When I wrote about my failures last week, my intention was to show you that failing is perfectly normal and if you dig deep enough into any success story, it will be a journey full of failures and mistakes.
One thing I didn’t touch on much, however, was the idea of knowing when to move on – when to scrap an idea, consider it a learning experience and move to the next.
How do we know?
It can be extremely difficult to let go of an idea that we once had a ton of excitement for, especially if we’ve already devoted so much time and effort (and possibly money) into it.
Also, how do we know if all our idea really needs is just a little bit more time?
Today, I’d like to hand the baton to you and see what you think.
In the comment section, please share your thoughts and on Friday I’ll highlight some of the responses in a round-up post. If you have a website, please be sure to add it to the “website” field (not in your actual comment) so that I can link to it if your comment is featured.
This is a very important subject that I know is on a lot of people’s minds, so please share what you think because we’re all here to help each other!
Thanks, and I look forward to reading your responses!
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I just talked about this very topic yesterday… I think it’s important to look at what you’ve put in, how long you’ve been working, and be careful about your perception of HOW LONG it “should” take… I know it’s easy to be really excited, and then when you don’t experience immediate success you can get discouraged. Make sure before you decide to quit that you’re looking at the situation through “reasonable” expectations… it might be wise to actually run it by an IM friend or mentor, and get someone else’s take on the situation.
Jackie,
I think you bring up a great point of checking with someone before you quit. Having a mentor/friend to put a fresh set of eyes on something will also provide you a different perspective – where maybe they see one small thing you can change that can be the difference between the idea taking off and you quitting the idea. Nice insight!
I’ve thought about this a lot, and I think there’s at least a few easy ways to tell when it’s time to move on.
- You’re no longer excited about or fully committed to a project.
- You’ve made no progress in several months (or however long of a period you think makes sense).
- There are other projects that you’re more excited about that have more potential but need more of your time. The old project may be standing in the way.
It’s tough to figure this out and separate emotion to make a good decision. I’m curious to hear what others suggest for doing that, too.
That’s a great question…
IMO, it’s time to move on if the numbers aren’t right and if the passion/interest isn’t there AT ALL…
Numbers: When you finally learn how to do proper metrics and analysis and figured that even with the best case scenario, the site won’t make enough money to cover expenses and time…
Interest/Passion: When the idea of healthy profits still don’t motivate you to continue that project, it’s time to move on…
On the other hand, if you’re doing something out of interest, you’ll probably keep going whether or not it becomes profitable.
Dave
Dig it, man, thanks for asking the question.
I tend to have a fairly rigid mentality about continuing things or giving them up, and it’s pretty much based entirely on the idea of helping.
In my mind, money is only a byproduct of helping people and providing things that others need and want. The more helpful awesome stuff you provide, the more money you’ll get, right? Sort of a cause-effect viewpoint.
So I don’t really base the life of projects off a monetary goal (although I DO have monetary goals). I tend to base it more on, “Well, shit, I don’t seem to helping anybody out. It’s probably time to pull the plug.”
Or, “Yay! That girl’s email shows me that I’m on the right track and there’s value-to-others in what I’m doing. I’ll keep on it as long as that value exists.”
And I think in that equation are implications on product development, how you market things, finding a proper audience, etc. Admittedly this is a work-in-progress for myself, but I do know that I much prefer to work on stuff IF it’s helping others out. If not, it tends to feel like a waste of time for me, and the wind goes out of my sails fairly quickly.
Cheers, man! Keep it up…
I have very strong views on this topic.
First of all – how hard you have worked on a project in the past is entirely irrelevant when it comes to deciding whether or not you should scrap it. You need to remove all emotion from the process. There will be times when your objective mind is screaming at you to dump a project, whilst your subjective mind wants to keep going. In such situations, you are almost always better off listening to the voice of reason.
Secondly, I would much rather beat an idea to death than not commit myself fully. Always err on the side of trying for too long. Better to be 100% sure that you have given all you can to a project, than flit from one to the next without ever truly dedicating yourself.
I’d agree with that last part, but especially so in online endeavors: upfront cost is typically so low that even if you keep pursuing a “dud” the only thing you will most likely lose is time and a few dollars, it’s nothing like the decision of deciding when to abandon a brick-and-mortar business.
Trouble is, my time is what I value the most.
Some people are the radar and others are the laser. I’m the laser. I focus on one thing and see it through before being able to multi-task like a radar.
Always see it 110% through before giving up.
You move on when your tired of sleeping on the couch because you’ve spent your last penny and your wife hates you.
So true Kenneth. It might actually be long overdue if you’re in that situation but we all know how hard it is to give up on your ‘baby’
Haha, Kenneth, thats sad but true.
Tim von J,
See i’m torn because i also feel like you can achieve anything, so i don’t know about giving up. Sometimes it takes our last copper penny for people to see the passion behind our idea.
Tram Tran,
It is sad. Oh by the way i love your site.
Best regards,
Kenneth Ashley
I’ve experienced failure quite a few times and that normal for any business/idea. One way to know that it’s time to move on is by looking at our time and effort. If you are investing a lot of time but lack effort, the problem is in YOU, not the idea. You lack the DRIVE to make your idea successful. But if you are putting so much effort but only in a short period of time, the problem is in your lack of PATIENCE. To make any idea successful it helps to be PERSISTENCE. Any Idea need times and effort (planning, implementing, etc) and once you’ve used both with no results, you’ll know that it’s time to move on.
Hi Pat, I am just in the middle of such a problem.
I have been working on version 2 of my Pingback Power plugin and it isn’t really turning out as I envisioned it when I decided to invest in creating it a few months back.
I had one main feature that I wanted to include into the new version of the plugin (automation) and that specific feature is not working as I would have wanted it to work. The free version has been downloaded over a 1000 times and I got plenty of great feedback about it. That led me to the decision to go ahead and work on a new and much better version which will mainly address all the great suggestions I got from a survey I run among the early users of the plugin.
Just as you mentioned, I was so excited when I first created this plugin and I was even more excited to see how many people enjoy it and find it useful that it really kills me to not be able to complete the new version.
I already put in a lot of money into it (low 4 figures) and I know that in order to get it to where I want it to be I will probably need to find a new developer which will require me to invest more money and time without knowing if it will be worth it in the end.
I really think that there is a need for such a plugin in the market and I would love to have a great premium working plugin but I just don’t know if I should keep going or just give it up for now.
I guess I should thank you for posting this “ask the reader” post since I will probably get some answers that will help make a decision.
Thanks!
I am in a niche without competitors, without online products and advertisers. I nevertheless feel that there is an opportunity.
So, i am not sure if i need to stay. My problem in my niche sports, is that it is overwhelmed with big sites like yahoo, sports illustrated etc…. So to get a good page ranking is extremely difficult. I guess that’s the reason why it’s difficult to get traffic, leads etc…
I would be worried about spending time and money on a niche without competitors. If you can identify your unique selling proposition/purple cow/niche within a niche, then you’ll attract people no matter how bad your rankings compare to Yahoo!, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, etc. Be yourself and find your voice.
Great question! And so timely right now. When we first started our business, we kept running into roadblocks and I just kept reminding my partners about the guy who went during the gold rush to claim his piece. Got a quick promise of gold, then sunk a lot more money into the project after borrowing from friends and family. After weeks of not finding anymore, he sold his rights and the equipment and left. The guy he sold it all to later found out that he was just by 3 feet away from finding the gold (Napolean Hill’s Think and Grow Rich). But it’s not practical to just keep digging without a plan-even if you do miss it by 3 feet There is a psychological shift that happens when you tell yourself, I will try this for X amount of time or X amount of money. If I don’t hit my goal, I have to quit and move on to something else. This is what Seth Godin advocates and what we finally realized we will be testing for the holiday season. If we don’t sell X amount of our product, it’s time to finally move on.
When the costs and risks are not in sync
When you are sacrificing what you have for what you don’t have
If I’m considering scrapping something BEFORE I’ve launched it because the cost (either time or money) appears to be prohibitive, then I make sure to ask myself the following question first:
Is there ANY way I could launch a “Beta” version of this thing and see what actual customers think?
Even if it’s real rough around the edges, or the support infrastructure doesn’t scale, or it still needs a ton of work before being finished, I try very hard to get even a shadow of the idea in front of a living breathing customer.
Revenue and actual customer feedback are the most illuminating and transformative things for most businesses. I try not to scrap anything until I’ve had a chance to hear from them.
holy cow… this is a question i have wondered about for a long, long time. no doubt we all wonder and ask ourselves questions about the validity of our ideas.
what i have concluded is, you have to trust your gut. there is a real power in trusting your gut and intuition.
i have started to read the book “as a man thinketh” again and there is a particular part that says:
“man hods the key to every situation, and contains within himself that transforming and regenerative agency by which he may make himself what he wills. man is the master, even in his weakest and most abandoned state”
what i take from that is we all know, deep down when it is time to let go. the hard part is trusting our gut and following the instinct. no matter how hard it is to make the decision to let go of an idea and look at it from the perspective of what you learned and gained rather than that you failed at this idea.
Working a full-time day job, having 3 going on 4 children, and building a board game publishing business puts significant strain on my resource of time. It is important to remember at any point in time, you have a fixed and committed number of resources. It could be measured in hours of work, dollars invested, or emotional drain.
So, as I pursue any project, it is important to project the fixed and sunk costs onto what will be needed to finish the project. Then, there is the question of maintenance efforts, final results, and integration into an existing platform. This should be compared to the value of the efforts you could spend elsewhere.
While I am very interested in Internet based marketing and feel that I am very good at it (to the point where I often think I should teach it), I have to remember that I am over 2 years into building a successful game publishing business. My efforts on the game publishing side are amplified by my existing platform. Additionally, when I continue to build aspects of that business, the results of my previous efforts are amplified.
Smart Passive Income is a good example, of how Pat has done this. Pat decided that he wanted to start doing podcasts, months after declaring that, he started. As he saw the benefit of the podcasts he continued. For me, I personally do not like to listen to podcasts, but it opened up the brand to a wider audience. He has to continually make the decision to continue with the podcast, thankfully at this time, that decision is easy to make.
When it came to abandoning the Wordpress plugins, I am confident he made the choice by a similar method. A choice that getting it right at this point would cost too much and the ongoing maintenance of selling it too high when compared to the income and brand build from finishing it.
Then again, maybe a non-commercial version that is stripped of many of the bells and whistles desired would make sense to build and give away. Once again, for the brand build and links that would result. A choice that was probably considered.
So, while at any point in time the decision to continue needs to be reassessed, the method of implementation also needs to be considered. If you have done the work and are 80% of the way there, then could you release the 80% effort version and still get significant positive impact?
These are the questions I ask myself before abandoning something. However, at this time, I usually stop myself before I even get on the path by remembering where I have decided to concentrate my efforts.
I think it’s important to examine your original goal and what drove you to think it was such agood idea in the first place. Remember the spark you had when you started. Is it still there? If not, listen to your gut. If it says “man that was such a good idea!” then look to keep going and make it better. If it says “yeah, well that seemed like a good idea then”, perhaps it’s time to move on. If th spark is gone for that project, and if the passive income is small but regular, then keep going and earn money while it lasts. If the income isn’t worth it, or the state of the project doesn’t reflect your brand anymore, then dump it and move on. I think it was Walt Disney who was paraphrased in “Meet the Robinsons” as saying ” keep moving forward”. Seems like a good plan!
Obviously its very difficult to break the emotional connection that you have with a site or project that you feel passionate about. The people that just dismiss this are ignoring human nature and the need we have to succeed in our life’s endeavors. With some people it takes a real kick in the pants to convince them. Whether this is a financial, personal, or familial hit varies, but eventually…eventually it dawns on them to cut bait and run.
If we didn’t have that persistence to make things work we wouldn’t be entrepreneurs, but to let go, that’s something that many of us have to learn painful as it may be.
There are tons of reasons that would be enough for me to quit what I was doing.
-Getting bored AND not seeing results
-Found another opportunity with GUARANTEED results (this is a tough one)
-It is getting in the way of more important things (ie Family)
Those are just the three on the top of my head, but I’m sure there are tons more.
The challenge is when you aren’t having any of these things going on. What I mean is that you enjoy what you are doing, you aren’t seeing better opportunities out there, you family life is great, and you are seeing results and improvement.
It’s funny that you wrote this post because I’ve been having issues with this for a while. I can’t even remember how many projects I started and gave up on, or just moved to something else.
What I’m leaning towards is making sure that you give EVERYTHING a shot for at least a little while. If you don’t have enough time (read data) to figure out if you should pivot or persevere, then you shouldn’t be doing what I have been doing and starting something else or giving up.
On the other hand, once you find something that knocks it out of the park, you will definitely know. If you love what you do, are seeing results that are improving over time. I say stick with it.
The only time you should quit is when you aren’t passionate about it and you aren’t seeing your results improve.
A great resource to check out for knowing when to “pivot or persevere” is a book called The Lean Startup by Eric Reis. I’m right in the middle of it now and it’s AWESOME.
The book mostly focuses on “regular” startups that sell products, but I know it is relevant to blogging and the like.
At the moment I’m more struggling with the idea of when it’s time to move on from the concept of 9-5, than a particular niche or ill performing business.
I’m a big fan of passive income and am struggling with the weight of security, pension and solid pay with the freedom of building things that can make me wealthy, give me more time with family and live a simpler and happier life.
Often people drop the traditional line that it’s time to move on when you start asking yourself if it’s time to move on. I don’t think it’s that simple with leaving the 9-5. No great entrepreneur became who he/she was without taking risks, but am I being too selfish to risk the financial security of my family by wanting to go out on my own?
Neither can be promised forever and sometime you can never know when is the right time; you just close your eyes, take a deep breath and tuck in your junk.
Thanks for a creating a great forum for like-minded individuals.
I’ve been in the Internet marketing game for 1 year now and I’ve only managed to make $400.
With that being said, I’ve failed a lot. However, I’ve come to realize that my business ventures weren’t failures at all. Instead they were simply the results I didn’t want. I still got a result, just wasn’t the one I’d expected.
It’s always a good idea to step outside of the box and examin your current situation. Each project takes time, effort, and 100% commitment. But like poker, you have to know when to fold and cut your losses. There’s always another hand to play.
I’ve failed way more times than I have succeeded in life, and business.
The big thing with me is that money can be made. I mean, you spend it, you make it. And the cycle continues. Time, however… Once you spend your time, its gone forever.
My feeling on ‘moving on’ is that once you feel that you’ve spent the amount of time on a certain project that you needed to, to make it happen – and it hasn’t happened – its time to move on. Or, at least pass the baton onto someone else to hold and run with for a while longer, before completely quitting on the idea.
I actually recently did this, passed the baton on, and allowed one of my staff to run with an idea I had worked on, on and off, for around 3 months without any major success. She did a great job, and we’ve since decided to pick things up a little and give it one more whirl… This time around, because of the things that have happened since she was running with it, I feel we’ll hit the mark.
Moving on is a state of mine for some. For others its defined by a movement. A real movement. Sometimes in another direction. The most important thing is that you do whats right for YOU, and for your time.
A life is a precious thing to waste.
I like the idea of giving it up once you’ve spent the time you think is enough to make it work.
That might bring up a whole new question about how much time that should be, but I think most people can figure that out.
I totally agree with you about time also. Time is probably the most valuable thing on the planet. Everyone wants it and no one has enough of it.
Now, if I could just get that time machine up and running again…
This is an incredibly important and rich question with – let’s face it! – no single or easy answer.
Presumably we’re talking about a case where one has
– already invested significant time/energy/money
– has lost (at least some) passion for the pursuit
– isn’t seeing the progress expected/hoped for, and
– is feeling unclear as to how to proceed.
(If one has little investment, is passionate, is satisfied with progress, and/or has a clear plan, one wouldn’t be considering quitting!)
I’d say:
– Ignore your time/energy/money investment to date; instead focus on assessing the investment you think may still be required, and line that up against what you really have available/are willing to commit to moving forward.
– If you’re no longer passionate, either find a way to rekindle your passion or get out!
– Revise your expectations (since they haven’t manifested anyway); if you can make peace with the new expectations stay at it, otherwise get out.
– If you’re unclear as to next steps, ***do whatever it takes to GET clear***
I think this last one is often the key issue, and it’s easy to dodge it – consciously or unconsciously – because it can be very hard work and take some time and real soul-searching to find. But having a clear path, at least the next few small steps, will ALWAYS increase your desire to stick with it.
Lastly, in all of the above, make sure the answers are coming from your brain, heart, AND gut combined. They each have important things to say, and can also each mislead you when considered in isolation.
Just look at what’s coming: Rewards and costs. If your outlook turns negative then cut and run, that’s it. When it’s an idea sometimes it’s hard to forecast these things, and we all heard of cases where someone else picked up another’s “failed” idea to make it work spectacularly. Heck, I’ve even created things that didn’t go anywhere for me but someone else came across the same idea a couple of years later and it’s working great for them. In those cases I think I cut too early. You have to keep the faith a bit, but if it’s a financial numbers thing then quit when the numbers turn against you.
It is really all about risk management. All enterprises have a risk of failing and you need to take that into account when starting out. Before launching into something I always think about what will I consider a success.
Success can be hard to measure. It could be a certain income over a period of time. It could be something else, like a certain number of page hits or something. The trick is to find some measurable. There has to be an objective measure and you must take your emotions out of the decision point.
Next I decide what I am willing to invest to hit that success goal – thinking in terms of time, money, emotional investment, and think about what I am not going to do to get this project done. When I’ve hit the investment limit it’s decision time.
If I’ve hit it right I’ll achieve success before I hit my investment limit. Then it is time for a celebration and think about the next goal.
If I’ve hit my investment limit before I achieve success it’s time for a reevaluation. At this point I’ll ask questions like – did I try hard enough? Was the idea right? Would a different investment model push this over to success? How close am I to success? Could a little push put me over the top? Have I lost passion for the project?
During the process it should become clear whether or not the idea is a failure. Before declaring failure I would talk to a mentor or trusted adviser just to make sure that my thinking is right and that I am not making a totally emotional decision (either to quit or to continue).
For example, right now I’ve got a blog going. I get few hits and make no money at it. But it has been a success for me because the goal was to invest almost no money (I’ve spent maybe $25 so far), to consistently write new posts and test if I’d have the passion and “stick-to-itness” to keep it up over a long stretch of time. I still have a full time career that I enjoy and make good money at but know that at some point I’d like to do something else so I’m taking some time to learn, try, test and see if I really have the passion to keep something going. So far I am succeeding at learning – which is my goal this year.
I know it’s time to let go of an idea when I feel like I’ve done all I can and nothing else can happen with an idea/site. I usually end up selling the site and sometimes, that’s the best thing you can do because then you can see how someone else can take your idea and run with it. You can see all the possibilities if they get the site off the ground. It sounds ridiculous but the one thing I learned when I started building sites and selling them – everything is a learning experience and we should take away any lessons possible so that we can do better next time.
You are asking for a specific answer, but a lot of responses I see are wishy-washy, in the flavor of “when you run out of passion”, “when you can’t do anything else”, and others that are pretty vague. I’ll try to be more specific.
First, I never flat-out kill a project. I prefer to “table” it. Maybe the timing isn’t right, or I’m missing some key insight that will pull everything together. Put it aside and maybe look at it once a year to see if you have a new perspective on it.
Now, when to table a project? I first make sure with every project I can answer these questions in 1-3 sentences:
1) What problem am I solving?
2) How am I solving it?
3) Who cares?
A lot of problems with seemingly dead projects go back to not having clear answers to these questions. I’m assuming henceforth you have answers and they are satisfactory (note: instinct does come into play at this point, but it’s a good idea to run it by a few trusted individuals as well. Your gut will play tricks on you.)
If you have promising answers to these questions then tabling a project basically comes down to a mix between resources and constraints. Resources are time, money, personnel, other viable ideas, etc., and constraints are hard limitations on these resources. Not to sound too unexciting, but moving on basically comes down to a calculus of these variables and just making a call. For example, if you have another viable idea in the pocket and your current project is stalled out due to a technical hurdle, and you have a hard deadline looming ahead, then you may need to table the current project and make headway on another. No one can tell you an exact answer that will hold in all situations since circumstances vary, but again, it’s good to have trusted individuals to ask for advice.
