Every entrepreneur, advisor, and startup knows what an MVP is, and they’re taught it from the earliest stages of founding their business.

But, not every entrepreneur is taught that there are Five Steps before building an MVP you should do. The reason this article exists is that I want you to be more successful as a founder and to learn them.

In this edition, I’ll go over the Five Steps before building an MVP and discuss the essential need for self-awareness entrepreneurs must develop to think better and innovate faster.

If you'd benefit by exploring these concepts at a deeper level to enhance your creativity, innovation, and momentum, then reach out to get started here.

Enjoy this week's 2 Ideas and 1 Playlist!!!

- Mark

1. The Five Pre-Steps To An MVP

All businesses, startups or otherwise, benefit from looking at their product through the lens of an MVP (Minimum Viable Product).  Because this technique helps many entrepreneurs evaluate, learn, and attract customers faster.

Unfortunately, most founders learn the techniques of an MVP but don’t know there are five steps to do before building an MVP.

Because of that, I'm listing them below.

First, what is an MVP again?

It’s the earliest conception of your product that customers can adopt and pay you for.  And without having customers who are paying you, you will run out of capital before building a thriving business.

The Five Pre-Steps To An MVP:

1. Self-Awareness. To be a successful entrepreneur, you must understand yourself as you are the heart of the business. Without understanding the core, how will you be able to soar?

2. Curiosity. Stack multiple areas you are curious about together to build a more successful idea. Now make a list of 21 things you are curious about and find the overlapping areas.

3. Passion. Curiosity is good, but Passion is better. Passion is the fuel that will take you further. Now spend time in the areas of your curiosity by reading books, listening to podcasts, talking with others, and discover your passion.

4. Market Research. You are building your self-awareness! Now research the markets that align with your passions and discover the market gap for your idea.

5. Share Your Idea. It may feel overwhelming to share your idea, but by doing that, you will receive the crucial validation you need, hone your thinking, and start taking actions that will move you forward!

Now take these steps and start your entrepreneurial dream today.

2. The Self-Aware Entrepreneur

For many early-stage entrepreneurs, when an idea strikes and the feeling of excitement sets in that you could build a business of your own, you immediately jump into action feeling like you’re already losing time by not acting or even that someone else could take your idea and earn your rewards before you do.

In the rush of excitement, you miss the crucial early steps to set yourself up for long-term success.

And, the last thing you want to do is discover a year into your business is that you’re not that interested in it after all.

To be a successful entrepreneur, the number one thing you will need is self-awareness to combat these challenges.

You are the heart and soul of your business, and understanding yourself, why you’re in business, and what your goals are will be the ballast to help you weather the ups and downs.

Strengthening your self-awareness is a skill that will have compounding effects on your success in the short and long term.

Self-awareness is one of the powerful precursors of Flow which will be your super-fuel to tap into your creativity and innovate longer.

Lastly, there has yet to be an entrepreneur who has said I want to be less self-aware, but many don’t realize how crucial it is to succeed in business.

Take action on building your self-awareness today because it's the one skill you can not outsource as an entrepreneur.

Founder's Playlist

What does an entrepreneur coach listen to this week while writing this?  Have fun and be inspired this week!

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If you’re ready to learn how to bridge the chasm between passion and strategy then click the button.

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Every entrepreneur, advisor, and startup wants to do one thing … take their business to the next level and do it better than the competition.

And, in the frantic race of being a startup to achieve results entrepreneurs build these enormous to-do lists and end up overwhelmed and when they’re not careful chasing the wrong metrics.

In this edition, I spent time writing about two strategies founders can use to reduce overwhelm, remove bottlenecks in order to think better and innovate faster.

If you'd benefit by exploring these concepts at a deeper level to enhance your creativity, innovation, and momentum then reach out to get started here.

Enjoy this week's 2 Ideas and 1 Playlist!!!

- Mark

1. Are Vanity Metrics Really That Bad?

Probably not, and I know most coaches wouldn't tell you that.

But first, what is a vanity metric anyway?

