How to get rich fast — Fastlane Millionaire

Highlight and comments

The road to wealth has no escort and is always under construction. Q: Why the road is always under construction? A: Because we can get rich fast but we can’t get rich easy. MJ always emphaised in the book that success is a process, not an event. During the process, there will be setback and failures. To succeed, you need to be persistent and consistent.
 
Fast wealth is created exponentially, not linearly. Q: How exponential wealth is created? A: Reviewing all those people who get rich quickly superficially, we would observe a single event that makes them an immense amount of money. This is the fast lane. But behind the scenes, there could be countless failures. However, all we need is one single success.
 
Your pursuit of wealth stalls when your focus is the road and its destination, and not the road trip. The road could be the business road, the real estate road. The destination would be money and freedom. But the road trip is everything else that you would experience. It is the process. The road is important but the road trip is where things actually happen.
 
Beliefs preceded choices, which precede action. Beliefs, Beliefs, and Beliefs. Only when you have the right belief, you can make the right choice and hence the right action.
 
A slow lane plan is a failure because the plan is based on time and factors you can’t control Q: Why slowlane is a failure? A: Slowlane means we work hard, we save, we put our money into 401K and into the stock market and hope that compound interest would do the magic. But we can’t control what it looks like after decades. It may be booming for decades, but it could also plumb more than 50% in months. Who knows what gonna happen when you need it?
 
Experience comes from what you do in life, not from what you do in a job. You don’t need a job to get experience How do I do that in reality? Show people what you are doing. Always look for something to do and to study.
Applied, this means instead of buying products on TV, sell products. Instead of digging for gold, sell shovels. Instead of taking a class, offer a class. Instead of borrowing money, lend it. Instead of taking a job, hire for jobs. Instead of taking a mortgage, hold a mortgage. Break free from consumption, switch sides, and reorient to the world as a producer. This is the same as Codie said. Instead of being the consumer, be the producer. If you find yourself using something heavily daily, make sure you have part of the ownership.
 
How does this company make money? What is the aim of its message? What kind of business processes are involved in offering this product or service? Is this company making a profit? What is the revenue model? Is this product manufactured overseas or locally? One piece is to find the problem. Another piece of the puzzle is to understand business. We can start practising it by analysing other people's business.
 
Wealth = Net Profit + Asset Value Net Profit = Units Sold x Unit Profit Asset Value = Net Profit x Industry Multiplier Any time you have an asset that has sustainable profits, an industry multiplier governed by prevailing market conditions determines the valuation of that asset.
This equation, especially the Net Profit reveals how we can manipulate the system that make more money. Either you raised the unit sold, or you raise the profit per unit. The industry multiplier is something that we can’t really control. It depends on market conditions and the industry you are in.
 
The rich accelerate wealth by accelerating asset value and selling those upgraded assets in the marketplace. Build a business that makes money and then sell it. The exit strategy turns you money on paper into real money
The five fastlane busines seedlings -rental system, computer/ software system, content system, distribution system and human resource system As Naval Ravikant said, code and content are permissionless. Here we can add a rental system/ franchise. The distribution system is Amazon-like. But none of these are possible without code.
 
When inventing any product, the invention is always half the battle. Distribution is the other. Build a great product and let it be seen. Also, lower the barrier of entry by letting the customer get the product easily.
The Law of Effection states that the more lives you affect in an entity you control, in scale and/ or magnitude, the richer you become – impact millions The Law of Effection doesn’t care about roadmaps or time trades or anything but the mathematical power of large numbers. Make a giant impact a few times or make a small impact millions of times Money is a number game. You affect millions, you gain million. Or you impact a few deep deeply
 
If you aren’t where you want to be, the problem is your choices. Your circumstances are the symptoms of those choices Belief → Choice → Actions → Where you are now
Fastlane success isn’t one choice. It’s hundreds
There are two types of choice: 1. Choices of perception (thought pattern) 2. Choices of action (choosing to read) I have never thought about that. It is a deeper level of dissecting the choices. You can control how you perceive and how you act.
 
As your journey progresses, respect yourself and ask, is this a good choice of perception? A good choice of action? Is this going to be treasonous to my dream and cloud my windshield to a better life? Have I chosen to be a victim or a victor? Have to chosen to surrender or accept the challenge?
Extraordinary wealth will require you to have extraordinary beliefs
Time is deathly scarce, while money is richly abundant Money is abundant. Money is abundant. Time is the only thing that is irreversible. Time is the true wealth. Everything we do is to gain our time back. I used to have that scarcity mindset for money, not for time. I hesitate to spend money and am willing to trade time for money, which is stupid. But in a way, it sort of depends on what financial situation you are in. Or you can choose not to buy that. Time is money, but time is also a value, which is not the mean.
 
