Rapid 3 – Guy Kawasaki
The number 3 is great. It’s more than just one, more than a couple, but a lot less than too many (like as in 10). It’s a number that if you limit yourself to, you have to make some trade-offs. Top 3 priorities, 3 dream trips, 3 people you’d most like to meet, etc. You have to focus to get down to 3. I guess what I’m saying is Top 10 lists are overrated.
I want to start periodically doing what I’m going to call the Rapid 3 here on my blog. I’ve found that if you can ask someone successful 3 targeted questions and get back 3 focused answers you can learn a lot in a very short period of time.
To kick it off, I couldn’t think of anyone better at communicating simple yet powerful ideas in short and sweet format than Guy Kawasaki–he does this regularly in his business books, Rules for Revolutionaries is my favorite book of his. Guy’s been a trusted advisor to me and Doba for about 2.5 years now. So here we go:
- What’s the most important thing every aspiring entrepreneur needs to know?
The most important thing is that sales fixes everything. That is, as long as you’re generating sales, you’re in the game. All the “vision,” “promise,” “passion,” and “partnerships” don’t mean much unless you have sales. I’m not saying you should sell products that are junk or not finished just to make a buck because “returns break everything.” But great entrepreneurs ship.
- What’s the biggest mistake you see first time entrepreneurs make, and how do they avoid it?
First-time entrepreneurs never make their “conservative” financial projects. As a rule of thumb, I add one year to the ship date and divide by 100 whenever I hear a forecast. The best way to avoid it is to make a bottom-up forecast. That is, starting from $0, figure out how you’ll make each dollar of sales. Most entrepreneurs do a top-down analysis and “conservatively” assume they can get 1% of a multi-billion market.
- Is it harder or easier in 2009 to be an entrepreneur compared to 1999? Why? And how should that impact actions you take as an entrepreneur?
There’s good news and bad news. The bad news is that it’s harder because people are spending less. The good news is that costs are much lower–tools, people, marketing, and infrastructure. The thing is to build your business out now while costs are low so that when spending returns, you’re off to the races.
I cannot help it: I have to plug something I’m doing. Your readers should use Alltop to stay on top of news, tips, and tricks at http://smallbusiness.alltop.com/ and http://ecommerce.alltop.com/.
What do you think? Would you answer this Rapid 3 differently than Guy? Thanks for the insights Guy!!
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