5 Golden Nuggets from an Event with Millionaires and Influencers 🌟

Issue #102: Five Priceless Lessons I Learned at an Exclusive Event. $825 Million-Dollar Advice. The Most Powerful Word in The World.

Aug 03, 2024

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Last week, I hung out with millionaires, internet celebrities, and a few billionaires in Victoria, Canada, for two days.

I had a bit of imposter syndrome when I signed up for this event. But the experience and wisdom I gained from the people there blew my wildest expectations.

As you know, I’m an obsessive note-taker. I took tons of notes because every minute, someone at the event was dropping some golden nuggets.

I’ll share some of those big and small wisdom nuggets in today's issue.

Nugget #1: Storytelling is a Very Powerful Skill, Especially for Businesses

Matthew Dicks is one of my favorite authors and an amazing storyteller. He convinced me (and everyone in the audience) that storytelling is the most powerful way to make your brand loveable and memorable. If you want to see and feel the magic of storytelling, watch this.

Resources to Learn Storytelling:

Book: Storyworthy by Matthew Dicks.
Book: Stories Sell by Matthew Dicks (This is Matthew’s new book; I highly recommend it to all founders).
Read my tips on storytelling on step #9 from my guide to public speaking.

I am so happy as I got a signed copy of Matthew's Book.

Nugget #2: Gut Feeling is a Reliable Guide to Decision Making

If you’ve read my checklist for decision-making, you know I’m very analytical in my approach. I love my process because it gives me the confidence to make good (and sometimes fast) decisions.

However, many successful people at this event shared that they reasonably rely on their gut feelings (instincts) in key decisions, which helped them make (or save) millions of dollars.

After this realization, I’ve decided not to ignore my gut feeling when making critical decisions. In fact, I’ll put it on top of my checklist.

Situations to Trust My Gut Feeling:

When I don’t have the time and means to gather all the evidence.
When it doesn’t cost much to act.
When it’s a two-way door, meaning I can easily (with some effort) reverse the decision.

Nugget #3: Undervalued (Arbitrage) Opportunities are the Best Growth Hacks

The ‘innovator’ in me gets very excited about big, innovative, hot business ideas, like AI and Electric Cars.

There are a few problems with big, popular ideas:

They require big time and money investments.
The failure rate is high because you need to figure out the right business model.
It can be very crowded and competitive.

On the other hand, there are several boring, undervalued, un-sexy, but highly profitable businesses (with lots of upsides) opportunities that don’t get any spotlight. Here is an example of this type of un-sexy multi-million dollar business.

Finding and focusing on this kind of arbitrage is the best hack to grow in 2024.

Nugget #4: First Build Audience and Then Build Business

One big lesson I learned last year is that we should first build an “audience” and then a “product.”

I met several internet celebrities who first focused on building an online audience (followers and subscribers), and then they launched their products and businesses.

I think that is a very smart, best, and sure way to grow an online business in 2024 and beyond. Here is how it works:

Traditional Startup Journey: Build a Product → Find Customers
2024 Startup Journey: Build an Audience → Build a Product

Nugget #5: Pricing is One of the Most Powerful Growth Levers for Business

Warren Buffet recouped all his investment within a few years of buying “See’s Candy” in 1972.

Do you know how?

He just did one thing - increased the price of candy every year.

Here are three business growth levers:

Operation Efficiency: Focus on improving team productivity to increase profit margins.
Customer Growth: Focus on selling more units and acquiring more customers.
Pricing Creativity: Focus on optimizing your product pricing (rate of service) and growing.

Pricing is the most underrated growth lever.

Here are 3 tips to leverage this lever: