We are confronted with obstacles every day. Sometimes they can be predicted, other times they cannot.

Being confronted with an obstacle is much more different than being confronted with a failure. While avoiding failure prevents action, avoiding obstacles may still bring success.

Since obstacles differ from failure, they require a totally different outlook.

1. The Only Real Obstacle to Accomplishing Anything is Yourself

The only real obstacle that prevents you from success is your own lack of belief in your ability to succeed. Every other obstacle that manifests itself can easily be hurdled if you believe in yourself, and is often an opportunity for growth.

If you don’t believe you can accomplish something, there is NO way you are going to do it.

Thus, having faith in yourself when confronting an obstacle is the single best way to deal with any hurdle.

2. Don’t Allow an Obstacle to Stop You

Like failure, it is inevitable that you will face obstacles during your entrepreneurial career.

Additionally, like fear of failure, fear of obstacles can be paralyzing. Don’t let difficulties stop your progress towards success. Work on a way to overcome roadblocks rather than feeling as if an obstruction is unpassable.

This might require you to be more creative or think more positively. However, remember that if you want something badly enough, you’ll find a way to make it happen.

3. An Obstacle is an Essential Hurdle to Reach Success

Instead of viewing an obstacle as a roadblock that prevents you from moving forward, view any difficulty as an essential hurdle you must overcome to reach success.

Try to view obstacles in a more positive light. While they may seem inconvenient, obstacles are present to ensure your company has the mettle to plow through and succeed against your competitors.

4. Expect Obstacles and Prepare for Them

Taking the initiative to prepare for obstacles is a great chance for your business to hone its predictive capabilities. This also ensures clients are served without a disruption of your service.

Expecting obstacles will allow you to reduce costs and maintain a high level of efficiency. You’ll adapt or react more quickly to a difficulty, and be able to confront it using significantly less resources.

Being able to successfully predict and preempt any obstacles that stand in your way will also make you a more competitive participant in your industry.

5. Confronting Obstacles Isn’t Easy

Never take an obstacle lightly. Underestimating the difficulty of clearing a roadblock can lead to a problem becoming that much more threatening.

When presented with an obstacle, always be completely ready to tackle it and anticipate additional complications.

6. Obstacles are Great Learning Experiences

Like failure, obstacles are great learning experiences. Facing different problems can teach you the best ways to solve them. You’ll also learn if the same difficulties will repeat themselves in the future.

Facing various difficulties will allow you to better understand the types of problems you will face in your business or industry. This will also better equip you to confront them in the future without overusing your resources.

7. Use Obstacles to Your Advantage

When resisting or confronting obstacles, you are using resources to clear roadblocks so they no longer pose a threat to you. While this strategy can be effective, sometimes using the obstacle to your advantage can be an even more powerful technique.

Consider using a difficulty to your advantage by developing systems that will make the presence of the obstacle profitable.

Consider the current economy. Business are struggling with a lack of customer spending, being unable to hire due to lower revenues, larger publicly held companies have to worry about falling stock prices and companies with financial portfolios have to worry about devaluing assets.

Instead of struggling to survive, certain companies produce products that naturally sell better during economic downturns. They can develop systems that complement recessionary periods and offer services that are more useful to consumers during a darker economic environment.

We see this already: car dealerships are resorting to selling more and more used cars and offering lower financing rates. We also see random businesses offering to buy gold.

These types of practices aren’t resisting the recession but using the climate as an opportunity to profit from it.

8. Avoiding Obstacles Can be a Good Thing

Failure is something that cannot be avoided.

Obstacles on the other hand, can be beneficial to experience, but can also be beneficial if avoided. Avoiding an obstacle does not mean you are stopping growth or avoiding pursuing a business.

Avoiding an obstacle means you are creating a system or strategy to avoid problems or obstructions that may stand in your way to success.

Thus, trying to avoid failure will paralyze you, while trying to avoid obstacles will most likely save you money.

What are some other useful ways to deal with obstacles?

We’re taught at an early age that failure is a bad thing. When we do poorly on tests, we receive a failing grade.

When a business goes bankrupt or dies, it is said to fail.

We are constantly reminded every day that failure is something negative. But what about the positives of failure? There are so many benefits to failing, I find it difficult to argue that failure is anything close to negative.

Failure is a Learning Experience

Above all else, failure is an opportunity to learn; and there is a lesson to be learned in every loss we encounter.

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
-Thomas A. Edison

This quote is great at stripping failure of its negative connotation. Failure is simply a way something “won’t work”. Instead of being a “lack of success”, it becomes part of the process of trial and error.

Thus, each idea we try that doesn’t work brings us that much closer to an idea that does. To that end, experiencing failure is a necessary step in arriving at success.

Keep in mind, it is very important you learn from every failure and that the same failure isn’t experienced twice. This could lead to unnecessary wastes of time and money and even possibly fatal mistakes.

Failure is Something You Have to Get Used To

Failure, like marketing or accounting is a normal business process. Because of this, failure is something you must get used to in order to survive.

Failure is such a common occurrence it should come to be expected. Thus, ensure you develop thicker skin if setbacks seem to bother you.

Get used to the fact that you will experience more failures than successes. This doesn’t make you a failure, but an even more savvy business owner.

Identifying opportunities and trying to capitalize on them are valuable skills that will inevitably cause failure. You aren’t a prophet, so it is impossible for you to know which ideas will be profitable. The only way to know for sure is to try.

Probably the most important thing to remember about failure is that it can’t be avoided. Trying to avoid failure will only prevent you from acting–and there is more danger in not acting than in failure itself.

Failure Shouldn’t be Taken Lightly

Failures must be taken seriously. Because mistakes are expensive, they should be studied to ensure a lesson is identified.

Even more important is to make sure you are able to identify a failure when it occurs. If you can’t spot a failure when it happens, mistakes will continue until you learn to fix them. This can be extremely costly and potentially fatal for your business.

Thus, you must handle failures with care by ensuring you can identify them when they occur. Then, be sure to pinpoint the lesson to be learned.

Are there any other reasons why failure isn’t bad? Does the downside of failure outweigh the benefits?

Want to know the single, best tip for idea generation?

We have covered some useful tips to get you started on idea generation when either beginning down the path of entrepreneurship, or looking for more inspiration to expand your business.

These tips may be quite helpful, but unfortunately they wont make you the next Starbucks.

So what are the types of ideas that will make you hugely successful? What is the anatomy of a solid business idea that will bring you the enormous successes that some of the well-known companies have enjoyed?

Let’s have a look at some of these enterprises and see if we can point out any similarities in their ideas and visions.

Facebook

A recent Fortune article pointed out that Facebook aims to be the main tool that we use to communicate on the internet. CEO Mark Zuckerberg envisions that the site will one day allow users to use their Facebook ID as an “online passkey to gain access to websites and online forums that require personal identification”.

That’s quite an ambition. Zuckerberg’s vision stretches far beyond the aspiration of creating just another social network and instead aims for something much more far-reaching and meaningful.

These visionary ideas are a huge factor in what drives the company’s success forward.

Google

Google is best known for its original ambition: it created a better search engine that delivers more relevant information to the user.

While the concept sounds basic, Google has truly revolutionized the way we find information online.

But Google’s recent projects have made the company even more ambitious:

• An email client that rivals Outlook in both features and usability
• An online equivalent to Microsoft Office
• An internet browser competing with Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari
• A desktop search application
• A photo browser rivaling iPhoto

All of these services Google offers are extremely user friendly and have the same amount of features the professional-grade software has–all for FREE! These services can also be used without taking up any more system resources than an open browser window does.

Google is taking on some of the older titans of the tech industry who charge hundreds for their products. Google on the other hand, charges nothing yet still manages to be incredibly profitable.

Google has created an impressive business model that offers free, professional-grade products, all based on ad-supported revenue. This is truly an outstanding feat, all derived on an ambitious and unique vision.