Everything we buy hasn’t one cost, but two: 1. The action dollar cost 2. The free time transformed into an indentured time The book gives a calculation: An audio system: $4000. My salary rate: $10/hr. Price of the audio system: 400 x 10. The cost of the audio system = 440 hrs ← this is the real cost! And if you buy it with a credit card, it is a parasite debt that takes away your free time.
 
The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out; the brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. The brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They are there to stop the other people. If it is easy, everybody can do it.
 
When you take intelligent risks and avoid the moronic ones, you amplify your wealth trajectory through time. Intelligent risks have a limited downside, while their upside is unlimited. Moronic risks have a bottomless downside and their upside is limited, or short-term. Take a risk, but take them only when the benefit is greater than the cost
 
Stop thinking about business in terms of your selfish desires, whether it’s money, dreams or doing what you love. Instead, chase needs, problems, pain points, service deficiencies, and emotions Sometimes I don’t understand why business exists. How would someone come up with this business idea? But of course, they found a need!
 
The amount of money in your life is merely a reflection of the amount of value you have given to others.
The motivational fuel for the Fastlane is passion, not love. Passion gets you out of the garage and onto the road. If you have a passion for a specific goal, you’ll do anything for it. A road that doesn’t converge with your dreams is a dead end. When you concede dreams, life withers What is your goal? To have free time to do what you love? To buy anything you want? To help everyone else? To redistribute wealth? Whatever. Doing business is not doing what you love but achieving your goal.
 
When it comes to entry, your industry and your business should not be available to everyone, because if it is, you must be prepared to be exceptional. And if you are exceptional, easy entry becomes not a liability, but an asset. It makes sense. That’s how the restaurant survives.
 
When it comes to money, the best warning flag is everyone. Everyone is a red flag that the Commandment of Entry has been violated. If everyone is engaged in the same activity, it surely will fail. Big money is not made easily because everyone chases money to some extent. If everyone can do it and is doing it, there is no one making money. It is simply the law of supply and demand.
 
Build corporate ladder - don’t join them. Build pyramid organisations - don’t join them. Think manufacture, not retail But doing business, you must always collaborate with someone. But at any point of business, you should avoid a single point of failure to gain control of your business. Also, the point here is never allow other people to control your income, other than the customer
 
Innovation involves two acts: 1. Manufacture and 2. Distribution Most innovation can only be the innovation, but they might not know how to mass manufacture or how to do distribution. It is paramount that customers can get it easily
 
The core activity of inventors is just taking something and improving or modifying That’s the spirit of entrepreneurs, like Nintendo. It is not using the latest technology, but putting pieces together. As an entrepreneur who just started out, there aren’t many resources for R&D.
 
The world’s most successful entrepreneurs didn’t have a blockbuster idea; they just took existing concepts and made them better, or exposed them to more people.
  1. Find the pain point 2. Innovate the solution/ Improve existing solution
 
Fastlane wealth is created by the net income and asset value-not of the stock market or compound interest. Your Fastlane business should fund this account, not savings from your paycheckLive below your means with the intent to expand your means Don’t overlook the part of net income. There is so much you can save if you only have this amount of income.
 
How you play each function will determine if you build fastlane speed or drift aimlessly. Those functions are execution, marketing, customer service, product, people and ideas Creating a business is hard because of it. There are so many aspects to be managed. Creating the product is only half the part done.
 
When it comes to your ideas, your plans, and your business, you NEVER know what works until you put it out to the world Validating your ideas. I should probably do the same for my entrepreneur apps. Or we can write a blog post analysing the idea first. It could help validate the idea as well if someone read it.
 
One complaint meant there were 10 others who felt the same way A customer complaint is the best advice
 
Pick your battles. Solve complaints that add the most value while helping the most Q: Why it is important? A: Because you can never satisfy everyone. Even though there are complaints of void, which means unmet opportunity, you just can’t do everything by yourself. They may not be your target customer.
 
Your customer service strategy will influence your company’s growth. Satisfaction implies expectations being met. To create raving customers, you must exceed satisfaction SUCS Principle (Superior Unexpected Customer Service)My object was to look like I had the power of a big company, yet give personal services as if I were a one-person operation Q: Why is customer service important? A: Because it affects people's satisfaction. Ideally, a brand should do its best at every touching point, which includes customer service. And good customer service is one way you differentiate yourself from others. But I would say it is the hardest because it involves managing human resource management (unless you are applying all the emails by yourself.)
 
