This is the first in a series where I go through my entire business and career history, so you can see how I ended up where I am today. I’ll go through all the major events of my past business life, but before I get started with my history, I’m going to give you an overview of where I am, in terms of business, today.
I own three small businesses: a business consulting practice, a lifestyle design business for men (the main blog for that is here), and an I.T. marketing company. The first two companies have been making so much money lately that I had to put the third company on temporary pause (grrrr) while I optimize companies one and two (as I discussed here). I’m going to turn business number three back on by winter of this year. I don’t like that I had to do that, but I had to do it because, like I said, the other two businesses were doing so well. (The only problems the Alpha Male 2.0 experiences are “quality” problems like this.)
I work out of my home, by choice, and have no employees, again by choice, in keeping with the Alpha Male 2.0 business model. I work with a team of subcontractors and virtual assistants, about eight different people. I set my own schedule and work whenever I feel like it, which is usually every day, though a “workday” in my world could mean just one or two hours of work.
I make a six-figure income, about 95% of which is location independent, meaning I could be literally anywhere on the planet and could still support this income as long as I had an internet connection, even slow one. This six-figure income could be supported on just 1.5 days of work per week. In other words, I could work a long day on Monday, work half the day on Tuesday, and take the rest of the week off until the following Monday, and my income would remain. (It wouldn’t grow very much, but it would sustain.) I work more hours than that because I choose to (I love to work, and I have goals that excite me).
I love my work, all three of my businesses. About 70% of my day-to-day work is exciting for me and brings me great joy, excitement, and fulfillment. About 10% of my work I consider just “okay,” and the remaining 20% I don’t like very much. But when you love 70%, the 20% that’s irritating isn’t all that bad.
If you’re curious, that 20% comprises grunt work tasks that I can’t outsource, such as replying to certain emails, double-checking the bookkeeping, dealing with legal and tax aspects of my companies, quality assurance monitoring of subcontractors, and so on. Fortunately, this stuff only takes up 20% of my work time or less.
I follow a process of outsourcing everything I possibly can, so I only work on the highest-value tasks that bring me the most income with the least amount of work. I work based on systems that force me to maximize and optimize everything I do on a regular basis. My operating goal is to make the most amount of money on the least amount of time, something I’ve been very good at over the course of my business career. Indeed, as a business consultant (and business coach) there’s extra pressure on me to be effective and organized, since I need to be the example.
I started my first real business at age 20 and dabbled in it for a bit while I worked at a normal day job. I got serious with that business at age 22, and two years later, at age 24 in 1996, I quit my day job and went full time with my business. That was 22 years ago and I have not had a job since, thank god.
In that time, I have started several different businesses, and every one of them have made money. I’ve made many business mistakes and blown money on several occasions as well (sometimes a lot!) but in the end, every business I’ve started made a profit, at least eventually.
Today, I’ve “settled” on my favorite three businesses, my business consulting (something that comes easy for me and is very profitable), my Blackdragon / Alpha Male 2.0 business for men (something that’s so fun it usually feels more like a fun hobby instead of a six-figure company), and my I.T. marketing company (my most profitable, turnkey, automated, niched, and scalable business; it pains me to no end that I can’t work on it right now, and I’m itching really bad to get back into it later this year).
I am a creature of business. Always have been. Most people who know me only through my writings as Blackdragon think the most important thing in my life is women. Wrong. Number one in my life is, and always has been, my work, my businesses, my Mission. My woman life is always second to that.
In the next installment in this article series, I will talk about how I first got started, way back when I was a teenager. Stay tuned.
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What were your three biggest bizmistakes or three biggest money loosers
Thanks
Hey caleb do you believe all three of your businesses are recession proof? Did you start these businesses based off that or do you not worry much about it?
Given the nature of your businesses, and the fact the business comes first, and you will leave the US by 2025 at latest, why wait to make the leap and go offshore to lessen your obvious tax burden.
I’ve delayed for reasons of raising my kids until they are self sufficient, and am now ready to expatriate both myself and my businesses (except for my real estate holdings). I’m curious to know your expatriation plan for business, money, banking and investment.
The one off the top of my head was I once lost $5,000, which was a LOT of money for me back then, in a direct mail campaign because I didn’t enforce my direct mail standards with the mailing house I used. That hurt.
