The Dropship Unlocked Podcast

ESCAPE THE 9-5: How Starting a Business Can Transform Your Life (Episode 133)

• Lewis Smith & James Eardley • Season 1 • Episode 133

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🗣 In this episode, Lewis Smith and James Eardley talk about how starting a business can transform your life, especially if you're feeling stuck in the 9-5 grind. 

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Topics Discussed:
★ Taking Control of Your Life:

  • How starting a business gives you control over your time, finances, and decision-making.
  • The shift from being limited by salary to controlling your income.

★ The Personal Development Aspect of Entrepreneurship:

  • Developing resilience through overcoming obstacles and learning new skills.
  • Why personal growth is key to becoming a successful entrepreneur.

★ Entrepreneurship vs. External Solutions:

  • Why relying on external solutions like promotions or raises keeps you dependent.
  • How entrepreneurship empowers you to create your own path and future.

★ How to Start Your Entrepreneurial Journey:

  • Practical advice for those feeling stuck in their 9-5 jobs and unsure where to begin.
  • The importance of starting small and staying consistent with your efforts.

Links and Resources Mentioned:

Key Takeaways:
★ Take Control of Your Life: Starting a business allows you to take control of your time, income, and decisions. No more being limited by the 9-5 grind.
★ Entrepreneurship Empowers You: Unlike external solutions that rely on others, entrepreneurship gives you the power to create your future on your terms.
★ Start Small, Stay Consistent: The key to success is taking consistent action, starting small.

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Unknown:

If you want to escape a nine to five job that you feel trapped in, then the best solution is to

James Eardley:

you can transform your life through entrepreneurship, but don't do what I did when I first started and

Unknown:

and when I did that one thing, everything started to shift in my life.

James Eardley:

Because as soon as you make that decision, you'll never look back

Lewis Smith:

looking for a way out of the nine to five grind. I think many people think that there's this shortcut, but the truth is, you Lewis, welcome to the dropship unlocked Podcast. I'm Louis Smith, the founder of dropship unlocked, and with me is our client success coach. James Eardley, now, when we're not recording podcast episodes or running our own e commerce businesses, you'll find us helping aspiring entrepreneurs launch their own high ticket drop shipping stores. So if you're ready to build your own six or even seven figure online business, then head over to dropship unlocked.com. Forward slash, start now, sit back, relax and let's unlock your potential with the dropship unlocked podcast today,

James Eardley:

we're taking a slightly different approach to a podcast episode. We're not doing the usual in depth, really specific business advice for this one. Today, instead, we're going to be providing advice and dive into how entrepreneurship and starting a business can transform your life, especially right now you feel like you're stuck in a nine to five grind. So we're going to be discussing between Lewis and I how starting a business not it's not just about making money, it's all about having more control over your life, having more control of your lifestyle and your future. So Lewis, are you ready to dive into this subject today? I am. I think it's a crucial topic to be discussing in today's climate and the environment we find ourselves in at the moment. And so yeah, really excited to discuss why I believe starting a business is the key to living life on your own terms. So yeah, let's dive into it. Perfect. So I'll start with a question to kick things off. How do you think that starting a business can help someone take control of their life, especially if right now, they feel like they're stuck in a nine to five? Well,

Lewis Smith:

the first thing that it gives you is more control over your time. Now it's not gonna happen from day one, but if you feel that, the reason why you want to escape a nine to five is because you want more control back and more freedom over your time. Ultimately, one of the best ways to get there eventually is to create your own business so that you call the shots on what you do with your time. I'd argue that's probably your most valuable, precious resource, even more so than money, because you can replenish money. You can earn more of it. You can't wind back the clock and make more time, can you so, yeah, when you've created a business, especially if it's an online business, it means no more having to commute to an office. No more set office hours, because you can work as and when you want from your laptop. You can create financial independence for yourself so that you can build a system that pays you regardless of your time. So you're kind of unshackling your time input from the money you get paid. So it takes a little bit of time to set this system up, but once you've done it, it really increases your decision making power, because you can then decide that maybe you want to go on holiday, or maybe you want to go and just see like your child's school play, or you want to go and play a sport in the middle of the week, like you want to do something that otherwise in an ordinary job you wouldn't really be able to Do, because you're on the clock, you're answering to a boss, you're being paid a monthly salary. But when you have your own business, you're in charge of the direction of that business. So it's very unlike working for someone else, where those decisions are kind of made for you. And we live in this ecosystem, this set of restrictions within the kind of artificial walls that we think shape our reality, like we're told where to go and where to be at what time. We're told when we have to be at our desk. We're told how much we get at the end of every month as a salary. And I think once you first start to see the results of a business that you create, you realize that those were artificial restrictions all along, and actually you have a lot more freedom than maybe you realized, but it takes a little bit of time to set that up. It certainly

