Lessons Learned The Hard Way —Month #1: Overcoming Every Obstacle!
From the beginning of this venture, I hoped this would become a weekly thing. And here we are!
Month #1 brothers and sisters! We did it!
The truth is that no one asked me to write those posts, and probably I would have stopped if it wasn’t for you!
As I wrote in my first post (and it’s almost the motto of the series):
Whether things are good or bad for us (and you), there’s a singular thing that remains common over these weeks, months or years: Knowledge!
It’s a shame all this information staying among us. So, we started using Geekbot in our Slack team, and one of the questions we set for our everyday standup meeting, was “Is there something you’ve learned, that’s worth sharing?”
That’s the reason I took the initiative to share it with you week by week.
By the way, we are launching our first growth hacking course! Make sure to join us. We are starting to build a great community!
During the last week (and still up to the day I’m writing these lines), I was working from home, due to being sick.
That time out of the office gave me the opportunity to read, watch and, as a result, learn more about the world and myself. That’s why I ended up adding as a bonus, to this month’s sum up things neither me or my colleagues experienced but really changed my views.
That said, I ain’t going to waste any more of your time.
Here are the greatest lessons we took during the last month:
Do things or die trying!
Are you familiar with great ideas that die before bringing back any results? Well, most probably they end up like that because you haven’t executed the way you were supposed to.
True story bro/sis:
I had to get 3k new email subscribers for our growth hacking course. I had a ton of other things to do, so I acted stupid enough and let the crucial courses get out of my hand. The outcome? 600 new subscribers. FAIL!
“A fisherman goes fishing during the ‘fish’ season; Not when he’s ready”
This tends to become a trademark phrase of Theodoros Moulos, our chairman. He always comes with new ideas, new challenges etc.
Actually, his moves are so wide-spreading that I caught myself laughing about it (me and a few other people), quite a few times.
The aftermath of these words is very simple. Whenever you think that you see an opening, go fo it. Don’t postpone it for later. Do it now, even if there’s chance to fail.
True story bro/sis:
So, lately (as I’ve already mentioned) we’re through great changes in GrowthRocks. In the past, we missed opportunities due to lack of faith in our instincts.
This is not the way we deal with things anymore. Although I‘m not still allowed to tell you the outcome, everything shows that it’s a WIN!
“I’m afraid that I won’t be able to handle too many customers”- That is a nice problem to have! Let’s talk more when we get there.
I really hate it, when this quote comes to the table. HATE IT! And with sadness, I realize that there’s a ton of people out there, that actually give a damn about it.
But, that’s just me. It doesn’t matter what I think. I know that even though it’s a good problem to have, it’s still a problem. And in case something like this occurs:
a. You’re on the right path.
b. You have to move as fast as hell!
True story bro/sis:
I got some feedback about this series, and someone told me that they feel like it’s too promotional about our company. Well, there’s an old saying that I can’t remember, but it roughly goes:
If you don’t brag about your home, it will crumble and bust your bloody head!
So, now that I made myself clear, with this section bragging about our company, I’ll proceed to the facts.
GrowthRocks is a consulting agency, but with a startup mindset. That means that we have one thing in mind. Growing rapidly!
As the previous week was the last of February, we did our monthly recap meeting, showing that March would be our best month so far (in terms of revenue).
But here’s the catch; that growth rate could destroy our work rate and skyrocket our burn rate (because we needed more people).
Theodoros Moulos managed to keep his cool and instantly built a way for us to be more efficient and found some external associates along with some junior interns, so we could still afford to sleep at nights.
WIN!
Email is the conversion king with great ROI
If you’re into marketing, you are probably, already fed up with everyone’s obsession with gathering email addresses. But why such a buzz?
BECAUSE IT CONVERTS LIKE HELL!
True story bro/sis:
I don’t intend to go long with this one. As we’ve grown our email list, more and more leads came in. But during the course of the previous week, magic happened:
12 new qualified leads came and also, 30% of our subscribers for the “Ultimate Introduction To Growth Hacking” WIN!
Focusing on doing things you love may skyrocket your productivity, but greatness lies outside the comfort zone.
“Greatness Lies Outside The Comfort Zone”. I bet you’ve seen this phrase quotes in so many Instagram posts, that you already hate me for bringing it up.
It may be cliche, but it’s also true to the bone- just like the intro riff from Deep Purple’s ‘Smoke on the water’.
True story bro/sis:
It’s not something particular that triggered this learning in my head, last week. I was just day dreaming and I realized that I come from a background that had nothing to do with marketing.
Me being a marketer was something completely scary, but if it wasn’t for that choice, I wouldn’t write those lines; I wouldn’t even think about the whole thing, in the first place.
I’m pretty happy with what I’ve achieved over time, and how this team helped me develop my skills in such a quick manner! WIN!
Nothing should be considered as a standard.
Daily routine makes us soft. Once you get used to doing things in a certain way, a certain lifestyle, meeting the same people over and over; that’s where trouble usually lies.
“How the f*#k am I supposed to build relationships or head towards a goal?”, I can already hear you saying.
Don’t get me wrong! Having a great schedule and great people in your life, is undoubtedly the path to success. But it’s a sneaky one.
I want you to ask yourselves: “ When is the time that life is going to turn around and kick my butt?”;
True story bro/sis:
I ain’t going to say much, as this regards a personal matter; But the story is rather simple and painful.
There’s an obligatory thing that I tried to avoid my whole life. That being said, I planned my life and goals suppressing this “obligatory” feeling in a dark corner in my mind. I thought that I could find a way to avoid it when the time comes.
Apart from that, my life got dramatically better the last 2 years, landing a job that I love, moving in with my girlfriend and having a cute giant dog. These improvements empowered the thought that I expressed earlier- “I can & I will avoid this”
Well, there’s no spoiler here; Last week my world shattered into pieces by a thing I considered as a standard.
FAIL!
Bonus:
“Be ok with things you ultimately can’t do, because there is so much you CAN do!”
Personally, the previous month was a disaster for me. As I’ve explained I lost nearly everything I considered as a standard (and made the decision never do the same mistake).
My mood became so bad, I couldn’t even concentrate on the things I do (which made things, even worse). Saying “that’s enough” is a totally different thing from applying it. We all not that.
As an individual, I really need mental stimulation in order to start acting.
So, what’s the story here?
Well, as I was drowning in sorrow, I found Sam Berns. This kid kicked me in the nuts. I mean… DUDE! Why am I doing this?
This little guy is truly bigger than me (and probably all of our team combined!). Sadly, Sam passed on January 10th 2014 but his legacy is everlasting.
Some things are out of our hands, but there’s a ton of other things that we CAN DO! Thank you Sammy & may the Force be with you! :)
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