On "Anything you Want" by Derek Sivers

“Anything you Want” by Derek Sivers is a refreshing take on entrepreneurship. We’re taught that business in general is rather cold: seeking profit at any cost, and employing complex business models to dupe the customer out of as much money as possible. Derek cuts through that veil, aiming to show readers how a good business grows in a very natural way through anecdotal experiences about how he started and later sold his company CD Baby. The book is short enough that it can be read in a couple of hours, each chapter is only a few pages long, but the bite sized pieces of wisdom are very practical - and I found that many of them challenge conventional wisdom.

Personal Compass

It’s very important to know why you’re doing what you’re doing. A lot of the time, people are spurred to action through imitation rather than through real passion. (Definitely also check out Brian Timar’s post on Mimetic Traps)

Derek makes the point that we are often caught up in trying to optimize the dreams of our friends or family rather than the dreams we truly hold inside. He makes the case to really sit down and ask yourself if you’re doing something because someone else convinced you of its value, or you’re doing something because you truly deep down believe in it. You have one chance at life, don’t waste it.

Don’t be on your deathbed someday, having squandered your one chance at life, full of regret because you pursued little distractions instead of big dreams. You need to know your personal philosophy of what makes you happy and what’s worth doing.

Switch Early and Switch Often

Not all businesses will succeed. Don’t get too attached to a business or idea that you doggedly try and force it to work. A good business should advertise itself, and be sought out by others.

Let the determiner of your continued attention to a business be the customers. If you’re not garnering enough sales or you’re feeling the market just isn’t there, don’t be afraid to switch. It’s better to switch early, than waste years of your life trying to force a bolder uphill.

Present each new idea or improvement to the world. If multiple people are saying, “Wow! Yes! I need this! I’d be happy to pay you to do this!” then you should probably do it. But if the response is anything less, don’t pursue it. Don’t waste years fighting uphill battles against locked doors. Improve or invent until you get that huge response.

“Hell yeah!” or “no”

This is something I’ve 100% adopted into my life.

We’re bombarded by time commitments and engagements. Seeing as time is the most valuable asset we have, Derek suggests we take the approach of rejecting anything which we aren’t super enthused about doing. Spend the time you have left innovating and working on things which really matter to you.

For every event you get invited to, every request to start a new project, if you’re not saying, “Hell yeah!” about it, say no. We’re all busy. We’ve all taken on too much. Saying yes to less is the way out.

No funding needed

Derek makes the point that most businesses don’t need a lot of cash to start up. Especially internet focused businesses can be started for usually < $500. A domain name is cheap, and there are plenty of services like Heroku or AWS which have free tiers you can take advantage of for server hosting.

By not raising a crazy amount of money at the beginning it gives you more optionality to switch gears, solve problems, and focus on satisfying the customer.