Microsoft

Microsoft’s founding vision might not sound so impressive today, but for its time it was extremely ambitious: to create an operating system that anyone can use.

If you sit back and think for a minute about the wide-reaching effects of this aspiration, you’ll realize that Microsoft’s influence over our day-to-day lives is nothing short of incredible.

What made this vision a reality was the impossible dream of turning a machine that was only used by specialists and programmers into something user friendly that anyone can use.

Apple

Apple, as one of the first manufacturers of the Personal Computer has had an equally impressive influence over our day-to-day lives.

Recently, the Cupertino company has continued to produce remarkable innovations and has revolutionized the way we listen to music.

Apple is in the business of consistently producing new and innovative products that continue to wow us every day.

Ford

The automobile company’s founder, Henry Ford was once quoted as saying: “If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse”.

Ford Motor Company had a crazy ambition: to create a machine that could be used for faster transportation.

Instead of improving on an existing “technology”, Ford thought outside of the box and created a product truly remarkable that changed our lives forever.

General Electric

GE’s founder, Thomas Edison has 1,093 US patents to his name. He was a serial inventor, most known for inventing the first Incandescent Light Bulb.

Like the previously mentioned visionaries, Edison had an idea that would change the world: using electricity to create light. He then went on to founding a company that would distribute electricity that could provide power for lighting.

Edison’s contribution to our lives is miraculous; and it all started with an ambitious vision and a passion to create.

What can we learn from these companies?

These are some strong examples of companies that have changed the world with technologies we have come to rely on every single day. What can we learn from what these businesses have accomplished?

The answer is to generate star-reaching, ambitious ideas. Never reject an idea because it is too ambitious or far-reaching.

Each of these companies have looked at existing technologies and envisioned something two or more steps ahead of what we were previously used to.

While these ideas may have sounded outrageous at first, the founders of these companies persisted anyway and enjoyed tremendous success because of it.

It doesn’t have to be new, just remarkable

There is a big difference between MySpace and Facebook. Not only between the user interfaces but also in their successes.

How?

MySpace aimed to be a social network targeted to teens and twenty-somethings. Facebook, on the other hand, aims to be a communication medium for EVERYONE.

Facebook’s visions are two steps beyond that of MySpace and are more ambitious and far-reaching than MySpace’s vision of a social network.

The final tip for idea generation: think BIGGER!

Let these company’s successes be your inspiration. They dared to think bigger and more creatively, and sought to do the seemingly impossible. What prevents you from doing the same?

You might not be able to pursue ideas the way larger companies can do, but you can start planning ambitious projects and ideas now.

You may have to begin by taking smaller steps, but they should all lead to an ambitious, seemingly impossible overarching vision. You’d be surprised at where your company will take you if allow your motivations to guide you and if you invest yourself in your vision.

If the past few months of economic news has gotten you depressed, you’re not alone.

While we are experiencing some very tough economic times, there is still plenty to be happy and optimistic about despite the fiscal troubles we are facing.

It turns out, we have a lot of reasons to stay positive during this recession and why our successes continue to have an optimistic outlook.

1. Opportunities have not vanished

Business opportunities have by no means disappeared. In fact, there are still plenty of prospects for business, entrepreneurship and making money, they are just more difficult to find. To find these possibilities, you’ll have to look a little harder and keep an open mind.

Due to widespread pessimism, opportunities might not be as easy to spot. However, by being more creative when looking for prospects, you’ll see different opportunities become that much more obvious.

In fact, this environment continues to bring new possibilities. We may be facing mounting problems every day, but each problem that we confront represents an opportunity for new business ideas.

2. Challenges are always opportunities to grow

Facing these economic challenges is an opportunity for you to test your mettle as an entrepreneur. By persisting and staying optimistic during this period, your leadership abilities will grow by leaps and bounds.

This can be a defining moment for your business and will provide a great test of its strength. And if you can survive a recession, you know your business will truly blossom during a recovery or economic prosperity.

3. The laid off or unemployed can pursue their entrepreneurial dreams

Being unemployed or laid off can be extremely heartbreaking, demotivating and discouraging.

