Saad Khan's EXECUTION THREAD

[Saad Khan]

If you are truly working during those work times, then yes this is fine.

How is this fine? I'm seeing that I'm doing work but its not translating to systems. I'm trying to train a friend of mine to do the redundant tasks that I do so I can free up time and focus on 20% of the work that generates 80% of the outcome.

Right now, my time is maxed out. Even today I got off my schedule so tomorrow I have to work double the time.

Need to work on creating systems. I need to free up the time to focus on high leverage tasks. Perhaps @Black_Dragon43 can deliver some insights?

Thank you for your input nonetheless bro. I didn't mean to water down your words. I'll check out Kinobody.

 

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[wyattnorton]

How is this fine? I'm seeing that I'm doing work but its not translating to systems. I'm trying to train a friend of mine to do the redundant tasks that I do so I can free up time and focus on 20% of the work that generates 80% of the outcome.

Right now, my time is maxed out. Even today I got off my schedule so tomorrow I have to work double the time.

Need to work on creating systems. I need to free up the time to focus on high leverage tasks. Perhaps @Black_Dragon43 can deliver some insights?

Thank you for your input nonetheless bro. I didn't mean to water down your words. I'll check out Kinobody.

When you first start out Saad, you're going to be working crazy F*cking hours until you get the hang of it.

Right out of college, I was pulling 4 am to 10 pm days building my landscape company.

I was doing all the WRONG and all the RIGHT things at the same time. Over the days, I figured out which actions worked better. I didn't give a shit about "my routine" just how can I get clients, fulfill their project, and hire/train employees.

Your routine is not the problem man... it is what you're doing during your work time.

How about you create a routine for your work hours instead of just your day?

First hour of work is proposals, second hour of work is fulfillment of services, third hour of work is studying the skill you're doing, fourth hour of work is learning how to get clients, etc etc.

Or one day you do solely outreach or 3 hours and fulfillment for 1, then the next day you do 1 hour of outreach and 3 hours of fulfillment.

 

[Saad Khan]

When you first start out Saad, you're going to be working crazy F*cking hours until you get the hang of it.

Right out of college, I was pulling 4 am to 10 pm days building my landscape company.

I was doing all the WRONG and all the RIGHT things at the same time. Over the days, I figured out which actions worked better. I didn't give a shit about "my routine" just how can I get clients, fulfill their project, and hire/train employees.

Your routine is not the problem man... it is what you're doing during your work time.

How about you create a routine for your work hours instead of just your day?

First hour of work is proposals, second hour of work is fulfillment of services, third hour of work is studying the skill you're doing, fourth hour of work is learning how to get clients, etc etc.

Or one day you do solely outreach or 3 hours and fulfillment for 1, then the next day you do 1 hour of outreach and 3 hours of fulfillment.

You're right. I have the general idea of what I need to do. I need to structure it so I can give enough time to each aspect. I can also look into dividing the work into days

 

[Black_Dragon43]

When you first start out Saad, you're going to be working crazy F*cking hours until you get the hang of it.

Right out of college, I was pulling 4 am to 10 pm days building my landscape company.

I was doing all the WRONG and all the RIGHT things at the same time. Over the days, I figured out which actions worked better. I didn't give a shit about "my routine" just how can I get clients, fulfill their project, and hire/train employees.

Your routine is not the problem man... it is what you're doing during your work time.

How about you create a routine for your work hours instead of just your day?

First hour of work is proposals, second hour of work is fulfillment of services, third hour of work is studying the skill you're doing, fourth hour of work is learning how to get clients, etc etc.

Or one day you do solely outreach or 3 hours and fulfillment for 1, then the next day you do 1 hour of outreach and 3 hours of fulfillment.

I agree with this @Saad Khan.

 

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[Saad Khan]

Update 17th April 2023:

From now on, I will be mentioning how much I make per month, because I feel vulnerable about it (and that's exactly why I'll do it)

March 2023 - Made $50 from a Pakistani client. That incoming $300? Yes, I'm now chasing clients to pay their invoices. Smh.

I expect to get that invoice paid in the upcoming days (the client paid it once but the payment bounced). Damn the banking system in Pakistan. Regarding payment processors getting set up, I'm completely dependent on my partner, which isn't a good thing. So now I'll be opening my personal bank accounts (I went to a bank and they told me to come back with my father. He visits us 2 times/a month so it's more hassle).