James Eardley:

does. Yeah, I agree. It's all about questioning the path that you may have gone down, because it feels so easy to or more passively, you go into that path, which is the nine to five job out of school, and suddenly you find yourself with those restrictions on you, where somebody's always telling you where to be, what to do, and I feel like the best way out of that is to be able to generate income without having to have bosses to tell you what to do. And that is essentially entrepreneurship. But like you said multiple times there, Lewis, it doesn't happen from day one, and it's not easy, so we're not glamorizing that. There's going to be work to get there, but I think that's that's something that actually becomes one of the biggest positives of it is that it isn't easy, because I think a lot of people miss the personal development aspect when it comes to using entrepreneurship as a vehicle for more freedom. I firmly believe that entrepreneurship is so closely tied to your personal development. So they say when you start a business either earning or you're learning. So if you're not earning and making money straight away when you start a business, then you'll definitely be learning a lot, and you'll be learning a lot about yourself. And you always mention this Lewis, quite commonly on the podcast, that we've got to get the mindset right. We've got to work on ourselves in order to be really successful with your own business. So how do you think improving yourself would lead to unlocking your potential as an entrepreneur,

Unknown:

improving yourself is is everything, isn't it? Because, like you say, you're you're either earning because the decisions that you made and the work that you did on yourself is already working, or, like you say, you're learning from the mistakes along the way, and as long as you're willing to correct those mistakes, then that's okay. The problem is, if you're not if you're making mistakes, you're not learning from them, then you're not learning and you're not earning. So you've got to always be in that mindset of, like, growth. And it is a big mindset shift, you know, the entrepreneurship path, when you go down it initially can be a little bit scary, because you're suddenly responsible for your own outcomes, and it forces you to grow. And I think it's a great thing. I think it's something that so many people would benefit from, being given that autonomy and having those artificial walls just fall away when they realize, Oh, it's just kind of me in the world. Now, I get to face these challenges head on. I get to decide how I approach them, and that mindset shift will be the key to your success, because it helps you become more resilient. It makes you stronger, and it builds up a thicker skin. When things go wrong and you have to fight fires in your business, and there's, you know, things happening that you have like not all of the tech always goes to plan, and there's stuff you have to figure out. But as you overcome those obstacles, it builds this mental toughness, which then can become fun. It can become like a game. And you think, Well, I actually quite enjoy this process of figuring out challenges. It's like solving a puzzle. It's like a mental exercise for which you then get paid for solving and the outcome of which is the best kind of thing. So I think it really unlocks your potential. I think it unleashes you. It gives you the ability to reach your true potential, rather than operating in the safe but limited confines of an artificial set of boundaries put in place by an employer to kind of keep you in your box and keep you in the confines of a very restrictive job description or job spec. As soon as you break that down and you say, well, it's now my business. I can do what I want. I'm the CEO and the sales person. I'm the customer support person. I can build a team. I can just run it myself. I get full say in how I run that business. That's really interesting skill to develop. And I think it forces you to mature, and it forces you to just enjoy the journey and build it and grow. And as you develop those new skills and that new knowledge, you start to reach this new level of confidence as well and a new level of capability that then opens more opportunities for you, because once you've built one business you're like, Well, what else is possible if that's you know, if I've shattered the false belief system that I had before that was holding me back, what other false beliefs do I have that might be holding me back? And I think it helps you kind of unlock potential in other areas of your life as well, whether that's health or relationships or travel or like all these different things that maybe you were living by a rule book previously that you now realize didn't even exist. Yeah, I've