This one was a little hard for me. When you’ve spent long hard hours… let’s be honest… I really mean months… on something that just doesn’t work, it’s not always easy to admit that it just wasn’t a good idea. After all, that’s “your baby” and who wants to face the fact that nobody else was able to “catch the vision” of the beauty of your baby.
I can recall a time or two that I just refused to accept defeat. I’d beat that project into the ground, dig it up again, try giving it new wings… beat it to the ground again… you get the picture. I’d be on a cycle that seems like it would never end. And at the end of the day (or year), nothing.
I remember one point where I was second-guessing almost everything I did. I kept confusing ‘scrapping a bad idea and starting with something new’ with ‘don’t quit because quitters never win’. But, once I was able to tell the difference between the two, I started to save a lot of time (and money too). I also learned the value of better evaluation of a project before I ever started.
I certainly haven’t perfected this issue, but I’m a lot further along than I use to be. Thanks for this post. It reminded me that other successful people have had their failures too!
Seth Godin wrote a short book called THE DIP about this very question. It is a quick read with a powerful message.
The premise is this:
Sometimes it is important to quit what you are doing and focus your efforts on something you can be the best at in the world (or at least the best in your niche). With laser focus on what you are best at, push through the dip (the challenging time when we need to work harder, invest more time and money, and overcome the adversity that others are unable to overcome) and become the best.
A similar concept comes from Jim Collins’ book GOOD TO GREAT. He calls it the Hedgehog Concept and I think it offers an important set of questions we should ask ourselves before jumping into any niche (or leaving it for another):
1. What can I be best in the world at?
2. What am I passionate about?
3. What drives my economic engine?
As internet marketers we know that so many things are possible with a website or blog, but we often fail to ask ourselves if we can really translate that possibility into a reality. My advice: follow your passion, focus on what sets you apart from the rest of the world, and most of all, do the things that can impact the most people in a positive way.
Awesome post Jared. Both Seth and Jim are a couple of my favorite authors.
Great point about THE DIP. I read this post in my reader and wanted to come over and mention that book, but it looks like you beat me to the punch. Great summary and a great book.
I ask myself the following:
How off from the center am I in regards to area of competency and interest?
What’s the ROI in narrowing the gap between that distance? Is it worth my time? Is it worth my family’s time?
Will I learn something meaningful that will be applicable later?
Am I even interested in continuing?
What am I ultimately trying to achieve?
I actually went through this process not too long ago when I was going to back to school for a master’s degree- I took a couple of courses, then paused, then said forget it! I’d rather learn on my own and pay for course created by real world experienced professionals who go out there and just crush it on a daily basis.
Not only is failure an option, if you are an entrepreneur, you MUST be prepared to fail; fail early, fail often, fail cheaply and always improve.
I had a $20K per month business that failed and the lessons that it taught me led me on a completely different path. I’ve linked to the information with my name.
I wrote a blog post in March called, “Why Quitters Sometimes Win” and listed the following three questions that help me figure out when it’s time to quit.
1. If I persevere, am I learning something or progressing toward a goal? Or, put another way, what will I have if I persevere through this situation that I couldn’t have gained in another way?
2. If I persevere, will I be harming myself emotionally or physically?
3. Am I persevering for a purpose or just because I’m afraid of what people will think if I quit?
I always have a hard time with this one. I spent the last year building one specific project, and it had worked amazingly well for the first couple of months, but then growth stagnated and I was not gaining any more traction in my niche.
I ramped up work on the project, and still no luck. After 3 months, I hadn’t seen a increase (and after the Panda update my traffic dropped 30%) so after much consideration, I decided to drop the project and move on. Its not easy, but the way I look at it, I’ve done all this work, it only costs me pennies to keep online and it still makes me a couple hundred $$ a month.
I feel bad the project didn’t succeed, but I’m taking it as a sign to move on to the next project (which started ranking almost immediately). Its a learning process, and as you said in your last post about failure, you can learn a lot from failing.
Thanks Pat! Your insights have been invaluable to my business!
For me, you know its time to move one when the balance of the following equation turns negative. If you feel like your time spent on a project is 80% work you’re not enjoying or higher, it is time to move on. The ideal is that every project for me is 80% or more enjoyment, and less than 20% work.
I’m not saying its not work, I’m just saying you should enjoy the work and it shouldn’t feel like work. If it is feeling like your drudging through just to do it, it probably isn’t the right project for you.
Having just finished “The 4 hour work week” — I think this is particularly important. Every few weeks/months/years, we all need to step back and reevaluate our goals, projections, etc and eventually cull the herd of it’s weakest members and move on.
The issue I think becomes more prevalent in our first journey into internet marketing and we make that first site we use as the test bed to see if we can make any money, or if we’re really cut out for it. That first one is always so much more personal than when you have 5, 10, or more sites.
As I’m about to start my first site…this is a great time for me to think about the situation NOW, rather than 6 months of sleepless nights down the road wondering what I need to do to get it moving. It’s probably a good idea with any project is to (I know…cliche here) start with the end in mind, and have some roadmaps to the finish point, and when you’re not meeting your goals, you have a set bail out point.
For some, that’s a timeframe…IE: if it doesn’t work in 1, 3, 6 months, then I’ll move on. For others, it’s monetary. Putting a limit on how much you’re going to spend on advertising and traffic generation helps as well, less we become tempted that “one more campaign” will finally put us over the edge, and we’ll continue chasing that edge forever.
So…for the TL;DR folks:
Set milestones and goals
Evaluate progress
Find that ‘bail out point’
Don’t look back
One thing I try to do is take my expectations of how long something *should* take to happen, multiply it by 2-3 times and then go that long before I decide if an idea should be scrapped
A lot of the time, though, it’s about a gut feel. I think all of us know deep down inside whether we’re on the right path, or whether we’re investing time and effort into something that’s a bad fit for any one of a number of reasons (poor timing, wrong skill set, bad expectations, etc).
I told this story on my site, but when I was in college, I decided to launch a silk flower design business. Never mind that,
a) I had no experience in the floral arts,
b) I was a college kid with three other part-time jobs,
c) I had next-to no money to invest in supplies, and
d) I knew absolutely nothing about how to break into the competitive wedding industry…
Needless to say, it was a huge failure, and even though it took me a few years before I was willing to admit how wrong I was (and finally dump my excess inventory off at the Salvation Army), if I’m being honest with myself, I had a gut feeling the whole time that it wasn’t the right fit for me.
I think it takes time to learn what that gut feeling means (and even longer to learn to respect it), but for me, it’s one of the best indicators of whether or not a project will be successful – even if it hasn’t yet started to pay off.
