Getting off the slow lane!

[Coreyc]

Just started reading the book, have tried some stuff in the past, didn't work so I got discouraged and went back to my sidewalk/slow lane.

Right now I am working to uncover a solution to a pain that I can create a software product for.

Sometimes I feel like it's hard to get off the slow lane, because there are so many people touting different ideas (affiliate marketing, Sass, freelancing, etc). I want to try them all at the same time!?

But, I promise that I am working my a$$ off to get off the slow lane.

My name is Corey, I am a pharmacist. 27 years old. Tons of school debt.

Hello. Nice to meet you all.

 

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[Piranha22]

Gotta start somewhere Corey. Pick one thing and stick to it. I can tell you from my own experience that trying to pursue multiple routes at once will get you nowhere. If you can't decide, flip a coin. And remember: a bad decision is better than no decision at all.

-Piranha

 

[Coreyc]

You're absolutely right.

 

[Coreyc]

I've decided to throw my effort into creating a SaaS business, my market is going to be independent pharmacies. There must be a need there that can be fulfilled with software, so I am trying to do market research now. I've emailed several people, tried to find people on linkd in and forums. Tomorrow I work all day so I've hired a freelancer to make cold calls to a list of pharmacies I've provided with a script.

Hopefully I can find a pain and solve it!

 

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[Coreyc]

I need to cold call. I need to cold call. I need to cold call. I need to cold call.

But the thought of doing it makes my heart want to jump out of my chest.

BUT I AM GOING TO COLD CALL. ROOOOOAAAARRRRRRRRRR

 

[Coreyc]

1st call - Not a success, but hey at least I got over my fears. The owner was "too busy" to talk to me. Probably a common theme, I'm thinking that maybe pharmacy isn't the greatest idea and that I should try something else (no one is responding to emails, linked questions, Facebook messages).

 

[Piranha22]

It's better to fail first than to succeed right on the go, I'll tell ya. Whenever I had 'beginners luck' in my life, I overestimated myself and my skills and came crashing down shortly after. So don't worry about the failures in the beginning, the first few cold calls are just to get your lines right and battle your fear.

 

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[Coreyc]

I have tomorrow off so I am gonna call a million people and harass them until I have a solution to someone's problem.

 

[Coreyc]

Just called someone who was SO receptive to my phone call, had all these ideas, one of them sounds so great. Such a confidence boost!

 

[Coreyc]

Trying to use twitter, Facebook, tumblr, instagram, snapchat, KiK, and any other friggin social media platform to find people's pain.

 

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[TextbookAnswers]

Hey CoreyC,

Finding pain points is an interesting subject. I recently start cold calling for a new idea I was testing. BOY am I glad I did. First I discovered that the pain was not nearly as relevant as I once thought. I only wasted a few hours thinking about the idea and coding a website. But during that cold call I got a consulting opportunity for something totally different. Strange but true....

Hang in there and have fun fishing. I pray that you find out sooner than later that the idea is viable.

 

[Coreyc]

Ugh, not finding a pain is frustrating. I feel like I am spinning my wheels and just not going anywhere.

I will not stop searching though.

I must keep going.

 

[StuckInTheMud]

Hi Corey,
I'm new here also and it's pretty cool to see that yourre working on finding pain points.
I work in a pharmaceutical manufacturing unit in the UK and I know we supply pharmacies - you might be in a similar facility being a pharmacist, but if I can help you at all let me know.

 

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[StuckInTheMud]

Double post

 

[Lex DeVille]

Ugh, not finding a pain is frustrating. I feel like I am spinning my wheels and just not going anywhere.

I will not stop searching though.

I must keep going.

What are you asking when you call?

You don't need the Pharmacist to find pharmacy pains.

Who else works in pharmacies that you can ask?

What if you posted a question on reddit or quora or some other place and ask:

"What's the most annoying thing about working in a pharmacy?"
"What's the biggest challenge you've experienced working in a pharmacy?"
"What makes you angry at work?"

