Sivers writing is such a pleasure. I always find myself just devouring his words that are dripping with common sense. his colloquial style I think is also very appealing to my sensibility. While I do enjoy the occasional stuffy essay or wordy article, Sivers style reminds me of sitting in a bar with a friend and just soaking up some great life advice.
"Anything You Want" is no different. Sivers covers his greatest successes and failures of his business CD Baby and reveals his simple secret on how to make a successful business, make customers happy. It almost feels stupid to write, but at the end of the day that is what all businesses should aim to do. So going in with that idea Sivers drops some other common sense that leads him to making a successful business. Ideas such as; Make a product that makes you say "Hell YEAH" and make a product that makes you happy and provides value to a niche.
Sivers also brought forward a new concept that I had never thought of which is the idea that business ideas are malleable and should be to conform to the restrictions that are set before them. He uses the example of a mail in underwear service and presents the idea that this business could exist with some creative problem solving even if;
1. The business only had $1000 capital
2. the business had no website
3. you could only start the business with a phone
the list goes on, you could provide any hypothetical challenge that faces the business and overcome it. With this understanding there should be no excuse why the business that you want to start can't exist. Start with its smallest element. Again Sivers brings up a great example, say that the business you want to make is a new schooling system that will change the world and have thousands of employees across the world. Start with the simplest idea and grow from there. Find someone who will pay you to teach them and teach. It costs a notebook and your time but it is one step closer to building the business you want to create.
Sivers provides a number of reasons why there is no excuse to start doing what you love and I think this is advice that is often missed by other entrepreneur self help books. They usually request that you start to learn in your field, or start to ask customers if they would buy your product but Sivers believes that "Ideas are just multipliers for actions" this is probably the most powerful point in this book.
bad idea = -1
slightly bad idea = 1
basic idea = 5
good idea = 10
Great idea = 20
Brilliant idea = 50
no action = 0
little action = $1000
some action = $10,000
lots of action = $100,000
Tireless action = $1,000,000
This is a simplification but I think it drives the point home that your business idea will not make itself, in fact even if you give your idea to someone else might not even happen because they might not action it. You alone can make your idea happen so just start doing it.