GET LUCKY | A Flid Media Blog

Get Lucky Because You Have Nothing Better to Do!

Amir Lehrer — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 18:28:55 +0000

Doing something because you “have nothing better to do” always seems to have a negative connotation. You are bored and someone asks you if you want to go to the mall and your response is “okay, i’ve got nothing better to do”. I personally think that doing something because you have “nothing better to do” is the absolute best thing you can possibly do with your time.

If you think about it, having “nothing better to do” means that the particular activity that you are thinking about doing is the absolute best thing you can possibly be doing with your time at that given moment. Obviously if you are bored and have nothing to do and going to the mall becomes an option, it is the best thing you can do at the moment. I love going to the mall because it is full of lucky opportunities. Something is always happening at the mall. You can people watch, notice trends, see the newest products, get a feel for what is going on in your community and so much more, but that’s just the mall.

I work because I have nothing better to do. I love the work that I do, I love being creative and helping people and I love making a living to support my family. I can’t think of anything better to do with my time during the day when my kids are at school.

I spend time with my family because I have nothing better to do. My family is the most important thing in my life and I can’t think of anything in the world that I would rather do than spend time with my family.

I blog because I have nothing better to do. I love to blog and share my thoughts with anyone who is willing to listen. I enjoy getting my ideas down on paper (or an electronic document). Most of all, I enjoy reading through my archives and impress myself with articles I’ve written in the past.

As you can see, doing something because you “have nothing better to do” is a really good thing and you should be doing everything in life because it is the best thing you can be doing at any given moment. What are you doing because you have “nothing better to do”?

Picture Credit: SAMAEL TRIP

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Write Your E-mails Backwards

Amir Lehrer — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 20:09:27 +0000

Have you ever accidentally sent an email before you wanted it to go out? Possibly you were in the middle of writing a sentence, pressed enter and voila, the email was sent.

Sending unfinished emails or even worse accidentally sending emails that you might regret if you read them over can potentially hurt relationships and at best just look very unprofessional but there is a simple fix to prevent this from ever happening again.

Write your e-mails backwards. That’s right. Write the content of the email and perfect it before deciding on the most appropriate subject line. Then when the email is complete, add the recipient’s e-mail address into the address bar. That way, if you accidentally press the wrong button, the email has nowhere to go.

For a silly email between friends this may not seem like much but for a business related email, this little trick can save your a lot of frustration because once it sends, you can’t take it back.

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How to Deal with Shiny Objects and New Ideas

Amir Lehrer — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 17:52:14 +0000

We all love shiny objects. They are the newest thing in town that everybody is talking about. The new toys, games, videos, business ideas, social platforms and more. Who can forget (or maybe remember) Chia Pets, Virtual pets, yo-yos, hula hoops, hula hoops that count how many times they go around and so on. Each had its place but slowly faded away leaving nothing but a slightly faded memory that brings a smile to our faces when we reminisce. It won’t be long before we reminisce about the dorks on Twitter promising 2 million pointless followers within a week. Since I’m the entrepreneurial type that’s always on the lookout for new things, I pass by more shiny objects than anyone can handle. The question is, How do I handle them?

I like to stay informed of the latest industry news and thought leader’s ideas so I read a lot and listen to podcasts whenever I get the chance including my regular workouts, walks and long drives. When you absorb that much information, ideas are bound to hit you about how to use new platforms, technology or tools. Showering works just as well for generating ideas. So many ideas lead to either wasting a lot of time on things that will never pan out or a whole bunch of decision paralysis.

The Simplest System

I created a very simple system that seems to work for me so I’ll share it with you hoping it will work for you too. I make a list. I have one document with a numbered list of ideas. Every time I have an idea, I add it to the list. It doesn’t matter if it’s my own idea or someone else’s, a business idea or a way to use a new tool. I just keep adding them all to the list. Now the secret to the success of this little system is time. I keep adding ideas to the list but when I am done, I save the list and leave it alone for a little while. Once a month or so, I open it up and skim through the list. Some of the ideas are ridiculous, some are brilliant but will never work, some are decent and can be used in some situations. If an idea still looks as good to you a month or a few months later as it did when you jotted it down, go for it. If it doesn’t, you know what to do with it.

