Hello all. I am just thrilled to join with Dylan in building this blog. Besides the fact that blogging is the “in” thing (my four young kids tell me I’m pretty cool now), it truly provides a great forum to discuss a wealth of ideas. If you’ve spent any time online looking to buy a business, you’ve probably run across some of my articles, products and services. My blog is not going to be a place where I try to sell my wares. It’s also not the place where I’m going to rehash content about buying a business. There’s ample content on the main site of www.bizquest.com and my website www.diomo.com for that.
Rather, I will take a more global or macro approach to entrepreneurship. As the author of six “how to” guides and over 100 published articles, I love the written word and my mind races endlessly with ideas I want to tell the world. This blog is the place where those ongoing ideas can be tabled and commented on by you. Ultimately, we’ll discuss issues that relate to buying/selling a business of course but the concepts will be more philosophical, fundamental, include current events, trends, interesting anecdotes, resources, and real-life situations.
In this first posting, I want to cover one of three traits I am certain that all successful entrepreneurs possess and that is perseverance (you’ll have to check in soon for the next ones). In my life, I’ve met with and cultivated relationships with some incredibly successful people and I’ve always been obsessed to learn from them but also to see if there’s a common thread that binds them. You know, a lowest common denominator. Perseverance is one of those commonalities. The dictionary defines perseverance as: “steady persistence in a course of action, a purpose, a state, etc., esp. in spite of difficulties, obstacles, or discouragement.” I’m a simple guy, I like to define it as: “setting the target, and not giving up until it’s achieved.”
You know Colonel Sanders from Kentucky Fried Chicken? He started out with the idea that he would sell his fried chicken recipe to restaurants, and get a royalty on every piece of chicken they sold. Good idea, right? Guess what? He went to 1009 restaurants and got a “no” at each one, until he sold his first deal. I don’t know about you, but I probably would have given up long before, and I’m relentless (just ask Dylan). There are tons of similar stories, and I’ll share them with you in time.
The lesson here is that you have to stick to the objective; all great entrepreneurs do.
The Colonel had a steadfast, unwavering belief in what he was doing. He set up the target and each day he fired arrows towards it. More importantly, he could see, feel, and taste the end result way in advance (must have been the 11th secret herb I guess). In one of the Rocky movies they called it “The Eye of the Tiger” and that’s the attitude you need to successfully navigate your way to business ownership.
The road is not straight. There will be obstacles. Deals fall apart. You may encounter some unresponsive sellers or business brokers. You’ll face some major decisions. You’ll have second thoughts. There’s a lot at stake. There’s a risk involved. That’s part of the hunt. However, the benefits of owning a good business outweigh all of them.
Your target has to be owning your own business.
You can’t just fire arrows and hang the target later on.
If all you do is search listings online but don’t contact or meet sellers, you’re just firing arrows with no target.
Stay the course. Persevere. If you get derailed or feel like giving up, take an hour and go to any one of the 11,000 plus KFC locations and just think about Colonel Sanders for a bit. Well, that’s it, that’s all.