My I.T. marketing company is. My other two are not. My Blackdragon business could even be classified as illegal in some countries down the road as the Western world continues to collapse and move left.
That’s precisely why you need 2-4 small businesses instead of relying on just one. Relying on just one source of income is not a long-term secure financial model.
I did consider it, yes, but I weighed that with other factors (ease of getting profitable, ease of marketing, how niched they were, how location independent they could be, how compatible they were with my lifestyle, and so on).
1. I have kids in the US and want to make sure they’re stable before I leave.
2. I would like my finances structured a certain way before I leave, and that will take a few more years.
3. I have a new live-in OLTR wife and need to get that relationship nice and structured before I leave.
4. I’m Alpha 2.0 so pay very low taxes as a percentage of my income as compared to the typical American, so it’s not like I’m getting totally ripped off. I can afford to wait a little while. I’m more concerned about my future tax burden as I make more money.
There you go. Me too.
Read the archive of this blog. I’ve talked about all of those things many times.
This is going to be a really good series.
Will you be covering what techniques you use to stay focused, motivated and self-disciplined?
I’ll be touching on them, but not focusing on them.
This is an awesome topic. I can’t imagine starting an I.T marketing company. I wouldn’t know where to start.
Looking forward to this series!
BD,
please explain. How illegal potentially ?
My Blackdragon business could even be classified as illegal in some countries down the road as the Western world continues to collapse and move left.
Actually it’d be pretty awesome to listen to how some guy with no business skills or job or college education got to become a business consultant
I mean why would they hear to you when they have better options? Or is reading books (which you did) enough to become a business consultant?
…Caleb, do you have any advice for someone like me who doesn’t seem to have a passion for any business/niche? It’s like on one hand, I see the importance of having your own business and making a good amount of money, but then on the other hand I just can’t picture myself enjoying and doing any type of business…? I think my problem is that honestly I’ve never really had a passion to begin with especially when it comes to a job/career.
Thanks for any advice
I have no idea. In the future, some of the more insane European countries could deem teaching dating advice to men as “sexual assault” or something and ban those websites in their countries. Maybe. Again, I don’t know and I’m only speculating.
I started as an IT consultant and moved into business consulting later, so I already had a lot of consulting experience and had a track record I could point to. I’ve also worked with hundreds of companies, and yeah, I’ve read and studied a lot of business books and other material.
I didn’t have a passion for any niche when I got started either. Passion is irrelevant at the outset in my opinion. It certainly helps, but it’s not needed. Passion comes later when you start making money. 🙂
Forget about passion and look to what you think would make money and wouldn’t be too boring for you. Start there.
A semi-boring business is orders of magnitude better than working at a semi-boring job.
Ok thanks for the reply, I appreciate it
It doesn’t have much to do with passion so much as it does a greater purpose, or Mission as Caleb calls it. If your motivations are like “meh, I just want to get by” that’s exactly what you will do. Get by. Read a blog called Bold and Determined, the guy who writes it says a lot about this.
Hey BD, I am really interested in knowing how you started as a teenager at the software company. I read your short guide about becoming financially independent and in one of the steps, you mention the need to work for a couple of years at a company operating in an emerging market while reading tons of books. Back in your age, the IT industry was booming and the entry barrier was not as high as it is today (companies requiring bachelor degrees for a stupid data entry job). How would you approach this in todays world? What market would you pick?
I can only see digital advertising/marketing as something where I could cold call companies in need of awareness and sell them my services. On the other hand, how would I approach companies working in the field of AI, Robotics, Finance? There are no simple beginner tasks. How would they trust me, a 21 year old, even if I had a lot of knowledge? The alternative I am pursuing now is free college (I live in an EU country) where I am studying for two majors: computer engineering and finance. I see these as the best possible combination for the future.
It’s all right here:
http://www.sublimeyourtime.com/2012/10/25/how-i-got-my-first-job-at-age-18/
The exact same way. Things are not as different as you think.
Health care, tech, energy, green tech, robotics, biotech, et al. Those are all growth industries.
Incorrect. There are beginner tasks in any medium or large company.
They would trust you just fine in an entry level position.
Do not waste your early 20’s going to college, even if it’s free. I’ve talked about that extensively at both my blogs. Working in the real world for four years is a far better investment than getting a worthless college degree. A finance degree is literally worthless, and a degree in computer engineering is unnecessary. I was making $100,000 a year by age 27 as a computer tech without any degree in computers.
