When you decide to change careers to become a cubicle crusher and venture down the path of being an entrepreneur, it can be rather daunting. You often find your motivation goes up and down. It can be a case of two steps forward and three steps back. Sometimes you can visualise the success you’re after but it often feels too far away.
One way to stay motivated and energised is to read about career changers and entrepreneurs to learn how they crushed the cubicle. This helps to remind you to just keep going! Plus if others can do it, then you can too!
Here’s some examples of three entrepreneurs who’ve changed careers and crushed the cubicle. This will help you to turbocharge your inspiration and remind you it’s possible.
Mili Ponce Oliver – From Supervisor at Belkin to Affiliate Marketer
Peruvian born Mili was no stranger to entrepreneurship as her father ran a successful business. After school, she moved to London to attend university although had to withdraw from her studies when her father lost his business. As she needed to earn enough money to support her parents and herself, Mili got four jobs, working around the clock with hardly any sleep. After a host of health challenges, she realised she couldn’t keep working like this.
After a friend’s encouragement, Mili then got a ‘normal’ 9 to 5 job, securing a supervisor role at Belkin. It was a good job, in a good company and she was earning a good salary. Although she wasn’t feeling fulfilled nor happy with the salary she received. After attending an internet bootcamp, she tried making money on Twitter by promoting affiliate products. After a year, she managed to make $500 and this encouraged her to keep going. She then got serious, researching everything to do with Twitter including how to get traffic. During all of this, she was still working her day job. In her second month online, she managed to make $1,700 and in her third month, $2,500. Her success rocketed from there and by month five, she had made $10,000 by running Twitter marketing campaigns for authors, speakers and a variety of small businesses. She had crushed the cubicle!! Today, she is an international digital marketing strategist and the founder of Europe’s number one social media marketing blog, Social Songbird.
Corinna Essa – From TV production to Social Media CEO
Corinna went from an unemployed TV production worker to becoming the CEO of a very successful social media management business, Social Media Worldwide which turns over $4 million per year. With a university degree in TV production, Corinna couldn’t imagine working in any other industry. After she was made redundant at age 25, in the middle of the financial crisis, she realised she needed to do something different. Like Mili, she attended a seminar run by Mark Anastasi on social media. After listening to many strategies from all the different speakers, the one that resonated with her was selling other people’s products on Twitter for a commission.
Like Mili, Corinna studied Twitter and started affiliate marketing via the micro blogging platform. She created free accounts and built her following up to 10,000. She then started promoting products via Clickbank. Within three weeks of promoting products, she had replaced the income she lost from working in TV. After her initial success and crushing the cubicle, she went on to develop an online course in 2011, resulting in $15,492 of sales overnight. Her success continued on from there and she was invited to speak at a social media summit. From there went on to launch a ‘done-for-you’ Twitter service which led to her current business, Social Media Worldwide.
Amanda Clarkson – From career chaos to eBay entrepreneur
Amanda was always interested in making money and getting rich. Whilst her desire for success was strong, she’d had 33 jobs in a 10-year period and hated every single one of them. She would wake up each morning not wanting to go to work. She wasn’t fulfilled, nor was she happy. An honest conversation with her husband Matt back in 2006 confirmed they were both disgruntled with their life, and fed up with getting up each morning doing the same thing but hoping for a different result. The two of them embarked on the search for a better lifestyle.
In the early 2000’s when the internet was just coming into fashion, Matt said to her, “I know that people make money on the internet”. They dived deeply into the internet, even travelling to Nashville, USA to attend an internet seminar. They both fell in love with the idea of having an internet business but they weren’t sure how they would do it. One day in their home office, Matt received an email about eBay and encouraged Amanda to check it out. After doing a lot of research, she found out that all she had to do to make money was to fill a need in the market. Simply – connect people with products. What really appealed to Amanda about eBay was that she didn’t need to build a website or find traffic. They then started a business importing health and fitness products. Within six months, they were turning over $60,000 AUD per month and had become Cubicle Crushers! Check out more here.
The common thing about Mili, Corinna and Amanda is they all desired a better life. They’re no different to you. After some hard work and plenty of dedication they achieved their desired lifestyle. If they can do it, you can do it! Don’t wait for tomorrow, get started on your dreams today!
What dreams do you have for your career? How will you achieve them?