Overnight Success
July 10th, 2008
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Photo by Jason Gulledge
Personal development blogger Steve Pavlina is considered by many people to be a great example of an overnight success. His blog achieved an income of $40,000 per month after only two years. But most people who create blogs fail to make any profit at all, and give up in frustration. Why?
In his article titled Skill, Steve gave what I think is the best answer to that question:
“There are several ways to answer this, but perhaps the most obvious answer is that most new bloggers give up within the first six months. The web is littered with abandoned blogs. But six months is nothing. It takes six months just to get your bearings in the blogosphere.”
In his first 6 months, he made $167, which by his estimates works out to 17 cents per hour. If you don’t have a blog, you probably think 17 cents per hour doesn’t sound like much, but believe me, it’s way above average! And it grew exponentially from there, reaching extraordinary levels after two years.
But many people don’t realize that it actually took Steve far longer than two years to get to that point. Before he started his blog, he read 700 personal development books. He also had experience with writing articles (some paid, some unpaid). He also had ten years of experience in running a computer games business, where he learned many valuable lessons in entrepreneurship after turning $20,000 in cash to $150,000 in debt. These were the dues he paid before he earned the privilege of making 17 cents an hour.
Compare this to an anonymous blogger I heard about last September. This person had written to Darren Rowse at ProBlogger with some questions about his make money online blog, and Darren replied with a video post. The anonymous blogger’s letter went something like this:
“Darren, thanks for your great blog. I’m amazed at how much money you’ve made from blogging, and I’ve decided to do the same. I’ve just started my own blog on how to make money online, and I’ll have some really great tips. I have some questions though, because this is my first blog. How do I set it up? How do I find advertisers and make money quickly? And what tips should I write about?”
Amazingly, Darren almost managed to keep a straight face in his video reply, something I sure couldn’t have done. Coming from nowhere, this person is starting a blog in an overcrowded niche, with no experience in the subject, and asking how to be an overnight success when he doesn’t even know what to write about.
Let’s look at this in a more visual format:
| Steve Pavlina | Anonymous blogger | |
|---|---|---|
| Number of relevant books read before starting blog | 700 | 0 |
| Years of relevant experience before starting blog | 13 | 0 |
| Money spent gaining the experience | At least $170,000 | $0 |
| Knows what to blog about | Yes | No |
| Income for first 6 months | $0.17/hour | Probably $0 |
| Income after 2 years | $40,000/month | Hasn’t made it 2 years yet, will probably quit well before then |
| Continues to work hard | Yes | Never did in the first place |
Given the difference in the dues each blogger paid, is the difference in their results unexpected, or unfair?
In the Fortune Magazine article What it takes to be great, Geoffrey Colvin points to research indicating that hard work is far more important than natural talent. This applies to sports, music, chess, business, and pretty much every other field. People don’t become an overnight success just because they stumble into a field they were born for.
“Reinforcing that no-free-lunch finding is vast evidence that even the most accomplished people need around ten years of hard work before becoming world-class, a pattern so well established researchers call it the ten-year rule…And as John Horn of the University of Southern California and Hiromi Masunaga of California State University observe, ‘The ten-year rule represents a very rough estimate, and most researchers regard it as a minimum, not an average.’ In many fields (music, literature) elite performers need 20 or 30 years’ experience before hitting their zenith.”
When people reach the highest levels of success at a young age, we might think they were an overnight success, when really they just started early. Bobby Fischer became a chess grandmaster when he was only 16, but after 9 years of practice. Tiger Woods won the U.S. Amateur Championship when he was only 18, but after 15 years of practice.
The article went into more detail about the link between practice and performance:
“Evidence crosses a remarkable range of fields. In a study of 20-year-old violinists by Ericsson and colleagues, the best group (judged by conservatory teachers) averaged 10,000 hours of deliberate practice over their lives; the next-best averaged 7,500 hours; and the next, 5,000. It’s the same story in surgery, insurance sales, and virtually every sport. More deliberate practice equals better performance. Tons of it equals great performance.”
How are you reacting to hearing this? Are you disappointed that you can kiss your chances of overnight success goodbye? Or are you inspired to know that there’s no reason you can’t reach any level of success you desire if you’re willing to put in the work?