Stuff like that to reach a wide pool without directly asking "what's your biggest pain?"

 

[Jay Dial]

What are you asking when you call?

You don't need the Pharmacist to find pharmacy pains.

Who else works in pharmacies that you can ask?

What if you posted a question on reddit or quora or some other place and ask:

"What's the most annoying thing about working in a pharmacy?"
"What's the biggest challenge you've experienced working in a pharmacy?"
"What makes you angry at work?"

Stuff like that to reach a wide pool without directly asking "what's your biggest pain?"

I like when @SinisterLex comes through, dropping the little golden bread crums....

 

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[StuckInTheMud]

The above twigged something - I know a couple of people working in the pharmacy department and on Facebook they share pharmacy related memes. It might be worth searching "pharmacy memes" in Google and reading them/any comments, as they are often relating to complaints about occurences that happen on a regular basis whilst working in such a place.

The ones I have seen posted are mainly hospital based pharmacy departments but I'm sure some of the problems are the same as those faced by employees of independent pharmacies, as both share the dispensing function.

 

[Coreyc]

Still haven't found the problem that I am going to solve. I keep reading that there are pains all around me and blah blah but I can't seem to figure anything out. I think part of the problem is that I am thinking "what problem can I solve in order to make money" and I just need to forget about the money part at the end and solve a problem.

I haven't done any cold calls recently. I'm trying to directly email people now so that I can set up a time to talk to them. No one was originally responding to my emails, but I was not directly emailing people. Any tips on getting the direct email, rapportive isn't working for me, I'm trying to guess a lot and getting a lot of mailer-daemon responses sent back?

I am cycling through industries too quickly, so I am coming back to my original niche (independent pharmacies).

I need to stop thinking in terms of just software too, my fast lane could be anything. Anything that solves a problem, which I guess means I need to open my eyes at work and really look for problems that I have there.

I also need to just push forward and not listen to the voice inside my head that says "THIS IS STUPID!"

 

[marklov]

Still haven't found the problem that I am going to solve. I keep reading that there are pains all around me and blah blah but I can't seem to figure anything out. I think part of the problem is that I am thinking "what problem can I solve in order to make money" and I just need to forget about the money part at the end and solve a problem.

I haven't done any cold calls recently. I'm trying to directly email people now so that I can set up a time to talk to them. No one was originally responding to my emails, but I was not directly emailing people. Any tips on getting the direct email, rapportive isn't working for me, I'm trying to guess a lot and getting a lot of mailer-daemon responses sent back?

I am cycling through industries too quickly, so I am coming back to my original niche (independent pharmacies).

I need to stop thinking in terms of just software too, my fast lane could be anything. Anything that solves a problem, which I guess means I need to open my eyes at work and really look for problems that I have there.

I also need to just push forward and not listen to the voice inside my head that says "THIS IS STUPID!"

Man You remind me of the first cold call I did.

Heart beating out my chest, butterflies in the stomach and I spoke so fast
I had to repeat for the person to actually understand lol

Thing is ...you need a good week of calling at least 100 #'s a day before
you get over the fear to realize all you really are doing is gauging interest
then maybe having a conversation with the prospect explaining your offer.


Just keep dialing and it sucks at first believe me I know and the rejection
can feel like they are shitting on you just because....

But persevere because someone is waiting on you to call because they
need exactly what you are selling and if they don't buy from you they will
from someone else who might sell them something crappy, so why let others
have your money that's just sitting there waiting for you?

Just get some dials under you belt most will politely turn you down
and some will hang up on you or interrupt with "not interested"

But keep dialing...dont give yourself time to allow these things to weigh on
you when they are pretty meaningless, as most business's wont even remember
you in a few days as they go through other hordes of callers and offers.

So no sweat....just keep dialing


In regards to emails I skim it for potential customers the rest gets slashed
to hell of the trash folder and whatever salesy ones I read I usually do it to swipe the copy
if it's good and very rarely will I actually opt in.

Business owners are no different really( maybe the copy swipe part lol), but if you do use email...