I also made a promise to myself. I will now stop working with clients for less than $100/mo. No more working for and with Pakistanis. I've been spending my energy on broke clients who are looking for a silver bullet.

So I outsourced all the work for less than $100/mo to my neighbor I've been training. He's ecstatic.

I've gotten some work on Upwork (which is more than $100/mo haha)

So in total, I have restored some of my free time again while making more than I used to. I also spent $200 on a Growth Marketing Course by a Pakistani guy I admire in my space. Before paying him a single cent, I secured a 1-1 session with him (Hint: Have something to offer which they really want). I literally invested all my savings. This is my first time I'm ever paying for a course.

Here's the bright side. My income all this time has been largely independent of freelance platforms. Right now I need to hit my goal of $500/mo consistently.

My holistic situation:

1 Client on retainer at $150/mo.
1 Upwork client with a $120 contract.
My university community which I'm working on
Training and nurturing some interns so they can be able to do the work without my input.
Learning Javascript and Vue JS in order to start making some websites (I have a guy in my neighborhood who's mentoring me on this and since I'm a CS student it makes sense)

Didn't go to the gym once in Ramadan.

I was having a chat with one of my friends and he mentioned how I ranked an entire food brand on Amazon and helped them make 12,000 pounds in December 2022 under the agency but I was paid only $100/mo for it. This led me to a realization. I'm devaluing my own self. So now I'm fixing that.

Plus I got enterprise-level software for managing Amazon PPC for free just for helping a fellow man in my niche haha. Good juju coming my way

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention a close call for one of my clients. I and my partner finalized the products and did all the due diligence (except checking their credibility because we both assumed we did it). We were getting a 20% ROI on our inventory and even got the invoice from the distributor. At the last moment, it turned out the distributor was a scam.

Now back to the drawing board. The client had been getting impatient and now it's more delays for him again. Unlucky. So for that reason, I've asked my partner if we can offer him a guarantee that after processing the current invoice, we'll keep working with him until he gets his product live on Amazon (which in itself is a tedious process, provided you're doing everything legally).

 

[srodrigo]

Learning Javascript and Vue JS

Out of curiosity, any specific reason why you chose Vue JS?

If I were to learn web development today, I'd choose React because there's more freelancing opportunities should I want go that route. Vue has got a pretty small adoption.

 

[Saad Khan]

Out of curiosity, any specific reason why you chose Vue JS?

He (the software engineer) uses Vue JS for front end. He's the fastest way for me to start working on projects that matter.

 

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[Funky Monkey]

Update 17th April 2023:

From now on, I will be mentioning how much I make per month, because I feel vulnerable about it (and that's exactly why I'll do it)

March 2023 - Made $50 from a Pakistani client. That incoming $300? Yes, I'm now chasing clients to pay their invoices. Smh.

I expect to get that invoice paid in the upcoming days (the client paid it once but the payment bounced). Damn the banking system in Pakistan. Regarding payment processors getting set up, I'm completely dependent on my partner, which isn't a good thing. So now I'll be opening my personal bank accounts (I went to a bank and they told me to come back with my father. He visits us 2 times/a month so it's more hassle).

I also made a promise to myself. I will now stop working with clients for less than $100/mo. No more working for and with Pakistanis. I've been spending my energy on broke clients who are looking for a silver bullet.

So I outsourced all the work for less than $100/mo to my neighbor I've been training. He's ecstatic.

I've gotten some work on Upwork (which is more than $100/mo haha)

So in total, I have restored some of my free time again while making more than I used to. I also spent $200 on a Growth Marketing Course by a Pakistani guy I admire in my space. Before paying him a single cent, I secured a 1-1 session with him (Hint: Have something to offer which they really want). I literally invested all my savings. This is my first time I'm ever paying for a course.

Here's the bright side. My income all this time has been largely independent of freelance platforms. Right now I need to hit my goal of $500/mo consistently.

My holistic situation:

1 Client on retainer at $150/mo.
1 Upwork client with a $120 contract.
My university community which I'm working on
Training and nurturing some interns so they can be able to do the work without my input.
Learning Javascript and Vue JS in order to start making some websites (I have a guy in my neighborhood who's mentoring me on this and since I'm a CS student it makes sense)

Didn't go to the gym once in Ramadan.