However, if you do your best to be positive and look at this situation optimistically, you’ll recognize that you have the perfect opportunity to pursue your entrepreneurial dreams.

You are no longer tied up at work, so you have no more excuses to delay. You are now free to pursue the business you have always wanted to open. Perhaps this horrible recession could actually be a blessing in disguise!

4. You can learn from other’s mistakes

We see what greed, short-sightedness and lack of transparency can do to the economies and financial markets around the globe.

While it can be depressing to think about, use these failures as an opportunity to learn. Based on some of the blunders we have seen in recent months, we have learned the value of:

• Using due diligence when investing
• Being wary of lack of transparency in an investment or business decision
• Resisting the temptation to be greedy
• Maintaining a long term focus

5. A recession is largely based on emotion and fear

There are a ton of technical reasons for the cause of this recession: toxic assets buried throughout our financial markets, high unemployment numbers, low consumer spending, the list can go on and on.

But what makes this recession even worse is the emotional reaction people have. People stop buying and investing in the economy even when their jobs seem safe.

People get depressed and let the recession dictate their behavior. This attitude only makes this downturn worse.

We can begin to improve the effects of the recession if we can recognize that it is our fear and emotion that aggravates this downturn. Once we approach these economic issues with a positive attitude, we will find that the environment will slowly get better and better.

6. Remember that recessions are cyclical

Recessions are also cyclical – they happen every few years. In fact, we have gone through one of the longest periods without one.

Since recessions are cyclical, we know they can’t be prevented and that it is only a matter of time before we face another one. It isn’t anything new and we have even faced credit crises similar to this one before.

Of course there are new, unprecedented elements to this economic downturn, but a lot of it we have already experienced time and again.

There is also something extremely reassuring to the cyclical nature of a recession: it is only a matter of time before we reach another economic prosperity. In other words there is certainly light at the end of the tunnel.

7. Our country has faced far worse

On the crisis we face, one of my professors once reassured me that our country has faced far worse than this recession.

We have been through two world wars, a civil war, a Great Depression, president assassinations, attacks over American soil and countless other wars.

Yet, our market has faithfully bounced back each time and always breaks records. Why would this recession be any different?

8. Many entrepreneurs are safe

Another reason to stay optimistic during this economic downturn is because many entrepreneurs will face minimal financial loss. Sure there are plenty that will suffer difficulty, but the majority will survive and emerge stronger.

Many entrepreneurs have strengthened their business model in such a way where it can withstand a recession, so their income will not suffer that much as a result.

Furthermore, more and more people are turning to entrepreneurship as a refuge from the financial instability of employment. They realize that entrepreneurship will protect them from layoffs and that income is NOT all or nothing.

9. Now is a great time to hire

If your business is doing well and you happen to need an extra hand, you can be comforted by the fact that you have a huge pool of skilled candidates to select from.

Because the job pool is so much larger right now, you can afford to be pickier with who you hire. That means the likelihood of hiring a better quality candidate has increased dramatically.

This is great news for you as you have the opportunity to hire some really talented people to help run and strengthen your business.

10. There is always a demand for quality work

No matter what economic cycle we are in, there will always be a demand for high quality goods and services.

Something of high quality will save consumers money in the long run, so they will flock to these goods and services in the hope that they will get the most out of their money.

This is why it is important that you ensure that your goods or services are of top quality to ensure that you are especially competitive during this time.

11. Bigger companies have less of an edge

If you are afraid of the competitive environment right now, this might comfort you a bit.

With the bigger companies continuing to lay off, their remaining staff feels overworked, guilty and demotivated. The low morale in these companies hurts their competitive edge.

This is a great opportunity for you to step up your marketing and ensure your products and services are of top quality. You might just emerge as a much more respected brand because of it.

. . .

StartupNation.com refers to 2009 as the year of the entrepreneur. Let’s prove this prediction and summon all of our entrepreneurial energy to remain strong, confident and persistent during this economic downturn.

Let us use our visionary and leadership ability to plow through this recession with the resolve that only entrepreneurs have!