July 10th, 2008 at 2:07 am
Hi Hunter,
Steve Pavlina is a great role model, but like you said, most people don’t realize how he paid his dues (and continues to pay them). He was the largest influence on why I started blogging, and I read how he worked for years before he saw a decent (blogging) income.
Often you’ll see posts about the 4 hour work week, blah, blah, blah, but without a person putting in the time to learn their profession, cutting back on their hours only gets them less pay and experience. Most successful people are doing what they love and for that reason enjoy doing it all day (and night).
I love how you ended this post, “there’s no reason you can’t reach any level of success you desire if you’re willing to put in the work?
For those who want to succeed, they should know, “work” is not just another four letter word.
Barbara Swaffords last blog post..Why Didn’t You Say Good Bye
July 10th, 2008 at 2:59 am
Excellent post, Hunter. I’ve submitted it to SU.
I really couldn’t agree with you more. When it comes to great sports people, even kids in a junior league who happen to be very good, there has been a lot of practice put in.
It seems, however, then when people enter the world of blogging or related fields, they forget all about the practice they had to put in as a kid to be able to win the championship. They think they can just win the championship without any practice, learning, teaching or hard work. It’s strange. With sport, we know we have to practice to be good. But with blogging and other fields, we just think we can make it with no effort at all. There’s very little logic in that attitude.
Jamie
Jamie Harrops last blog post..Childhood Memories - Join me on an Adventure
July 10th, 2008 at 5:16 am
Overnight Success… how boring would THAT be?
July 10th, 2008 at 9:38 am
Yes, the world is filled with people looking for a get-rich-quick scheme. It’s kind of like hitting a rock ten thousand times and finally on number 10,001 it breaks. People only see that last hit that broke the rock. But what about the 10,000 that came before that?
July 10th, 2008 at 10:19 am
2 great quotes to go with this …
Eddie Cantor: “It takes 20 years to make an overnight success.”
“Success is 90% starting and 10% not stopping” — A. D. KESSLER
Dave Navarros last blog post..Fighting Work-Life Balance Stress: Attack Of The 50-Ft. Goals
July 10th, 2008 at 10:51 am
The really nice thing about the blogosphere is that readers can tell when someone is being authentic, or just trying to rack up their pay-per-click advertisements. One other reason Pavlina has been so successful is that he is completely ‘real’.
Hayden Tompkinss last blog post..Free Speech on The Internet
July 10th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
I read a lot of blog articles. Some I enjoy, some I don’t. Most I forget. But not this one, Hunter. It stuck in my mind. So here I am, at 3am, coming back to reread it and to comment. Must be a good post, eh?
I was thinking about Steve’s answer why bloggers don’t succeed: “…but perhaps the most obvious answer is that most new bloggers give up within the first six months.”
There is a desert stretch in every worthwhile endeavor - that’s when we the can feel the passion and we know we’re on the right path. But there is a lag. Success in whatever form hasn’t yet quite caught up with us. That’s when most people fold.
What I love about the blogging world is that we are fellow travellers and not competitors. We can help each other and give support to each other in order to keep walking through that desert patch.
After reading your post, I had a good look around Steve P’s blog. What struck me was the positive feeling. Every post was geared towards making life easier, happer, more fulfilling. I’m going to have a good think how I can adapt what I’m doing at GoodlifeZen to go more in that direction.
July 10th, 2008 at 12:24 pm
Lol. It took me 5 years of relevant experience to get me valued at $5k+ p/mth in a mgmt job even without any diploma or degree in the field.
I recalled that there was this 6 months which I was totally stuck in the library that I started to pick up leadership and management books and read them through and through for hours daily (cos of some school rules about not being able to take up part time jobs and that we can’t leave the premises as we have to clock in and out at the start and the end of the day).
Haha. So, being an overnight success is like possible - only if you know your stuffs well, and that whatever you say can be backed up by the things that you can do and had done.
This is an awesome post there Hunter! Great work done.
July 10th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
Hi Hunter - People like the guy you mentioned always make me laugh. There’s so many bloggers like that guy who pack in after a few months because they start blogging for the wrong reasons - to make as much money as quickly as possible. And they all seem to start in the how to make money online niche.
I started blogging just over a couple of years ago. I began on a free google blog and practised there - and I needed it. Then I switched to the blog I have now about 16 months ago. I haven’t really tried to monetize it much at all yet - and I don’t expect to make a heap of cash from it anytime soon.
And I don’t understand these people at all who begin blogging about something they know nothing about. I had heck of a lot of business experience before I began blogging about business - I think I would run out of things to say otherwise.
It’s like the other commenters have said - it takes a lot of hard work to be an overnight success.
Cath Lawsons last blog post..Immigrating to Canada or Australia - Pros and Cons
July 10th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
One more quote for anyone who thinks successful people are ‘lucky’:
“The harder I work, the luckier I get.” Samuel Goldwyn.
July 10th, 2008 at 1:23 pm
To tell you the truth, this doesn’t come as a surprise to me. A lot of people look at young musicians’ successes with envy, but not many people can really comprehend the amount of time a person needs to spend alone with the instrument. As a driven musician, there’s no partying, no going out, no social life - period.
I’ve always figured it was the same way with writing. Turns out, hard work will get you anywhere
@Dave - I like that last quote you gave
rld - taekwondo happinesss last blog post..Why can’t I gain belt rank? (part 2)
July 10th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Hunter -
Amazing article. I truly needed this at the right time my friend.
I have to share a similar story here. My latest article just hit the front page of Digg so I’m reading some comments and one comment made me think about the mindset that exists in our culture today. Here is what the reader wrote, “The truth of all these articles is that they’re pointless. You can’t change someone’s motivation in life. Motivated people are successful. If you need to read a blog post with 7 tips for living life, you probably aren’t firing on all 8 cylinders. The people who are winning the game of life are doing so because they’re out there trying different shit all the time, not looking for help from someone who lives in their parents basement.”
According to him, I’m leaving in my parents basement. As a matter of fact, my father is a wealthy person in India and I’m the only son but I choose to leave the country to chart my own destiny. I have worked in American ever since I arrived. I’ve worked as a Pizza delivery person and a cashier while completing my post graduate studies. I was denied graduate assistantship despite my strong mathematical skills for the fact that I didn’t know how to communicate. After all of this hard work by me and my wife, I’m living an American dream. I do live in a very nice golf community but I’m simple at heart and I wanted to share my passion for the personal growth with everyone.
If we do anything to make money, we are doomed to fail, ALWAYS! It is sad that some people have conditioned their mind to avoid taking personal responsibility for their own lives.
Shilpan
July 10th, 2008 at 3:28 pm
As a 6 year blogger, came through Jamie Harrops’ twitter, I’d like to offer a few thoughts.
When I started blogging. Blogging was exactly that - blogging. Not about marketing, or SEO, or social media. Just writing. There were a few places that had directories with all the blogs out there (Technorati, and Blogger had one), and a few sites focussed on the blogospheres comings and going, with reviews (there was one called “The Weblog Review” which - surprise surprise - reviewed weblogs). Technology supplements were about new phases about blogging, and you just had to talk about yourself to be successful.
Now blogging is so much more, but the core aspect remains the same, leave a comment and you probably will get a comment back, and the most successful blogs are ones that contribute the most. It is this that people forget. To receive, you have to give a lot, especially in the blogosphere. In some ways, it’s easy to make money, in others, it’s terrible. But if you enjoy it, success will eventually come, as the more you put in, the more you’d get out.
Only now am I beginning to get some remnance of success, 6 years after starting. So it can take time, but I wouldn’t change it for the world
Rhyss last blog post..Twisted Metal 2: World Tour
July 10th, 2008 at 5:59 pm
@ Shilpan
Thanks for sharing your story! I think there is both a ‘yes’ and a ‘no’ to what your commenter said.
On one hand, if we go on living ‘in the parent’s basement’ then nothing much will happen. And you obviously don’t do that but have created your own life. [By the way, it's quite funny that you were denied assistentship because you "didn't know how to communicat"'.I mean, look at your brilliant blogposts! If that isn't good communiation, what is!?]
On the other hand, successful people tend to keep feeding their motivation and their mind by reading and assimilating what other successful people do. That’s were this post by Hunter comes in. Reading it, I feel energized! It’s not that I lean on it like a crutch. But I use it as good nourishment for my path. That’s why posts like this are so valuable.