James Eardley:

been through that exact experience, Lewis, of realizing that I had more to give. And I think I realized that while I was still in my nine to five job, and a big thing pulling at me was that I wasn't feeling like I was getting to my full potential, and I feel like there was more to see in the world, and I could become more as well. And I knew that entrepreneurship, it called out to me in a way that I knew it could be a great vehicle for me to reach my potential, because I knew it would push me all the way to become better. And we spoke to James on the podcast last week, and he was talking about his journey after joining the dropship on lock masterclass, and get into the position he's in now, and how it's changed him in a way that he's now able to view the small things in life as very, very, a lot smaller than you would have seen them before starting a business. So for example, in my own life, because I've been able to deal with challenges, I've understood that obstacles is all part of the path of building a successful business and succeeding in life. When something happens, like someone cuts me up when we're driving or if I get the wrong order of food, or if these little annoyances happen in life, I'm able to control my emotions a lot more, which for me, has made my life a lot more enjoyable to live when you level up and grow, and I put that down to starting a business. So there's so many other advantages, other than just the financial one or the lifestyle freedom, it's also the person you become. Yeah, I want to take a step back now in this conversation and kind of look at the society's view on entrepreneurship as a whole, and where you stand on this. Lewis, so I think when some people feel stuck in a nine to five job, they're often looking for external solutions that promise quick fixes. That was the rise of get rich, quick schemes, etc, and other quick fixes that some people might suggest are external to you as ways to improve your life, rather than entrepreneurship. So how would you think that entrepreneurship would differ from various external solutions that you might be presented with, and why do you think it's more empowering? Yeah, I guess this comes back to like, how you define entrepreneurship as a whole, doesn't it? And what what we even mean by entrepreneurship? I think it's easy to write off entrepreneurship as this thing that only the tech bros in Silicon Valley can do. And it's like, are you either a unicorn startup or you're one of the 99.9%

Lewis Smith:

that fail? The reality is, there's so many small to medium business owners across the world that run small businesses that might not even label themselves as an entrepreneur, and I'd even argue, and this is possibly a different view to many, but like most roles, if you strip them back to their core, basics are entrepreneurial. The Entrepreneurship, the way I see it, is creating some kind of innovation that delivers value to the world in exchange for money. That's my definition. I kind of made up, but I feel like it encompasses it, right? So then you say, Well, okay, but you can't, you know, we can't have a world full of entrepreneurs. What about and then come the examples of other professions that are not cast as entrepreneurship. So let's use, like, I don't know a nurse, for example. Do you say, okay, you know, what about we can't have a society that functions just with entrepreneurs. What about nurses? Well, I'd argue if you took away the the kind of

Unknown:

architecture of society, and you stripped it back to the basics, and you said, Okay, I'm a caveman, and, you know, I have a cut on my arm, and I need someone to care for me. Someone emerges with an offer, before the word nurse even exists, and says, Well, I can help you fix that. I can care for you. I can, you know, help you back until you're well again. That to me. And then I say, Great, thank you for that. I will pay you so that, to me, is an exchange of value, and that is someone doing a fantastic job caring for me, using their skills in exchange for money. Now that money back in the caveman days may have come directly from me. I know I'm mixing up time. La, so we didn't have money in those days, but you see what I mean, it's an exchange of value, and I think we've become so far removed from that now that people forget that just because, yes, now that person gets paid from a salary from an organization that is funded by taxpayer money that comes off the salary of other people who are working in society, it all becomes very disjointed, and we lose the kind of thread of like, No, that was a value for money transaction. That was an exchange of value. They helped me in exchange for some some funding. You know, yes, it's a free service, but it's not free. It's paid for by the taxes we pay. So I think when you strip it right back to that, it's, yeah, it's disempowering to believe that external solutions, as you put it, are the answer. Because I think we're all entrepreneurs, to an extent, if you work a job and you deliver value, you are creating an exchange of value for money, whether you get paid directly by the person who you're creating that value for, or through some kind of disjointed network of taxation that then funds a government body that then pays you a salary. So I think, yeah, if you're hoping for, like, a promotion as your answer. It kind of keeps you dependent on the system. You're dependent on other people you're dependent on, like the the internal politics and bureaucracy of the organization you work for as to like whether you'll get selected for it. Entrepreneurship on the flip side, however we define that, whether you call yourself an entrepreneur or not. Business ownership or exchange of value, however you want to define, it puts you so much more in control. In my opinion. You know, you're the one that gets to decide your next move. You get to decide your strategy, how much value you offer, how you scale that value to the world. And with entrepreneurship, you get to decide and create the future that you want. You're not just hoping that it comes from someone else's decision to promote you one day. Yeah,

James Eardley:

