Ever feel like its hard to stand out in a crowded market? I get it, it’s more competitive than ever out there and there are more ‘want-preneurs’ than ever adding more and more content to the already overcrowded sea of information.

Trying to find clients can feel like fighting for the scraps in shark infested, bloody red waters. In fact, that was the basis for a book and business philosophy called ‘Blue Ocean Strategy’.

What is Blue Ocean Strategy? 

To sum it up, most of us are competing in an oversaturated and overcrowded market, a ‘red ocean’ so to speak where it is highly competitive, a bidding war, a race to the bottom to beat out competitors. Think about an ocean where there are plenty of sharks and not enough fish and the sharks are fighting for all available resources. 

But by starting to think expansively, you can move out of the red oceans and find a ‘blue ocean’ where there is little to no competition,...

𝙔𝙊𝙐 𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙩𝙧𝙪𝙚 𝙙𝙚𝙘𝙚𝙣𝙩𝙧𝙖𝙡𝙞𝙯𝙚𝙙 𝙘𝙧𝙮𝙥𝙩𝙤𝙘𝙪𝙧𝙧𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙮.

One of my biggest mistakes in my first online business back in 2005 is I created the business around the products I sold.

There were 3 problems with that:

1 - Unless you own the intellectual property, other people could sell the same stuff that I sold.

2 - People could also could create products that competed with the ones that I sold.

3 - Physical products require materials, manufacturing, warehousing and shipping.

This creates what's called a Red Ocean (bloody red waters where the sharks fight for every fish). It becomes a race to the bottom where the lowest price wins. 

But here's the thing that I didn't realize, I shouldn't have been growing a business around the products or 'what I did', instead I should have been building my personal brand and making the offers that I sold just a part of the business. Do you see the difference? The focus is on the brand and not the products or offers. 

What is a personal brand? 

...

Ever wonder what is the biggest common denominator in businesses that succeed and one that fail?

Two years ago, I had the opportunity to work in one of the largest coach training businesses in the world where I got to be a consultant for aspiring entrepreneurs. Unfortunately, this coaching business was really good at selling people on the dream of making money by helping other people out, but horrible at teaching them how to actually close deals.

The strategy was to follow other influencers on Instagram and stalk people in the comments and then try to slide into their DMs and get into a conversation with them, then get them on a call an flesh out their pain points, pour some salt in the wound then pitch them on a solution and a high ticket coaching package. It was horrible.

They were so good at selling people on this dream, but the students failed miserably because they didn’t have the social proof or street cred of the influencer that sold them on the dream. People...

𝙃𝙤𝙬 𝙩𝙤 𝙜𝙚𝙩 𝙥𝙖𝙞𝙙 𝙩𝙤 𝙢𝙖𝙠𝙚 30-90 𝙨𝙚𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙙 𝙫𝙞𝙙𝙚𝙤𝙨 𝙖𝙗𝙤𝙪𝙩 𝙨𝙩𝙪𝙛𝙛 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙡𝙤𝙫𝙚:

Its called UGC (User Generated Content) and I think it's a market getting ready to explode. 

According to Hootsuite:

"User-generated content (also known as UGC or consumer-generated content) is original, brand-specific content created by customers and published on social media or other channels. UGC comes in many forms, including images, videos, reviews, a testimonial, or even a podcast."

But can you make money with User Generated Content? Yes, absolutely, and this has actually been one the best ways to make money online that I've ever experienced. And many that I know are creating full online businesses with UGC.

Unlike 'affiliate marketing' where you refer YOUR audience to the products you know, like and trust; UGC is creating content for brands or distributors to use for THEIR audiences. While I do like recommending offers to my audience, I like to do it sparingly and not all the time, which is why UGC is...

I created my first online business in 2005, not because I chose to or because I was smart, but because I had no other option.

I was failing and failing fast.

My first employer knew that I wanted to be an entrepreneur and was no longer engaged in what I was doing so he gave me 2 months worth of pay and booted me out the door to go figure it out.

I latched onto another entrepreneur who had a brick and mortar business but it was already going downhill fast due to the high cost of leases, inventory and employees.

I built a website for him and started to sell his products online and drop ship some of the products right to the customers.

But it was too late to save his business, and his business wouldn't save me either because over the previous years my bad decisions racked up $100k in credit card debt.

It was a tough decision for me to leave and do my own thing, but it was the only way, so I left the website with him and built my own.

Over the next year, I built my first 6 figure business, all...

𝙈𝙚𝙩𝙖 𝙟𝙪𝙨𝙩 𝙢𝙖𝙙𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙗𝙞𝙜𝙜𝙚𝙨𝙩 𝙧𝙤𝙤𝙠𝙞𝙚 𝙢𝙞𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙠𝙚 𝙞𝙣 𝙗𝙪𝙨𝙞𝙣𝙚𝙨𝙨.

Threads, the new app by Meta has lost 88% of its traffic in less than one month.

I'm going to break down what happened and 3 questions you should ask whether you are a one person business or a gigantic company like Meta so you don't make the same mistakes..

Meta did an exceptional job launching the Threads app, with over 100 Million sign ups in just a few weeks (1/4 of the total users of Twitter).

FOMO and curiosity was strong, plus the easy barrier for IG users to instantaneously set up.

Threads easily crushed every social platform with getting people in the door, but then lost momentum almost as fast as it came. So what happened?

After a month of playing on the platform, I cannot understand a clear benefit of using it. And according to the Live Mint Blog, which also said usage is down from 19 minutes per user to 4 minutes: 

"One of the main reasons for the Threads app losing traction with users is the lack of clarity about what...

Here are 7 ways to make passive income that don't require purchasing, storing or shipping anything, can be ran from anywhere in the world, can be done part time or while you have a job. These are all streams I've created in the last year and only required a few hours from me per week.

1 - Amazon Influencer program - allows you to create 'shoppable videos', basically demo's or videos of products sold on Amazon, they will place them on the product page and if someone watches then buys, you can make between 2-8% commission. Check out my YouTube playlist about the Amazon Influencer Program here! 

What's amazing is I did video reviews on all of my favorite Amazon items in my house, we knocked 200+ video's out in about 45 days. I took the entire month of June off (and most of July) and I'm making around $600 per month in straight passive income that will continue to grow over time as I add more videos. 

2 - Amazon Associate program - anyone can make a small commission...

There are people searching to find you and saying, ‘Take my money’!!!!  

But are you putting yourself in a position to ‘be found’? More on this in a sec, but let me tell you why this is important:  

In the mid-2000s I was at the point of bankruptcy when sh*t hit the fan for me. I had accrued almost $100k in mostly credit card debt because of poor lifestyle choices and bad investments.  

It was a shameful moment when I looked in the mirror and realized what I had gotten myself into. But it was also the moment when I took 100% ownership of the mistakes I had made and commit to paying it all off, even if it took me the rest of my life.  

Over the next year, I created my first online business and was able to pay ALL of it off within a year. Want to know how I did it? 

I created my first online business and used SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to rank in the first 3 spots on Google. I set up accounts with...