I think that’s a great point Sarah. The only way to know what your ‘gut’ is telling you is to look at what its told you in the past.
One thing I’ve noticed with many of my projects is that when I first launch them I get a sense of how well a new project is going to do almost immediately. Assuming you have a marketing plan of some sort before you launch, when you do launch it usually seems pretty obvious pretty quickly if things are going to work out. Now I’m not saying the project has to be a home run out of the gate, but if you look at your ROI and listen to your customers the future starts to become quite clear.
I’ve especially noticed this with sites where I was planning on driving traffic using PPC campaigns. When I start a new PPC campaign if it’s not at least 80% there it’s never going to be a winner. You can tweak that last 10% or 20%, but anymore than that and you’re just trying to polish a turd, which doesn’t work.
Short and simple: When you don’t feel like getting up in the morning for your old ‘thing’ any more.
I wrote about this exact question back in August, when I was asking it myself. I’ve linked the full post (Perseverance: How to Keep Going, and How to Know When to Stop) from my name, but here were my criteria:
1. Am I doing any good?
2. What’s it costing me, and can I continue to afford that?
3. Am I personally getting a benefit?
4. What would be the cost of stopping?
5. What’s the emotional context of wanting to give up?
6. Am I seeing any success at all?
7. If I keep going at this level, is that OK, or do I have to make it big?
Obviously, I decided to keep going, but I think it’s good to review these questions from time to time about whatever it is we do.
When to move on is a tough question, because you don’t want to move on too soon and potentially leave a what could have been something great in the dust, but you also don’t want to linger on something that just isn’t going to work for you no matter what. The trick is being able to tell the difference between the two.
For me, it depends in part on what the idea means to me. If I’m determined to invent a teleporter and I’ll always regret giving up the idea even if I never succeed, I’m going to keep at it anyway, and enlist all the help I can find.
If it’s something that not an obsession/lifelong dream, then I’ve got some general guidelines. First I look to see if anyone else has has success with a similar project. If they have, chances are I could too. If not, it may be tougher — or even something I’ll put a time, effort, or money limit on.
In general, I think that if you’ve either reached your self-imposed limits, or have exhausted all the avenues you and others that you’ve brainstormed with can think to try, it’s time to move on. In the case of something that you don’t have much passion for, I’d argue that you shouldn’t be wasting your energy on it in the first place. But if you are passionate but just discouraged or distracted, regroup and press on.
If you aren’t passionate about your idea, then it’s time to move on. In my opinion, that’s all that really matters. You can run the numbers and see you aren’t making money and may never make money, but if you are still passionate about what you are doing then you won’t be able to totally abandon that idea. You may end up putting it on the back burner, but you will continue to think of that idea if you are passionate about it. Now you may lose passion for something because you aren’t making money on it, and I would say it would be time to move on. Without passion, you it will be difficult to produce a quality product or quality content.
Simple, if you need money then sell it, if you have money sitting in the bank then continue working on your project. We’re all here for the same reason.
Great question and I was wondering when or if I was going to come across a post that addresses this. For me personally, I have four niche sites up. Sniper blogs. When I first started I didn’t have “expert status” when it comes to niche choosing so I ran with doomsday 2012 as I knew 40K people were typing in my targeted keyword and not too many good looking sites ranking. The other one is giving up weed (I know right?, who’d want to give it up? jokes) and currently thanks to your backlinking strategy that works for the 2012 I went from page 38 to page 1-2…still trying to get the numbers up traffic wise and writing more content etc…I only have year left for that because it’ll be 2012 !! Anyways, I’ve been banging away at them for several months and no sales or money made yet. I won’t quit though because I feel I’m close and often times it’s the last key of the bunch that opens the door so I’ll keep going. Learning all the time helps too because through trial and error, you learn for the next one. Just my thoughts.
I think “letting go of an idea” can be an extremely dangerous thing, let me explain…
In my personal experience, I always had the idea, or dream of getting on the CBS Reality TV Show Big Brother. I started applying when I was 21. I was rejected twice by CBS when applying and there was a time when I battled with letting the idea go, of getting on the show. After 3 years of trying to get on the show, I finally made it, and it changed my life forever.
The point is there were many times I could have quit, or let my dream go, but I battled through it and kept after it because I believed that I could do it.
I say letting your idea got is a dangerous thing because once you start doing that, it becomes a habit of essentially quitting. Once you quit once, it becomes easier the second time. If you believe in something strongly enough, you can always find a way to get it done.
This is a question that we all have trouble with. Even experience marketers like myself. To be honest, there’s really no way to know exactly when to say, STOP.
People tend to fall in love and get so attached to the idea, which can be a huge mistake.
What I always say is that with a little bit of time and experience, you’ll develop a knack for it. You’ll start to see patterns, you’ll figure out how long it’ll take you to see results. No necessarily money, but the things you’ve been working on like backlinks, rankings, and traffic.
It also depends on what you’re doing too. If it’s lead generation, squeeze page conversions, etc. then that can be done fairly quickly. With a few solo ads you can see results pretty fast and you can determine whether to proceed or not.
With niche sites and seo stuff, well it takes a bit longer.
Either way, with time and experience you’ll learn when to say go, and when to say stop.
Hope this helps
Moving on from a failed project is like breaking up with your highschool sweetheart. NO breakup is easy, especially with those you devote your love, time( and possibly $$$) into. You know you gotta be the dumper when
1/ your mum tells you you should end it (she may not knows how to use a laptop but she knows YOU and if a project( or bf/ gf) is eating you alive, mother knows best)
2/ you stop feeling the love ( you don’t want to spend time together( either with your projects or partner)
3/ he/ she doesn’t love you back in 12 months ( In this case, the projects don’t produce any sufficiant products). 1 year is a safe milestone to decide to stay or move on.
LIFE MOVES ON! you will find the love of your life( or in this case the perfect projects that love you back)
#Peace#
Tram Tran,
I like the comparison. I would agree, i think 12 months is a perfect milestone to gauge leaving it or keeping it.
Keep up the good work!
Kenneth Ashley
Great question Pat and one I personally faced just recently. I posted about it here http://thekickstartbiz.com/business/big-wake-up-call-stop-the-bs/
For me, it’s time to move on when the joy has gone. When you stop loving what you’re doing and realize you’re doing things because you think you should instead of because you want to.
Moving on doesn’t mean giving up though. It means finding the next thing and learning as much from what didn’t work as what did.
How do you know anything? The truth is you don’t know for sure. But, when the passion is gone it’s time to move on. It’s that simple. Rationalize with your head along the way but follow your heart or you will miserable.
I don’t believe in failures. They’re not isolated events of failure they are part of the journey to success on your own personal terms. That’s not a cliche, it’s true. “Failure” is a label, why use it? You can also label it “learning”, “adventure”, “exploration”, “searching”, “discovery”, “sorting the wheat from the chaff” etc, etc… Why use the most negatively loaded label when the truth of the matter is it’s ALL part of the journey, a continuum of experiences and none of it is wasted if your cause, your heart and your goal is true.
I thought that it’d be a great idea (just one month after starting my first ever blog) to create another blog about green ideas for athletes. Although I still think it’s a good idea, I realized I mostly wanted to create this site for the money I thought it could make me.
What made me scale back was realizing that I was stressing about it endlessly, instead of enjoying it. I’m simply not ready to put in the effort required to keep a new idea like mine alive with the necessary hours of research and writing it would need to be successful.
So, I decided to roll some of those ideas into my existing personal blog. If things change in the future, I might re-think my plan but do you know how I know I made the right choice? I felt so much better immediately after thinking about scaling back.
If anyone is guilty of “hanging on too long”, I am. It is very hard for me to call it quits.
But over the past year I had to consciously place a value on my time.
I know – lots of successful internet marketers have many, many sites. Some are big, some are small – and the claim is that not every site requires a lot of time commitment.
But that rule doesn’t apply to me. Everything I do online has a learning curve. So as I started growing a portfolio of sites, the time involved was far more than the return.
I knew I had to scale back.
I am in the process of getting rid of sites with topics that do not interest me and that do not produce.
It is just not worth the sacrifice.
My first reasons is when I have no idea again how to increase my blog value and income. The second reason is when I have no time to maintenance and have another online business.
Hey Pat.
Hope you are well.
I wrote about this issue twice before and the comments from the readers were far better than anything I could come up. The articles were:
Why Blogging is a Waste of Your Time
http://www.blogtyrant.com/why-blogging-is-a-waste-of-your-time/
How Do You Know When You’re Cooked.
http://www.blogtyrant.com/how-do-you-know-when-youre-cooked/
Hope they help.
Tyrant
Hey Tyrant, thanks for the helpful links! I’m sure the comments are just as good as the ones I’m seeing here too. Good stuff, thanks!
Really tricky question today Pat. I’m basically stumped. I would say that instead of abandoning of total idea or website. You go for a different strategy instead. Like if SEO isn’t working. Go for Social Media. Now as far as the time that you switch strategies. I have no clue. When you have a feeling it won’t work. I don’t know Pat, you got me!
This is an interesting question, and I think one that all entrepreneurs will have their own answer for.
I’ve, “moved on” from several business ventures, both offline and online. And the defining moment for me is when my heart is no longer in it. It’s usually that I’ve come to the realization the idea isn’t going to work. Either that, or I discover I’m not really passionate about it anymore.
If I no longer truly believe in what I’m doing, it doesn’t matter how much I persevere, I know that I’ll eventually quit or fail somewhere down the road. So I save myself the time, energy and money and move on to something else right away.
“Moving on” is usually seen as the point of failure, but to me it’s a point of opportunity because I’ve gained a lot of invaluable knowledge from the experience that will help me succeed in my next endeavor.
It gives me confidence and brings excitement when I, “move on”.
Great question Pat. I know that this is something most of us struggle with on a recurring basis. For me it’s simple. It comes down to these key points:
– Don’t make a personal judgement
– Don’t become married to an idea
– Don’t take it personal
– Let the market do the talking
– Let the numbers make the decision for you (if the CTR is 1 in 200 or 0.5% minimum, it’s a good indication to give it a go)
– Choosing ‘NO’ for an idea is not necessarily bad. It was however, just an idea (and saying ‘NO’ could save you more in the long run. Don’t be afraid to say no if the numbers don’t support your idea)
– The reality is that most ‘ideas’ don’t work…and that’s ok.
– If you end up making a ‘NO’ decision that’s ok. You could always end up selling what you have on Flippa or Sedo and recoupe your costs, and quite possibly more.
Finally I leave you with this quote: “Success is not built on success. It’s built on failure. It’s built on frustration. Sometimes its built on catastrophe.” Sumner Redstone
Don’t be afraid to say NO!
Keep up the great work Pat!
Cheers,
–Jayson
There is a quote I read recently,
“Success is –
Idea – 5%
Execution – 95%”
I think its absolutely true. Even if a bad idea is executed with passion, hard-work and diligence, the project cannot become a failure and moving on does not become an option.
Totally agree with you Raj
Its difficult to let loose when you are tied emotionally to the project. I once let loose on a few domains in my educational niche I started to develop for different language markets – couldn’t see any profit, not even near break-even for 2 years, so I let the domains expire. They were instantly snatched by someone else, but when I check them nowadays I only see parked domains with no backlinks (the old ones that pointed to my site were taken down by their owners when they encountered that they linked to just ads), no alexa ranking. So my decision probably was right – no money/success in the short/medium term.
But deciding when to trash a project is difficult.
I usually write down a short business plan that I refer to and update during the lifetime of the project. If the project runs off track, I investigate the reasons and evaluate if a change in strategy or tactics would get me back on track.
Keeping track of your earnings and cost (money and time) is also mandatory and if you run out of budget (like in my above example) and have no alternatives -=> TRASH IT.
It’s easy to come up with new ideas since our brain is always working. The next step is the most important, will the new idea work? Do you have the resources, time, patience, and desire to work out the new idea. If you can’t answer these then it’s probably just a good idea but needs more refinement or it’s just something that will just live in your dreams.
From my personal experience i can tell that, whenever a blog is being created, the owner is really passionate about the niche and is very much hopeful to be successful. However, the internet world is harsh enough not to value this emotion and almost 90% of the time the situation becomes completely opposite.
My advice is to let an idea to go after trying for it at least one year. If someone is really trying hard and couldn’t pull the site up enough, it is quite clear that either the niche, the site, it’s elements have problems or the owner still have a lot to learn.
For me, I am have a more patient than what is practical. I am still trying with the site (under my sig.) i have built for the fast time in my life. Its been close to 2 years already and all i have is around 150 visitors a day and barely $30 a month revenue.
I havn’t went through leaving a site yet actually. But I must work on it because now i know this is reality. SPI has helped me a lot about learning a million of things and I am really greatful to my friend who referred me here. Oh and thanks to Pat too.
I think it’s crucial to establish a goal, perhaps a monetary goal. It has to be realistic and if you don’t meet the goal then it’s probably a good idea to move on. If you have to play the game there are two things you got to know:
1. Learn the rules and,
2. Learn WHEN to quit.
In my case, I’ve been running my website for two months, and every month I set various goals, from URL goals to conversion goals, and so far I’ve been meeting my expectations. But if at a certain point my website stops doing what’s supposed to be doing, I’ll just move on. This is a business, so falling in love with projects or ideas isn’t the best way to go about it.