When you trust everyone, you engage in business opportunities that violate the Commandment of ControlToday I trust no one but give everyone the opportunity to prove trust Verify that this person is trustable before you trust him/ her
 
When hundreds of people get into a business solely because they know how to or want to, and it is not based on need, you get put into the position you are in: price wars haggling over a few dollars The entry barrier should be high enough that few can get in, or you must be exceptional. The last thing you want to do is price war.
 
If you’re following, you aren’t leading, and if you aren’t leading, you’re not innovating Differentiation matters. I do believe that if I started hearing something being a profitable business, it is too late to get into the market because there are many smart people figuring that out already and the market is saturated.
 
Everyone has an invisible sign hanging from their neck saying, ‘Make me feel important,‘ Never forget that message when working with people – Mary Kay Ash’’People are loyal to brands and relationships, not corporating or business Think branding, not business. People buy from you because you provide value and make them feel you value them and you speak their language. All great businesses have great brands.
 
If you get someone’s attention, half the battle is won. The other half is letting selfishness take over your audience and tailor your messages to self-interest To break through the noise, you need to become unexpected. I would say speaking your target customer’s language is also key.
Translate features into benefits People don’t want to know what your product can do. They want to do what it can get for them
 
Price is a brandy-builder because price implies value… Unless price is your brand, don’t let price steal your brand when it should be defining it. Price war is not for small business. It is never a maintainable business especially when you have limited resources.
 
 

 

Tips on starting your business

  • Choose your business entity that can protect you and pay yourself first
  • The Five Fastlane Commandments
      1. Need
      1. Entry
      1. Control
      1. Scale
      1. Time
  • The Need
    • Make them feel better
    • Help them solve a problem
    • Educate them
    • Make the look better
    • Give them security
    • Raise a positive emotion
    • Satisfy appetites
    • Make things easier
    • Enhance their dreams and give hop
  • The Entry
    • Higher entry barrier = less competition, less need for exceptionality
  • The Control
    • Don’t let the other control the income
    • Don’t join something, organise something
  • The Scale
    • Law of Effection = how many and how deep people you can affect = scale
    • Law of Effection honors only those in control
  • The Time
    • Can the business be automated and systemized?
    • Enough margin to hire people?
    • Can my operation benefit from the introduction of a money tree seedling (web/ content/ etc)
    • How can I get this business to operate exclusively of my time?
  • The Three Fastlane Interstates
    • Internet
      • Subscription
      • Content
      • Lead generation = bringing people to a segmented industry (Platform)
      • Social Networks
      • Brokerage system
      • Advertising
      • Ecommerce
    • Innovation
    • Intentional Iteration
      • The mean or act of repeating a process, usually with the aim of approaching a desired goal or target or result.
      • e.g. real estate investor, no scale but can be done repetitively
 
 

Tools for analysis

  1. Worse Case Consequence Analysis (WCCA)
    1. What is the worse-case consequence of this choice?
    2. What is the probability of this outcome?
    3. Is this acceptable risk?
  1. Weighted Average Decision Matrix (WADM)
    1. Weighting different options by factor and give each factor a weight | Factor | Detroit | Phoenix | | Weather (10) | 2 [20] | 8 [80] | | School (3) | 2 [6] | 3 [9] | | Total | 26 | 89 |
 
 
 

How to set your goal

  1. Calculate the cost your dream living style
  1. Find out how much capital you need to fund your lifestyle: cost of dreaming lifestyle / 5% (5% annual investment return is the standard)
  1. Break it down, save, raise income source, celebrates small success
  1. Fund the brokerage account to get the 5% return
 
 

Become Financial Literacy

  1. Interest rates
  1. Taxable and non-taxable yields
  1. Amortization of mortgages
  1. The balancing of check book
  1. Calculating ROI
  1. Why stock rise and fall
  1. How stock options work
  1. How a mutual fund works
  1. What bonds are and why they rise and fall
  1. Global currency
 
 

About complaint from a customer

  • complaint is the best advice you can get
  • complaint about a change
    • Human psychology may be in play. People resist change!
  • complaint about expectations
    • You either need to do a better job in fulfilment or a better job in managing their expectations
  • complaint of void
    • Your greatest opportunity! There are unmet needs
 
 

Developing your USP

  1. Uncover the benefit
    1. what problem do you solve
  1. Be unique
    1. Strong and short verbs that create urgency and desire
    2. e.g. “Obliterate fat”
  1. Be specific and give evidence
    1. To alleviate natural consumer scepticism
    2. Your home sold in 30 days or I own it
  1. Keep it short, clear and concise
  1. Integrate USP into all marketing materials
  1. Make it real
 
 

How to rise above the noise – so people can hear you

  1. Polarise
  1. Arouse emotion
  1. Be risque
  1. Encourage interaction
  1. Be unconventional