I love that. That nurse analogy really hammers it home what entrepreneurship really is at its core. And it's so easy for us to see these professions in the world that we need, of course, like nurses, and disregard them as being in any way entrepreneurial. But when you strip entrepreneurship right back really thinking at the top level now, so we can understand why we believe in it so much. I agree with you guys. All it is really, is being able to offer value to somebody, and in turn, they give you monetary rewards for the value that you provide. And so. The what I think gets mixed up at the moment is that when people think you need to become an entrepreneur, there's these flashy Lamborghini driving person that comes to your mind when you think of an entrepreneur, and the reality is very, very different about what it really means to become an entrepreneur. It means you've decided that you're going to provide something of value that somebody values in a monetary amount, and we exchange that value for you with the payment, and that what it boils right down to. So with that as a definition, then Lewis surely that opens up becoming an entrepreneur to a lot more people if they realize that it's just finding something that's valuable in the market that they can offer exactly because then you know, the next example that people use is all of the kind of commonly thought of jobs or professions that are seen as like the polar opposite to entrepreneurship. I'd argue that most of them, any of them, if you strip them right back, they are an exchange of value for money, and therefore they are a form of maybe slightly diluted entrepreneurship, but that's only diluted because of the kind of layers of middle management and bureaucracy that gets added on top of it. So, like, you say, okay, yeah, but what about the postman or the post lady? It's like, okay, well, let's go back to a world before that existed.

Unknown:

I want to get a message to you across the world, we don't have the internet, you know. How do I do that? I'll send a letter. Okay. Do I deliver it there myself? No, I pay a courier to go and do it. Okay. Do I pay that courier money to deliver the message? Yes, therefore that courier is an entrepreneur, and therefore that's it's only over time that it's kind of become this like job that is seen as, like, No, you pay a salary. You're not an entrepreneur. Like, they still are delivering value. Maybe it's the person that invented the Postal Service. That was the original entrepreneur of that. And then from there, there are like sub layers of entrepreneurship within there. But you know, if that stops becoming a valuable service, those people stop getting paid, and that industry just dries up. So like, the market will tell you if it values the service, and I think that's got to be the ultimate test, hasn't it? We can't live in a world where we constantly like, where we want to allow jobs to exist that just are no longer valued by the market. That's not you or I being harsh. That's just the reality of like market dynamics and value. And in an evolving world and society, what is valued by the market will change over time, so there will be new trends of call them entrepreneurs, call them business owners, call them even employees, that will emerge that are just creating value in exchange for money. So I think everybody who works a job, the heart of it, if you boil it right down, is, uh, providing some kind of entrepreneurial service, whether directly or indirectly. I love that approach. I think what that does is anyone stuck in a nine to five right now who feels million miles away from ever becoming an entrepreneur, what that allows people to think and realize is that, well, right now, you're delivering value to somebody in some kind, in some way, and entrepreneurship is no different to that. It's just doing it externally from a company that's already been established, and you're just the person that creates the company that then delivers that value without all of the extra, well, extra people around you, it's just you delivering that service. And I think that's quite an empowering way to look at it, if you know already that you're delivering that so with that idea in mind of entrepreneurship, how essentially, it's just providing value, somebody deems it at a market value and will give you money back in return for the service or product that you provide, surely, then society as a whole is sort of underpinned by entrepreneurship. If a society is going to continue in a positive direction, it needs to be underpinned at some level by entrepreneurs that are the problem solvers, the people providing value. Do you think that there's something to be said there about celebrating entrepreneurship more widely? I do, and for the reasons that we've discussed in that I see entrepreneurship as more universal than perhaps the common mainstream media narrative is where it's like the lucky few that Richard Branson, the Elon Musk, the, you know, the people that like were the unicorn one in a million who succeeded and became billionaires. That's so far removed from what we're talking about here. We're talking about helping everyday people replace their incomes and earn 5060, 7800, grand a year in terms of replacing their salary with an E commerce business. Now, of course, they can scale it well beyond that if they want to, but like that's where you have to start. You have to do that first, and so I don't think it should be demonized. The approach of essentially building an online retail business and helping provide value to customers by helping them find products that they want to buy. Like at its most basic form, that's the equivalent of like back in the 1950s setting up a shop on the high street and say, I'm now a shopkeeper. It's like, back then, would we have demonized those people in society and said, those people are you know, how can we live in a world where everyone wants to start a business and provide value to others? It's like, well, that kind of is how society was built. Like that is the underpinning of everybody. Job in society, because, as we mentioned, their job only exists because there's a value there, or it to exist. You know, unless you're doing charity work for which you're not getting paid, ultimately, you're, you're either an entrepreneur or you're working for someone who was an entrepreneur and set something up, whether that's part of government or whether that's an individual, private company. So, yeah, I think it's, it's way more prevalent entrepreneurship than is perhaps realized by people. I think it's seen as this, like, fringe group of risk takers on the side that just like, work online and live in Bali and try and, you know, or that, that crowd, and there is that element to it. But I also think it's like, well, the mechanic down the road that set up his business 20 years ago and makes a decent income helping the people of the village fix their cars when they break down. He's an entrepreneur. Do we demonize him in the same way that we demonize the, you know, the people that are starting online businesses? It's to me, there's a disconnect, and I think it comes from a misunderstanding and maybe like a distortion of the definition of the word over time? Yeah, I think so as well, I think, and I don't media necessarily helps or, you know, because the entrepreneurs that get the screen time are the ones that have gone to the the extremes, that know that the Mega Millions and billions, and they're almost the ones that get called entrepreneurs in the media. And so it's easy to forget that at its at its core, entrepreneurship is essentially providing value that somebody you know will actually pay money for you to provide for them. And so the more successful you are to that same point, the more successful you are, therefore the more value you must be providing. And so that's why I think entrepreneurs should be celebrated. And the more successful those entrepreneurs are, at some level, is because they've provided more value to people along the way. So at a society level, I'm glad we've been into that. I think that's why it should be encouraged for people to go into business and start a business. But I think what we need to also touch on is, at an individual level, the difference it makes to people's lives. And some people would argue, and I'll put it to you. Liz, that entrepreneurship is hard. Starting a business is hard, and so encouraging people as an individual to start businesses is a difficult task to ask somebody to do or to suggest for somebody to do. Yes, we know it's difficult, but what are your thoughts on recommending entrepreneurship to people on an individual

