Episode 3-12: Take Action

I got a message from a podcast listener the other day, and he said, “Alex, I have been following your podcast since it started, taken a lot of notes, and I just cannot wait to start taking action.” And I’m like, “What? That is the exact opposite of what I want you to do. I want you to start taking action immediately after you get a good idea from my podcast.”Let’s dive into it.

So, I want to talk about action. Massive action is required for big goals. I don’t think I’ve talked to a single entrepreneur who has listened to my podcast or jumped on a coaching call with me, I don’t think a single one of them has said, “Man, I really hope I make enough to pay my bills.” Nobody has said that. What they say is, “I want to make five figures a month. I want to hit a million dollars. I want to be able to retire my wife. I want to be able to live the life I’ve wanted.” They have big, big goals. And then when I talk to them about the actions they’re taking, one thing becomes painfully obvious. The actions they’re taking do not meet the height of the goals that they want. Massive action is required for you to reach the big goals that you have.

On my last podcast, I talked about the 10X principle. I’m not going to dive into that again, but that principle, adding a zero to the amount of actions that you have to take, the things that are within your control, that mindset will help you meet whatever the goals are that you have. Now, I’ll give you some examples. I got a lot of positive feedback from the last podcast episode. Y’all are just taking good notes and hitting me up. I love that. I love the encouragement. One of the things that a listener asked me, he said, “Alex, how has the 10X rule affected you?” That’s a great question, and that goes right into my action taking, because again, I received some really great responses on the 10X episode, but one of them, I was like, “Man, I have to address this.” One of them the guy was saying, “I’ve been taking notes, and I can’t wait to take action.” Whoa, you have to start now.

So, back to how it’s impacted me. I knew that video marketing was going to be a big thing. This was like a few years ago, before YouTube was out. It’s been out for a while now, but Snapchat was coming out, Instagram, Facebook started allowing videos, and I saw the tide turning. I knew that videos were going to be a big thing. Two years ago, I mean, Gary V’s everywhere, Grant Cardone’s all over the place, and I’m like, “Man, I’m seeing some major trends here.” You know what I did? I did nothing. I don’t say that with pride. I did nothing. I just sat on my butt, and I was doing positive action, right? But I saw video, I knew where it was going, and I didn’t take enough action two years ago.

Well, I got just smacked in the face by my business coach. He was like, “Why are you not doing this? Why are you not creating videos? You have a great presence, a good voice, and a ton of knowledge. Start making videos.” I said, “Okay, okay. I’m going to do it. I’m going to do it.” He said, “How many are you going to do?” I said, “You know what? I’m going to start with one a month,” and he said, “No, not one video a month.” He was like, “10X that. Do 10 a month.” I’m like, “Okay, okay. I’ll start doing 10 videos a month. Got it.” Because you know, if you’re like me, you need coaches. You need someone pushing you. You need someone keeping you accountable. So I said, “Okay, we’re going to do this, 10 videos a month. Got it.”

So I started writing out ideas for videos, and then I started doing it. I started reaching the 10 videos a month, and guess what happened. My presence started exploding, the number of leads coming in from my videos started to trickle in, and I got excited. You know what that did? It created momentum for me. Action creates momentum,and a lot of unexpected things started happening when I started doing videos. People started seeing my videos. They started sharing my videos. People that were seeing my video, that had never heard of me, were reaching out and saying, “Hey, your buddy, Elgin, shared the video. I loved it, and I want to work with you.” Whoa. That’s another big thing that I learned, is that action creates momentum, and it opens doors that you did not even know were there before.

The video marketing is one example of me taking action, and it opened a door that I didn’t even know was there. I started getting partnership propositions. I started getting affiliate sales that I wasn’t expecting. I got deals that were just landing in my lap, from people that were watching videos. This episode is not about video marketing. It’s about taking action. This is just one example.

I’m going to give you another example of how I took action, and it gave me a lot of more benefit than I thought. You know, as I’ve been an entrepreneur since I was 17 years old, and risk doesn’t scare me. It doesn’t. I have a healthy fear of risk, but I’m willing to take it, and I was approached by a competitor of mine, who said, “Alex, I got to talk to you, you know? We need to have a private meeting.” And I was like, “Okay, sure,” you know? And I have good relationships with my competition. I have a respectful relationship, and he reached out, and he said, “Alex, I’ve seen what you’re doing. I really like the direction you’re going, and I’ll be honest with you, I’m not really in love with what I’m doing anymore.”

I was like, “Oh, okay.” I didn’t know why he was telling me this, right? And he said, “Alex, I want you to buy my business,” and I was like, “Whoa. What? Okay, like, all right. Talk to me,” right? So, we started going back and forth, and he opened up his book of business that he had, that he was looking to sell, and we started talking, and after looking at it, I was like, “Man, I have to take this opportunity here, you know?” I’ve bought businesses in the past, and this one was just a really good opportunity for me.

So, I made him an offer he couldn’t refuse. I probably overpaid, honestly, but there was a couple accounts in there that I really wanted, like bad, and I knew that if I had those accounts, it would open the doors for me. And there was doors that I saw and he didn’t, and he was getting ready to get out of the game anyway, so I jumped in, and I wrote him a big, fat check for his business, moved all those accounts under the Branning Group, and I started working the new book of business that I had, and I’ve at least 10X’d my investment in his business, at least. So, it has been great, and it still provides revenue to this day. What was the difference? You know what it all started with? It all started with me making videos, because he saw my videos, and said, “Wow, Alex is going in a great direction.” Isn’t that crazy? It’s mind-boggling.

