Per • sist • ence
It means progress, not perfection. To be able to move the needle just a little bit, means you are moving in the right direction. As a startup founder, I think this is a key attribute you must have to “keep your ship from sinking”. In the startup realm, your boat is already half filled with water before you’ve even started. But how do you keep your boat from being fully submerged? Persistence (and other things.. but you get the point).
I started with an idea almost a year ago and since then I’ve learned that it isn’t about being perfect but getting shit done. When everything seems like it’s not going your way (trust me that happens a lot) or not moving fast enough, you have to learn how to just keep it moving and get over the hurdles. I think one of the things my co-founder and I have learned is that a setback does not mean its the end of the world.
“Missing 11 times and hitting that 1 time is still ROI positive”
I’ve recently begun having people reach out to me on a daily basis, asking me for advice (I still don’t understand why lol) about, “Hey I have this idea but I don’t know how to start” or “Hey I already started working on so-and-so but I just wanted to pick your brain”…. The single most important thing I tell each and every person is to be persistent and just go out and do it. Now, I don’t mean go and hire a developer without having done customer discovery or build something without having validated the idea. What I mean, is to be persistent with regards to doing things you know will get that idea or product off the ground. The best thing you can do when you are first starting out is actually doing something! I recently started watching Gary Vaynerchuk videos and one of the things he tells one kid who has his own clothing company is:
“If you want to make something happen you have to grind, hustle, and do everything to make something happen. If you know the 3,000 boutiques you want your clothes in, you need to tag them on your IG pics, DM them, Send them samples, stop by the store, comment on their boutique photos. It might take you 9 hours every single day but that’s what it will take to get that 1 boutique to sell your product.”
When you start doing this you’ll not only begin moving the needle, but you’ll also learn so much that it’ll blow your mind! So be persistent and put in the hours in everything you do. Starting a business is not easy and it definitely takes persistency to keep moving the needle in the right direction.
Persistence = Doing = Action = Getting shit done