What about defense/aerospace? At least investment wise, I like those because whilst it may not be a big growth if something happens in the world those will go up.
If you are interested in engineering/science/medical you still need a degree. Sure purely money wise you are right but its also important to do something you enjoy/are good at not just pure money.
Yes, but anything even quasi governmental means lots and lots of paperwork and regulations, so one would have to be aware of that.
Incorrect. If I was 18 years old right now, knowing what I know now, I’d go into medical sales immediately. No degree needed, and I’d be making six figures in a growth industry before I hit age 30. That’s just one industry example; I could give many more.
Then it’s your job to find something that will make good money that you will like.
In the photo you seem to have a very strong jaw, which is a masculine characteristic.
Then you would be in medical business but the work would be sales. If someone doesnt want to do sales and wants to do tech stuff for medical then theyd need a degree. You could of course say you could start with sales learn the tech part on the job and then switch to some other role, but again, what if I really did not want to do sales? Purely money wise you are right but its also about liking what you do or at least not hating it. Many people hate sales work.
Yes, for example tech consultancy after getting a degree and some big company work experience. Maybe you can say I lost some years where I could have been making money, but whats it matter if I am making the money now. Some of us need those university years to mess around and figure stuff out. I was still a child basically when I was at university.
Bingo!
You nailed it, I have no interest what-so-ever selling anything. I think that’s the core point why I suck at even starting to be motivated to do anything business related.
Now my question is how to move from this inner core mentality to a sales person money and business oriented spirit?
My main interest in money is yo pay for sex instead of having to game.
I dont think you have to do sales to have your own business theres lots of other options. You can have business partners, outsource some stuff or even start a business where your service that you provide doesnt require going through normal sales. You might still need to do marketing but thats not the same. Or if you already have a good network maybe you dont need that at all. So you could just focus on building a network instead.
If you want something long term and higher quality attitude from the women you will still need at least some game if you for example want to do sugar daddy stuff or just attract women on the fact youre rich. If you dont care how badly the woman behave that she might be full of diseases and that you might have to get a new one every time then its true you dont need any game.
It sounds hard at start but I’d say its not that hard. I went in about a year and a bit from having no clue about dating and getting women and having no control about when and if I get dates even never mind taking them home to having new first dates every week (on average) pretty reliably and many of those women happily come, after just 1h face time, for a second date to my house. And I was focused and really trying to apply stuff and working on it properly maybe only last half a year. Of course I am not counting all that time before where I spend getting rid of some fixed ideas I had and overcoming mental blocks, thats probably the hardest part, but if you can force yourself to just do it you can make that stage shorter.
That’s a photo technique. I clench my teeth whenever I get my picture taken to accentuate my jaw. My jaw doesn’t look quite that good in real life.
A dumb question. The medical industry is massive and requires literally thousands of different jobs (and/or small businesses) and at least some of them will pay decent without any college degree. Sales is the best, but you don’t have to do sales. You’re just nitpicking the example.
You don’t need a degree to have a tech consultancy. I was making over $100,000 in my own tech consultancy without a degree.
Yep. And learning stupid shit you don’t want to learn and that will never help you, and getting brainwashed with false Societal Programming, and (if you’re in the USA) going into massive debt, and so on, and so on.
“My life was fucked up for years but now it’s not. So what?”
That is not how I look at life.
You don’t need to go to university to figure stuff out. You can do that in the free market instead.
All the more reason to not go.
Clearly you just want to get a college degree (or defend the concept). If that’s what you really want, I won’t argue with you about it, go ahead and do whatever you want, it’s your life. I’m just telling you it isn’t required for high income and will usually cause more harm than good.
“Business” and “sales” are two different things. You don’t have to be a salesperson (though that will get you to the money the fastest).
Fine, have that be your motivation to get your ass to work.
@Investor
I totaly agree with you about game. I do game, and have sex with a lot of women MLTRs mostly and FBs. I am already pretty advanced at that stuff.
But sowetimes I really fell like I’d much better spend a lot of that time and energy into making a business that would yield so much that having sex with prostitutes would be cheaper in term of time*energy*mone than to game for FBs and MLTRs.
I would still game anyways, at least to have one or 2 on going relationships at a time, but I could cut down a lot on game by paying for sex.