It is amazing to read your own thoughts and ideas as if they were somebody else’s. That is one of the reasons that I love to blog. I often look back at my archives, read my old advice and am blown away that it was me that wrote it. You should try this with your own blog and if you don’t blog, try reading a paper you wrote in college.

Another Use of the “Time System”

You can also use this “Time System” to proofread your own work. The only drawback is that it takes “time” which you don’t always have when working on a deadline. When working on a project and you are completely immersed in it, you will make mistakes, typos and little errors that you will completely miss when proofreading. If you wait a few months between writing and proofreading, you’ll catch all the mistakes and do a better job than most editors.

Have you used the “Time System” or something similar? Let me know in the comments.

Picture Credit: pareeerica

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Why the Hell is a Bird in the Hand Worth Two in the Bush?

Amir Lehrer — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 15:07:20 +0000

Thanks http://www.flickr.com/photos/nosha/ for the pic.

Everybody has heard the saying that “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush” or something similar. The traditional way of understanding the saying is that when you are holding a prize in your hand, you shouldn’t throw it away to find out what’s behind door number two. Our subconscious minds take the saying a little differently though. They say, “A bird in my hand is worth more than the same bird in your hand”. When you own something, it takes on a completely new level of value. You form mental and emotional attachments to your property incomprehensible to everyone else.

I’ve been keeping my eyes open lately for a potential house to purchase. An ongoing theme that I’ve seen so far is that people feel that their homes are worth more than they really are. As a buyer, I look at the home as a piece of land, a structure and a whole bunch of living space. The sellers look at it as a home with memories. A place where they grew up or raised their children. The place where they held parties and had great times. You can’t put a dollar amount on memories but then again, you can’t sell them either so they are worthless to the buyer. When selling your house, you have to be realistic about how much the actual house is really worth and not what it is worth to you.

On a smaller scale, we as human beings are just as bad. There are many things that we would never buy (or never buy again), but if we already own them, we cannot get ourselves to get rid of them. Think about your old comic book collection or clothes that you haven’t worn in years. I thought about this recently when looking at my collection of domain names that I own. There are some domains that I continue to pay $8.99/year for that I would never even think of buying if I didn’t already own them. There are many domains that I own because of an idea I had that I never pursued or because of an old project that is not in existence anymore.

To see the extent of the value gap between owners and potential buyers, watch this video by Dan Ariely, where he speaks about what Duke basketball season ticket holders are willing to sell their tickets for and what non ticket holders are willing to buy them for.

Lucky people get passed the inexplicable emotional attachment to the bird in their hand and think realistically. Unlucky people think that they may make some money off of all the old “stuff” they hoarded for all of these years and continue to pack everything away. The amount that you will make off of the sales and the frustration you go through to sell it are not worth the money you are spending on storing and maintaining your possessions.

Looks like I am going to do some spring cleaning. What are you going to do about those birds in your hand? Let me know in the comments.Similar Posts:

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The Tiny Little Search Box is Just the Tip of the Iceberg

Amir Lehrer — Tue, 11 May 2010 19:52:18 +0000

Photo Credit http://www.flickr.com/photos/natalielucier/

When I was about 7 years old, my class learned about the Titanic and how it ended up at the bottom of the ocean. It was such a massive ship and the captain felt that a tiny little iceberg couldn’t do any damage to the Goliath of a ship he was conducting. As any 7 year old knows, that was just the tip of the iceberg. In life, you can learn a lot from the Titanic and specifically Icebergs. Just because it looks tiny, it doesn’t mean that you are seeing the whole picture. From the Captain’s point of view, he could only see what was above the water, not what was below. If he was able to see the whole picture, the titanic would have had a very different ending, James Cameron wouldn’t have made so much money from Titanic the movie and thousands of people would have had 3 more hours of their time, if they all lived happily ever after.