I was having a chat with one of my friends and he mentioned how I ranked an entire food brand on Amazon and helped them make 12,000 pounds in December 2022 under the agency but I was paid only $100/mo for it. This led me to a realization. I'm devaluing my own self. So now I'm fixing that.

Plus I got enterprise-level software for managing Amazon PPC for free just for helping a fellow man in my niche haha. Good juju coming my way

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention a close call for one of my clients. I and my partner finalized the products and did all the due diligence (except checking their credibility because we both assumed we did it). We were getting a 20% ROI on our inventory and even got the invoice from the distributor. At the last moment, it turned out the distributor was a scam.

Now back to the drawing board. The client had been getting impatient and now it's more delays for him again. Unlucky. So for that reason, I've asked my partner if we can offer him a guarantee that after processing the current invoice, we'll keep working with him until he gets his product live on Amazon (which in itself is a tedious process, provided you're doing everything legally).

Damn start marketing in America or Europe my friend. I make 500 for simple 1-2 page sites that take like 10hrs if I do it all by myself and that's marketing to small business. Large business pays many times that. Hate to see a south Asian brother struggle.

Btw tip on being consistent with the gym: Treat it like chores and reduce friction as much as possible. I make it easy for myself by going to the gym uas late as possible because it makes me sleepy so I go an hour or 2 before bedtime and I don't even worry about clothes I'll go lift in my jeans and polo. Also having a program (if you dont have one 4 day GVS on Yt) and seeing your lifts go up (or down if you didn't eat/sleep properly) can be good motivation for going.

 

[BizyDad]

Woah. @heavy_industry did you help @Saad Khan upgrade his profile pic?

That is QUITE the transformation. Good for you dude. Stepping your game up. You won't regret it...

 

[Saad Khan]

Woah. @heavy_industry did you help @Saad Khan upgrade his profile pic?

How did you know? What is he, a jedi? @heavy_industry

 

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[Saad Khan]

Btw tip on being consistent with the gym: Treat it like chores and reduce friction as much as possible. I make it easy for myself by going to the gym uas late as possible because it makes me sleepy so I go an hour or 2 before bedtime and I don't even worry about clothes I'll go lift in my jeans and polo. Also having a program (if you dont have one 4 day GVS on Yt) and seeing your lifts go up (or down if you didn't eat/sleep properly) can be good motivation for going.

Thank you. The reason I haven't been able to go to gym in Ramadan was because when you're fasting, you can't maintain your diet plus when you do workout, you can't even walk again.

I sleep at nights unlike my peers who will go to gym at night. Good sleep is more important.

Damn start marketing in America or Europe my friend. I make 500 for simple 1-2 page sites that take like 10hrs if I do it all by myself and that's marketing to small business. Large business pays many times that. Hate to see a south Asian brother struggle.

I have started my efforts to market to western businesses. I also need to set up the payment processors because I only have payoneer at the moment and all the foreign clients I've worked with have never heard of it.

I pulled a sheet of businesses and brands on Amazon that are making $10k-$50k/mo on average.

Before paying him a single cent, I secured a 1-1 session with him (Hint: Have something to offer which they really want)

In exchange for this info above on finding unlimited leads, I'll be getting his funnel + SOPs. I'll be hiring VAs or students to do the outreach for me.

While we are at it, can you guys let me know what do you use for when processing payments? Stripe? Wise? Paypal?

 

[Saad Khan]

Oh and just to clarify, I've never watched an anime series in my entire life. When I first joined the forum, I copied the pfp of a youtuber "Nowack" I used to follow. People later told me it wad Itachi Uchiha from Naruto.

And I love jet black suits.

 

[machinistguy]

While we are at it, can you guys let me know what do you use for when processing payments? Stripe? Wise? Paypal?

Stripe & Paypal

 

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[Edgar King]

While we are at it, can you guys let me know what do you use for when processing payments? Stripe? Wise? Paypal?

Stripe only at the moment. I've heard some horror stories from those who've used Paypal - Paypal closing your account almost out of the blue, Paypal taking money from your account, Paypal almost passing a policy that allows them to take money from your bank etc.

 

[Saad Khan]

I prepared a Word doc where I brainstormed everything for my upcoming campaign. I'll be reaching out to the first 50 brands manually, learning the problems and obstacles I face and creating SOPs and training materials so I'm able to plug a college junior into the campaign, and work on outsourcing the outreach so I can focus on hiring people once the projects are started. I already have a few PPC managers in my network who agree to this.