It hardly seems that a day goes by without new gloomy economic figures: market downturns, unemployment, consumer spending – seems like nothing but bad news.

Watch any news station or read any newspaper headline and you’ll see something depressing about the economy.

So what is really the cause of our economic problems? One post couldn’t possibly cover all of the intricacies of this financial crisis. However, there is one cause I would like to discuss: ourselves.

Credit crisis: bad, media reaction: worse

Our current financial crisis is bad. Toxic assets lay hidden everywhere and the culture of corporate greed continues to run rampant throughout our business sector.

Unemployment numbers have reached very discouraging levels and consumer spending continues to plummet.

However, as with any economy, recession or market downturn, there is always one less technical but major contributor to the problem: emotion.

We see the media reporting gloomy economic figures, interview those who have been horribly affected by the economy and liken our financial situation to the Great Depression.

While recessions are, in fact, cyclical and we have faced crises similar to these before, the media brings out the very worst in these times. They look to report the bad news and inject worry into each and every one of us.

Bad news is what sells

Don’t get ready to hate the media just yet. They are just doing what we, as entrepreneurs always strive to do: pursue what sells.

The media knows that bad news will always sell better than good news, so they will accentuate the bad news and minimize any good news there is to report.

Something sells because it is demanded

Why does bad news sell? The answer is obvious: we demand it!

We crave bad news. We have a desire for controversy and crisis and want to hear every detail about it.

This is a horrible outlook to have, not to mention an even worse approach to being optimistic. We demand bad news, which in turn discourages us. We reinforce a cycle of pessimism and it is very unhealthy for our ability to persist and to remain hopeful.

Thus, we are going to have to make changes in ourselves in order to prevent this recession from getting worse.

Lets call a spade a spade

First, we need to recognize that the media is going to bring out the worst in the economic crisis because that is what sells.

Not that this situation isn’t bad, but we need to recognize a recession for what it really is: a cyclical economic downturn, a cooling off period.

The credit and financial meltdowns are not that dissimilar to problems we have faced before in the 80′s during the savings and loan crisis. Neither are the tales of corporate greed, which are similar to the Enron-type scandals in the early 2000′s. We’ve survived those didn’t we?

If we can recognize that the media is going to give us the news that sells; and if we can remember that the economy will eventually improve, we we will ensure that we will not let the throes of this recession get to us.

Look for the good news

Next, we need to look for the good news and any improvements that are coming our way. We need to look for the best in ourselves and in others and how people come together to help each other through these tough times.

By identifying the good news, we can find the faith, hope and optimism that rests in all of us. We will realize that this recession isn’t nearly as world ending as some will make you believe.

Beat the recession: stay positive

Since recessions and market downturns are largely emotional, we can actually fight this recession by staying positive!

Don’t let our current downturn prevent you from living your life or enjoying what you want to enjoy. Maintaining optimism will prevent the recession from affecting you the way it has affected others.

If enough people can remain positive during this problem, we will find that the effects of the recession will lessen the more positive we become.

Stay tuned for my next post, where I will discuss the reasons why we should be optimistic during this economic meltdown.

What prevents you from achieving success? Is it lack of a brilliant business idea or a solid business plan? Something else, maybe?

Below are some obstacles that will prevent you from achieving the entrepreneurial success you have always wanted.

1. Yourself

You have the power to define your own success. If you are positive and have faith in your leadership and visionary abilities, you will inevitably be able to captain your business to profits.

However, if you remain doubtful of yourself for too long or consistently approach your work with a negative attitude, your pessimism will only beget failure.

Remember that you have the power to define yourself. You and only you have the ability to determine your own success, so start acting like one!

. . .

Oh, I’m sorry, were you looking for a longer list? Well it turns out that the only real barrier to success is yourself. If you are motivated, invested and confident in your own success, there is no obstacle large enough that will prevent you from reaching your goals.

Sure there are some tiny obstacles that will prove troublesome along your business’ lifespan, but nothing that will grind you to a halt if you want success bad enough.