Recently, a friend approached me to complain about the web developer that he had just fired. The guy built him an e-commerce website for about $3000 for my friend’s business which has been working out pretty well for him. The business has been doing well and has been expanding so much that the website now needs a “search” feature for visitors to properly navigate it and find what they want. My friend was flabbergasted when the developer told him that the search feature he was looking for would cost about $1200 to develop. When he finished complaining, I asked him what he wanted the search to do and he told me. Basically, what he was looking for was a very customized search engine that would integrate with all of his products. I told my friend that $1200 seemed reasonable for what he was interested in doing. ”But it’s just a tiny little search box! All I want is a tiny little box on the side of the site”. If he wanted, he could have put a free Google Search Applet on his site which would use Google to search his site but he wasn’t interested. He needed specific features in his search box. This is a perfect example of someone just seeing the tip of the iceberg. He has no clue what goes into the back end of web development. The same goes for anything else in life. How can anyone make good decisions if they don’t see the whole picture.

Lucky people try and get all the facts. They research, they talk to people and hire professionals and consultants when needed to make sure they have the whole picture and make the best decisions. My friend could have held onto a very good web developer if he would have just done a little research to learn what was involved in adding his “tiny little search box”. Next time, before making rash decisions, try and look for the whole picture and you will get lucky.Similar Posts:

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I Hate Homework Rule: Follow it and Get Lucky!

Amir Lehrer — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 00:35:35 +0000

A little while ago Robert Tuchman reached out to me to see if I would write a review of his new book “Young Guns: The Fearless Entrepreneur’s Guide to Chasing Your Dreams and Breaking Out on Your Own”. I gladly agreed since his book was right on topic with this blog as it discusses paving your own path to success. Although I haven’t finished reading the book yet and will write a review when I am done, I wanted to discuss an important step that Tuchman addresses in his book, the “I Hate Homework Test”.

Looking back to my days in school all the way from first grade until the end of college, there were certain courses that I enjoyed doing homework in while the majority of course work felt like a chore. The courses that I enjoyed doing homework for were the courses that I really enjoyed. The rest of the courses were basically, a means to an end.

Part of being an entrepreneur is seeing the world a little differently than everyone else and focusing on problems and how they can be solved. Being an entrepreneur myself, I find new problems and potential solutions on a daily basis. I get excited about these ideas and create plans to turn these solutions into businesses. I have files with hundreds of these ideas and plans of action but for most of them, the excitement fades away after a little while, as I get excited about the next idea. That is where the “I Hate Homework Test” comes in to play.

Tuchman writes that to find your passion and an idea that you can turn into a profitable business, you need to have a certain excitement for the topic that is unmatched by the excitement for the rest of your ideas. You need to be able to say “I love this” and “I can’t believe I actually get paid for this” about your idea. To find out if you have the right passion and excitement, just think about doing research on your market and finding out more about how you will move forward. Does any of this seem like homework or is this something you would do for hours on end in your spare time, even if it wasn’t your business? If any of it seems like homework, then this idea is not for you. Otherwise, you may have hit gold!

It is so simple and yet so accurate. Over the years, I have gained and lost excitement about so many ideas but the one that stuck is what I am passionate about, marketing and technology. I started Flid Media, a marketing agency specializing in digital media over a year ago and I am going strong. Even when I worked at a traditional marketing firm with almost no connection to social media or technology, I spent most of my free time reading about it and listening to related podcasts. Looking back, if I would have done the “I Hate Homework Test”, I would have started Flid Media even sooner.

Ideas are worth a dime a dozen so the next time you have a “brilliant” idea, do yourself a favour and take the “I Hate Homework Test”. It can save you hours of time and effort.

Does your job pass the “I Hate Homework Test?

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Monitor Your Credit: Why Everyone Must do it Regularly

Amir Lehrer — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 17:52:48 +0000

My score dropped by 32 points because of a mistake last month but was corrected quickly because I monitored my score.