One of the things that one of my coaching clients said was, “You know, Alex, I would start doing this,” and she’s talking about creating a course and a coaching program, “but I’m worried that I may make a wrong move,” and I totally understand that. I’ve made mistakes in the past. I’m going to continue making mistakes. I’ll tell you what, though, it’s a lot easier to turn the car than it is to start the engine. You know what I’m saying? It’s a lot easier to adjust the direction that you’re going than it is to get started, because once the car’s going, once you’re going down the hill, if you have to make an adjustment, you can do that at any time, but the key is to get started. Start getting that momentum, start to see doors open for you, and then greatness will happen for you. Turn the car. Don’t worry about, “Should I wait until I have everything right?”

Starting a business, making a big move, there is never a perfect time, period. You will always have to make changes. Don’t worry about it. Don’t try to think about, ” What mistakes am I going to make?” Don’t worry about that. Look at, “How many doors are going to be open for me? How much momentum am I going to create? How much movement am I going to get by walking through this and starting to take action?” That’s what you should look at.

One other thing I want to talk about regarding action. This is one of those other things I just want to push you towards, is instead of trying to hit a home run every time, it’s okay to just get on base when it comes to business stuff, right? It’s okay to just get on base. We don’t need a million dollar funnel every time. We don’t need our marketing campaign to 10X our revenue every single time. We just need to start creating momentum and movement. We need doors open for us. We need to start the process. We need to start moving down the track. We don’t need a home run every single time.

There are some things in my business that are working really, really well, that are not working as well as I had hoped they would, but they’re still profitable parts of my business, and I’m not going to turn them off, right? And it was things like, I launched my own software a while ago, where we built apps for people, and I was just … I had these big dreams, and I was so excited about it, and I thought, “This is going to be great. This is going to be just an amazing new venture for me. This is going to be the thing that will retire me.” You know what I mean?

And I went ahead, we built this whole software out. I mean, it was just intense, months of one of my team members devoted to this, and designers, and oh my gosh, it was so expensive. It was good, but it was expensive, and we finally got it built out, and we started launching it, and we started getting people signed up for it, and it didn’t go as well as I had hoped to, but you know, it was profitable within the first year. I made my money back, and it’s still going now. I still have the Your Custom App platform up and live today. It’s still generating revenue. It’s just not where I wanted it to be.

But you know what? Me having that app platform, that new custom software, that opened doors for me to speak with a guy named Casey Eberhart, who is just an absolutely brilliant mind in the network marketing space, and a really great speaker, just a good dude, right? And if I didn’t have that app platform, Casey never would have reached out to me, and there are so many cool doors that have opened for me because of that relationship with Casey. Now, I have some great clients that are still with me, and one of the reasons that they’re still with me is because I have the app platform, right? Because they’re like, “Well, I got my website with him and my app, so I’m just going to stick with it.”

So, the app did not create the million dollars that I thought it would. I legitimately thought I had a seven-figure idea. It didn’t do that. There’s a lot of things that I could have done better. Lesson learned, but it did help me go down the path of software development, so I can empathize with people who are starting their own SaaS company. It helped me learn how to deal with technical problems and issues, and having to change. I mean, those are things that I deal with on a website, but you know, an app platform, dealing with iTunes apps and Google Play, there’s just a lot of things in there that I didn’t anticipate.

But you know what? I still took action anyway. I’m so glad I did, and I’m still getting rewarded for my action years later, years later. Your Custom App was something I built three-and-a-half years ago, so I am so happy that I took the action, even though I didn’t hit the home run that I thought I would. It still counts, because it still opened doors for me, it created opportunities for me, and it is a profitable part of my business that I’m not going to shut down, right? I’m going to keep it up, but it was a little bit different than what I thought it was going to be.

And then, one of my last points, and I kind of hinted at it with the Casey thing, is that action attracts other action-takers, and this is huge for you, because you cannot build an empire alone. You need people that are around you. Action attracts other action takers. Me taking action and building Your Custom App attracted Casey Eberhart to me. Me taking action and reaching out to Eric Lofholm, and hiring him as my business coach, opened doors for me that I did not anticipate at the time. Me taking action and going to Scottsdale, Arizona, and learning about JV from Jay Fisette has opened doors for me and unlocked all of these ideas that have taken my business to the next level. Me taking action and investing in this new software product, called ClickFunnels, and trying to figure out what the heck this is, has changed my business. Me taking action and moving to Redding, California has opened doors for me within my own spiritual life and the people that I’m meeting more than I ever anticipated.

It’s all about taking action. Don’t worry about what if things go wrong. Look at all the different things that could go right, and start taking action, because without action, nothing will change.

You guys are awesome. Thank you so much for being on my podcast. My listenership has grown a lot. I value each and every one of you, and I’m excited. I am excited for you to start taking action, and I would love to hear your success stories. You can email me. Go to alexbranning.com. Hit me up on any social media platform. Message me, and tell me what you are taking action on.

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