Trail Blazer Brainstorming

docs.google.com

Also, I've realized that my offer will be needing an upfront payment of some sort; so I can reinvest that money into hiring resources for the project.

All the scripts are written and now I have to prepare the outreach list from the raw data I got. I prepared this 2 weeks ago but sharing it now.

Any feedback is appreciated. I'm focused on following the principles, rather follow gimmicks.

 

[Saad Khan]

Update:

I and my partner are facing some problems sourcing an authentic product for the client. We gave it our shot for 2 months, and found 16 profitable products, but had a close call. The distributor we were gonna order from had terrible Trustpilot reviews so no, I'm not risking $3k of testing inventory on a scam wholesaler. After that, we were back to square one. So we hired some outside help to speed up the process. Hopefully, we'll be placing an order for the inventory in the next week with a brand that we're talking to.

In order to make up for this unexpected turn of events, both of us decided that we won't get paid invoices unless the inventory is sourced and paid for. I want to make everyone's life around me better. So I thrive as a consequence.

Now onto my other stuff...

In the 4th week of May, the pitching contest is expected to happen.

I got my personal bank account made last week! As soon as I got the card, I bought a couple of courses I've been eyeballing (no, it's not some internet marketer's $97 course). International transactions enabled baby! Now gotta figure out how to set up a receiving payment processor.

I never thought I would say this but yeah... my 1/5/10 Planasy goals now include getting tf out of this bankrupt country after doing my bachelor's. 300-400% inflation is too much.

 

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[Saad Khan]

Made $200 this May. And saved $170.

May retainer payment still remains (until I hit a milestone which I'll be hitting today). So would've been $350. Also I'm not taking 100% of retainer money in my pocket. Reinvested 50% of it back into the project. I now understand that when I get paid, I get paid cashflow first. Then I get to take my income out of that cashflow. Business 101 haha.

As for the brand outreach update...

After researching and qualifying 15 brands, I keep finding new info to track and add in order to qualify my ideal prospect. And I have only qualified 15 brands. Need to work on that.

Got data for other Amazon Marketplaces as well other than the US.

Plus I have a tracking sheet from which I'll be making further case studies (They're not the sexy and crazy ones, rather boring but sustainable ones). I personally am insecure about lacking credibility which I will solve by writing an article about PPC principles and troubleshooting and getting those sweet sweet certifications (sorry guys I'm a sucker for certs cause I need external validation to further bolster my credibility)

 

[Saad Khan]

Okay so this June I made $170 while putting in maybe around 10 hours a week. $450 in contracts still pending cause one of my clients didn't get results we told him to expect so I'll invoice him when results are gonna start to show (I want to work with this guy long term cause he can be a good source of referrals so I'm looking for the long term picture). We went through a major process for his account, now it's sit back and watch the sales pour in for the client. You might ask, "Where was I the rest of the time?" Here's my story for this month.

To cut this short, I met the Prime Minister of Pakistan at the Prime Minister's house for the pitching competition's result and I didn't win (I'm still satisfied). Yes, it was a government funded competition. I met so many guys doing epic shit (most of them were students with their Final Year Projects). I met 195 people who pitched in front of judges (plus I also had a temporary crush on a tall girl there). And I also went fine dining for the first time. Cost me like $20 bucks lol (it's a lot here). Plus I got the contacts of the 2 out of 3 judges who ripped apart my pitch lol and connected with them on LinkedIn.

People here dream of meeting with Commissioners and here I am hanging out with the Prime Minister and their associates. Mindset is everything! Think big, think bigger! And doing all of this while I'm 18. Grateful beyond measure to the Fastlane community.

You might ask, "What was your pitch Saad? What did you pitch man? Should've pitched your Fastlane progress thread XD"

To be honest, I was nervous. Real nervous. I validated the market need for my EdTech startup with a bunch of surveys in the university and tons of digging in the internet + I created a group (that university community group) in which I teach and learn programming along with my peers which helped me frame a story for my pitch. AI dubbing has made the idea even easier to execute. I need money to be able to afford those AI models man. I contacted google about their api and still haven't received a response + I have a hunch it will cost $3-$4k. I analyzed my idea from many different angles and asked lots of different questions, practiced my pitch for 3 days but all of that went outta the window when I was done pitching to the judges and they started asking questions. I answered all of them except this one. It was about contextual translation. You should've seen me flustering there haha. I agreed to their suggestion of hiring a translator to go through my curricula which you design which was pretty expensive. And it cost me the win I guess?