July 10th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
@ Barbara, when I see people talking about the 4-hour workweek, I think “Why don’t we first learn how to succeed in a 40-hour workweek?” Or even 60 hours. That’s hard enough without the added constraint of only 4 hours!
@ Jamie, that’s a good point. In some fields, it just seems that people expect instant success, or have unrealistic expectations. Like “I’ll do whatever it takes, as long as it works by Friday.”
@ Thomas, honestly, I’d take it if it were possible. You can always make things less boring later!
@ Marelisa, if people knew about the 10,000 other hits, there would be chaos in the streets. We have to keep it a secret!
@ Dave, great quotes, but I wonder if it’s more like 10% starting and 90% not stopping.
@ Hayden, I completely agree. I believe Steve when he says he’d still be doing it even if he was still making 17 cents an hour.
@ Mary, thanks, but 3 AM? Go to sleep! They say the breakthrough point comes after the breaking point. It would be great if we had a clearer view of the indicators, but since we don’t, all we can do is what you said somewhere else, “keep on keeping on.”
@ Daniel, 6 months of reading library books is something that most people wouldn’t have been willing to do. Even if they had nothing else to do, they probably would have done nothing rather than reading. But you did the work, and it got you that job! Way to go!
@ Cath, yeah, there’s something about the make money online niche that seems to say to people “this is the best way to make money, no experience required.” People who fall into that don’t seem to understand supply and demand. And then they run out of things to say, so then what? Sigh.
@ Dave, I love that quote, but never knew who said it. Sam Goldwyn just went up a notch in my book!
@ rld, the “no partying, no going out, no social life thing” - for many people it won’t be worth it, and I can understand that. Fine, but then they need to accept that they won’t be as good as someone who does. Instead, some people choose to complain, which doesn’t really help anyone.
@ Shilpan, I always wonder how some of these people come up with their crazy ideas. This person thinks you’re living in your parent’s basement? Anyone who’s been reading your blog for a while knows the truth is quite different. I’m looking forward to your ebook about how you came here with only $20 and ended up owning 3 hotels!
@ Rhys, 6 years? That’s amazing! You’re practically one of the founding fathers of blogging! It seems that while technology and the blogosphere have changed, the basic principles haven’t. People who provide value will find people wanting to read them.
@ Mary, thanks for replying to Shilpan. I agree, it’s funny that they say he doesn’t know how to communicate, and then he launches a successful blog!
July 10th, 2008 at 10:21 pm
You described a scenerio that is very typical of a new blogger. Many gurus are guilty of selling such dreams that it is easy to make money quick to them. I know. I’ve been on the web for a few years. When I first started, I got distracted by these promises too.
You are also right to point out that there is really no such thing as an “overnight success”. No one really knows what has gone beyond the “success”. When I asked a friend, an internet marketing expert (in the millions), whether his beach bum lifestyle was really true, he told me crisply ‘far from it”. He worked his “a**” off!
Setting up a blog or site is not a quick ticket to success. I’m one of those who have left many of my sites stranded after some time. It has been much of a learning experience. Without exploring all those niches, I wouldn’t have known what I wanted. I wouldn’t have known what my passion really is.
Thanks for an awesome article! I really enjoyed reading it. Stumbled!
Evelyn
Evelyn Lim | Attraction Mind Maps last blog post..Draw Inspiration From Never-Give-Up Success Stories
July 10th, 2008 at 11:18 pm
[...] you hadn’t heard of Steve Pavlina before, you heard about him in my post yesterday, Overnight Success. Steve got to where he is by having lots of fantastic original ideas about personal development. So [...]
July 11th, 2008 at 12:07 am
@ Evelyn, I’m sure that’s typical, to go through a number of things before you find what you want to do. I think you’re lucky to have found it, because most people never do. I know you’ve found your niche, because you just seem so natural in it!
