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If you are old enough to be able to ride a bicycle while slicing a cake then you have probably heard the expression, “If you build it, they will come.”
I have a secret to share with you: no they won’t.
You may be the most efficient employee this world has ever seen, you may have invented a revolutionary product that will change the world forever, you may have written the most influential book that will change the lives of infinite generations to come or discovered a life-altering fact that will impact the entire universe – there’s just one thing: it’s all useless if no one knows about it.
The sad truth is that with every new generation we, as a whole, get stupider and lazier.
People got so used to everything been brought to them ranging from food to mortgage specialists that they have simply given up on going out into the real world and finding things for themselves. They expect anything and everything to be brought to them – otherwise it simply doesn’t exist.
Gone are the days of the hunter leaving home for days to gather food for his family, replaced with obese teenagers who order their five tonnes of chicken wings with the click of a button as they ransack the Night Elves’ layer in World of Warcraft.
No longer do corporations go out and seek the best of the best prospects, as now fat CEOs are too busy stuffing their huge bonuses into platinum briefcases to care about improving their businesses.
I can keep going, but you get it: we all have an underserved sense of entitlement. I do, you do, and we all do.
But here’s the beautiful thing about all this: While everyone is just sitting there, twiddling their thumbs and waiting for success to come to them, they are leaving the entire world ripe for the picking.
The world is yours. Literally. You just have to know what you want and be bold enough to get it.
So, let’s get conquering!
Conquering the Workplace
Chances are, you honestly believe you should be getting paid more for all the work you put in at your job. Chances are you’re right. Thing is – no one cares.
You can be the most productive worker in the entire company and bring in more money than anyone else only to see your somewhat mentally challenged cubicle buddy get the promotion you’ve been desperately seeking. In today’s world, you not only have to be the best at what you do, you also have to be the best at making what you do be seen by the right people.
This guy knows how it's done
There may not be much honour in bragging about your accomplishments, but there’s certainly even less in muttering to yourself about your accomplishments never being recognized.
I’m not saying go out and plaster signs vividly describing how much more superior you are to the average man, but at least that’s a start. All I am saying is do whatever you can to get noticed!
Start hanging outside your boss’s office and talk loudly to coworkers about what you would do to improve the company’s productivity. Write up an amazing business plan and “accidentally” leave it on your supervisor’s desk. Type up a list of all your amazing accomplishments in giant font, unplug your keyboard and snap it in half and then call in the technical support guy to fix your computer. Or you can just simply walk up to the head of the company and explain to them why you deserve a promotion.
A friend of mine had an internship at a leading brokerage firm, one day he got tired of doing the same thing every single day over and over again so he mustered up his courage, got up, walked past
Introducing: "Take Your Yacht to Work Day"!
approximately seven sets of bosses in ascending importance straight up to the CEO of the company and explained exactly what he would do to improve the company’s efficiency.
The result? The next day he got a job offer with a salary higher than people working there for years.
Were there people who may have deserved the position more than he? Probably. Were these people brave enough to step up and take what was rightfully theirs? Not at all.
You may be furious at the fact that the CEO of Goldman Sachs took home 2,000 times more income than the average person (in 2007, $68.5 million versus just under $34,000) along with all the other executives who take their yachts to work while you are busy clipping coupons, but there is a reason they got to that position in the first place. While you were busy working harder than an astrophysicist in the midst of a nuclear war just not to lose your job, these people simply stepped right over you and took what you weren’t bold enough to take for yourself.
Is it unfair or even sleazy? Without a doubt. But I’m sure these people are too busy racing their Bugattis in the Sahara desert to care enough.
Conquering the Business World
Chances are you have heard the statistic, 96% of all businesses fail. If you didn’t, well, that’s not a typo. There’s a reason for that.
The intricacies of getting noticed in the corporate world versus the entrepreneurial world may be somewhat different, but the politics certainly remain the same: GET NOTICED!
As I said earlier, you may sell a life-altering product or provide an immensely useful service, but it’s not doing anyone any good if no one is using it. Gone are the days of simply coming up with a sweet business plan and then just sitting back and collecting big fat moneybags – there’s simply too much competition for that nowadays.
The good thing about today’s world is that it is easier to get noticed than ever before, especially with that contraption known as the interwebs. In what other time in history can a video of dancing cats get over 7 million views?
So, if it’s so easy to get noticed, how come everyone’s not getting noticed you ask?
Well, first there’s that mentality of “build it and they will come”, but I think the real culprit is a lack of action. Studies have shown that the more things a person has to do, the higher the chances of him/her ending up doing nothing at all.
You can learn a thing or two from this guy
Many people simply give up before they even start, thinking that there is a limited number of publicity to go around. Thing is, information is limitless.
Just look at Tiger Woods and his little mishap with a fire hydrant – virtually every single news organization in the world covered it for weeks on end and are still going strong. Now imagine what would happen if you actually come up with a useful story.
People are hungry for information, you just have to deliver them something that brings value to their lives and, sooner than later, they won’t be able to get enough of you.
How? Start building your social circle.
Just like you would lurk around your company’s washroom and wait for the CEO to stroll in to strike up idle chitchat, do the same thing in the business world.
Make friends with influential people. Wine them, dine them, seduce them – whatever it takes.
Journalists are always looking for some juicy story to write about, so deliver it to them! Explain to them how your business will revolutionize the world and make them believe it – if you truly believe in the words that are coming out of your mouth then it shouldn’t be too hard.
Call up the mavericks of your industry and offer to take them out to lunch and pick their brains. A surprisingly large amount of them would be happy to do so – honestly, who doesn’t enjoy bragging about themselves?
Or just make a viral video on YouTube and get millions of viewers, people have done it before!
Innovation is also a good idea
Your success is limited only by your imagination and thankfully your imagination is limitless. Don’t limit yourself to only one plan of attack, the more things you try the more likely one of them will take off. The important thing to remember is don’t try to do too much too fast or risk ending up looking like Amy Winehouse and don’t give up too soon or risk feeling like Amy Winehouse.
Conquering your Investments
Found an amazing stock that for some reason hasn’t taken off yet? The reason many amazing companies don’t get recognized and ultimately have their stock price shoot up to stratospheric levels is because most investors are too stupid and lazy to go out and find great stocks for themselves. They wait for analysts to recommend it to them.
So, what would a young whippersnapper such as yourself do? Contact some analysts and make them notice your little gem of a company. If your company is actually good, they will report about it. Trust me.
How do you get a hold of an analyst? Call up their company and find their name and number in the directory – virtually every business in the world has a company directory.
Having a hard time researching something about a stock you are following? Call up their head of Investor Relations and strike up a conversation, say you are a portfolio manager and they will be glad to speak to you – and no, you aren’t lying, you’re just managing a really small portfolio.
Or, if you live in the area, take a stroll over to the main headquarters and sniff around.
All these options are available to anyone and everyone; people just assume it will never work. [Disclaimer: it does.]
Conquering the Publishing World
Wrote an amazing book and can’t find a good publisher? Find an influential authour in your industry and contact him/her. Virtually everyone has a blog nowadays and every blog has contact
Keep at it champ!
information. Use it!
Humans are altruistic by nature, so they won’t mind helping someone else out. Who knows, they might even hook you up with their own publisher.
If you are worth responding to, you will get an answer. Guaranteed.
I don’t know anyone who doesn’t check their email, do you?
Conquering the World
Just get off your ass and get to work. The hardest part is starting; the rest gets exponentially easier as you go along. All the tips mentioned above don’t have to correlate to their specific section, you can easily take the advice from one section and utilize it in another one – you just have to do it right.
The worst mentality you can possibly have is assuming people will take notice of you if what you are selling is good enough – that’s just giving up before you even start.
If you enjoy being as successful as Tara Reid’s bodybuilding career then follow this mentality all you want; but, if you want to have more money than Arnold Schwarzenegger can do push-ups, then that’s just not good enough.
Remember, to be able to get spectacular results, you must be able to fail spectacularly.
Need inspiration? Scroll up to the top of this page to where the quotes are and just keep refreshing the page until your eyeballs fall out. It always does the trick.
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