However, passed a certain age (65? I dunno, depends on how I look then), game will offer very small returns, especially with women in their 20s. So the most reliable source of sex in older age is prostitution (and its variants)… Until we have great sexbots, VR and whatnot, if ever in my lifetime. Still requires money.
I understand intellectually that business, sales, marketing and networking are different things.
But emotionally for me it’s all the same super boring stuff that I have no interest in doing or learning. I feel they are the most essential parts of a business though.
I am totally the kind of guy who would get lost in technical details to make the product so great and would forget to advertise and sell it efficiently.
Anyways, I am still stuck in the middle of this mental block and here whining instead of building a new business.
Of course money is good, not just for this, it gives you a lot of back up and assurances, but its also good to not rely on it. Outcome independence and all that.
At that age if you want to bang girls in their 20s then yes you either need prostitutes or be super rich/famous. If its anything better than regular prostitutes or escorts you will still need lots of game to manage it long term.
Probably for your case its best to start a small business together with someone else who handles the business side. Or be an independent advisor. Networking doesnt have to mean going to events and chatting up people its also about the network you build over time as you work at different places. I guess you are introverted? Sounds like it then sales and marketing can be hard for you though I think Caleb is introverted and still does it just not so much in person.
I agree with you on the money side regarding college, especially if its some place like US where you have to pay a lot for it its absurd to go there. If you dont have to pay or not so much then I think its still great thing to do, which can be hard for you to understand since you didn’t do it. Not for money but for other reasons.
Hey Caleb,
I’ve read your articles on your first job at 18, tips for younger guys on how to be successful, and your ebook on how to be financially successful too.
But what I don’t understand is:
How would a young guy fresh out of high school, with literally no job experience at all, be able to compete with kids with college degrees who are also applying for entry level positions at large companies in the local region?
Based on your experience, is this the case in other countries as well? As in can you get an entry level position with no degree and minimal job experience in places like Asia? Cuz from what I know, Asia has a huge boner for diplomas.
He probably couldn’t for those particular positions, but large companies have thousands of entry level positions available, and not all of them will be mobbed by 4.0 GPA college graduates (unless you’re talking about a “cool” company like Google, or your particular city is an odd exception to the rule).
Of course. As to how hard or difficult it would be in Asia as compared to the US, I couldn’t say.
Even better, work in the real world, save up for college if you want, and make college a hobby of sorts that you utilize while taking time off your job lol.
jk, college is a giant waste of time and money. Has been for quite some time actually. I kinda really regret going.
Caleb:
I don’t understand why having full-time regular employees doesn’t fit Alpha 2 model? What makes regular employees unacceptable vs having VAs contractors? You still need to manage people in both cases. If you setup business in a way that (for ex having a business manager) many daily routines all automated/delegated to manager and employees, and you sided from business it may still run well and you can check with manager 1 hour/week etc., and then you will have all time and freedom to live Alpha 2 life. So, what is wrong with having employees?
1. All the massive laws and regulations regarding the hiring, managing, and firing of employees, none of which apply to contractors.
2. Often need to pay more tax, or more convoluted taxes.
3. Much more paperwork and bureaucracy invovled, which creates more work for you to do yourself or pay someone else to do.
4. Harder to deal with when you don’t have work for them to do, which in a small business happens from time to time.
5. Far less management. Employees need to be managed every day, all the fucking time. Contractors just occasionally.
There’s nothing wrong with that, but you’ll make more money and put in less overhead work getting to that point if your business manager, etc, are contractors rather than employees.
I remember reading something from Gary Halbert where he didn’t like the idea of selling “tail” meaning your time.
Last I checked, your $150 rate for an hour (to me, and I’m not rich) seemed pretty low based on your knowledge and experience.
What are your thoughts on selling your time Caleb and how did you arrive at the price you charge currently?
Incorrect. My lowest rate is $294 per hour, it’s very rare I actually get paid that low for consulting time, and I put several limits on the amount of time that can be used at that low rate.
I’m actually pretty expensive most of the time, and one-on-one coaching/consulting is a very small percentage of my overall income.
Hey Caleb,
Do you have any system/methodology for getting the hard(not so fun) but necessary things that are necessary for increased revenue/profits? How to ensure that I am not overlooking these?
Wait until the summer.