James Eardley:

level?

Unknown:

Well, it's difficult, but in comparison to what would would be my response to that, because most jobs are difficult. They're difficult for a long time. They're difficult throughout your whole career. They're difficult right through until retirement, and you get paid a monthly salary for doing them, and you give up all your time to that employer for doing it as well. What about just choosing a different type of difficult, rather than the difficulty of only having a few weeks of annual leave per year that you have to ask a boss for and get drip fare day limited salary throughout your whole career. What about the difficulty of front loading the work, building something of value, creating a system, maybe hiring an employee to manage it for you, so that you can then choose to free up your time, and then the difficulty that you take on. If we just assume difficulty is a given and that we'll all be facing difficult times at some point, whatever route we choose, you can choose your difficult so it's like for me, I've chosen the difficulty of having a business, having a system, having the responsibility of salaries to pay, having the responsibility of the tech to fix if stuff goes wrong and breaks, but also then having the bonus and the upside of the freedom that it creates, the time, freedom that I can do what I want, when I want, that I can travel when I want, the financial freedom of having income that I could never reach in a salary job, and just having that level of difficulty in that maybe sometimes there'll be challenges that rise to the top because, as in, like, they get escalated up to me, because I'm kind of where the buck stops in the company, and I then have to make those difficult calls. But the reality is, like, I'll just do that, and to me, I don't see that as any more difficult when you when it comes down to it, than me going in and working, you know, 10 hours a day in a management consultancy company and giving my life away to them in exchange for a salary is still going to be difficult either way, at least I'm building asset value by doing this. I could sell my business one day. Or, if I wanted to, I could just kind of put it down into maintenance mode and just say to my team, I'm going to take a few weeks off. I need a break. Like, can you do that? In the world of work? You might have to book annual leave. You might run out of annual leave. You might not even get paid if you take leave, depending on what job you're in. So I think on an individual level, it's, yeah, it's crucial as well, that that you understand that it's going to be difficult both ways, but it's just about choosing your path. I like that. I like that approach of choose your difficult we've both been in corporate nine to five roles before doing entrepreneurship. And for sure, their struggles in both avenues, no matter which road you go down, it's just a different kind. And a rebuttal that I hear people push back on is they would quote that the high number or high percentage of businesses that don't make it do. Or that do fail. But my response to that is that, yes, a lot of people, ourselves, include, or myself included, went through failures before reaching a business that was successful. So if you're somebody that jumps on the bandwagon of saying, yes, it's you should never suggest it as an idea, because it's so difficult to get a business that works. What you're forgetting is we're not expecting necessarily, to hit the jackpot on the first time, and there will be time for you, trial and error for you, until you reach the success that you're going to make. For me, I had failure drop shifting businesses before I hit the nail on the head by joining the dropship a lot masterclass had a big part of in doing that. So I built a business that was successful. But before that, I had failures, and had I just decided that I was going to quit because I was part of that percentage of people that quit their loot, they they failed their first business, then I never would have had the consistency and the persistence to continue to carry on. So if I'd have employed that mindset that a lot of people push on people to say that businesses rarely succeed, then it wouldn't I would never have felt that motivation to start in the first place, and I would have never had that motivation to continue beyond the first difficult time when that happened. So yes, I'll put that to you as well. Liz, have you heard people say that and quote the difficulty of business? And they give that as a reason, perhaps not to try? Yeah, definitely, because it's a nice, easy get out, and it means you then you don't have to put yourself on the line, and don't have to expose yourself to the inevitable failure that will come as a result of trying. So, yeah, it's a I see it as a protection mechanism that people put up like a defense guard so they can stay within the comfort zone. But what we don't often look at and realize when we're doing that, and I'm not saying that they're doing it intentionally, it might be just a subliminal kind of instinct reaction to like reflex reaction to push away the idea of entrepreneurship, because so many people fail, and I read it in the paper that you know, only one in 10 businesses succeed or survive beyond whatever the you know the milestone is. The reality is, yes, you are going to fail, so you might as well accept it. Yes, it is going to be difficult, so you might as well accept it. But it's up to you whether you give up or not. So like, yeah, you could try a business and it not succeed, but it's your call whether you then try a different business, or whether you pivot and continue to try that business. And I think excuses as to why it wouldn't work are everywhere. So if you're coming into this looking for reasons why it won't work, so that you can immediately throw in the towel and write it off. You don't have to look far, you know, you'll find those very, very quickly. You'll be able to come up with a million reasons why it wouldn't work and why. I told you it was difficult, and I told you it wouldn't work, and I told you it was too good to be true. But do you want excuses, or do you want results? Because if you want excuses, they're everywhere. If you want results, you have to cut through that, and you have to know that there's going to be failure after failure after failure is