A few reasons why I was interested in starting my own business in the first place all came down to one thing - freedom. Freedom to plan out my day, freedom to travel, financial freedom and for security in knowing that I will be able to rely on multiple streams of income that I could build out at scale to the point of automation. However, as I was starting to build out my business plan, I realized that wanting to be free was not good enough. Although being free and secure in all those areas would certainly be amazing, I slowly understood that passion needed to be deeply rooted in whatever endeavor I was looking to pursue (especially if I wanted to be in it for the long haul), and more importantly, I knew that I needed to give back and provide value to others in some way, shape or form.
Once I understood these basic fundamental principles, I was able to narrow down a few verticals and industries where I could eventually start running my own book of business, which ultimately, I ended up choosing real estate here in New York City. The reason I chose real estate initially is because I was always in love with architecture as a whole and loved going to open houses to check out the interior spaces and designs of luxury homes (especially here in New York City, which is arguably the real estate capital of the world, containing multi-million dollar commercial and residential properties at almost every corner block). Also, being that New York City is a melting pot of people from all walks of life, cultures and backgrounds - I love being able to meet new people, network and be able to build and maintain rapport with people from all walks of life, professions and cultural backgrounds so doing real estate in New York City enabled me to experience all of that while earning income. Lastly, I was fully aware and extremely interested with the business-side of real estate, especially when it comes to investing and learning how to make money with real estate in order to set up multiple streams of income and maximize my earning potential by generating passive income to the point of automation (e.g. buying property and turning it into rental units in order to earn monthly passive income through rent, flipping properties and more). After I was able to build a solid book of business here in NYC and close on a few real estate transactions, I started to think about what my next business move was going to be and that’s when I realized that the real estate industry was getting hit pretty hard with companies like Amazon moving more towards digital which meant a lot of retail businesses no longer needed to invest in real estate and pay monthly rent for their commercial spaces when they could simply create a website as their store front which is far less in overheads costs. After I let all this digest in my mind for the next few months, I realized it was time to take advantage of all the technology available to us and the digital era that we lived in. That's when I decided to create a website themed around entrepreneurship called The Entrepreneur's Complex so that I could share my entrepreneurship journey with y'all, help others going through the same predicament by being a source of motivation (because we all know how hard it is to build a profitable business from scratch), build a networking-hub and community of like-minded individuals, provide amazing content for y'all to digest all the while being able to monetize my efforts through partnering with ad-networks who pay me on a CPM and/or CPC basis or by partnering with different affiliate-networks and companies who pay me directly to be an affiliate marketer for their products and/or services as well as through other means which I'll introduce you to more down the line.
As I mentioned in my last blog post, I've been working in the Media and Ad-Tech space here in New York City for the past 7+ years, which has enabled me to work with various brands and agencies (ranging from SMB to Enterprise-level accounts) who needed help with optimizing their digital marketing strategies and paid media campaigns across multiple channels (search, social, display, native) in order to maximize their return on ad-spend and ultimately achieve their marketing KPI's and business goals. Having worked in the Media and Ad-Tech space here in New York City has opened my eyes to the digital era that we live in, and by working with various brands and agencies and listening to various C-level executives and decision makers regarding their thoughts on the impact that digital marketing is having towards businesses today, this has enabled me to witness first hand the inevitable change and impact that digital is starting to have for all companies of all sizes across all verticals. But don't get it twisted, there are numerous benefits that digital brings to our society, especially the way it helps open communication and connects everyone from across the globe (something that businesses in the past generations didn't have access to). And because of this, I've seen how the digital era that we live in has created more entrepreneurs than ever before since it's never been "easier" to start your own business, especially online.
I share bits of my personal career journey with you just to show as an example that everything that I've gone through, all the risks that I've taken (whether the outcome was a success or failure) and every decision I've made has led me to where I am today, which ultimately, helped me find my niche and purpose. From living in New York City for the past 9 years, to the different jobs and industries I've worked in and even all the countless number of people I’ve met along the way that planted seeds in my mind - there's no one proven method to find your niche and purpose. If anything, the best thing you can do is just take action by taking the first step, and most certainly, be ready to take risks. If you fail, then fail forward and learn from that experience so you can make better decisions when you face your next situation because we all know that failure is part of the game but what separates the real winners are those that are not only able to take risks but also the ones that are able to get back up quickly after they get knocked down... but y'all already knew that. And by trusting the process, you’ll find your niche.
In conclusion, here are three questions that might help you narrow down your niche which I highly recommend you think over before considering this entrepreneurship thing and/or spending your hard earned money to start a business:
- What are you passionate about, and better yet, how can you monetize it?
- What is your "Why" and what types of "freedoms" are you looking to achieve through this?
- How are you giving back, helping others or providing value through the businesses you're looking to start?