Dan and Chris hit the home run – it’s all about passion and excitement. Dan didn’t give up on the reality show because the passion was still alive. This was the basis for not cutting the dream loose. Chris put it perfectly – it’s a passion game – if you aren’t passionate or excited how do you think that is going to read through to your readers/followers? Words, ideas and advice all carry energy whether it is positive, negative or even manufactured I believe the reader will catch that energy. When you are no longer excited to share a message, idea and it has been a chore don’t share your misery with others.
I think when you cannot get the results that you envisaged in the set time frame, then you must move on to do something different.It does not necessarily mean moving away from the project but doing something that you have never done before to produce the required results.
If you don’t FEEL IT, drop it.
Well, this is kind of a hard question, in my opinion, there is no way 100% when it’s okay to quit, because what if you pushed a little more and the idea/project would work out?
If you’re playing the SEO game, then you sort of quit when you reach a certain result, position, goal and then move on, however, in SEO there’s no end to the work that can be done.
I am in this position myself, I’ve been battling with Google trying to rank my web site for 6 months for some nice buying keywords, and I succeeded only for like a week, due to recent Panda update all the rankings went down significantly.
I am not sure why this particular web site went down, I was following the same path as other site I have, they didn’t get hit.
Well, I decided I give it a rest for a few months and move on to a few of my next projects. The best part of the internet is diversity, try not to focus on one thing for too long, stick to multiple things, one of them will work out for sure!
Also, I’ve tried many things in the past doing video marketing, article marketing, PPC and other stuff and very few things worked out pretty well for me, very few. So it’s a game of pure trial and error, but once you find a gem it will make you some good money for years.
Sorry for double post, but I just got carried away.
Pat,
I would highly recommend “The Dip” by Seth Godin. It’s a short book about figuring out when to quit. It can be read well within an hour. Very good advice. Check it out.
Here’s the problem: you don’t know what you don’t know.
Hopefully, I wouldn’t be unwilling to give up a dud idea if I knew WHY it wasn’t successful.
The trouble is the lack of success could be do to any number of variables. Is it unsuccessful because:
1. I’m using the internet marketing strategy
2. Allocating my time incorrectly promoting the product, business
3. The concept itself is wrong
4. I don’t have the skillset to make the idea work
5. Competitors are too strong to overcome with the resources available
6. The list goes on and on….
#3 and #5 I can figure out with some analysis but #1, 2, and 4 (of this truncated list) are hard to test particularly expeditiously.
I’d love to hear more or get more resources on coming to data driven conclusions about those potential reasons that an business isn’t succeeding along with how to test other things that are frequently the cause of failure, need to move on, or realizing that you are on the brink of success.
Hmmm, I liked the Dip but didn’t find the definitive answer in there on when to quit. As someone who’s quit too quick many times in the past, and since doing my Kolbe A test, I’ve learned that I’m a QuickStart so I need to get momentum on a project so that it’s got at least a chance of getting some results before I run out of steam. Results = More Steam!
When told by clients “my website’s not working” I like to work through a ticklist of questions before I’ll agree with them. Are you getting traffic (Yes/No)? Are you turning those traffic into subscribers (Yes/No)? How many of them as a %? Are any of them buying your Lead Product (Yes / No)? Do you even have a lead product? If yes, how many of them as a %? etc etc.
What I find most often is, when you ask these questions, you find that they don’t actually have all the steps in place needed to make sure a website CAN work – I’m not immune, I realised recently that I’d taken off everything a visitor COULD buy at my site, totally by accident! I was so focused on my customer journey via free webinar, free videos etc., giving value et al, that even if someone arrived ready to sign up or buy….nada available! LOL
And definitely give it up if you are not enjoying it. Or if a job would be less stressful (never an option for me no matter how poor I got).
Cheers, Nicola
This is a great point Nicola and I love the process you go through with your clients. So many bloggers quit after 3 months because they never strategically envisioned their goals or measured their progress towards those goals.
It happened to me sometimes. Once, I started on a project and shortly after I noticed that the results didn’t quite match my expectations. I went back to the drawing board and checked my market research. I discovered a slight mistake in my research that totally changed the potential of the targeted market. The new – and correct – results didn’t offer enough potential and therefore I decided to dump that project entirely.
Precisely, in my case, I had made my calculations using broad match keywords instead of exact match. The difference in my case was huge.
Conclusion: we shouldn’t wait too long if the results don’t meet our expectations to double check our market research.
Glenn Allsopp reminded me of this a few days ago via Tom Ewer’s site:
“I’ve got to say that I’m with Napoloen Hill on this one: you have to want to escape the rat race more than you want anything else. More than you want to watch TV. More than you want to bitch about companies on Twitter. More than you want to click on that related YouTube video. More than you want to check your notifications on Facebook. In his words:
Weak desires bring weak results, just as a small amount of fire makes a small amount of heat. If you find yourself lacking in persistence, this weakness may be remedied by building a stronger ?re under your desires.
When I finally managed to quit my day job, you can be certain that not much else had been on my mind for the few months leading up to it.”
—-
I agree with him completely and I believe that wanting to succeed is about NOT scrapping my work for the next greatest thing.
I also want to add that prayer and putting my fate in God’s hands to open doors has lead me down the right path every single time. And like many people above have said, it might not seem like the right plan at the time to scrap a project or stay the course, but His plan has always lead me in the right direction.
I think you have to go with your gut.
Sometimes it is just good to leave an idea for a while and come back to it again later.
P.S. I like your comment Brendan. It was a great encouragement and reminder today.
Good question and post Pat.
A lot of comments here and I’ll leave mine without reading the others, but will go back and read everyone’s comments as I’d like to see what you all have to say!
It’s a hard decision to make when to move on especially when you know your commited to focus and you should never give up! My stamina and inspiration comes in this Thomas Edison quote:
“We now know a thousand ways not to build a light bulb”.
Or you stopped 3 feet away from hitting gold.
Well the opposite is that I had put all my focus, time and effort and more into one online business venture for many years without getting the results I was looking for.
I made a hard decision to leave it in pursuit of another venture and other results.
2 years later that online business folded and doesn’t exist.
To sum it up: you don’t want to hang in there for a thousand years without obtaining the results your after.
It really depends on the competition. For my micro niche sites (usually 1500-2500 exact searches, $1.00+ CPC), I set expenditure at $100. If I’ve spent $100 (that includes cost of domain, 5 articles, and backlinking), and I’m not seeing any money from it yet, I’ll usually sell it on some forums I’m active on. Sure, I could work on ranking it higher on page 1, and would probably make a couple bucks a day, but again, it’s a risk. I may end up spending $300, and with Google’s alogorithm, you never know exactly what’s going to work. I usually sell the site for a bit more than I spent on it, so at least I break even. I do lose my valuable time, bu it’s a lesson learned. Not all projects succeed.
As far as my bigger sites (for example, one I’m targeting currently gets 50k exact searches, $17.00+ CPC), I set the bar higher. I started the site 1 month ago, and have no plans of quitting for at least a year. It’s a long term investment for me.