going to be difficult, and you will incrementally learn from those things, and you will eventually get to the point where we succeed. Now, one of the things you just need to be aware of and make sure you do is ensure that none of your failures early on are so catastrophic that you can't come back from them. So that's the that's the key to it, is just balancing that risk reward, making sure that you don't take bets that are too big, too early on in your journey, that you can't come back from and then you just work. And then this is one of the best models for that, in that, you know, I don't say to you right, to you, right to start your own drop shipping business, you have to take a half a million pound loan out that you'll pay back over the next five years, and hopefully we'll make it work. It's like, No, you just sign up to whatever it is, $29 a month. Shopify account, sign some suppliers, build a website, run a few 100 pounds in ad spend to it, and you start to see your first sales trickle in. And if you don't, okay, well, you're down a few 100 pounds. You pivot and tweak until you do. So I guess it's just knowing that the path's not going to be that easy, but it's your downside is so much lower, your risk is so much lower with a model like this than it is with the more traditional types of businesses. So entrepreneurs in the past had it so much harder than we did, and they still succeeded. So that's the way I'd try and reframe that if, if someone was looking for excuses, yeah, and if they're trying to use failure as an excuse, and need to be reframed as to make sure that, yeah, we'll fail fast and we'll fail early, but we're not going to fail in a dramatic way that's going to close us down. So in my journey, I failed and a few 100 pounds, 1000 pounds in ad spend on Facebook, ads to a few poor quality products. But I could fail fast and keep learning. And ultimately, it didn't hold me back, because I had the mindset. And if you fall into the trap of the negative, trap of saying that it'll never work, then you I would have quit at that point. So it's really important what you feed your mind, podcasts like this, understanding that failure is all part of the process, but continuing. And ultimately, if you never quit, then it's very, very difficult to fail, because you will work things out over time. So for anyone listening, Lewis and this is the advice on the individual level to somebody that it does feel stuck in a nine to five job. Or perhaps you could imagine you were giving this advice to your your children, your two young sons, and they, they want to, they come to you and. Feel like they're stuck. They've got stuck into a nine to five, which I'm not sure they would do in your situation, but say they did, and they're looking for a way out. Where do you think would be the best place for them to focus their energy to start seeing results in the entrepreneurial world? Well, yeah, they are only two and four at the moment, but we have had career discussions, and so far, the top runners, the front runners for professions are, one wants to be a bin man and one wants to be a fighter pilot. So quite a diverse career trajectory, I think, for both of them. So we'll see how those develop over time. But I've supported them in anything they want to do, as long as they're happy. That's the point. But yeah, my advice would be, if they, or you listening to this, were looking to do that and try and figure out how you take that first step and how you can focus your energy to see results quickly. I would just start small, like we said, limit your downside, limit your risk. Start small, but stay consistent with it. Don't be disheartened. Don't go into it looking for excuses as to why it won't work, because you'll find them. You'll find them on day one. And if you were looking for that, I can give you 10 excuses now, and you might as well give up and throw in the towel now and continue working the job you're in until retirement. Like if that's going to be the bar, that's a very low bar to reach. So let's, let's elevate above that and make it that we're looking for results from this, and that we know it will be a somewhat rocky path along the way, but it's so worth it in the end, the freedom that you get from having created that system, it's just incomparable. So I'd say it's about taking consistent action, even when you're not getting immediate results, you're learning from them. Like you said, you spent a grand on Facebook ads. You're running it to some poor quality products, but you didn't just sit there and think, Oh, I wish I could just pour more money on these products, and it would make it work. You realized something's fundamentally wrong. The customers aren't happy. The ads are not converted, the products are not good quality. And you started to piece together a path out of that system, maybe, yeah, you stumbled across one of our ads, and then you're like, this, this feels better. It feels more ethical. It feels like a better system. Oh, customers are buying the products? Oh, now I can spend ads and earn money, more money back in profit than I spent on those ads. Okay, now I have a system. Then you built that up, and you were like, right now I have enough money to pay someone to come in and run it for me. And then you're like, now I've got the freedom. Maybe I'll start another business, right? So that's how it grows. It grows from not giving up. If you can leverage a proven model, like high ticket drop shipping, like the home turf advantage. It's a very accessible model. You do it from anywhere in the world. You just need a laptop. It's very low risk, and gets you into business without huge overheads or debt coming into it that can really restrict you in more traditional types of entrepreneurship. And it's a great skill to have, if nothing else, you get to learn how to run a successful e commerce business that is a valuable skill going into the future, especially if you have your own business that benefits from you up skilling and learning those things. So yeah, I see it as investing in your learning, whether that's through joining courses, communities, books, mentors, however you want to do it, you just need to continually be leveling up your knowledge and staying ahead of the game and making sure you're keeping your skills sharp and not looking for excuses, but looking for results. Yeah,