Anyway, I saw that I can do better than most of the guys in that auditorium at the Prime Minister's house. I saw guys smarter than me who weren't committed to making it big with their ideas. Like dude imagine you make an IOT sensor that can help you measure all the soil contents and water the crops either automatically or manually through a mobile app. Then there was this guy who made a sensor that you put in buildings to see where you can reinforce the beams + pillars of the building to make it more earthquake resistant. When talking to them, they were like, "If I don't get the grant, I'm throwing my idea in the drawer, in the abyss of academic marvels and getting a job at a multinational firm."

This also gave me an idea. Why not go to Ivy League schools and get their faculty to show you the research of their alumni to get inspiration for some ideas. Then when you validate the idea you go to that engineering alumni, sell him the Fastlane dream and the stats and onboard him towards making a CENTS business?

Thank you for reading my braindump.

Now what's next?

I learned that in order to be able to pursue my EdTech idea, I need to make sure that:

• I put all my energy and money towards it and expect nothing for 5 years. Just replace EdTech with a CENTS business. That's what I mean.
• Should have an income stream that pays for my bills.

So my short term focus is that I need to scale up my Amazon PPC business and differentiate in that market somehow so I can charge more and earn more to pump more money into my CENTS idea.. Also I'm an AI student so I've been taking data science + maths courses and had been practicing maths on MAPLE software recently (It was fun to see I was solving problems I didn't even know what the question meant lol). For context, I hated Maths.

So yeah, 60% focus on learning and 40% focus on earning. Cause there isn't really some major thing I can differentiate with from the competition except my communication (which is a big thing) but I need to stack up more. Plus there was this idea of outsourcing manpower to companies in the US. There were 2 guys like me from the US getting their stuff set up while I was doing the recruiting process. So yeah, I also interviewed 30 people on call with those guys and have a general flow of like what to ask from an applicant in an interview. Now they're getting funds to hire 10 guys out of those 30 so now the ball is in their court and this is on standby for now.

This paragraph is for @ZCP. Yes, that doctor turned engineer who now owns an EV bike company he agreed to make a group. He didn't win the grant tho so when he told me about this he was kinda sad so I didn't poke him much there. But yeah, it was just my mind that was painting a doom and gloom picture.

Amidst all of these exciting events, There's one thing that bugs me. It's just that my lazy and distracted mind isn't in my absolute control. I waste so much of my energy on things that don't move the needle. Like some days I get back on gaming, when I get out of it, I get on some harmful stuff like porn, then its a perpetual cycle of misery. I've realized that I'll never stop playing games. I kept saying to myself that after I finish this game, then no more games. Guess what? I've been saying that for the past 6 months or so. Technology is a blessing when
you control your mind but a curse otherwise.

Moral of the story: Believe in yourself. Take Action. Knowledge and grit is all you need.

 

[Roli]

Amidst all of these exciting events, There's one thing that bugs me. It's just that my lazy and distracted mind isn't in my absolute control. I waste so much of my energy on things that don't move the needle. Like some days I get back on gaming, when I get out of it, I get on some harmful stuff like porn, then its a perpetual cycle of misery. I've realized that I'll never stop playing games. I kept saying to myself that after I finish this game, then no more games. Guess what? I've been saying that for the past 6 months or so. Technology is a blessing when
you control your mind but a curse otherwise.

Unfortunately an intrinsic property of the human mind is it tends to focus on the negative. Sometimes this helps us, like in instances where we focus on a negative outcome to spur us on to do something positive (example: I don't want to get fat so I take up jogging).

However this doesn't benefit us in so many areas. I have read a large part of your thread and you have clearly made progress in so many areas. I'm sure if I had told the Saad Khan who started this thread that he would be going to the Prime Minister's house to pitch a business idea, that guy would have told me I was mad.

So let's get to the porn and gaming and anything else you want to stop. Instead of focusing on the times you give in to your urges, you're going to create a subtle mindset shift with the following exercise.

Take a piece of paper and draw a vertical line down the middle. Then pick at random, either the left or right side as your favourite.

