Well today is my 31st Birthday and I couldn’t be more excited about where my life is at this very moment. I am months away from marrying the love of my life in Malibu, our software company appraiso had a launch month that far exceeded our expectations, and my business is on track to triple year-over-year, crazy! It is times like these that I get pretty darn reflective, I feel so lucky, but at the same time, it’s taken a lot of hard work and failure to get where I am today.
So I thought for this Birthday, rather than writing one of my usual long reflective posts I’d change it up a bit. One thing that I realize each year is how much I learned that year, and how some of the things I thought I knew, I really didn’t know at all. I guess that’s just part of getting older, and I’m all about learning, taking everything in, and learning from every experience possible.
One thing I learned a long time ago that’s stuck with me is that you learn the most from your failures, not your successes. This couldn’t be more true, and that’s why I am excited to share with you 31 things I’ve learned in 31 years. Oh, and since a majority of my readers are Domainers, there will be a domain-specific tone to this, I’ll save the really mushy stuff for my friends and family!
- Content is king, always has been, always will be.
- Build for users, not for search engines.
- You can do anything you set your mind to, but you might not get it right on the first try.
- Never do business with people you don’t like doing business with.
- Don’t be the first person to throw out a number in a domain negotiation.
- Visit every single city in every single country you possibly can, the world is an amazing place.
- We are all more similar than we are different.
- The key to running a successful blog is writing at least one post every single day.
- The key to running a successful business is staying strategic and hiring people to do the tactical.
- Finding good people is hard, very very hard.
- Outsourcing can work, but not if you’re managing it yourself.
- .COM is king, always has been, always will be.
- That being said you can build a great business on any TLD.
- If you’re overloaded it probably means you need to hire another person, not get less sleep.
- Sleep is important.
- Never sign a contract you haven’t read.
- Listen to your customers.
- Listen to yourself.
- Don’t work too hard, life is all about balance.
- Running up and down a spiral staircase can hurt your knees.
- Once your business really takes off, taxes become less fun.
- The DMV is never fun.
- Get a sports car and enjoy it, it’s worth it.
- Try to get away from it all at least once a week, once a day is even better!
- Live by the Ocean.
- Jogging is one of the best ways to explore a new city.
- Know who your real friends are.
- Don’t be afraid to take big risks and make big mistakes.
- Spend more time with friend and family than anything else.
- There is never a reason to be proud that you’re working late, be proud that you got home early.
- Find love, it gives true meaning to life.