The average person never sees his credit score or finds out about his credit’s health until he is about to make a big purchase such as a car or house or needs to take out a loan. At that point, they are often shocked at what they find out. Any late or missed payments can kill your score but even worse, someone else can be using your information and killing your score for you.
I am proud to say that I have been keeping track of my credit score by monitoring it regularly through free annual credit reports and more recently through Credit Karma, a free online service for monitoring your credit score. About a month ago on Credit Karma, I noticed that my score dropped over 30 points. I always pay my bills on time and in full, so I figured it had to be some sort of mistake.

I immediately called the credit agencies and my credit card companies to figure out what happened and it turned out that I used a department store credit card (to save 5% off my purchase) a month before and haven’t paid my bill yet. I forgot about using the card and the credit card company didn’t put my apartment number on the bill it came back to them. When speaking to them, they realized it was their fault and said that they would correct it with the credit agencies. I was lucky that I caught it right away because if a few months went by, i’m not sure that the company would be so quick to make the changes.
Don’t wait until the last minute to check on your credit’s health. Just like your personal health, it needs regular checkups just to make sure everything is ok.
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Save Yourself Hours of Frustration!

Amir Lehrer — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 14:42:41 +0000

I happened to be in a friend’s office yesterday when they were reading their email. One of the emails had MS Word document attached and they opened it. Looking at her, I noticed a slightly frustrated look on her face and asked what was wrong. She told me that she can’t stand how Word documents always open up in “reading layout” instead of “print layout”. I told her that she can just close it if she wanted to change the view but she already knew that.

She said that she’d been closing the “reading layout” every time she opened an attachment from an email which is about 5 times per day, for the past 5 years. Doing the math, considering that she probably works 5 days per week and 50 weeks per year, that is a total of 6250 times that she had to close the “reading layout”. It only takes about 2 seconds to click “close” and another 5 seconds for MS Word to process the command each time but if you add it all up, she wasted over 12 hours just trying to change a layout. That doesn’t include all of the frustration that could have led to other problems, slowdowns or wasted time.

I got so frustrated with Microsoft Office a couple of years ago and how slow it is that I started using Google documents and other tools to get my work done and open email attachments so I didn’t have the answer for my friend offhand but I did offer to help. I clicked on “Help” in the menu bar, and then typed in “change default view”. Within 30 seconds, I had the answer and changed her default settings.

From now on, my friend can save time and frustration on a daily basis, be more productive and all it took was about 30 seconds. Just think of all the things you can save time and frustration on if you are willing to invest 30 seconds or even a couple of minutes to solve. If you want to learn more about solving your little technical problems, read “The Wise Man Gets Lucky” or “Just F’N Google It”.

What should you learn in 2 minutes that can save you hours of your life?

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Tim Ferriss and Gary Vaynerchuk are Complete Opposites, How are they Both Successful?

Amir Lehrer — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 20:26:56 +0000

Tim Ferriss VS. Gary Vaynerchuk

You may be a little confused. Yesterday I wrote an article about Gary Vaynerchuk and how his constant hard work is paying off as an incredible business strategy. He works non-stop and is reaping the rewards. In the past, I have also written about Tim Ferriss who I would say is almost the exact opposite of Gary Vaynerchuk. Tim looks for any way to minimize his actual work and automate processes so that he does not have to be involved. The only thing they have in common with each other is that they are both huge success stories.

Opposite Strategies But Both Successful

Both Gary and Tim are huge successes in their own right and I would say that the reason is that they are both consistent. They chose a strategy that worked for them and they stuck with it. I don’t think Gary would consider closing down his brick and mortar store, stopping to vlog and quit participating in social media to automate an online store. At the same time, I know that Tim Ferris is careful not to spend too much time on social media. When he started using Twitter, he followed 0 people and was heavily criticized since twitter is a new media communication tool meant for conversation. He finally caved and started following a limited amount of people but still believes that he shouldn’t be spending too much time in the social media space.