Vanity metrics are the things you can measure that fail to help you accomplish your goal.

Has an advisor ever given you the advice “It’s not the number of followers you have that matters?” And have you then felt like this person doesn't know what they're talking about?

They're probably trying to tell you they think your metric is a vanity metric.

Let's step back and look at how successful entrepreneurs are using metrics and see if this helps bring clarity to the situation.

The reason successful people focus on measuring outcomes is they want to be able to make a decision based on the data and continue making progress on their goals. If they are measuring the wrong thing, then their decision is not going to move their goals forward.

Taking a look again at having a massive following. If the goal of your following is to convert followers into clients this might be a good tool for you. But if you’re measuring the size of your audience without having the means to measure how many followers are converting to clients, all the hard work to build a following may not be paying off.

It depends on what the goal is and your goal may be entirely different from someone else.

The best step you can take is to first clearly articulate your goal and then implement a way to measure if the goal is being met.

2. Make A Stop Doing List

Because by doing less as an entrepreneur you will start getting more.

The way to eliminate the drains on your time, energy, and focus are to follow these two simple steps.

Start now! And, be as specific as possible.

1. Make a list of all the things you will stop.

2. Next to each item write, “I will stop doing X by eliminating Y.”

When an item on your list tries to creep back in then, pull out your list and remember how you’re going to eliminate it.

Founder's Playlist

What does an entrepreneur coach listen to this week while writing this?  Have fun and be inspired this week!

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If you’re ready to learn how to bridge the chasm between passion and strategy then click the button.

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Every entrepreneur, advisor, and startup wants to do one thing … accelerate progress and have their startups skyrocket to success.

From the smallest to the largest startups, it can feel like a never-ending queue of decisions that need to be made.

Because of this, it’s crucial to understand how to avoid decision fatigue and how to make progress by understanding decisions versus actions. For these two reasons and many more, I wrote up exactly what you need to be aware of in order to make increase your productivity.

If you'd benefit by exploring these concepts at a deeper level to enhance your creativity, innovation, and momentum then reach out to get started here.

Enjoy this week's 2 Ideas and 1 Playlist!!!

- Mark

1. How To Avoid Decision Fatigue

Every decision is not created equal!

This is the mantra every entrepreneur, advisor, startup, etc. should embrace if you’re trying to avoid decision fatigue.

And yet, this isn’t how we end up treating our decisions.

For many founders, they overanalyze even the smallest decisions and the cognitive load can be draining to our productivity and ability to make progress on our goals.

I’ve embraced a simple approach to help me make decisions faster with less overwhelm.

At the heart of it is to follow your intuition! And, here's how it works.

If you have a decision to make and the repercussions of deciding incorrectly will have minimal to non-existent ill effects then follow your intuition and quickly decide.

Does this sound overly simple? Well, it’s not because this is not how most people treat these types of decisions.

Have you ever found yourself spending 20 minutes deciding what to wear only to settle on your first choice?

Have you ever found yourself spending 20 minutes finding the perfect filter for a social media post only to settle back on the one that struck your eye first?

Maybe you haven’t hit these exact ones, but I guarantee you haven't been immune to these types of scenarios.

Imagine what would happen if you used your intuition quickly with just three of these low repercussion scenarios a day, then you could easily add an extra 60-minutes of time to your already busy schedule.

The next time you’re in one of these situations instead of dwelling on all the options follow your gut and don't look back.

2. Decision vs Action

Decisions are not actions, is the confusion many entrepreneurs make.

This confusion often causes a lack of progress in making progress on your goals.

A decision is a conclusion or a resolution. You may decide to be an entrepreneur, to be a runner, to be a …

An action is a process to achieve an aim. It is the process you put in place to found a company, to train for a marathon, or to …

But many times we confuse our decision to become something new with the actions we are doing in order to be something new. And it's understandable when this happens because deciding feels like progress.

And today, I challenge you to take one action on your decision in order to move your resolution forward on your journey to achieve your dream.

Founder's Playlist

What does an entrepreneur coach listen to this week while writing this?  Have fun and be inspired this week!

