What Can You Learn From Entrepreneur Interviews?

If you know anything about me, then you know I love entrepreneur interviews. Whether I am reading a blog post, listening to a podcast, or watching a live video, I can’t seem to get enough of them. I see real value in learning from the people who have actually experienced successes and failures along their entrepreneurial journey. Somehow, learning their stories, I feel like I am learning from my own personal business coach, at no cost.

Personally, I have interviewed over 50 entrepreneurs. They’re all different in their own ways, but when it comes to these entrepreneurs sharing advice to entrepreneurs; they seem to relay very similar messages. I've learned a lot from online interviews so today I would like to share the top 3 messages I’ve captured in the past month.

#1 Just Start.

When it comes to business, one of the best pieces of advice is to “Just Start”. If you’re passionate about starting a business, chances are you’ve already read the books and learned the basics, so the only thing left to do is to actually start. As entrepreneur/investor Barbara Corcoran stated from an interview with John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneur on Fire “Business don’t have to perfect to start”. I now completely understand why she felt the need to share this quote.

The simple fact is the earlier you start the better. Yes, you probably will make some mistakes and will even fail at some point, but launching a business early will give you more time to learn from failures and perfect your craft.

#2 If I Did It, Then You Can Do It.

Almost every entrepreneur I speak to seems to have the idea that everyone can be just as successful as they are. I’ve come to realize they say this because of how little they knew about their business when first starting. Now, let’s look at this further. From a recent interview, Social Media expert Kim Garst revealed to Andrew Warner of Mixergy that she didn’t even know how to copy & paste when she first started her company. When you think about this, you understand why someone as successful as her would say that anyone can do what she did.

Successful entrepreneurs are regular people just like you and I, but with a different mindset. They seem to be able to focus more on the things that they want and take action towards it.

#3 Learning and Applying What You Learn

“Learn then apply what you’ve learned quickly.” You should only learn what you need to do right now and nothing more. I say this because we sometimes get so caught up reading and learning new information that we’ll sometimes forget to take action and actually do it. One of the worst things you can do is learn how to do something and then move on to something else without first applying what you’ve learned. There are many platforms to help entrepreneurs in regards to employment and getting a workforce/ team which will bring great value to his/ hers corporation. There are reverse phone lookup systems and the website also has additional handy tools.

For example: Let’s say that you wanted to learn how to grow your email list today. Well, you should probably focus only on that until you accomplish it successfully. Learning about advertising may be helpful to your business, but at this moment, it will not help you with the current task which is building an email list. – Stay focused on the task at hand, don’t lose track of what you’re trying to accomplish.

The lesson is, learn it then apply until you can do it successfully. I learned this technique from the Five Deadly Startup Mistakes by Jaime Tardy of Eventual Millionaire – Her recommendations will make you more productive and ultimately stop you from consuming too much information.

In conclusion

When it comes to starting a business there is a lot to learn. But luckily, we can learn from the people who actually have the experience and know how. We should take advantage of all the online resources available — like podcasts, blogs, and video interviews. With these resources, I believe we all have our very own virtual mentors and can learn how to be successful.

About the Author:

Herby Fabius is an entrepreneur, and  social media networker. He runs the Entrepreneurship Interview blog Billion Success and co-founded Triplefy Daily Deals & Gift Cards. He is in charge of marketing and social media brand monitoring.

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