Keep this in mind when an issue presents itself to you. Some may seem large and threatening, but it is your job to put these problems in perspective. Approach these setbacks with the attitude that there is no problem big enough that will prevent you from plowing through. View the problem immediately as something that can be addressed and will be fixed no matter what.

Never ask yourself: “how am I ever going to get through this?”, as yourself: “what is the most tactful way I can address this problem and still maintain maximum profits?”. Notice that the idea of loss or failure never came into question with the latter quote.

If you don’t let failure be an option, then it won’t be a result.

Just because optimism is the ideal and is a huge driver to your success, does that mean it is easy stay positive?

Is there some special optimism button that you can turn on like a light switch?

The answer, unfortunately is no and the sad truth to remaining optimistic is that it is not always so easy. Bad things do happen, workloads can get you stressed out and not everything is always rosy-colored.

I’m not bringing this up to discourage you, but in fact to encourage you. Don’t feel as if you are a failure because of an air of negativity you can’t seem to shake off. You are human after all and ups and downs are inevitable.

It’s easy to say “stay positive” but it is another thing to remain positive all of the time, even if you believe in how powerful optimism can be.

The key to fighting negative thinking is to recognize pessimism when it comes. If you don’t recognize it, it is impossible to change your attitude. Once you recognize that you are looking at something with a gloomy lens, you can then take proactive steps to fight negative thinking.

While it is important to use whatever techniques you can to get yourself out of a depressed outlook, it is equally as important to not let yourself get more down because you have some cynicism or doubt. Doubting yourself is bad, but allowing yourself to get even more down because you can’t stop doubting is even worse.

Before you even try to combat doubt, remember that we are all human and doubting oneself is normal. Once you accept that, then, by all means, do whatever you can to try to boost up your morale.

Does knowing how to do something necessarily mean you care enough for something to get done?

What if you know nothing about a given project, subject, department or industry, yet you are motivated to learn or succeed in this area? Does this impassioned person stand a greater likelihood of flourishing than the individual who already knows the subject?

In this post, I will describe why being motivated and having passion in a given area is a much more powerful driving force than having the “methods” to getting something done.

Motivation will help you find methods

Your uncertainty on how to tackle a problem will quickly be cleared away if you have enough motivation to succeed in your desired area. If you are unknowledgeable in a given subject, be it in an industry you hope to enter, or a business process, yet have plenty of motivation, you will find a way to get what you need accomplished.

In the face of true motivation, lack of methods will prove to be a tiny obstacle

Motivation is a much stronger driving force than know-how. Just because you know how to do something doesn’t mean you will be willing to accomplish it.

However, if you are motivated enough to achieve, not knowing how to complete something will seem like an insignificant road block. Learning about your topic of interest will seem like a straightforward solution and you will find yourself proactively looking for answers rather than stressing over not knowing something.

Methods can be flawed, motivation will work through and fix flaws

Who’s to say that the standard way of doing something is the best way accomplish a given task? Methods can be flawed, inefficient and maybe even harmful.

There is no flaws in motivation. In fact, being motivated will help you locate flaws without being discouraged. An unmotivated person following methods will simply shrug their shoulders and continue to use the methods they know, even if they know it is defective.

Not everything requires a method in order to be completed, but it does require motivation

You can have the smartest people in the world working on a project for you. If their hearts aren’t in it, there is no way the project is getting done.

Some things may require know-how and methods, while others don’t. However, EVERY project requires motivation in order for it to move anywhere.

Having the knowledge to complete something doesn’t mean you want to see something through to success. Motivation, however is what drives a project to the finish line and is what gives someone the desire to learn, succeed and even obtain know-how.

Apply these points to your business. You may be discouraged about entering into an industry in which you know nothing about, or in taking on a role in which you have little experience. Don’t fret! If you have a strong enough desire to prevail, nothing will stop you from learning what you need to learn in order to prosper.

There are plenty of “industry leaders” that clearly possess know-how on how to succeed in their area. Yet, their culture, customer service and drive shows that the company lacks motivation to truly deliver an outstanding product. This is your edge! Your heightened passion and motivation can lead you to success far beyond that of your competitors. You just have to remain impassioned and be committed to meeting your goals.