Now each time you feel you've played a game for "too long" add an 'X' to your least favourite side of the paper.

When you feel you have resisted the urge to lose yourself in gaming, either by not logging in or stopping a session, add an 'X' to your favourite side of the paper.

Each day, look at the paper with no judgement. All you are trying to do is fill up your favourite side, if all the exes are on the "wrong" side, just shrug and repeat the exercise the next day.

Make a different piece of paper for porn, don't mix the two as it is not as psychologically beneficial.

Remember, don't do the exercise with any self-judgement in mind, you are simply adding crosses pieces of paper.

Have a go at that and see what happens. Let me know the results in a few weeks time.

 

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[Trait]

Amidst all of these exciting events, There's one thing that bugs me. It's just that my lazy and distracted mind isn't in my absolute control. I waste so much of my energy on things that don't move the needle. Like some days I get back on gaming, when I get out of it, I get on some harmful stuff like porn, then its a perpetual cycle of misery. I've realized that I'll never stop playing games. I kept saying to myself that after I finish this game, then no more games. Guess what? I've been saying that for the past 6 months or so. Technology is a blessing when
you control your mind but a curse otherwise.

Two possible reasons why you indulge in porn -
1. Some underlying problem, insecurity/sadness with life.
2. Compulsively seeking pleasure.

If it is 1 then you would need to fix that problem first or a healthier way of coping with it without destroying your dopamine receptors and digging a depressed hole for yourself.

If it is 2 it is actually easier - use something else you enjoy to beat the urges to fap. Maybe you could play videogames to counter fapping. If you do both video games and porn you are on your way to dopamine desensitization commonly called depression. From my experience video games is way easier to quit then porn and porn is far more damaging so I would say try to get rid of it first. And when on the nofap journey - do not count the streaks but how many times you do it in a month.

Also take it step by step, if you try to quit both Video games and Porn at the same time you will have withdrawals and relapse. Good to see you acknowledging porn is a problem. A lot of people are still in ignorance to this modern problem and it only gets worse.

 

[Black_Dragon43]

this June I made $170

Make a hockey stick graph in July

 

[Saad Khan]

Sorry to disappoint @Black_Dragon43, I did make a hockey stick graph this month, just downwards to absolute $0 this month. It would've been $600 if I had paypal or a wise account to receive the payment from my client. The client can't pay via wire transfer because it bounced and cost him $60 in charges.

I've had an emergency at home that I had to help parents with and it cost me almost the first 2 weeks of July and 3/4th my savings lol. Everything's fine now. In the last 2 weeks of July, I and two other guys have decided to make an Amazon brand management agency, combine all our resources together and enter a partnership. We will be signing the contract today while we've already kicked off the intern training process a week ago. Also paid half amount to another agency to start developing a website for us, so we are no longer individual freelancers. Thinking of registering our company as an LLC in the USA so we can make company bank account which we desparately need to be able to receive large sums of payment. It's frustrating living in a country where you have to go through hell to receive international payments.

 

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[Black_Dragon43]

Sorry to disappoint @Black_Dragon43, I did make a hockey stick graph this month, just downwards to absolute $0 this month. It would've been $600 if I had paypal or a wise account to receive the payment from my client. The client can't pay via wire transfer because it bounced and cost him $60 in charges.

I've had an emergency at home that I had to help parents with and it cost me almost the first 2 weeks of July and 3/4th my savings lol. Everything's fine now. In the last 2 weeks of July, I and two other guys have decided to make an Amazon brand management agency, combine all our resources together and enter a partnership. We will be signing the contract today while we've already kicked off the intern training process a week ago. Also paid half amount to another agency to start developing a website for us, so we are no longer individual freelancers. Thinking of registering our company as an LLC in the USA so we can make company bank account which we desparately need to be able to receive large sums of payment. It's frustrating living in a country where you have to go through hell to receive international payments.

Yeah I know, it's tough with payments in Pakistan. Even many PayPal accounts aren't legal from what I've understood.

Not sure how easy it is to open LLCs in the US from outside, or how taxes/accounting there is handled.

Imo for you, Western Union is the easiest. A client just needs a credit/debit card and a Western Union account (takes 5min online to open it) and they can send you money. Then you go to a local WU and pick up the cash in person.

I'm sorry to hear about the issues you've had with family, those are always tough to handle. Happy to hear things are OK though in the end.

