In this post the entrepreneur and coach Esther Roche will comment on her personal experiences and learning about the possibilities of Make money with a blog .
He is a professional Coach dedicated to a sector in which he is a pioneer. Created the Web coaching Because it has very clear objectives: to help entrepreneurs to create their businesses online from scratch using a fusion between coaching and their knowledge of creation and web positioning.
First of all, thank Alberto for the courtesy of posting this post on his website.
At 9 she was already an entrepreneur. I was ordering a neighbor with a keychain that I had brought from a warehouse of Chinese somewhere in Madrid and I sold them in school. There everything started... and nothing.
Actually, my entrepreneurial spirit always stiffened in the face of conventionalism and, in the end, I was saddened. Many illusions, dreams, projects, that were only that, projects. Until a few years ago, thanks to the internet, everything seemed much easier and less risky. And is that, according to what cases, a large investment is no longer necessary.
Oh, how wonderful this is about technological advances. You grow up with an online business unless you sing a rooster, and more now than four years ago, when I made my own website, it was something more complicated.
Now the tricky thing comes from somewhere else. For the over-democratization of the topic of becoming a web. But I'll leave it for another day. Now I will only give you some information, at least, curious: in 2010, when I did the first, the number of websites in the world was 206,956,723. To date, there are about one billion (1,000,000,000) webs, in just 4 years, the number has increased fivefold.
The rapid pace that this number grows shows that nowadays, anyone has a website because it is easy to have it and even to do it. The trick is to make it work for what is intended in each case. By the way, the data provided can be seen on the website of Internetlivestats .
In 2010, I had a hard time making contacts in person because at the time, even though I was a coach in my"free time", my job was tied up for 12 hours a day from Monday to Friday. Where was I going to take time to attend events of any kind and make contacts that would provide me with clients? It was simply hiding so much that I seldom found it.
However, I am"a lucky girl". Well wait. Actually, I am one of those who think that luck does not exist, but that there are possibilities and open and prepared that we are or not to see and take advantage of them. Okay. Well then, in 2010 came a time when I was ready to see the possibility of starting my online coaching business.
Learning # 1: Focus on opportunities, not problems.
So I began to study and gather information everywhere. Internet, books, some online course, information, information, information. I also chose (less badly) to create my first website in WordPress, and not in its free version, but paying my domain and my hosting, which for that was, besides a lucky girl, a serious girl, and that of not having Your own domain, as it is not serious.
I studied WordPress too, and I got soaked in online marketing, different strategies, social networks... Anyway, a little bit of everything, to see the global panorama of this world of internet. So much so, that I was overwhelmed with so much information.
When I was already"going by WordPress", with so much stress and about to start creating my website, I thought:"Let's see, for the car, it's going to give you a heart attack. You are overwhelmed with so much infoxicación that if WordPress that if SEO that if online marketing that if networks that if email marketing...". I ended up hiring a guy who gave me private lessons, to get acquainted with something more complicated. I've never been so glad to learn paying.
Apprentices # 2 and # 3: The information can not be absorbed quickly, run over or in excess. So we do not internalize it. We learn it today and have forgotten it tomorrow. #3. We can not do it all alone and we must let ourselves be helped. We need supports. Especially when we start to undertake.
I will not tell you the complete learning process of my knowledge of WordPress, SEO and online marketing. I'll just tell you that, because I worked for someone else, you know, I started to base 100% of my business on the web. I had no other choice. And I had no choice but to learn. Learn every day. A master, I did, but not months, but years. Today I continue to learn daily about SEO, WordPress and online marketing.
Today, looking back and analyzing it, I believe two things: on the one hand, that was a tremendous mistake. Basing 100% of your business, (at least my type of business, coaching) on my website, and in virtual"recipes", IS a mistake. There is nothing like a direct contact with your potential clients, like they know you in person.
But on the other hand, if I had not made that mistake, today I would not be who I am. Today I would not dedicate myself precisely to guide and accompany people through the complex process of undertaking online, to create your website with meaning and that really works. It's what I'm really passionate about.
Learning # 4 and # 5: Basing 100% of a business in"virtual"is, in most cases, a serious mistake. You have to go out there. # 5: Errors are good, incredibly good, if we learn from them.
Another serious mistake I made was to remove that boy who taught me WordPress, want to do it all, I alone, I manage. Even though it's late, it does not matter. I want to know everything and do everything. Oh... If you knew the amount of work and time it takes to learn"everything", you would not think the same, I assure you. So, indeed, another mistake... but again, that mistake also led me to what I'm passionate about.
If I had not made that mistake, which lasted for three years, and I did not know, today I would not be the creator of web coaching nor the only web coach in Spain. I mean, a professional coach dedicated to this (you know that the"coach"tag today is put from life consultants to Malu, when in fact they are not).
I do not mean arrogance or arrogance. On the contrary, I think I am humble, accessible and simple. The fact of being the only"real"web coach, well, the truth is that I simply use it as a way of saying that, first, I'm a coach and from coaching I helped to make web pages or improve them.
And back to wanting to learn and do everything, regarding SEO, etc., if I had not made that mistake, today would not have the"weapons"needed to prevent many people from committing it. My experience also served for that, to be able to prevent my clients and my potential clients about this error, among others that I committed and could correct. Nothing like someone who has gone through the same thing as you and has overcome, to accompany you.
So if, thanks to a big mistake, you became a great expert... maybe that is the way you can go, or add it in some way to your online business. Think about it. Maybe you have not fallen and been there forever. It took me over 3 years to figure it out.
Learning # 6: Others' mistakes can be our benefit.
One last word.
To finish, to re-link from here with what I said at the beginning about the over-democratization of the creation of webs. Today it is so very simple to make a DIY web, at home, without help from anyone, that are made webs in bulk.
There are data that assure that only ONE of every 10 web pages are visible in the eyes of users who would possibly need the services of those that are invisible. I think the error is precisely that, the ease with which we can have and make a web own for our business. We believe that by having it and perhaps spreading our news on social networks, or learning three or four things from SEO and online marketing, we will get lots of visits and, worse, that we will get customers in abundance. Nothing is further from reality.
Because of my work, I know a lot of people who think this way until someone opens their eyes. Many of them spend huge amounts of time writing articles and getting informed (or getting intoxicated with the amount of information, often contradictory, available at a single click). Everything, so that in the end the result is zero. O close to zero.
I think this is one of the most serious mistakes, not only because of the result it generates, but because of the wear it causes and the frustration it triggers.
And here, what would be the learning of error? Although for me it is basic and clear, I recognize that it may not be so much for the reader. Whenever we want to do something well, the preparation, planning and previous analysis are decisive.
After doing well whatever it is that we are going to do, sometimes means having external help. Many times we get excited and want to do things bypassing those steps, and then we pay the error. It has happened to me, putting up some complicated furniture from IKEA. I had to dismount and start over, with someone who knew more than I did.
And you, has it ever happened to you?