Rob & Melissa Stephenson from Flea Market Flipper talk about how to overcome analysis paralysis in your business.
Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fleamrktflipper/
Check out our FREE Workshop: https://courses.fleamarketflipper.com/flipper-university-workshop-webinar
You can find us at: https://fleamarketflipper.com/
How To Overcome Analysis Paralysis In Your Business
Rob: What's up, pro flippers? On today's episode we're talking about how to overcome analysis paralysis.
Rob: All right, guys. So on today's episode, one of the biggest problems that flippers and new flippers face is analysis paralysis.
Melissa: We actually just got off of a challenge that we did with a group of people, like trying to make your way to your first $250 from flipping and we had a blast with them.
One of the questions that we asked though was what is stopping you from making more money in your flipping business? And it's a very common theme that keeps coming up is analysis paralysis. And it could be like other words you use too, like you're overthinking too much before you dive into it, before you actually take action.
You're just, you're paralyzed in fear. Those can be a couple of the same things. So we just wanted to talk about it for a couple minutes on here because it shouldn't be something that stops you from making some money in this business. So.
Rob: If you are facing this, you are not alone. Like Melissa just said, there's a lot of people that deal with this.
We're going to try to help you combat this and overcome this with a couple key things that you can do to work past this analysis paralysis.
Melissa: Yeah. So to start, so what is exactly analysis paralysis? It's really like when you are like you see all of this stuff that needs to be done or you need to figure out all of the things before you actually take action and do the thing.
You need to know all the things about everything and every outcome that could happen and all the things that you could possibly know. And it's so much information or so much to think about that it paralyzes you. So, and you don't move forward. So how do we combat that?
Rob: Absolutely. And it is just like Melissa said, it's maybe you and you know how to do it, but you're scared to take that first step to do it.
And that's what you're, you're paralyzed by. You're stopped by is you know what to do, but you can't make yourself do it because you're just paralyzed with fear. So, these are some ways that you can totally get past this and get some results because our goal in this business is to make money. We want to make money to pay off debt, to go on vacation, to spend more time with your family.
There's so many reasons why we want to make this work. We just have to get you past that analysis paralysis.
Melissa: All right, so the first one, the first way that could help you get past this is number one is to find a coach or a mentor to help get you through that.
Rob: And this is awesome. This is a way Melissa and I do this every single year.
We have at least one or two coaches that we're paying to help us get results in our business, help us get better at flipping, help us get better at digital stuff. So we're always trying to move forward in both of our businesses. That is our goal as, as a coaches ourselves, but that is our goal to constantly be growing and getting better.
And you can't really do that unless you are coaching with somebody, unless you're following somebody, unless somebody is mentoring you, that's the way to do it.
Melissa: And it can be as simple as, I mean, it could be as much as like doing a full coaching program with somebody, or it can be as simple as reading a book, listening to a podcast like you guys are doing right now, which is very helpful.
We got to know a lot of mentors through podcasts like that. And then sometimes if we really liked somebody, we've reached out or we found ourselves in their program eventually down the, down the road because we really resonated with how they taught or, and yeah, what they taught. And so, and we really enjoyed the way that they taught.
So, we ended up in some of their coaching programs. So, or another way, is at conferences. So, this happened more than one time. We've listened to speakers, and then afterwards you're like I love what they're doing. I love their mission. Let's see if they'll coach us. So, we've done that on multiple occasions.
Rob: That's a fun fact.
So a couple of the coaches that we have hired to help us in our business, they have not been coaches. They actually spoke and they had results. So they're speaking on stage somewhere. We listened to the presentation, went up to them afterwards, introduced ourself, created that relationship with them and then asked them if they'd be willing to help us get better at our business.
And we've paid them to actually help us coach or paid them to coach us, in our business so we could grow. So, but that's a fun fact that they weren't actually coaches. They were just people who had results and talked about their results on stage somewhere. And we approached them and had them come into our business and really really help us.
Melissa: They were helping grow our blog or do Facebook ads or different things and we like, oh, they, they're pretty good at this. I wonder if they could totally help us out. So, and yeah, so that's how we ended up with those, those coaches. But if you can't hire a coach or you, I mean, podcasts are free books. You can get pretty cheap. But, if you, another way, if you don't have a coach or you don't have a mentor, is you can get an accountability partner.
