Do You Have The Courage To Fail? 

What's the secret to success beyond your wildest imagination?

Testing and Measuring.

Or to be more accurate. Testing and measuring. Then making changes based on real-world feedback.

In other words. You get an idea. You offer your product to the market with great excitement. What happens next...?

You get a result. You get some test data.

That's the sugar-coated way to say you fail. You make some changes.  Then you fail again. You repeat this process until... you build your dream business.

The Truth About Failure

There are 3 truths about failure that I'd like to share with you today.

 

  1. Failure Is Feedback
  2. Make Failure Survivable
  3. Failure Takes Courage
Let's look at each of these in turn.
 
 

Failure Is Feedback

The truth about most marketing campaigns is that they are not perfect. You need to change something... to get a better result. The better result could be more webinar registrations. More email sign-ups. More sales.
 
Yes, there are unicorn examples of sales letters that run for decades. My favourite is the Martin Conroy sales letter than ran for 25 years and made $2 billion!
 
That's the star that I'm shooting for!
 
How am I going to get there? Testing and Measuring. Then making improvements based on real-world feedback.
 
Every time you run a sales campaign you get a result. The result you get will be one of the following:
  1. What you wanted
  2. Better than what you wanted
  3. Worse than what you wanted
 
What does the data tell you?
 
It tells you what you need to do next. If you make the time to report on your results. If you make the time to dive into what the results show.
 
It's easy to know you should report on your results and then not do it. That's what I did last year.
 
Reporting was on my to-do list. And somehow there was never enough time. There was always something 'more important' to do.
 
Reporting scared me. That's the truth. That's why I didn't do it.
 
I didn't want to see my faults. I didn't want to stare failure in the face.
 
This year I've made reporting a priority. I run the numbers. Then write detailed reports. I look for what the numbers mean. I make the time to learn from my successes and failures.
 
Reporting has made every action I take a step forward. A step towards building my dream business. Reporting turns real-world feedback into knowledge. Knowledge that I use to make better decisions. Knowledge that I use to write better copy. Knowledge that I use to get better results.
 
Let's get back to the 3 types of result you get from a campaign:
  1. What you wanted
  2. Better than what you wanted
  3. Worse than what you wanted
 
Let's look at the best case scenario...
 

Results Better Than You Want

This is a good problem to have. Would you agree?
 
It's a problem all the same. A problem that creates chaos and stress. And if you're not careful. It will create angry customers.
 
What's the solution? Systems. Processes. Team. The immediate solution is hustle. Nothing beats long hours for a quick fix.
 
Before you run out and build a team. You need to know if you can repeat that result.
 
You need to throw fuel on a raging fire and see what happens.
 
Before you do that. Learn from your success. Put systems in place so you can better serve your customers. With less of your time.
 
If you've got a repeatable winning campaign, then you can start building out your team.
 
What about reporting? It's easy to not report on a successful campaign because you got a better result than you wanted. It's easy to run the numbers and stop. Numbers don't mean anything. Take the time to look at the sales page conversion. Is it as high as you expected? If not then you know how you can improve on a great result.
 
What about your email open rates and click through rates. Are there places where you can improve? There will be. What patterns can you see in the results? Do stories perform better than anything else? Or is short and direct copy better?
 
Reporting requires discipline. Discipline to look for patterns. Patterns of what worked and what failed. You will see that in stunning campaigns if you make the time to look.
 
What happens if you run into the worst case scenario?
 
 

Results Worse Than You Want

When you get results that are worse than what you want. It's easy to hide. To not report on the campaign because you don't want to see what you already know.
 
The reality is that some parts of the campaign performed better than you know. When you can see what worked and what didn't then you know where to focus your energy. You don't have to throw the baby out with the bath water.
 
That's what I used to do. Throw everything out and start again. That's really stupid! That's the path to brutal hours. Stumbling through the dark. Why stumbling through the dark? Because you aren't making decisions based on what worked and what didn't. So you stumble through the dark looking for the light.
 
Reporting shines a light on your work. Reporting tells you to keep your sales page because it is converting at 10% (for a low priced product).
 
Reporting shows you what emails to improve because the open rate is terrible. Reporting tells you what you should keep.
 
Reporting turns real-world feedback into knowledge. Knowledge that you can use to get a better result next time.
 
