Who Deserves Your Time?
I see a lot of new entrepreneurs that are desperately dying for people to value their time. But the market doesn’t value your time. We don’t see you as valuable yet, and that frustrates a lot of people. I know this because I went through it. Eventually, you get to a tipping point where you start showing the market that, hey, I am worth a lot. Right then, a bunch of people will try and pull you in different directions. Family shows up out of nowhere, people who never used to call you, now they’re calling wanting to hang out with you. If you’re not too careful during that time, all these people will make you feel guilty. You’ll start wasting your time in those areas you won’t grow, you’ll actually go backwards.
There are three different areas I want to show you when thinking about valuing your time.
- What Levels there, are on your way up, and where you are right now?
- Who you should give your time to and who you should be protective around?
- How to analyze and allocate your time to maximize your growth
We’re going to give you an infographic to download. Take a look at and laminate it, put it on your office, your mirror, your wall, where ever. If you can see it over and over and over again, eventually these concepts will sink in and will become a part of you.
No matter who you are, you fall into one of these three different categories.
- You’re either coming up as a new person, you can be a new real estate agent, new insurance guy, new digital market, a new doctor, new dentists, etc. But you’re new in your community. No one knows you, yet.
- Your name is out there in the marketplace. If they see your face and name, they can recall who you are – that’s a local real estate agent. That’s a local dentist. You’re not the pace setter yet, but your name brings some value.
- Then there’s the front runner. You’re number one either in your community, your state, or your country. You are number one and everybody follows your pace.
A lot of times a person coming up wants the kind of respect of a front runner, but they haven’t earned yet. You’ll hear them say, ‘Well I’m busy, I’m really busy.’ What they don’t know is that the word busy has three different categories in it.
- The first kind of busy is the facade busy. Say you’re a real estate agent and you don’t have any clients. No client wants to do business with a real estate agent that has a lot of time on their hands. To make up for you lack clients you tell everyone your busy and you make up fake appointments, so they have to fit into your ‘busy schedule’. Fake busy is a tactic that can help you from day one, but you can only do that for so long.
- Eventually, the goal is to actually become genuinely busy. When you are busy versus a facade busy, everybody feels the difference. People will feel it and see it in how you interact and carry yourself.
- Then third one is you’re extremely busy. Say you used to do an hour and a half appointment, now you have to do only 30 minutes. You used to have one assistant, no you have three. You do this so you can focus on what matters in your business and all the other tasks you used to do they move to somebody else who is coming up.
I want you to take stock of your situation know the different levels and the different types of busy and decide what you are worth in the marketplace. Not what you think your work, what you are mathematically worth to the marketplace. If you are just starting out and you don’t have a lot of experience don’t let your ego oversell your value. If you are six months in and haven’t gotten very many clients, you can’t go around demanding $400 dollars an hour. You will get burned by the marketplace. Bring real numbers to the market and let it decide if that is correct or not.
Once you do that, you need to look at your time and how your time relates to what level you are currently at. There are a lot of people that are going to demand your time, here are three types.
- A’s – People that are above you are making money you want to make. 1 million, 10 million, 100 million. They maybe seven to ten years ahead of you but they want to invest in you. They think big, so should you. Honor their time and commitment and learn from them.
- Then you have the people and relationships that are on the same level as you. They give you sanity and peace of mind because together you are experience the same struggles and wins. Commiserating with colleagues on the same level provide perspective and support.
- The final group are your mentees, the next generation. Giving back time and investing in them, if you are at the level, makes it all worth it. You build a community and foster a future by giving back.
All three are necessary. However, the goal today is to teach who your top 15 people are. These top 15 people are so important to your business and your life that no matter what you are doing you pick up on the first ring if it is them. You may have 27,000 numbers in your phone like me but only 15 have earned my time that I will pick up right away. Your goal is to eventually get to a few friends, many acquaintances, few business partners, many associates, few influencers, many creators. Those amounts for each group are crucial. Too many people in the entrepreneurial world are trying to win a popularity contest. I am not trying to answer the phone for 600 people. I’m not. If you try and get everyone to like you, you will be miserable and worst of all you will not get nothing done. Your goal is to realize who is worthy of your time and who’s not.
You’ll offered a lot of projects when you’re new. You can’t say, “Oh, I’m only going to focus on this project.” You don’t have that luxury, yet. You need to wear a lot of hats. You may even have to put 10% of their time into 10 different projects. But eventually, you’ll graduate to 20% of your time in five different areas. Your goal is to eventually get to a point where you are putting 90% of your time in the project that has the biggest upside that needs your attention and 10% into minutia.
We have 9,700 agents in our insurance company in a 100 plus offices in 49 different states nationwide. In 2019, we are growing faster than ever before, and my attention is going to fewer things than ever before. I’m putting 90% into the project that has the highest upside. Hence, we’re a bigger company today and we’re growing at a bigger percentage than ever before because of the 90-10 rule. And I know a lot of people will say, “How about the other person that needs your time on all this?” I get it, but I don’t feel guilty about it anymore. I used to at one point, not anymore because the 90% that goes into my small group wants it more than everybody else and as a result, we create the biggest return.
Key Takeaways to Ask Yourself
- What level you’re currently at? Where do you want to be? Make a goal and do the math on how you can get there.
- Who do you associate yourself the most with? How many friends do you have you? Are you accessible to all your acquaintances?
Don’t let anyone take your time by being late. We had a speaker try and do that to our sales team and I set them straight. They told us they were going to be ten minutes late to our call and I said no, we must reschedule. If you are paid to be somewhere by a certain time, be there. You know what time the speaker showed up to the rescheduled time? Ten minutes early. Show everyone you meet that they must respect your time because you value it.
There are two other videos I want you to watch. The first is 16 Time Wasters; so many people exhibit these 16 time wasters. The other video is 10 time saving hacks.
I told you we’re going to have an infographic if you text (747) 260-8461 again, (747) 260-8461 you will get the link to the infographic we made. Download it, print it out, laminated it, and post it somewhere prominent so eventually, all of this stuff will become a part of you. You got any questions or thoughts? Comment below. And if you haven’t subscribed to the channel, please do so.
Visit the official Valuetainment Store for gear
About Valuetainment:
Founded in 2012 by Patrick Bet-David, our goal is to impact entrepreneurs around the world through value and entertainment. We are the #1 channel for entrepreneurs because of the best interviews, best how to videos, best case studies and because we defend capitalism and educate entrepreneurs.
To reach the Valuetainment team you can email: marketing@patrickbetdavid.com
Follow Patrick on social media: