WHERE TO START & CHOOSE THE RIGHT ONLINE BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY FOR YOU? (FREEDOM SYSTEMS PODCAST EP2)

INTRODUCTION QUOTES:

"Do you love it? Could you be great at it? And is it something that the world needs? And if there's something in there for everybody, is, is this an industry? Is this an opportunity that can see you through and keep you going over the next 10, 20, 30, 40 years when times get tough? Or the initial adrenaline of its excitement, it's new. When that wears off, are you. Able to be consistent and be disciplined and have that willingness to pull you into the future."

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TRANSCRIPT:

Welcome to episode two of the Freedom Systems Podcast. I am your host, Kev Blackburn, and I am super excited. I am inspired every single day to go on this journey and take massive action with you.

So we are going to talk all things. Choosing your opportunity. I wanna have a bit of an introduction on online business and some of the things that, biggest takeaways and lessons that we've learned since we started in 2015. And this really takes off from the episode one where we were talking about what ignites massive action.

We need to ignite massive. because that will tell you what you, uh, maybe do want to experience in life. And this is why it's called of Freedom Systems. Um, freedom where we are able to potentially escape the rat race, the Tang race, um, where we as individuals, we. Go on this hero's journey to the ultimate visions that we have, which is another, uh, idea, which we will most likely talk about along the course of this podcast together.

Um, but we want to ignite massive action to work out what we actually do want. Sometimes you don't know what you want, but you know you don't want this. And then naturally what you're gonna be searching for is an opportunity. an opportunity to allow you to achieve what you actually want. And this is for, for me, was all to do with from an online business perspective.

Uh, online business is an opportunity. That can create freedom. And we have the ability to build great businesses in different industries, different business models, and it allows you to learn so much. I mean, I've learned so much from virtual assistance and team building and. , um, core values and structuring and creating systems and processes and, and working procedures.

And we have got so much to dig deeper into from a systems and a, an entrepreneurship point of view. But naturally, you're gonna be looking for an opportunity. So for me, We stumbled upon the e-commerce industry, the e-commerce opportunity, and there's, there's a number of, there's a number of reasons for why this was really, really attractive tools, and we're gonna go through how.

the e-commerce industry can actually lead into other industries and how you can build this as you get on your journey and you may already be on your journey. Um, so a couple of things right at the start that I was sort of thinking about was I was looking for initially like a, an opportunity that was practical that I could get involved with.

And you have to think about the. Resources that you actually have at your disposal. And the resources really comes down to, you know, what time availability do you have? Uh, what capital availability do you have? Um, ultimately whereabouts you are in your life and in your journey, whether you've got. Uh, family members that can help you, or you've got, in my case, Kylie was on maternity leave at the time, so she was at home every day, which was, which was a great, um, advantage or a plus to us.

And we'll dig a bit deeper into that story. But for me, here's a reason why I love e-commerce. I love it so much because you are looking at, really, you're looking at. , what time availability do you have? You're looking at what capital availability do you have? Naturally, you're gonna be looking at whether there's an element of being able to gain some leverage or make aspects of your business passive in some way.

You're also gonna look at the difficulty, what are the entry points to a business? So for example, we could. , um, software is an an incredible business model that you could get yourself into, but if you think about that, it's gonna take a lot of time, a lot of capital. It's, it's long-term passive and it can work and it can work whether you are there or not, but it's gonna take a hell of a lot of manual active work to get to that point.

The difficulty is off the scale. It's gonna take a lot of hard. Very, very difficult. Um, so software is an amazing business model, but is it at the start? Is it where, where I was personally starting, is that something that I could get started working full-time, young family, not much capital, not much time.

Do I have the skills to even do it. It wasn't gonna be within my realm of reach at that moment in time. So that's one of the things, um, that you want to consider the. those resources. Another thing, uh, that I wrote down here is something that you enjoy doing, right? And I can't remember what this is specifically called, but you want to think, you wanna think about something that you love doing, okay?

Something that you actually enjoy doing. Something that if you don't enjoy or love what you do, I know it sounds cliche, but if you don't enjoy. If you don't love it, then when times get tough or the initial adrenaline of its excitement, it's new. When that wears off, are you still gonna be able to be consistent and be disciplined and have that willingness to pull you into the future month, month on month, year, on year?

You're probably not going to continue with it if you don't love it. The second thing, , is it something that you could genuinely be great at, right? Is this something that you could be, do you know what? This is right up my street. This is exactly what I love to do and I could be great at it because naturally if you love it, you've probably very interested in the topic.

You probably like to study around it. You've probably maybe got some hobbies around it. Um, , uh, this is something that doesn't take any energy. Maybe you're interested in reading books about it, listening to podcasts about it. You might have friends and communities that you're involved in already that are always talking about it, right?

So is it something that you can be great at? And then the third thing is, is it something that the world ultimately is looking for and the world needs? So they're. three, and I can't remember what you call this, but they're like three parameters, right? Do you love it? Could you be great at it? And is it something that the world needs?

And if, if you can get all three of them, then you may have something, it might not work out, and it might not be something that you are. End up pursuing in the end. But it's something that can definitely get you stacked in an opportunity because at the end of the day, you are at that moment when you were like, enough is enough.

You want to find an opportunity that you can get your, uh, hands-on, get, you know, roll your sleeves up and get to work. So they're the sort of the, the first thoughts that I have around this. Um, another thought. Is this an industry? Is this an opportunity that can see you through and keep you going over the next 10, 20, 30, 40 years?

Because some things could be something that's an opportunity right now, but it's not. Here again, in six months time, something could be an amazing opportunity, a quick win now, but it's not here in two years time. So you've always gotta consider that too. And for. , looking back, the e-commerce industry really ticked all those boxes, absolutely, all the parameters that I've just said and things that I look for, and I encourage you to look for.

Um, it ticked them all because I love, I love work. I love getting my hands scrolled up. I'm not afraid of, of, of working hard. Um, coming up, growing up at a, a council estate. Um, running around the streets playing football, uh, hide and seek, um, uh, block. Right. Um, Kirby, get getting your hands dirty. Don't matter whether it's raining outside, snowing outside, I'm outside.

You know, the, the kids in, in the, the council state back then, everybody was inside. There weren't, you know, there weren't phones like this. They are today. And, um, so e-commerce, it was like, wow, I can get interested in this. I can, I can find product. Uh, at discounts and, and sell. And then it starts to make you think of the, the path ahead that the 10 years, can this industry be still around 10, 20 years?

Will e-commerce is expanding? It has continued to expand. Yes. It has its ups and downs and just like any industry, you're gonna have your cycles of the industry. Um, E-commerce, it is not going anywhere. So that's a tick. Another thing is like when you start to think about the dis different business models, whether it's retail arbitrage, which is going into physical stores and trying to find different items to, uh, at discount that you can sell, whether it's online arbitrage, um, going online.

finding discounts that you could purchase to sell, whether it's at wholesale, um, calling up wholesalers, going to trade shows, building connections and relationships, and getting in the door with suppliers and distributors, or whether it's exclusive brand deals, getting involved in brands that are launching or having difficulty that you can get involved in the growth of their business in a great exclusive partnership, whether it's private label, starting your own brand, your own mission, your own physical products.

I think e-commerce has, there's something in there for everybody, whether you're very creative and you want to do sort of private label, et cetera. And we'll go into the, the, the differences and the, the complexities as we go throughout this podcast. But you also then love, I love the fact that. , you can develop other skills.

Like for me, coming from a systems background, an engineering background, you can systemise your business. You, you can set build teams around your business. You can get involved in virtual assistance, and you get into, uh, key performance indicators and working procedures. And, um, you can get into appraisals and building teams and, and building structures of what your team structures going to be and setting goals.

And, uh, w you know, working with productivity and you can get involved in warehouses or not warehouses. You can, it can be virtual based on your laptop or you can be in a warehouse. There's so many amazing things that can spark an interest and, and an opportunity also on the back end of this, when you think of that 10 year roadmap, when you build your business, you can go up the levels, whether you go from online arbitrage, starting with maybe very little capital to then wholesale to one day in the future, going into.

