One of the very hardest questions to answer in business is, “When should I give up?”
As it relates to marketing especially, you want to/need to “endure long enough to get noticed.”
At the same time, maybe you’re not getting noticed because whatever you’re trying to do just isn’t your thing.
I like to think of this as endurance vs. stupidity. It’s always a good idea to endure long enough to see the results you want. It’s always a bad idea to do something for a long time and never see results from your efforts.
Both true. Both opposites. How do you deal with these kind of decisions?
Let me start out by saying, this is just one man’s take on the issue. You don’t have to listen to a word I say. And to be honest, I’m very much “thinking out loud” here anyway.
I think first of all, to really be effective at something, you must be motivated to do it by something greater than the thing itself.
Scale is not a motivator. Money is not a motivator. Nice things are not a motivator. Oh sure, big businesses, lots of money, and fancy stuff is cool.
Who doesn’t want those things?
But are they enough to cause you to deploy hard work and endurance toward them? I doubt it.
You could be a lot more effective if your “why” was stability for your family, a fundamental belief you have that your product or service promotes, etc.
I’m not telling you what to care about. You can be in business so you can afford your morning latte addiction for all I care.
I just think it will need to go deeper than that in order to creating something lasting and meaningful.
Another thing to think about it is how proven the framework you’re using is.
Let’s say you want to lose weight. It’s never a bad idea to keeping eating healthy and/or exercising.
See what I mean? While maybe you should quit that gimmick diet that isn’t getting you results, you should not stop doing things that have provably led to better health for thousands of years.
In that regard, sometimes it can be genuinely useful to look at others.
Content creation is another one. While maybe you quit creating a certain kind of content and keep creating until you find “your thing,” it would be a bad idea to stop creating content.
Why?
Because hundreds of thousands of success stories have proven that building a business using an educational model works.
It’s why there are items related content creation on my schedule every single day. Over time, it works. It almost can’t not work unless you are exceptionally bad at it.
The point? It’s definitely possible to balance endurance and stupidity. Figuring out that balance can be tough, but it’s worth it in the end.