Email them and then when you call refer them to the email you sent atleast you
have a common point of reference but even this is tricky because if they drudge through
for the email and see some poor offer.... well I don't have to explain the rest lol

Cold Calling is one of the fastest ways to grow your business and put money in your pockets
it works and continues to because I do this for atleast 5-6 hrs every single day and I get those sales
waiting out there for me ripe for the picking and you can do it too.

Good Luck man

 

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[Coreyc]

I really would like to get off stage 0 though and move to having an idea that I am 100% all in on.

 

[marklov]

I really would like to get off stage 0 though and move to having an idea that I am 100% all in on.

Here's the truth

Your first idea will never be something your 100% on.

Go look up Andy's " Launch and Learn"

While your sitting there waiting to feel 100%

Comfortable, safe and cuddled by an idea.

People out there have some iteration of your idea out there
selling in one way or another and making money.

Your market was pharmacies right?

What's the niche your going after?

What's the pain within that niche regarding software solutions?

You say you are not 100% on an idea
Well how can you remove at least 50% of the pain then?

So now you gotta come up with 50% of an idea....still stuck?

It's not the idea holding you back...its YOU

 

[Coreyc]

Here's the truth

Your first idea will never be something your 100% on.

Go look up Andy's " Launch and Learn"

While your sitting there waiting to feel 100%

Comfortable, safe and cuddled by an idea.

People out there have some iteration of your idea out there
selling in one way or another and making money.

Your market was pharmacies right?

What's the niche your going after?

What's the pain within that niche regarding software solutions?

You say you are not 100% on an idea
Well how can you remove at least 50% of the pain then?

So now you gotta come up with 50% of an idea....still stuck?

It's not the idea holding you back...its YOU

Yeah, I get that I'm not going to be 100% confident about anything. Right now, I literally have no idea. I'm trying to find an idea, so that I can put all of my efforts into that idea.

The niche and the pain is what I am trying to figure out.

 

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[marklov]

Yeah, I get that I'm not going to be 100% confident about anything. Right now, I literally have no idea. I'm trying to find an idea, so that I can put all of my efforts into that idea.

The niche and the pain is what I am trying to figure out.

Just don't get hung up on the idea stage, the fact you considered doing cold calling
means you're on the cusp of discovering something great, when you get that
idea , just pick up the phone right away and start dialing away.

The confidence will come and it wont be from the sales but just from
simply hearing some interested in what you have to offer.

Then the bulb will go off, that people out there do need what you have.

keep at it.

 

[GrayCode]

Just started reading the book, have tried some stuff in the past, didn't work so I got discouraged and went back to my sidewalk/slow lane.

Right now I am working to uncover a solution to a pain that I can create a software product for.

Sometimes I feel like it's hard to get off the slow lane, because there are so many people touting different ideas (affiliate marketing, Sass, freelancing, etc). I want to try them all at the same time!?

But, I promise that I am working my a$$ off to get off the slow lane.

My name is Corey, I am a pharmacist. 27 years old. Tons of school debt.

Hello. Nice to meet you all.

Hey Corey i am new to the site as of today, however i read the book in full around 4 months ago. Anyway before i get on to my own introduction post i thought i would comment on yours as i read through the entire post.

No one in particular mentioned this... BUT! you said, you are a pharmacist.

what pain points do you personally experience, or better yet, you have without a doubt dealt with customers yourself. What do you find them to be complaining about the most?

If you think this through you might just find the answer was right in front of you the entire time. Cheers.

 

[Longinus]

I learned more by taking action and starting something, instead of breaking your head about what to do. Your first idea will probably not be your success story.

Verstuurd vanaf mijn SM-G800F met Tapatalk

 

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[GrayCode]

I learned more by taking action and starting something, instead of breaking your head about what to do. Your first idea will probably not be your success story.

Verstuurd vanaf mijn SM-G800F met Tapatalk

Totally agree, i hope the OP realizes that maybe he doesn't have to beat himself over the head and just get to it!