Exclusive brand deals, et cetera. But then there's also complimentary business models that have that I love, uh, things like affiliate marketing when you are referring other people and, um, . There's information based products. There is podcasts that you can do. There's YouTube that you can do. There is blogs that you can write.

There's, and then you can go down the list. You can information products. I've got, you can write books, uh, coaching, consulting, mentorship. You can do events, right? Events and masterminds and networking. You can do services software we just mentioned as well, like.

opportunity. This industry is so vast. You know, we've been doing this for nearly a decade and we feel like we've only, we're just getting started and we're meeting and we've met some incredible people that we work with, so, so here is. Is how I kind of learned this or experienced this over the, the sort of years of, uh, I mentioned in the previous episode of, uh, we went to Sue Rider, uh, we sold on eBay, then we got into Amazon FBA.

We learned about online arbitrage. And then the one, the great thing about it is because it can be system. You can then start to create criteria and then you start to think to yourself, well, will there, will there always be deals? And I used to think that there's a couple of sort of beliefs that you have is like, why would, why would anybody purchase more?

Why would anybody purchase something from Amazon for five pound more, 10 pound more Then if you can just get it at Argos and I, I used to think this, I used to think these types of things, but then I start to think. and really think it through, and you realise that when you make a purchasing decision, whether it is in your own personal life or for your business or whatever the case might be, it doesn't just fundamentally go on price, right?

You don't just fundamentally think, I'm not gonna purchase this because of the price, because there's other factors that are involved, for example, If it was Harper's or Theo's birthday tomorrow, and I'm like, oh no, like I need to get that tomorrow, I would purchase it for an extra five pound, an extra 10 pound, because I know I'm gonna get it there tomorrow.

some people don't have the time to do sort of research around different stores and um, go to Ag Os or go to Walmack or go online and search all online and try to find the best price to save three pound, five pound. Some people just go, I know I can get it. Amazon, Amazon, sell everything. Put it in my basket and, um, make the purchase and I know it's gonna come tomorrow.

It's Happy's birthday tomorrow. It's, it's Theo's birthday tomorrow. It's maybe your, your wife's birthday. Your husband's birthday, right. So I started to question the story of. The beliefs or limiting beliefs that I had of why things work and why things don't work. And why do I think these things? Because you kind of put a barrier up and think to yourself, ah, that is that really gonna work?

Do I have the time to do it? You have all these kind of limiting beliefs of like, um, is is it gonna work? Am I smart enough? Am I old enough? Am I young enough? And I literally just published a, a, an amazing quick video from, um, Jim, one of our inner circle members. Jim has a fantastic story as he's retired from his career and he wanted to start a business and he was incredibly successful by himself.

He, he built, started building his business. He built a small little team really in incredible, like it's, he's, he's on sort of, he's retired from his career, so age doesn't matter. You can be any age. And start whether you are towards the, you know, the, the forties, fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties, in fact, nineties in fact.

Doesn't matter what age you're at, or you are, you know, you're a teenager, you're 13, 14, you, you're selling things, you're getting used, you're getting into entrepreneurship. So there's like beliefs that we have, whether it is, I ain't got enough time, I ain't got enough money, I ain't not smart enough. Um, that holds you back.

And it, and it. Imagine a table, a table like this where the story is the tabletop, and each of the, the legs of the story are the things that we're telling ourselves. And it can be so convincing. The, the table can be so strong because it has so many legs on the table, right? So, , for example. Um, if a table, if you wanna knock down the table the story, you start to question all its legs.

So, you know, if you right now wanting to start a business and you say to yourself, well, I ain't got enough time. Well, is that the truth? Have you, have you genuinely not got enough time? It could be, but honestly, is that the truth? Or are you finding other priorities to spend your time? . And when you have ignited that massive action, you know, the, the hunger, the massive action that you're like, not another day.

All of a sudden the things that you once was, you've started to think about ain't got enough time. You all of a sudden that's not actually an answer anymore. That leg is gone. Then you think to yourself, well, I ain't got enough money. I used to think, um, maybe building a business would. Hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Millions of pounds. And then the story is, is well, is that the truth? Well, for me, I proved in, in my journey going to Sue Ryder at 10 pound, and I made that 10 pound into 35, 45 pound. That was from 10 pound. Now imagine if that was a hundred pound and turning that to 400 pounds or 500. , or let's say that was a thousand pounds and you turn that to 4,000 pounds or 5,000 pounds, right?