Can you succeed without being profitable? The sole purpose of going into business is to make money—to achieve outputs that exceed your inputs.

However, most businesses take some time to become profitable. In fact, it takes a long time for businesses to even make any serious revenue or sales.

To that end, it can be difficult to stay motivated if you aren’t achieving the primary goal of going into business. Because of this, it is important to understand some other great success measures that will keep you motivated and optimistic while you work to become profitable.

Answering affirmative to any of the below questions will signify that you indeed have been succeeding all along without even attaining profitability. Read on, and you will certainly find that there is still plenty of hope if you haven’t had that huge payday yet.

Is your marketing successful?

This is probably one of the most obvious ways to measure success even if you aren’t generating profit. But nonetheless, you deserve a pat on the back if you have gotten this far. It can take awhile to determine the right marketing mix, or one that at least generates some sales/revenue.

If you are getting hits on your website (as a result of Search Engine Optimization or Pay-Per-Click Ads) or getting people to proceed to checkout on your site or landing pages (even if they don’t actually buy) means that your ad copy is doing its job, it may just need some minor tweaking.

Generating leads from your advertisements or referrals are also great milestones and it means that at least some of your marketing efforts are working. Name recognition is even better. The best of course is making sales. None of these mean that you are profitable yet, but they do suggest you are getting closer to positive net income and that your marketing mix is beginning to work. You should be proud of yourself for this and applaud your business for making it this far.

Have you finished any important tasks?

Marketing is your first and foremost priority, but it takes some steps to prepare for investing in any kind of advertising. Depending on your budgets, you may need to hire key people or outsource various tasks to other firms, including certain marketing tasks. Accomplishing any of these things are certainly a step in the right direction and are all something to be optimistic about.

Completing your market research is definitely something that merits excitement, since you are learning more about your product. Coupling this with completing your competitive analysis is even better since now you know even more about your product, you competition and your industry. You will know what advertising works, what customers want and what is and isn’t profitable.

Understanding all of these things will aid you in completing your marketing plan. This too is an important task that, upon completion, should also create some optimism. Putting together a marketing plan means that you have a list of potentially successful marketing ideas that can start to bring in revenue.

All of these tasks are a step towards profitability and should get you excited about working for yourself, even if you aren’t profitable yet.

What have you learned from your market research?

Learning specific information from your market research can show you the potential your business and industry have. This can also reveal to you best practices for advertising your product.

Conducting market research will help you determine if your product is a profitable one. If it is, your success (or lack thereof) is dependent on your marketing, NOT the product itself. Your success is only a matter of trial, error and persistence.

If you have made any marketing mistakes in the past, the knowledge you obtained through market research will help you understand what you did wrong and what you can do to fix it. Correcting any mistakes is absolutely a step in the right direction towards profitability. So learning something new is definitely something to be excited about.

You will also get a better sense as to whether or not your target customers are profitable and if they are a high paying demographic. If they are, this is more good news for you. This means you can utilize premium-pricing strategies to enjoy greater profit margins.

If the results of this market research are not so bright, this is good to know as well. It is better to know this now than finding out after you have spent a ton of time and money on something that is unprofitable.

Did you learn anything new from your marketing campaigns?

Making mistakes are opportunities to learn. Therefore, if you have made any mistakes in your past marketing campaigns, chances are, you are learning something from them. As long as you use these opportunities to correct yourself, you will only be getting closer and closer to profitability.

In fact, as long as you continue to correct yourself, the more failures you have, the closer to success you are actually getting. You are narrowing down the list of ideas that actually work, which means you have a greater chance of success with the next idea. In this light, having some failures can actually be a good thing.

Have you completed any other milestones that you have set?

Have you set any goals other than profitability that you have met? Have you completed them on time? If so, this should encourage you as well. No matter what these milestones were, they demonstrate your ability to complete goals timely and effectively. Just make sure that these goals in some way contribute to eventual profitability.

