Stories for speeches

Before Gary Halbert wrote his “Coat of Arms” letter, the most mailed piece in history (over 600,000,000 sent), he was dead broke using his utility money to pay for stamps while he and his wife sat in a dark house without running water waiting for orders that would never come. And he lived like that for years. Imagine having not one success, not even a minor one, for years and years. People calling him crazy, his wife giving him grief, but knowing you have what it takes to make it. When Ben Suarez, author of 7 Steps to Freedom, made his first minor success, he quickly lost $70,000 to a crooked list broker. It almost sunk him before he even got off the ground. He has to second mortgage his home. When John Carlton was starting out as a freelance copywriter he had an Oliveti typewriter with a sticky g key, one month's rent, a tank of gas in his beat up old P.O.S., and a lead on some books that might help him out. It's almost a right of passage for successful entrepreneurs. But it doesn't have to be that way for you. Sure, you are going to want to fail forward because that's how you learn what works is through experience. And not every ad you put out there is going to be a winner. In fact, Ted Nicholas, the legendary $6 billion direct marketer said he would be happy if one out of every ten ads was profitable. He knew that one winning ad would more than pay for the nine losers. But most people are too scared to take a risk, even a small one. As my friend Kevin used to say, “No risk, no reward.” But you aren't going to have to take a risk really. I mean, do you have a dollar to spare for a domain name? Do you have six dollars a month for hosting your website? And you're not even going to risk that much.