Idea Generation

“Write down every single idea you have no matter how big or small.”

Richard Branson

“The best startups generally come from somebody needing to scratch an itch.”

Michael Arrington

“When you find an idea that you just can’t stop thinking about, that’s probably a good one to pursue.”

Josh James

If you’re stuck in this phase, here are some questions to help you come up with ideas.

Solving Problems

“Don’t find customers for your products, find products for your customers.”

Seth Godin

“Our job is to connect to people, to interact with them in a way that leaves them better than we found them, more able to get where they’d like to go.”

Seth Godin

“A business is simply an idea to make other people’s lives better.”

Richard Branson

“To launch a business means successfully solving problems. Solving problems means listening.”

Richard Branson

Making a Difference

“Connect, create meaning, make a difference, matter, be missed.”

Seth Godin

“The only way to win at content marketing is for the reader to say ‘This was written specifically for me.”

Jamie Turner

“Stop selling. Start helping.”

Zig Ziglar

“Care about your customers more than about yourself, and you’ll do well.”

Derek Sivers

“Some entrepreneurs think how can I make a lot of money? But the better way is to think how can I make people’s lives a lot better? If you get it right, the money will come.”

Richard Branson

“The best marketing strategy ever: CARE.”

Gary Vaynerchuk

“There’s lots of bad reasons to start a company. But there’s only one good, legitimate reason, and I think you know what it is: It’s to change the world.”

Phil Libin

Being Unique & Authentic

“Marketing is really just about sharing your passion.”

Michael Hyatt

“Authenticity, honesty, and personal voice underlie much of what’s successful on the Web.”

Rick Levine

“Write good content about stuff that you love. Readers will find you.”

Michael Arrington

“Authenticity, honesty, and personal voice underlie much of what’s successful on the Web.”

Rick Levine

“The currency of blogging is authenticity and trust.”

Jason Calacanis

“To be successful you must be unique, you must be so different that if people want what you have, they must come to you to get it.”

Walt Disney

“Build something 100 people love, not something 1 million people kind of like.”

Brian Chesky

Effective Marketing & Storytelling

“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.”

Tom Fishburne

“Marketing is telling the world you’re a rock star. Content marketing is showing the world you are one.”

Robert Rose

“Content is fire, social media is gasoline.”

Jay Baer

“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.”

Tom Fishburne

“Marketing is storytelling.”

Seth Godin

“These days, people want to learn before they buy, be educated instead of pitched.”

Brian Clark

“Nobody reads ads. People read what interests them. Sometimes, it’s an ad.”

Howard Gossage

“Marketing is the art of telling a story that moves people to act. Marketing is no longer a tactic used to sell stuff. It’s about finding ways to create meaning and make people feel something, rather than making them do what you want them to do in the short term.”

Bernadette Jiwa

“If people believe they share values with a company, they will stay loyal to the brand.”

Howard Schultz

“On average, 8 out of 10 people will read your headline copy, but only 2 out 10 will read the rest.”

Brian Clark

“We elect and buy from people we like. Likability is number one. We also need to believe they are honest, and have our best interests at heart.”

George Farris

“If your content isn’t driving conversation, you’re doing it wrong.”

Dan Roth

Risk-Taking

“As ever, the accountant in me saw the risk, the entrepreneur saw the possibility. So I split the difference and kept moving forward.”

Phil Knight

“No more romanticizing about how cool it is to be an entrepreneur. It’s a struggle to save your company’s life – and your own skin – every day of the week.”

Spencer Fry

“Fearlessness is like a muscle. I know from my own life that the more I exercise it, the more natural it becomes to not let my fears run me.”

Arianna Huffington

“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something—your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

Steve Jobs

Key Takeaway:

Taking Action & Perseverance

“If you want to continually grow your blog, you need to learn to blog on a consistent basis.”

Neil Patel

“The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.”

Nolan Bushnell

 “Ideas are easy. Implementation is hard.”

Guy Kawasaki

“I’m convinced that about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.”

Steve Jobs 

“We think, mistakenly, that success is the result of the amount of time we put in at work, instead of the quality of time we put in.”

Arianna Huffington

“It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. It doesn’t matter how many times you almost get it right. No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them and those around you because all that matters in business is that you get it right once. Then everyone can tell you how lucky you are.”

Mark Cuban

“Reading is good, action is better.”

Eric Reis

Just Getting Started

“If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.”

Reid Hoffman

“The stars will never align, and the traffic lights of life will never all be green at the same time. The universe doesn’t conspire against you, but it doesn’t go out of its way to line up the pins either. Conditions are never perfect. ‘Someday’ is a disease that will take your dreams to the grave with you. Pro and con lists are just as bad. If it’s important to you and you want to do it ‘eventually,’ just do it and correct course along the way.”

Tim Ferriss