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struka

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Artifax

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The E-Myth Revisited, great reinforcement for me trying to automate and scale my current business, and for my vision/value prop/systems for the new venture. To think I could have read this 25 years ago...

Going to recommend this to two people I know who built themselves jobs.
 

The Abundant Man

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The E-Myth Revisited, great reinforcement for me trying to automate and scale my current business, and for my vision/value prop/systems for the new venture. To think I could have read this 25 years ago...

Going to recommend this to two people I know who built themselves jobs.
How did they build themselves jobs?

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Artifax

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How did they build themselves jobs?

They built their own businesses from the "technicians" perspective (in e-myth terminology), they both work "in" their businesses rather than "on" them.

Both are either run ragged or feeling trapped, and looking for a way out.

I think the first half of the book is a great wake up call for someone in this position.
 
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The Abundant Man

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They built their own businesses from the "technicians" perspective (in e-myth terminology), they both work "in" their businesses rather than "on" them.

Both are either run ragged or feeling trapped, and looking for a way out.

I think the first half of the book is a great wake up call for someone in this position.
So like MJ'S story of the coffee shop owner who was still tied to working 80 hours a week on her coffee shop?

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jon.M

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Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. Very interesting and useful for sales and marketing

If you liked that one, you might like his other book Pre-suasion. Great read. My favorite.
 
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ds_groundupbiz

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Currently, I am reading the Private Lender Playbook by Brant Phillips with Nathan Long. It is a book about lessons in private mortgage lending. I feel like the book would be a good resource for anyone who wants to learn more about how people are lending their money (especially using their IRAs) to fund deals, earn interest, and make a fair return in today's real estate market. I like the book so far.

61ptpkurMtL._UX300_PJku-sticker-v7,TopRight,0,-50_OU01__BG0,0,0,0_FMpng_AC_UL200_SR200,200_.jpg
 

Jaden Jones

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Just finished Blue Ocean, would recommend to everyone anywhere, applies to slowlane and fastlane.
 
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B. Cole

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Picking through Unscripted again, as a refresher, from page 304 on. Also Deep Work by Cal Newport.
 

Vanesco

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I don’t read books, I don’t have time for it at all, although I bought books on sale that I wanted to read for a long time, I’ll need to start reading them.
 

Xeon

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Currently reading E-Myth after seeing this title posted in one of the posts here.

I'm at page 83 of the ebook and the author talks about some Business Format Franchise thing and how the true product of a business is not the product itself but the business (is he referring to the experience that the business can provide to the customers?). I hope he explains what all these means in later chapters cos it's sounding a bit abstract to me right now.

Like how those wise old man on Wudang Mountain in remote China telling you stuff like "In emptiness exists existence and in existence, there is emptiness".

I hope the book is not about asking readers to buy a franchise cos if it is, imma gonna demand a refund and throw rotten pies at the author's face.
 
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Veloman

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"Where good ideas come from"
I think it was on the recommended reading list here... Not sure. Buts its amazing so far.
 

LiveEntrepreneur

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I've been reading less lately but have been reading more books on copywriting. These include:

* The copywriters handbook

Also done some Udemy courses relating to copy writing.
 
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Jeff Noel

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Right now ? Typing on my PC.

Seriously, I'm waiting for The Fastlane Millionaire to arrive, don't know if you heard about that book.
I also ordered Unscripted .
 

jon.M

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Currently reading E-Myth after seeing this title posted in one of the posts here.

I'm at page 83 of the ebook and the author talks about some Business Format Franchise thing and how the true product of a business is not the product itself but the business (is he referring to the experience that the business can provide to the customers?). I hope he explains what all these means in later chapters cos it's sounding a bit abstract to me right now.

Like how those wise old man on Wudang Mountain in remote China telling you stuff like "In emptiness exists existence and in existence, there is emptiness".

I hope the book is not about asking readers to buy a franchise cos if it is, imma gonna demand a refund and throw rotten pies at the author's face.

Long time since I read the book, but I think you might be misinterpreting his message. He sure does talk a lot about franchises, but definitely not in the way that you should buy one.

Take McDonald's for example. They sell burgers. Anyone can sell a burger. It's a piece of bread, meat and some veggies. And in fact, many would argue that McDonald's sell shitty burgers.

But McDonald's is still the #1 food chain in the world. Why do you think that's the case?

One reason might be that Ray Croc or someone else defined a specific process for how everything in the restaurant should be done. Fries need to be fried for 3 minutes and 43 seconds. Toilets are cleaned every 30 minutes. This is exactly how you make a Big Mac, that is how you deal with customers.