Are there any new marketing ideas that you are excited about?

Learning something new about your customers through either prior marketing attempts or market research may have revealed a new opportunity for you and might have even given you an ingenious idea.

This is an example of another potential success. What are you doing to make it happen? Have you found any proof that this idea appears to be a profitable one? If so, then any steps you make to bringing this idea to life are indeed mini successes. You should let this progress encourage you and get you excited that profitability is coming soon.

Have you had any other breakthroughs?

Is there anything else that you have learned through conducting business? Maybe something new that isn’t market related? Perhaps you have learned better ways to stay organized, to hire people, to motivate people or even at becoming more efficient and productive. All of these breakthroughs are positive steps towards strengthening your business and can all help to bring your business closer to profitability.

Being an entrepreneur and business owner presents a very unique opportunity to grow and self discover. You can uncover hidden motivations within you as well as find a creative side that you never knew you had. You can learn a great deal about doing business, more than you ever would in any other job. Any breakthrough or learning experience you have while running your own business is certainly a success and one that you will likely achieve nowhere else.

At its worst, maybe you’ll discover that this business isn’t right for you. Maybe something different in a new industry is. There is even a possibility that you’ll find that entrepreneurship isn’t right for you. This too, is a success because the sooner you learn that something isn’t for you, the sooner you can pursue the tasks that you truly love.

Are there any other alternative measures of success you use before your business becomes profitable? Does completing these help you to stay motivated?

There is an excellent article posted on the Four Hour Workweek Blog discussing the manic depressive tendencies of entrepreneurs. It is really a great read and touches on a lot of what I have written here.

The article describes (and demonstrates graphically via a Transition Curve) the periods of mania (high energy, optimism) that entrepreneurs go through at different stages of their business’ life cycle, followed by periods of depression (and pessimism).

What leads to periods of depression?

In this article, depression or pessimism seems to be inevitable. Near the beginning of your business life cycle, where you start to market your product and you begin to experience the difficulties of finding the appropriate marketing mix, you will have a discouraging realization that success might be further off than you originally anticipated.

The more you experience these difficulties, the more pessimistic you can become. You can start doubting yourself and excessively worrying.

While I believe that having these discouraging realizations are inevitable, I also believe despairing, doubt and pessimism can be mitigated. The best thing to do at this stage is to take steps to combat doubt.

The important thing to keep in mind at these stages is that success may be more difficult than you had originally anticipated, but it is still within your reach. It may be more difficult and take longer to reach your goal, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still achieve it.

How to mitigate the effects of entering into the “Informed Pessimism” and “Crisis of Meaning” stages

Other than fighting doubt, researching early on and keeping yourself informed is a good thing. I feel that part of the problem that leads to depression is that entrepreneurs will cling to uninformed expectations for too long, and it will take them too long to become informed.

If you have an idea that gets you really excited, doing some market research on the idea right away may reduce some of the excitement, but you wont lose it entirely. However, you will also have a clearer picture of what to expect in the beginning. This way, you can plan for at least some trouble spots right away, lessening the effect of any discouraging realizations.

It might also not be a bad idea to set some milestones or goals that you hope to accomplish that are not directly related to revenues or profits.

Understand that profits will be practically non existent in the early stages, and sales may be just as difficult. Instead, using other milestones will help you stay motivated and you will remain encouraged that you are still making steps towards making consistent sales.

Remember, sales is always your ultimate goal, but defining and achieving small milestones that will eventually lead to making sales can keep you from being discouraged in the early stages.

Why is it important to always stay informed?

You want to know what you are getting into very early on so you don’t get too discouraged. However, it is also important to stay informed because having mania and high energy when uninformed can be dangerous and lead you to make poor and risky decisions.

The most important thing you should take away from this post and the Four Hour Workweek article is to make sure you research your business idea as soon as possible so you can make educated decisions and not have too many unpleasant surprises or difficulties.

Further, if you begin to doubt yourself or get too pessimistic, while this is normal, you should take active steps to combat doubt and try to remain positive.