It, it just compounds and the story doesn't add up because you, if you can turn a penny into two pens, then that is something that is valuable, right? That then questions the story. If you can turn two, one pound into two pound, that then questions. You've gotta question the story and knock that leg off. And before, you know, The table doesn't hold up, the story doesn't hold up.

So I have really a part of like these freedom systems and things, um, just being, brainstorming the dots and, and something that I spoke about with our, um, inner circle and, and Platinum X was all about, you know, the 10 year roadmap. And designing that roadmap and knowing when you, where you are starting on that roadmap, whether you're starting, if you're interested in e-commerce, getting your hands on, uh, being able to go into stores or online.

I personally didn't go really that much into retail arbitrage. I did a couple of times, um, realised that it wasn't scalable. And one of the things that we're gonna talk about with systems is developing system, you know, systems that will allow you to scale the foundations. You know, going back to Jim, he built a great business, but the reason why he reached out to us and he was, is part of a, a systemised fulfilment is, um, he was plateauing in his business.

He was, uh, feeling burnt out in his business and. from, from that perspective, that's where like the systems mindset and the, the foundations, the organisation, the structuring, the team, building the culture, the, the, the, the foundations of the business I I is very much like the foundations of a building, right?

The foundations of a. One story House isn't going to be able to cope with, to be the same foundations of, you know, the tallest buildings in the world, the Shad in, in, um, in London. You're not gonna be able to build the Shad on a, on a foundation that would just support a, a one story house, right? So, um, and this, this is, uh, an incredible thing.

You're navigating this path, and everybody is unique. Everybody has different things that they love, what they can be great at. Everybody has different time, different resources, different capital. But with an online business, there's most definitely a passive element, whether that is with virtual assistants, softwares, um, you know, laptops, Amazon fb themselves.

Shopify, um, because that's all a part of the e-commerce, um, eBay, other marketplaces, Walmart, the difficulties are variable, right? Difficulty is variable because online app avatar might not be as difficult or likelihood for success as like a private label, and that is why genuinely I absolutely love. Um, eCommerce that can, that can build into this tree of so many different legs and, and, and so many different fruits and branches that can all feed the same ecosystem, the same ecosystem.

So really the, you know, the, this, this, uh, one little bit of conversation here was really just touching on. Very much choosing your opportunity. Um, you know, section one of the book, as I've sort of done it is, is ignite your massive action. Section two is all gonna be about choosing your opportunity and it's actually gonna have section three and section four, which will record in, um, future episodes and we'll dig it and give introductions into these.

But I'm giving you big, big pillars as a starting point because then we can filter into. , uh, the different pillars and the different concepts. And, um, I've actually, hopefully gonna have some guests that come on and we'll, uh, pick one of these topics and we'll share their story and we'll talk a little bit about it.

So, um, just as a, you know, a starting point, please give it a big thumbs up if you've enjoyed. Please, uh, give a review on the podcast or if, if you, if you're listening to this somewhere else, please share it. If you are interested to share down below, is this something that is, uh, interesting to, to start digging into and to, to keep going down this journey and, and share stories and share some takeaways and some concepts and ideas and framework.

the more you obviously engage, um, and give some feedback. Maybe you've got some questions if you want to put some questions that we can certainly answer some questions here as well. Um, but, um, as a starting point, hope you enjoyed this episode of the Freedom Systems Podcast. That was all about choosing your opportunity, um, that you can actually take massive action.

Uh, gonna have different links and show notes and things to different, um, things if you are watching this all the way from the first time. Um, but if you're, if you're returning a subscriber or, or a returning friend of mine, uh, you'll know on the YouTube channel for example. We've got lots of different topics already that we've spoken about over the years.

So my name's Kev. I am your host here. Um, take care. Keep taking massive action and uh, I look forward to seeing you. in the very next freedom Systems podcast Take care.