It's so simple for a worker do this because they won't have to learn stuff for themselves, just follow the instructions. How else could a popular fast food chain be largely run by pimpled teens with no former experience?

It's a business system. Like a money-making machine where all you need is to turn the key. You've got processes and systems defined for everything, and everything needed for things to go well is someone to follow the instructions.

That's why McDonald's got franchisees. People want to start a business with high chances of surviving, so they start a McDonald's. All they've gotta do is to show up to do the work, and things could work out okay.

This is also an important notion to businesses that are NOT franchises. It will help you make things more efficient and painless, make it easier for potential employees to get in the groove, and might make the business more valuable if you choose to take on investors/sell it off.

Let's say you run an ecommerce store selling pet clothing. If you had to write a document outlining the process for everything that's needed to be done in your business, in simple, easy-to-follow instructions, what would you write?

What are the steps for finding new suppliers? What are the steps for importing and storing the product? How do you add a new product in the store? How do you package and ship it off? How do you deal with customer service? How do you communicate with followers on social media -- are you friendly and sincere, funny and viral etc?
 

Mikkel

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Basic Economics, Fifth edition by Thomas Sowell

Literally, mind blown during each and every chapter. Also, I've been pro-free markets... but could never rationalize properly why it is a better system. Thomas Sowell is great at doing this.
 

The Abundant Man

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Basic Economics, Fifth edition by Thomas Sowell

Literally, mind blown during each and every chapter. Also, I've been pro-free markets... but could never rationalize properly why it is a better system. Thomas Sowell is great at doing this.
What are your thoughts on Mergers? Amazon being so big? Should the Government intervene? (For Example Anti-Monopoly)

Where/when do you think Government should intervene/ what should they regulate? If this was completely pro-free market we wouldn't have organizations such as FDA or USDA etc...

Why are pro-free markets better?
 

Xeon

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Long time since I read the book, but I think you might be misinterpreting his message. He sure does talk a lot about franchises, but definitely not in the way that you should buy one.

Take McDonald's for example. They sell burgers. Anyone can sell a burger. It's a piece of bread, meat and some veggies. And in fact, many would argue that McDonald's sell sh*tty burgers.

But McDonald's is still the #1 food chain in the world. Why do you think that's the case?

One reason might be that Ray Croc or someone else defined a specific process for how everything in the restaurant should be done. Fries need to be fried for 3 minutes and 43 seconds. Toilets are cleaned every 30 minutes. This is exactly how you make a Big Mac, that is how you deal with customers.

It's so simple for a worker do this because they won't have to learn stuff for themselves, just follow the instructions. How else could a popular fast food chain be largely run by pimpled teens with no former experience?

It's a business system. Like a money-making machine where all you need is to turn the key. You've got processes and systems defined for everything, and everything needed for things to go well is someone to follow the instructions.

That's why McDonald's got franchisees. People want to start a business with high chances of surviving, so they start a McDonald's. All they've gotta do is to show up to do the work, and things could work out okay.

This is also an important notion to businesses that are NOT franchises. It will help you make things more efficient and painless, make it easier for potential employees to get in the groove, and might make the business more valuable if you choose to take on investors/sell it off.

Let's say you run an ecommerce store selling pet clothing. If you had to write a document outlining the process for everything that's needed to be done in your business, in simple, easy-to-follow instructions, what would you write?

What are the steps for finding new suppliers? What are the steps for importing and storing the product? How do you add a new product in the store? How do you package and ship it off? How do you deal with customer service? How do you communicate with followers on social media -- are you friendly and sincere, funny and viral etc?

Thanks for the explanation! I agree with all these "systems" and "processes" and they should be an essential part of the business. However, the reason why most small businesses fail (which is what the book is supposed to address), I feel, might be because the market has no Need for them in the first place? I think this is the most important point not covered in the book.

Let's say John starts a small business selling light-up boots for people who keep the northern hairy-nosed wombats as pets. He can follow the teachings in the E-Myth book to the last atom but his business will still fail due to no Need lol. He can set up his business in such a way that it runs even smoother and more efficiently than Mac's, but still....

But then again, I guess MJ already address that in his books.

The one thing I like about the E-Myth book is the concept of the 3 personalities : The Entrepreneur, The Manager and The Technician.