Dabble and You will Flop

Too many people dabble in so many things and become somewhat of a jack of all trades and a master of none. This brings me back to people striving to be average when the only way to get ahead is to be above average. It doesn’t make much sense but many people use messed up logic such as “John has an online store and is successful, therefore if I open an online store, I will be successful”. They go and open an online store, flop and then wonder why they failed, not even thinking about what John does that they didn’t do.

Seth Godin Likes to be the “Best in the World”

Seth Godin doesn’t have a Twitter account. Seth is one of the top marketing gurus out there and he does not participate on twitter because he will not participate in something that he cannot be the best in the world at. Seth has his own strategy and is successful as well.

Mixing Diets is a Recipe for Disaster

Imagine you are a few pound over your ideal weight and you want to start a diet. You look around for a diet and many times you start a diet because someone you know just lost a ton of weight on that particular diet. After suffering through a couple of months on the diet and not getting the results you’d hoped for you start to wonder “why didn’t it work?”. Chances are, you used some of the logic I spoke about earlier. “Well, the Atkins diet says I can have as much protein as I want but no carbs and the South Beach diet is very similar so it must be okay to have fries since they are ok on that diet”. People mix and match the parts they like and fail to stick to a single strategy.

Stick to One Strategy

You can be successful at almost anything but you need to choose a single strategy and stick to it. Don’t get sidetracked by shiny objects. You can work 20 hours per day like Gary Vaynerchuck or you can work 4 hours per week like Tim Ferriss and be successful. Just don’t mix up your strategy and you’ll be fine.

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Gary Vaynerchuk is the Least Scalable Person and is Reaping the Benefits

Amir Lehrer — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:28:14 +0000

The Disposable Age

We live in the disposable age. We eat take out, use disposable dishes, and look for a quick and easy fix for everything. The current bestselling books talk about doing less and enjoying more like “The Four Hour Work Week” by Tim Ferriss (which I am all for by the way). We are bombarded with mlm (multi-level marketing), network marketing, internet marketing and many other disguises for a way to make a quick buck. It seems like most people have forgotten that the most important ingredient in becoming successful is hard work.

Gary Vaynerchuck: The Hard Worker

Being involved in social media, I am very familiar with Gary Vaynerchuk, a wine expert/store owner who has used social media to grow his family business from $4 million per year to a $50 million business. I’m mentioning Gary Vaynerchuk because he is a modern example of a hard worker. He is passionate about what he does and he may be one of the hardest workers out there.

Scalable and not so Scalable Apps

Not long ago, platforms such as the Facebook and iPhone opened up to developers so that anyone can create an application for their platform. Most people saw this as an opportunity to create a scalable app that can continue to make them money while they slept. It was a dream come true for some people. Gary Vaynerchuk jumped on the bandwagon and created his own Facebook app but contrary to what everyone else was trying to do, he may have created the absolute least scalable app in Facebook history. His app “Ask Gary” was pretty much just a place for people to ask him questions about wine. Gary answered every single one of the questions himself.

Gary Vaynerchuk’s lack of scalability doesn’t end there. He also answers every single one of thousands of emails he gets every day. To top it off, he personally speaks to almost every customer that comes in to his store. Gary also manages to record Wine Library TV, a regular videocast on wine which happens to be very entertaining.

Gary on Social Media

Gary was recently asked how much time he spends on social media platforms such asFacebook and Twitter to which he responded “about 2.5 hours per day”. Shocked at the answer, Gary explained that it is a CEO’s job to make connections and get business and that he has found Social Media, the best place to make his connections.

Gary’s Research and Development

Looking at Gary and what he has done, you may think that Gary has it made and can start delegating now. He can let other people do his work for him and go relax on a beach, he can definitely afford it now. Gary feels otherwise and for a very good reason. By answering thousands of people’s questions, speaking to customers and doing research online, his mind and gut are a better R&D team than you can ever possibly hire. He can smell new trends and predict what people will want and like. The human mind can accurately crunch more information that any super computer in existence. Gary takes advantage of this and stays years ahead of his competition.

Hard work does pay off… Just “Ask Gary”.

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