90 Days Is All It Takes · Start a Business with No Money

Adam McCollough

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May 25 (edited) • 💬 Community Chat

90 Days Is All It Takes

Because I’ve got ADHD, my default setting is scattered chaos.

I’ve got thousands of new ideas

New projects? I want to start all of them, and right NOW!

New opportunities? I was already halfway in before I’d finished the last thing.

And that’s exactly why I HAD TO MAKE A RULE:

I’m only allowed to focus on ONE NEW THINg at a time…

and I have to COMMIT to it for a full 90 days.

No quitting early.

No “this isn’t working.”

No jumping ship because something shinier came along.

I can tweak. I can improve. I can pivot slightly.

But I cannot give up.

Why 90 days?

Because most things don’t fail… they just don’t get enough time and commitment.

This is especially true with anything driven by algorithms, such as social media, Etsy, Amazon, digital sales, content, whatever. These platforms reward consistency, not bursts of enthusiasm.

It's like going to the gym. You get far better results scheduling your gym days, and turning up and doing your thing consistently. 💪

In a year you'll see much better results than if you'd gone all in for two weeks then gave up.

You don’t get results because you tried once.

You get results because you didn’t stop.

I’ve seen this play out more times than I can count, in areas that I know would have succeeded.

When we first started selling toys online, we got traction pretty quickly. Nothing crazy, but enough to know it worked.

My brother-in-law Jamie saw what we were doing… and copied it almost exactly.

Same idea. Same products. Same e-commerce platform. Same time. Same opportunity...

Fast forward 20 years:

We went on to open toy shops.

He’s still a bus driver.

The ONLY difference ...?

He gave up too early. 😖

Same story again…

I’ve got a colleague, Barry who makes very similar wooden products to us. I told him years ago to get onto Amazon Handmade.

We were doing it. It worked.

I sat down and spent an entire day showing him exactly how we do it. Getting his store set up, how the images should be, how to optimise the listings, how to research the right keywords, everything he needed to know to succeed.

Four years later, we’re still making consistent sales every day.

He still says, “Amazon doesn’t work.” (for him), and still grumbles about not having enough money. We're still friends. I still let him come and borrow my belt sander but it's so frustrating to know that the only reason he failed is because he didn’t really try. Not properly. Not long enough. He gave up too soon!

Don't be a Barry or Jamie,

They fail because they stopped before it has a chance to work.

If you have a great new idea, keep it simple:

One thing.

Ninety days.

No quitting.

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90 Days Is All It Takes