James Eardley:

love that approach. Liz, yeah, it's constant and never ending learning when it comes to entrepreneurship, and the best way to learn fast is to start fast and to get involved. And if I was to tell my previous self what to do, it would be to start as soon as possible, start early than I did, because as soon as I started learning, that's when I as soon as I started I that's when I started learning a lot faster. And then you learn, and then you adapt, and you pivot, until you get to a point like you described, Lewis, until you have a business that's up and running, that run where you can bring a virtual assistant on board so that they can manage the process hire another virtual assistant so that it's completely outsourced and operating over the weekends, and then, yeah, at that point, you have the freedom that comes with entrepreneurship. So we're not glamorizing, but there does get to a point where my life now as an entrepreneur with my E commerce businesses, is definitely a lot more glamorous than it was in a nine to five job. I was working in the Housing Association, surveying and measuring up people's bathrooms across the across England. So there's levels to glamor. It's not glamorous in so much that entrepreneurship, a lot of the time is spending time building a business at your laptop. But that gets to a point where, certainly the point I'm at, at the moment where I've got virtual assistants looking after the E commerce business that I built over time with hard work, and now I'm living and recording this in Thailand, and I'm traveling across Southeast Asia while still continuing to run my business. So it pays off. We talked a lot about failure. We talked a lot about hard time today. But I think there's also something to be said about eventually, when you do get to a point where you've generated consistent income with your business, then you can seriously change your lifestyle to the point where I can live the lifestyle that I dreamed of having when I first started my business. So I think this is a good point at this stage to plug a previous episode that we did where we talked about what a day in the life looks like once you are successful in entrepreneurship. So that's episode 112 to queue up after you've listened to this one and we walked through in that one, what a day. In the life looks like for a successful e commerce entrepreneur. So a final message on this point. Then Lewis, for people that are feeling stuck in the nine to five, what would you say for them? What advice would you give reframe entrepreneurship? It's not just about making money. It's about taking control of your life. It's about creating the freedom that you've always wanted, and now is a better time than ever to be able to start a business, whether you're looking for just more time, whether you do want to free up more finances, create financial independence, or if you just want to be able to make decisions on your own terms. And you're like me and you you want that autonomy and control over your decisions. Starting a business is the first step to getting to that point. If you're serious about starting your own entrepreneurial journey, I recommend that you start by exploring the Drop Shipping model, especially if you want to see how it works in real time and actually build something that doesn't saddle you with huge amounts of debt. We have seen so many people turn their lives around with this business model, and we can help you get there too. So if you're ready to take that first step, and you're not looking for excuses, and you're ready to make it happen and do like many of our other members have done, and create your own business, then head over to dropship unlocked.com. Forward slash, start to learn how you can begin your journey too.

