What’s Your Story?
A friend of mine who works at Apple came to me the other day saying he felt stuck. He’s making $150,000 a year but didn’t know what his next move could be.
He said he’s been doing staffing and sales for so long that he wasn’t sure if he could ever start a business.
Below is my response and the $50 million dollar business he started with just $2,000 to get going.
To my friend, here is your story, idea, product, and service.
THE STORY
One day a friend asks you which Apple products and apps that would help him on a project. You give him a handful of products and app recommendations and he’s off to the races.
Then a few weeks later he asks you if you know anyone that’s badass at using the products and apps you recommended to him. So you connect him to someone in your network.
THE IDEA
A lightbulb goes off and you realize there must be 1,000s if not 10,000s entrepreneurs with similar questions — What Apple product and app stack should I use to bring my idea to life, and who are the people that can help me do it?
THE PRODUCT
You develop a framework to help you keep tabs on any and all apps that would be helpful to entrepreneurs, as well as a network of people that are experts at using them.
THE SERVICE
Entrepreneurs pay you a fee to build an app stack recommendation and connect them with people that want to work on their project.
You join entrepreneurship clubs and networks. You tell your story. People ask for help. You help them. They tell their entrepreneurial friends how you helped them go from 0–100 super fast.
In year one you make $1,000. But you are so good at this that people from all over the globe start asking for help. It doesn’t matter where you live, and your market is global.
REVENUE:
Year 1 $1,000
Year 2 $10,000
Year 3 $50,000
Year 4 $150,000
In four years you quit Apple, and within 10 years you’re running a million dollar business. Then you decide to build a platform vs. providing this service manually. You’ve met all the right people on your journey to build this platform. The platform scales and you sell it for $50 million.
You do all of this with an initial investment of $2,000 to create your LLC and buy a few miscellaneous items.
You grow organically and never need outside investors.
WHAT’S YOUR STORY?
Stories lead to ideas, ideas lead to products, products lead to services.
If you can define your story, you’ll have your roadmap for success. The story above is a real story, but it’s currently in progress. I helped my friend write his story, and now he’s got the clarity he needs to execute.