I’m no quitter, but sometimes we have to be realistic and realize when something is working, and when it isn’t. No shame in failing here and there. One must fail to succeed, IMO.
Hi Pat,
I know it is time to move on when I can literally “feel” the wall in front of me that I keep banging my head against.
I generally don’t give up or quit but when I feel inside that I have completely stopped moving either mentally or physically or both it is time to move on.
Hi Pat. I just made a good experience with a website which is just running a comercial script I bought for 30 bucks or so about a year ago. I only set it up added adsense went on to the Next project and didnt touch it for about a year.
On 10/13/2011 I couldnt believe what I saw. My adsense earnings for this website raised from 5 euro per year to 5-11 euro a day!! I guess it happened because of the latest google update.
This shows me, that knowing when to move on and holding a website without a ROI even for years can really pay out! Its about patience and instinct.
I think how much time and effort you’ve already put in is completely irrelevant.
The only thing that matters is whether or not getting it from where it is now, to where you want it to be, is worth the effort.
Don’t stick with something purely because you’ve already put time and effort into it. Move on and do something more profitable or fulfilling.
I cut my losses when continuing on with my current project seems less likely to succeed than starting over with something else.
This is an interesting question. I haven’t quite failed in either of my two ventures. The latest being razor sharpening. However, when I quit my last one, it was because I simply didn’t care for it anymore. I wasn’t not making money. But it wasn’t making me enough to live off of either.
No, what happened was that I made some decisions in my life that made pursuing that business not rewarding anymore. I wanted to try my hand at the normal American 9-5 job. I wasn’t making terribly much money and I was pouring in hours upon hours of time.
Now, the takeaway shouldn’t be quit the business when you stop caring about it. No, the takeaway should be that if you enjoy doing whatever it is your doing, and you make enough money to support yourself otherwise, you should keep on doing it. Just doing it has its own value. You don’t need to make money from blogging or talking about whatever it is you love talking about. Think about it, you don’t make money by talking with your friends about the latest movie. We, in fact, pay the movie theater for seeing that very same movie. A lot of our lives are rather relaxed and leisurely in comparison to hunter-gatherer living. We have a lot of free time. And who’s to say that we shouldn’t spend it blogging.
Now, if this is your only source of income, that’s a different story. In economics, I learned that you should quit when you aren’t able to meet your variable expenses. In the case of an internet business with no employees, the only variable cost is essentially your time. Since domain & hosting expenses are paid upfront, they are fixed costs.
Now, you have to figure out what your time is worth, but economics helps us in this regard again. Your time is worth the opportunity cost. That is, what you could have made if you spent that time doing something else. So, if you can make $20/hr starting up another business, whereas your making $1/hr (like I am now…) then in pure dollar terms, you should stop. However, it doesn’t quite work that way. If you like what your doing, that has value too. If your going to hate the new project, then, maybe $20/hr isn’t that appealing. Also, if your still learning while failing, that’s also valuable.
As you can see, not an easy decision. But, you don’t have to choose. You can always cut back on the hours spent on the “failing” project and revive it later when you have more skill and resources. Especially if you like doing it. If you hate doing it, then you should have quit long ago. Or let it run on autopilot. Since this is the passive income blog.
-Lee
Another thought provoking post Pat,
I would agree with some of the previous posters that it is vital to get at least a second persons viewpoint before “pulling the plug” – maybe, just maybe they will have spotted something that you have missed, could be the old woods from the trees analogy.
Maybe the failure, if that’s what we agree to call it couldn’t be down to a lack of planning at the outset, possibly unrealistic expectations – I always try to refer to the S.M.A.R.T goal setting which I am sure that many if not most of you will be aware of, it works for me anyway
Remember that even to best plans need to change, so don’t be afraid to re-asses things as you go, in this world things can and do change almost instantly.
Certainly it is important that if you do fail that you understand what went wrong, and if the worst comes to the worst never, ever take it personally – it’s one of those dust yourself down and pick yourself up moments, ready for the next challenge, whatever that may be! (I know this part is a little off tangent but some readers may find it useful.) Beating yourself up over things isn’t a healthy occupation (trust me!) and hopefully you can still take some positives out of the situation.
Thanks again Pat for getting all of our grey matter going on this pertinent subject.
Glenn
After trying all the means and yet they did not work, then move on! When I put up a small business and it did not give me the revenue I expected after six months, I closed it down and looked for a new venture.
Ah, the big question I’ve come across so many times over the past year. I’ve been on my internet marketing mission for years trying to work out the perfect website that would allow me to leave my current 9-5. However after a lot of failed attempts I’ve had no luck. With each ‘failed’ site that I’ve built I’ve worked on it for a while then somewhere down the road always got the feeling that what I was doing wasn’t right. And that’s what it is a ‘feeling.’ I don’t think you can ever really come up with a strict system of identifying the point where you should quit what you’re doing.
But what I have learnt is that it’s so important to love what you do, or to start a website on a topic you love and that you are passionate about. If you’re doing something that you love and you’re enjoying it, then this question – ‘when should you move on?’ will never need to be answered.
However if you’re blogging or simply making websites to make money regardless of the value you provide, you’ll have to answer this question with each site that you build because when the times get tough you won’t enjoy the work. At this moment in time I have moved onto my next website and it’s finally on something that I am passionate about. It has no visitors and nobody seems to want to read what I have to say and it has not made any money. That being said I enjoy it supremely and despite the failure that it is I will not move on because I love it.
Sometimes it’s hard to know when to move on, but I am a firm believer in the fact that the universe always pushes you in the correct direction. Here’s what I always look for:
1. Is my quality suffering?
2. Do I dread logging in to my business?
3. Do I put off necessary tasks?
If these three things sound familiar, it’s probably time to move on to something else.
For me its when your heart is no longer in it or it turns out to be an unsustainable venture as far as your passion, energy and enthusiasm – in spite of profits. If you later find that the idea is misaligned with who you are, your values or your natural skills. It’s a personal choice, to learn to trust your gut and intuition (not just your intellect) to guide your decisions for going forward or dumping ideas that are just getting in the way.
Hi Pat, I’m just catching up on your posts. Anyways, I created a blog specifically to North San Diego Real Estate a few years ago and it started to take up way too much of my time without much return so I stopped and focused on my main site. It was a tough decision but the return wasn’t there.
It should be a business only, emotion free decision, but boredom plays a large roll for me. I don’t really decide to abandon certain projects, I just do. That’s not true for all of my online endeavors, however. Some projects I actually looked at the business case for and against before deciding to pull the plug, or at least let it languish for the foreseeable future.
In some cases I still enjoy the project, but need to turn my energies and resources to another that seems more promising. In those cases I often end up revitalizing the projects down the road, and in many cases, they generate significant passive income while they’re lying semi-dormant.