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If you’re ready to learn how to bridge the chasm between passion and strategy then click the button.

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Did you know that entrepreneurial strategies can have a compounding personal growth effect even for people who are not your typical entrepreneur?

I’ve discovered there are two types of people those that call themselves entrepreneurs and those that are entrepreneurial but fail to identify as an entrepreneur. It’s this second group who miss out on many of the benefits of implementing traditional entrepreneur strategies into their daily lives because they don’t think of themselves as an entrepreneur.

This is why I’ve taken the time to tell you about seven benefits of creating a pitch even if you’re not an entrepreneur and the one question everyone should be asking themselves every day.

If you'd benefit by exploring these concepts at a deeper level to enhance your creativity, innovation, and momentum then reach out to get started here.

Enjoy this week's 2 Ideas and 1 Playlist!!!

- Mark

1. Seven Reasons EVERYONE Should Create A Pitch

You don’t have to be an entrepreneur to benefit from creating a pitch, you only need to have an idea, and luckily for you...everyone has an idea.  And let’s be honest, you have many more than one idea!

There are many more reasons than seven EVERYONE should create a pitch deck even if you’re not planning on building a company.  Here are seven to get you started.

• You will become a better storyteller.

• As far as activities go, it takes very little time for the tremendous creative return you will experience spending time thinking about your idea.

• You will increase your expertise in an area you are passionate about.

• You will create a record of your thoughts, interests, and who you are.

• Your actions will shape your thinking.

• You strengthen your sense of self-worth that your idea is important and needed by others.

• You may create a new lifestyle for yourself!

Put yourself to the test and start working on your pitch today!

2. Entrepreneur Growth Question Of The Day

Being an entrepreneur can be overwhelming.

When we get caught up in the busyness of business we often lose track of our goals because we're focused solely on our tasks.

This is the one question you should ask at the end of every day to accelerate your growth for tomorrow.

"What work did you put in today that will help you improve tomorrow?"

Start using this one entrepreneur growth question today.

Founder's Playlist

What does an entrepreneur coach listen to this week while writing this?  Have fun and be inspired this week!

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If you’re ready to learn how to bridge the chasm between passion and strategy then click the button.

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This week spending a lot of time on Clubhouse and coaching entrepreneurs one theme kept coming up over and over again … motivation.

In each of the conversations, I was having the question of how important Focus and Motivation are was the number one tip people needed to hear. It can be tough as an entrepreneur to maintain these two bedrocks of success and this is why in this edition of the newsletter I focused on writing about these two concepts.

How do you focus and maintain motivation? Are you one of the 42% of people struggling with motivation?

If you'd benefit by exploring these concepts at a deeper level to enhance your creativity, innovation, and momentum then reach out to get started here.

Enjoy this week's 2 Ideas and 1 Playlist!!!

- Mark

1. The Currency Of Focus

You don’t have to be an entrepreneur to have heard there are only two currencies: TIME and MONEY.

And you know you’ve run into a founder or advisor with this mindset when you hear them say, "My time is money."

You might even feel this way yourself sometimes.

"Time is fleeting", you might say if you’re someone who keeps putting off becoming an entrepreneur.

"I’m losing money hand over fist", is what might be happening to you if you’re fixated on what you wish would work instead of what is actually working.

The real currency you need to be worried about is your FOCUS.

You can direct all the resources you have at a problem but only by honing your FOCUS and directing it at your goals will you see TIME and MONEY increase.

2. Find Your Motivation Frequency

We all have a motivation frequency we resonate with as entrepreneurs.

It could be low and slow, thumping and bumping, or a whisper to a whistle.

When we hear it we feel it in through and through.  But, when we struggle with it we'll feel out of tune.

Don't try to resonate in frequency with someone else's motivations, find your unique motivator and stay in tune with that.

Founder's Playlist

What does an entrepreneur coach listen to this week while writing this?  Have fun and be inspired this week!

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If you’re ready to learn how to bridge the chasm between passion and strategy then click the button.

Follow me on Instagram | Twitter | LinkedIn