Rob: So yeah, absolutely. Now this is, somebody you can find is a friend, a best friend, a spouse, a little bit harder with a spouse, but if you're aligned, well, if you're aligned, it will totally work. If you both are on the track to pay off debt or you're both on the track to do this and you want to help each other, stay accountable.
You can totally do a spouse, a best friend, a family member, somebody who knows what you're doing and somebody who wants to walk that journey with you. If you guys do it together. This will totally crush analysis paralysis because you can work off of each other. You can just join forces together to be able to move forward versus getting stuck where you're at.
Melissa: It's so much better to do it with somebody. Like we have our group that we do. So people are constantly, you know, it will do a listing challenge or helping each other out when there's a question. And if you do have, you know, that friend or family member, you can both be like, all right, how many items you're going to get listed this week?
Or, you know, and you have somebody to, to feed off of and to help you guys, you can make a game out of it. Like, are you competitive? Then, you know, I gotta be, I gotta list more items than they do. So you can make a game out of it. So hopefully, you know, help you get past that analysis process. So my next one would be, which is the hard one to do for a lot of people is let go of being perfect.
So this is something that is our, not superpower, but benefits that we are not perfectionists. Absolutely. You're actually more of a perfectionist than I am when it comes to like being clean and stuff and tidying up. You like things a certain way. I am. I'm more like, get the job done now. I'm a faster executor of things.
You will take time and you'll procrastinate or I, I'm like, get it done, get the work done, and I'm a hard worker. But neither of us are really perfectionists. And that probably is how we've been able to grow more and like do this podcast even started two years ago because we're not afraid of being imperfect.
Would you say that? No, for sure. So yeah. So you have to let go of being perfect because your business is not going to be perfect in the beginning. Like things are gonna, you know, you'll make mistakes. You don't have to know. That, okay, this listing, all the pictures have to be perfect, the description has to be perfect before I can list it.
You can always improve, like, there'll be always room for improvement. You know, obviously do your best that you can do, but it's only going to get better as you go, and as you learn more, and as you see what, like, you have more buyers on items when your pictures are brighter, or like, little things like that you learn over time from doing so.
And you'll learn how to use the platform, that's another thing, like, people get overwhelmed with. Like eBay, for example, like the shipping process and, and doing eBay, but you learn the most by doing so like knowing how to do it and learning how to do it, but not actually doing it. You're not going to absorb as much as actually doing it. So.
Rob: And you will get better. Like Melissa said, you will get better. The more you do something, just like anything. I mean, if you go back to listen to one of our podcasts in the beginning, Probably junkie. It was not that great, but now. Not that we're perfect by any means. No, we're still not perfect. But at the same time, we've learned, we've gotten better communication, even communication between us while we're doing a podcast.
It's one of those things that the more you do it, the better you're gonna get at it. So let go of that perfection that you, you have to be perfect with it. You just need to get in there and get it done. Get her done.
Melissa: That's it. So yeah, take messy action is another way to word that, and it's okay to make mistakes because you will make mistakes in this business, and that's okay, and that's another reason why we are big promoters on getting your stuff listed that's smaller items at first, smaller dollar items at first because you don't want to be making a $2,000 mistake once you get into those higher value items. Because they could happen, but, and people are always nervous of what if you get, you know, a mistake there, but start those mistakes now so you don't make those same mistakes when you get to those bigger value items.
Rob: Absolutely. Pro tip list 20 items that are 20 or less. When you're starting off, you want to get the whole process down from start to finish pictures, listings, fulfillment. Once it sells, you want to be able to box it up and ship it out. You want to totally get that stuff under your belt before you go to the next level and you want to make all the mistakes that you're going to make in the beginning.
You want to do it on those low dollar amounts before you get to a $1,000, $2,000, $5,000. That's what you really want to do is to make all the mistakes you possibly can.
Melissa: Yeah. So mistakes are good. So they're a good thing. Learning. You always learn. And then, you know, when you do make those mistakes, you don't typically make them again.
So, they're definitely a learning process. So hopefully this has a little bit been beneficial. If you deal with analysis paralysis, analysis paralysis, hopefully this can help you bust through. Let us know. Reach out to us on Instagram. Send us a DM. Let us know if that's something you struggle with and you're gonna work hard to bust through it.
Rob: That's it. You guys rock. We've had so much fun with you today. Cannot wait to see you on the next episode.