but benefits.
37. Not be a polygamist opportunist: Focus!
38. Not engage my business like checkers, but chess.
39. Not live above my means, but seek to expand my means.
40. Not live without the insurance of financial literacy.
Application
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I will pay attention to potential problems I can solve
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I will develop the skills needed to solve such problems
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I will use my ideas and skills to save time
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I will learn how to use wordpress to create a website
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I will become a producer rather than a consumer
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My main source of income will be entirely controlled by me, and I will eventually find a way to make it passive
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