July 11th, 2008 at 2:10 am
@Hunter: I believe that before the beginning and in the end you ARE an overnight success. You play a game of life because it’s boring to be perfect, but all the limits, you put them on yourself. If you already are a success, you have the power to do that, right? That’s why you should be grateful of your problems, because they let you experience life, whereas the easy stuff would bore you. Take a look at Robert Scheinfeld’s theory; I think it’s a bit more scientific than Steve P’s articles, but in the end it’s the same thing they talk about. Not that I favour science, but it reaches another group when there’s scientific evidence.
July 11th, 2008 at 8:44 am
I always assumed that sucess is a combination of talent, persistence and hard work. So I can’t say I’m surprised. I do believe that to be *hugely* successful, talent is a must.
July 11th, 2008 at 5:54 pm
Great post, Hunter. If being an ‘overnight success’ were possible and everyone was doing it, who would have all the good stories about the journey? Achieving goals and success is great, but the journey is where life is and interesting people are.
July 11th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
@ Thomas, well, you do have a point there. Without any struggles, much of the experience would be missing.
@ Vered, but how do you explain Michael Jordan, who was cut from his high school basketball team? No talent, huge success.
@ Laurie, in a way I’m glad that it’s hard, because I really like those stories!
July 13th, 2008 at 5:02 am
[...] Overnight Success Hunter Nuttall discusses overnight success, or the lack of it. Even those people who seem to have achieved “overnight success” have indeed spent many years training, learning and absorbing. From the page… “When people reach the highest levels of success at a young age, we might think they were an overnight success, when really they just started early. Bobby Fischer became a chess grandmaster when he was only 16, but after 9 years of practice. Tiger Woods won the U.S. Amateur Championship when he was only 18, but after 15 years of practice.” [...]
July 13th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Great post! You don’t have to do something that you love or that you’re talented at to be successful, but if you can at least be interested in it that really helps you get experience and be persistent - and that will increase your chances.
I’ve read a lot about internet marketing (fortunately not buying any of the countless products) - but eventually I found that what I was actully doing all along was more interesting. Once I stopped looking elsewhere I started doing much better and I’m now on my way to building a real business and eventually getting it to run without me. I learned a little bit about business from the internet marketing world but the most important lesson is to work on a business that fits with your interests, what you do well, and what people want.
July 13th, 2008 at 6:24 pm
@ Richard, it sounds like you’ve found the right thing for you. I agree that you can’t go wrong with a business that fits with your interests, what you do well, and what people want. If you have all of those things, it’s going to be a lot easier to be persistent for years until you become an “overnight success.”
July 13th, 2008 at 9:02 pm
You just convinced me to quit my blog!
Just kidding - great post.
Mike
July 14th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
@ Four Pillars, hopefully not!
July 17th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
[...] has something interesting or entertaining to say. Some of my favourite posts on his blog include: Overnight Success and Comparing America and Japan Part [...]
July 29th, 2008 at 8:51 am
[...] Don’t expect overnight success. It doesn’t matter what you do if you don’t give it enough time. Leo was an anomaly; [...]
July 31st, 2008 at 5:07 pm
This is a painfully wonderful post, Hunter. I can personally testify that people are often mislead by looking at the end result of a successful individual rather than at their long, failure ridden road to success. Michael Jordan once said that he practiced hundreds of hours for every 40 minutes of game play; not to mention his countless failures along his journey.
I think so many people start really promising projects and then set astronomical initial goals for themselves with no steps in between. The inevitable pitfalls are then interpreted as failures rather than lessons and the project is aborted.
I am a new blogger. It is great to plan on hitting the big numbers but my first goal is to get my first independent (not one of my family or friends) comment. Then I’ll move on to making $40K per month.
T
Terrence Edwardss last blog post..Self Employment vs. Owning a Business
July 31st, 2008 at 9:31 pm
@ Terrence, “painfully wonderful” is a new one for me, but I like it! That’s a good point that the absence of effortless extraordinary success is taken to be a failure, when really it just means that they have many more steps to take. Now, I’m off to leave you an independent comment!
August 6th, 2008 at 12:59 am
[...] And His Wonderful Pauschisms Overnight Success Comparing America and Japan, Part 1 The Introverts Strike Back What Is An Ebook Worth? How To Be A [...]
September 5th, 2008 at 9:31 am
Fantastic article!!
September 6th, 2008 at 12:33 am
@ Thanks, Ron!