----------------
Side note: I was reading another book, "The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR" the other day. Kinda paused on that book for now cos' it seems to be advocating a PR approach. Which is good and all, I agree with everything the author says. I stopped reading halfway as I felt the tactics mentioned will i) kinda hard to carry out if your business is not news-worthy and ii) very difficult to get featured on magazines/tv/media unless you've connections in the industry
 
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Last edited:

jon.M

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However, the reason why most small businesses fail (which is what the book is supposed to address), I feel, might be because the market has no Need for them in the first place? I think this is the most important point not covered in the book.

Let's say John starts a small business selling light-up boots for people who keep the northern hairy-nosed wombats as pets. He can follow the teachings in the E-Myth book to the last atom but his business will still fail due to no Need lol. He can set up his business in such a way that it runs even smoother and more efficiently than Mac's, but still....

You're right. However I think the author could be mainly addressing businesses that are surviving, but where the owners have just started another job for themselves. AKA the thousandaire fastlane. Restaurants, that girl whose life purpose was to bake pies (lol), hotel owners and more.

Essentially the slowlane entrepreneurs. And doing the e-myth thing alone will definitely not make them survive or achieve fastlane success. As you're saying, enough people will obviously have to be willing to pay for your stuff. Doing all this stuff without a product people want is like placing a pie plate in the owen -- without putting pie dough and filling in it!

But if you look at it from a fastlaner's perspective, what he's teaching could at least let you take your already growing/successful business and spend less time and money on it.


What did you think of it?
 

Vigilante

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lowtek

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What did you think of it?

It's OK, if a little dated. I think the second edition has more stuff on Tensorflow so it's more current, but books always tend to be behind.
Really with all the free info out there, you can learn enough just by doing some toy projects. The stuff you can't learn by doing that, isn't really in the book.
 

Kyle T

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Just Finished: "Secrets of the Millionaire Mind"

Currently reading: "The One Thing" & "Cashvertising"

Cashvertising is GOLD but it has taken a while to read because I want to take diligent notes on nearly every page.
 

Mikkel

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What are your thoughts on Mergers? Amazon being so big? Should the Government intervene? (For Example Anti-Monopoly)

Where/when do you think Government should intervene/ what should they regulate? If this was completely pro-free market we wouldn't have organizations such as FDA or USDA etc...

Why are pro-free markets better?
When I look at free markets, I want what is best for the consumer(myself) and the access to these products.

Mergers: These tend to be positive for the consumer as the two companies tend to bring their strongest assets/systems to the table and become more efficient and therefore decrease their costs, which is good for most everyone... except the competition.

Monopolies: I am not a fan of monopolies just because they can force new businesses out of existence. However, how do monopolies become a reality? It is typically due to regulations that make it impossible for small business to stay in business, leading to companies to buy out their competition and take a stronghold in the market. Even Facebook stated that increasing regulations for social media would be great for Facebook because it would help destroy its competition while FB would be able to weather the regulations due to its capital.

Government Intervention: The government should ONLY regulate against actions it wishes to exterminate. Like smoking. If you don't like smoking, tax the crap out of it and people will stop. However, what they SHOULD NOT do is try and regulate things they believe is good. Products are neither good nor bad. The individual can determine for themselves if a product is good or bad at the current free market price.
An example of bad regulation: when you give price caps on the water to farmers in California, you allow farmers to use excessive amounts of water to grow their plants, leading to shortages in water. If the government didn't cap the price of water, farmers would be more hesitant on whether they should grow water hungry plants in such a dry climate. Since the market can provide those exact same crops at a lower price because other areas don't have to pay for water since it is free... since it rains more often in other areas. The point of free markets is to allow the markets to determine the price and to allow for allocation of scarce resources.

FDA: Why can't a private institution do this? Why are consumers unable to determine if they should take a certain drug or not. Why should terminal patients not have access to potentially life-saving drugs just because they don't know if those drugs will cause damage to them... they are already at the end of their life if they don't do something different.
Now, I can see an argument that the FDA may be helpful in ensure drugs don't cause harm to patients, but why does a drug company have to spend years testing if their drug is effective? The market can determine that. Instead, the FDA jacks up the prices of these drugs because of all the testing that must be done, causing the drug companies to spend more money on R&D which gets past on to the customer.

The free-market system is just ONE system on how to distribute scarce resources. I believe it is the most efficient as individuals know the value of a product to themselves a LOT better than the government knows what is best for each individual.

Thomas Sowell and his book explain these ideas much better than myself. :happy:
 
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Neos

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Set out to read 24 book this year and am on track with the fastlane millionaire being book #23. By far the most eye opening book I read!! So excited for the future and what the next 5 years bring....
 

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