Lewis Smith:

Are you enjoying the podcast? We'd love to hear from you leave a comment or a review, and we might feature it in an upcoming episode, and for detailed show notes and resources, visit dropship, unlock.com forward slash podcast. If you found value in any episode of this podcast, please. Could you take just 10 seconds to leave us a quick five star review on your favorite podcast app? It helps us more than you can imagine, and who knows, you might just hear your comments read out on the show. Thanks for being a part of our community. Your support helps us keep delivering new episodes to you every week.

James Eardley:

Now it's that part of the episode where we're going to answer a question that we've received from a listener. So thanks for getting your questions in. If you have a question that came up while you're listening or watching today's episode, then all you need to do is comment beneath the YouTube video version of this episode and it may be featured in an upcoming episode. So this week, the question has come in from Mark Edwards, 1423, and he's asked, How do I get suppliers to respond to my inquiries to become a trade partner. Thank you for

Unknown:

your question mark. So your success rate with signing suppliers will probably depend largely on what you do before you even make contact. So it's not so much about what you just say on the phone. It's there are some steps you want to take to ensure that you're only reaching out to suppliers in the first place who you know are already drop shipping. So to do that, you should first identify your direct competitors in your chosen niche market. Then once you've found out who those competitors are, you can then see who their suppliers are by checking their product listings, supplier directories or reaching out to them. And once you've identified the bright suppliers, the best approach then is to just pick up the phone. I always prefer phone calls. It just tends to get you the best responses, because it adds a personal touch. It shows that you're serious about partnering with them, and yeah, it just gets ahead of the pack of emails that they might be receiving from people trying to work with them. Persistence will pay off at this point, because suppliers are often busy. They might not answer the phone first time. They might say, Can you give us a call back? So if you don't hear back straight away, don't be afraid, don't be offended. Just follow up with a friendly, professional tone and make sure you keep them on your list until you've signed them. I'd highly recommend having a script to guide your conversation as well, just to make sure that you get everything right and all the answers to the questions that they're going to have spot on. It just ensures that you're saying all the right things, and it will help you come across more confidently and professionally, which will give you a better response rate as well. So yeah, good luck with getting those suppliers on board. Mark, getting the right supplies is definitely a big game changer for your business. So yeah, best of luck with it. Perfect. Yeah, always exciting to hear when people are reaching out to suppliers and making their e commerce business come to life. So thank you. Liz, now we're going to highlight a recent review that we've had for the podcast as well. We want to show you some love if you've shown us some love by leaving a review in the past. So a big thank you to OE luxury, which is their YouTube handle for sharing your thoughts. Oe luxury said, Thanks for this really insightful. I will add what I have learned to my site. Great Glad to hear it OE luxury, and very glad to hear that you've been enjoying the podcast as well. Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed today's episode, why not share it with a friend or a colleague? It's a great way to spread the knowledge and help someone else on their own entrepreneurial e commerce journey. We appreciate every bit of support. So thank you, and we'll see you next time. Thank you for joining us on this episode of the dropship unlocked podcast. We hope you are leaving with new insights and inspiration to fuel your entrepreneurial journey. To kick start your E commerce business, head over to dropship unlocked.com.

Lewis Smith:

Forward slash, start. It's the perfect place to start and get access to resources. That will help you build your business from the ground up. And don't forget to hit that subscribe button for more episodes packed with strategies, tips and success stories, plus, if you enjoyed this episode today, a five star review would mean the world to us, and you might even get a shout out on the next episode. Thank you for choosing to spend your time with us today. We can't wait to bring you more insights on the next episode of the dropship unlocked podcast. You.