 

Make Failure Survivable

I'm sure you've heard the phrase "Plan for the worst and hope for the best"
 
That's exactly what you must do with the steps you take to grow your business.
 
If you are running Facebook Ads for the first time, don't spend your life savings.
 
Success comes from the process of testing and measuring. Then making improvements based on real-world feedback.
 
If you blow your life savings on the first campaign then you kill the process.
 
We all want instant success. But nobody strikes gold on the first day. We have to grind out success. We grind it out through the process of learning from our successes and our failures.
 
If you don't give yourself room to learn from your failures. You close the door on success.
 
Yes, you will have to start small. This can be frustrating. This can make it hard to see patterns in the numbers. If you have a sample of 10 and 1 person buys. Does that mean your campaign will convert at 10% when you scale?
 
There's only one day to find out.
 
If your campaign is profitable with a 10% conversion. Then run another small test. Confirm the result is repeatable. Then you can scale with confidence.
 
This process needs patience. Patience gives you profitable growth. Profitable growth gives you a dream business.
 
Now let's move on to the final truth about failure.
 
 

Failure Takes Courage

If you accept the truth that success is the process of testing and measuring. Then making changes based on real-world feedback. Then you guarantee your success when you follow the process. Simple. Right?
 
Yes. And... No.
 
If you can be stoic about failure then the process of testing and measuring is easy.
 
I'm too emotional to make the process easy. Failures bruise my ego. Failures cut my wallet.
 
I see the process of testing and measuring as a boxing match. I'm thrilled to be standing in the ring until I get punched in the face. That's when my dream collides with reality. That's when I have to ask myself "how much do I want this?"
 
I know it's a privilege to stand in the ring. When you get a chance to duck and weave and jab for your dreams. It feels like living.
 
Then a body blow sucks the air out of your lungs. You're gasping for breath and trying to avoid the next hit. That's not fun.
 
That's when I want to cry like a baby. That's when I wish it was easier. That's also when I remind myself of my business mantra.
 
 

Words I Live By

If you aren't failing then you are not trying hard enough. If you aren't failing then you are playing too safe.
J.K. Rowling said something similar in her Harvard address.
 
"You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all - in which case, you fail by default."
 
What I'm trying to say is that testing and measuring is easier said than done. Our emotions make the process hard. That's why failure and success takes courage. That's why I have a mantra that I use to stay in the ring even when I'm taking body blows.
 
 

The One Thing To Take From This Blog

There's one thing I want you to take from this blog...
 
Success comes from testing and measuring. Then making changes based on real-world feedback.
 
This is true for success in any area of your life. The world tells you if you are working hard enough to get what you want. Reporting and learning from your actions tells you how to improve.
 
Without reporting you will spin your wheels faster... only to get stuck further in the mud.
 
Now let's look at the second truth about failure.
 
 

Now It's Your Turn

I hope you can now see that success is the process of testing and measuring. Then make changes based on real-world feedback.
 
You can build your dream business with this process. If... you commit to reporting on your results.
 
Reporting transforms your promotional activity into a step towards your goals. Reporting gives you insight and expertise. Reporting shows you what's working and where you can make improvements.
 
Reporting is free!
 
And it guarantees you improve your results.
 
So make a commitment to report on all your promotional activity. And let me know how your results improve.
 
If you've found this useful then please leave a comment below.
 
If you know a business owner that struggles to get their name out there then please share this with them.
 
Until next time...
 
Carpe diem
 
Roland Eva
 
P.S. if you'd like to build your dream business then you need a proven system to create customers on demand.
 
After many, many failures, I’ve created a simple 5-step system to create customers on demand.
 
This system made me £672,989 in just 9 days!
 
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About The Author

I’m a copywriter and business growth trainer, mentor and consultant.

For the last 5 years, I’ve helped business owners to sell products and services in many industries. The products and services have ranged in price from £5 to £12,000.

My most successful campaign made £672,989 in 9 days.

I took that result and transformed it into a simple repeatable system. A system that I teach to ambitious entrepreneurs that want to make money on demand without a sales team.

Why do I want to help other business owners? Because my marketing journey began when I lost my first business. The pain of watching my business die, motivated me to discover how to make sales on demand without a sales team.

Today my mission is to prevent every business owner from suffering through the same pain as I did. That's why I teach entrepreneurs how to use my simple system. Anyone can build their dream business when they use my proven system.

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