How do you deal with information overload? I have more than three e-mail accounts. Each have suddenly become a terror and time stealer! Each day, there are several mails from opt-ins and newsletters that I have subscribed to at one website or the other. Some webmasters are inconsiderate; they send as much as two e-mails per week to me. Those e-mails cannot be called spam, because I requested for them, however, they are not helping me because they are too many and the information they provide does not justify the time I spend reading them. Why is this so?
There are too many experts trying to teach one skill or the other which they claim they have mastered, especially as regards making money online. Unfortunately, we hardly get to see the physical proof that shows that those expert are what they claim to be (cooking up a fake picture of a cheque or fake video is not so difficult). Oftentimes, after reading tons of e-books on a particular subject, one gets more confused than enlightened on what is the best approach to tackling a challenge. This has taught me an important lesson (I am not afraid of sounding controversial), I carefully choose who I want to learn from!
Instead of spending hours reading e-mails, manuals and how-to e-books on Making Money Online written by self-professing gurus, I look around for two types of people to learn from.
- Experts who have earned a name in their area of expertise and are willing to teach others the tricks. These are not to be confused with those who assume the role of experts and use others manual to teach what they know nothing about.
- Newbies who are struggling with the same kind of issues I am struggling with but are willing to share, the little tips they have learned from prior mistakes. Since they have learned in a practical way how not to do it, I can easily avoid making the same mistake.
In my few months of working online, I have come to learn valuable practical lessons from people like Yaro Starak and Rich Schefren who are not just experts in their respective fields but are great teachers as well. I particularly appreciate Yaro’s style of teaching. He believes in sharing both his success and failure so that you can learn why he is making progress instead of you assuming that he is one lucky guy! He shares a lot of tips freely on his blog and his e-book Blog Profits BluePrint is a must for any new online entrepreneur. However, if you prefer having him as a personal mentor (which I highly recommend) you can join his Blog Mastermind Class (mind you, you need to part with some cash, but you can be rest assured that the result will justify the cost).
As a newbie with no cash to throw around, I often rely on free knowledge I acquire from fellow newbies. These are set of online entrepreneurs who are yet to make name online but are willing to share their trials and triumphs as they labor in their respective fields. The only disadvantage is that such information are not compressed. For example, it may take 2years to master an online strategy using free knowledge available online, while Rich Schefren will teach same strategy to you in a one-week class and you start seeing the result immediately. He is one guy I will love to sit in his class. You can have a taste of what he has to offer by reading his free e-book, the Manifesto.
So how do I deal with information overload? I choose who I want to learn from and ignore the rest. I am unsubscribing from all those opt-ins that I have crowding my email box. They have made me become less productive. One of my mentor told me earlier that I will not get better by visiting all the blogs of the successful online entrepreneurs, I will only get better by working on mine! I wish I had pondered over that simple statement before now.
How do you handle information overload? I sure will love to learn from you. Please share your tips in the comment section or refer to a post you made on this issue. Thanks for visiting.
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Tags: Blogging, Entrepreneurship, Tips and Tricks
I must say, I’m loving the new theme. First things I loved was how easy you made it for someone to subscribe to the site and also to advertise. I think considering your ridiculously high Alexa Ranking, all you need to do is market intensely for a month or two and get to a point where a couple thousand people pass by your site in a month, create an advertise page like Yaro has and you can begin making some nice passive income from this site while you create content and continue marketing.
Ok, now to read the article.
Ok, I have read the post. I actually wrote a post about this a while back called Stop Thinking and Reading! Do Something Instead!
I think the Internet has such low barriers to entry and so much information available that I would suggest that people can actually get started this very moment doing something. Just go online and select a means that you want to test out for example, affiliate marketing, which I did. Setting up a wordpress blog and paying for hosting is dirt cheap and you can immediately begin creating content, pulling products from clickbank and marketing on forums or blogs…..that’s just one way.
The main point behind this, is I agree with Tony 100%, you’ll only get analysis paralysis and info overload if you spend all your time studying. You should actually begin testing things in field and only study when you run into obstacles as to how to overcome those obstacles and keep on moving.
Btw, I am a member of Yaro’s Blog Mastermind and I have read the Blog Profits Blueprint….absolutely phenomenal life changing stuff. I can’t recommend them highly enough either.
Mwangi – the Displaced Africans last blog post..8 Things I Am Passionate About (The Mo Ma Meme) and Obama
Pal, you love the theme! Well considering the number of hours I have spent struggling to make it work, I am happy you love it.
I tend to get sidetracked even when I have my plan laid out. There are so many options when it comes to making money online. It does help to add some new info to the mix once in a while as long as you are still reaching for your goals, I think.
Stephan Millers last blog post..The Second of Three CommentLuv Blog Lists – 100 Blogs
Hi Naija,
Have you heard about the book named “the 4 hour work week” ?
It is a book by Tim Ferris. I think that you will like it.
If you have trouble finding it, you can drop me an email.
Greg Braves last blog post..The Original Lord of the Rings Ring
I second the four hour work week recommendation. Revolutionary piece of work that book.
Mwangi – the Displaced Africans last blog post..The First Ever Displaced African Survey
Hi Naija,
I think you’ve said what many of us feel. There is just too much information and it is important to be selective. Unfortunately, even the professionals hide much of the valuable information to themselves.