Why did you guys choose to go for a partnership rather than being independent freelancers?

 

[Jeix]

Oh and just to clarify, I've never watched an anime series in my entire life. When I first joined the forum, I copied the pfp of a youtuber "Nowack" I used to follow. People later told me it wad Itachi Uchiha from Naruto.

And I love jet black suits.

What jpeg you upload on a random website has zero impact or correlation to your success (or lack thereof) in your life.

Been following your threads from the amazon days, are you still active on that front? It sounded like you were a real expert, how is it going?
I respect your hustle a lot and wish you the best, keep us posted.

 

[Saad Khan]

Been following your threads from the amazon days, are you still active on that front? It sounded like you were a real expert, how is it going?

Still active on that front, now transitioned into an agency this month with 2 other guys. Have been scaling that slowly since.

About the jpeg, I didn't want to be seen as an anime nerd or a weeb haha. Nothing serious

 

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[Saad Khan]

Update 11th August 2023:

The contract payments have been received. I have received my biggest paycheck uptil now which is $600 which I split with my working partner 50/50.

My fitness journey took a toll as my wrists have been hurting for the past month. I ignored it but I decided to rest for a week to see if my wrists heal. It didn't. Here I am sitting on my home office chair with 2 weeks of not going to the gym and surprisingly, my wrists hurt even more! They hurt only when I try to do pushups (when I apply force against my wrist).

As far as the agency update is concerned, the website dev is going on but its stalled due to my partner suggesting an entire different layout. So I told him to took charge and he didn't coordinate with the web guys. This is causing us delays.

Moreover, the brands are being hunted for outreach by interns and my 2nd partner is managing that thing.

 

[Saad Khan]

Okay so here's the update.

Bought a PC with a good GPU and it runs super fast! (I'll admit I did play some games that I dreamt of playing since childhood). I did spend a pretty penny on it and although it was a sidewalker decision, I'm still loving it. I'm aware that its a double edged sword.

Started to record podcasts, both for my own channel and my agency's channel for the purpose of building stronger and authentic relationships and content.

Here's the link to the first podcast episode:

View: https://youtu.be/XpKj_9be2yw?si=n64SuxkCVRhy3cPt


I'm planning on releasing weekly episodes.

I coughed up around $500 last month from my savings for the PC and the agency's expenses.

 

[BizyDad]

A digital marketer spending money on computer equipment is not a sidewalker decision...

And neither is making some lifelong dreams come true by playing a few games...

If we can't take the time to make our dreams come true, what in the world are we doing here?

Keep going @Saad Khan !

 

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[xShepherdx]

Can't believe I only just found this. Keep up the good work @Saad Khan!

 

[Saad Khan]

Reminder to myself.

The reason why I'm transitioning my work into an agency is so that I can break the $150/month max cap working for a single Pakistani client for the same effort and charge $1500-$3000/month from big brands with quality products (that do have value skews, in short I want to work with productocracies) that can afford to pay this and not care, and hire the best of the best resources for them for the SAME workload.

I signed up a Pakistani client last month and even after establishing myself as an authority in my niche, the max they were able to afford to pay was $200. I got them results within working with them in the first month. Here's the stats in a nutshell

Before: $1300 spend with $1600 sales, $640 payout

After 1 month: $560 spend with $1300 sales, $760 payout

They left anyway because they ran out of money. Left the account with a testimonial in the bag though.

Atleast I know now that I have grasped the ability to actually be capable to deliver value. Now I just need to do this in the right place for the right people.

That's why I'm creating a perception that big brands would want to work with. The website for Profity Media is almost complete, it should be live in the next week. 4 podcasts have been uploaded so far with tons of content waiting to be cut into shorts and distributed. I'm taking action along with my partners and now have started to assemble a team for social media content, as soon as the website is dealt with. I'm handling the content marketing side, while my partner is working on the sales side.

In the last month, we've cold emailed over a 1000 manually researched brands. Not only that, we're firing on all cylinders and holding conversations with brand owners.

This update was long due, so here it is. Its not much given for 2 months but an inch is better than none at all.

Also, I've been playing a lot of games recently as well. Mainly trying out new games and the ones I wanted to play since childhood. But let's not hide the fact that its excessive gaming and its hurting my progress.

Can't wait to finance my CENTS biz once I get the agency up and running.