It never ceases to amaze me how difficult I make things for myself.
Paralysis by analysis is a disease I’ve been stricken by several times in my life.
If you had told me ten years ago that I’d be scared of a Facebook ad ten years ago, I wouldn’t have believed you.
I know it seems silly now, but I was terrified to launch my first Facebook ad.
I shared this story with a few people, and I’m not sure if they respect me anymore.
Why in the world did I get so scared of a little bitty Facebook ad?
It may take me more time to explain the answer to that question than you have to read this article.
The short answer to the question is that I was scared to slay my baby.
That answer will make more sense at the end of this story.
I spent a few months developing a product to sell on the internet.
There were some extremely long days and nights in product development.
I remember waking up at 2 am one morning to start my day and ending the day at midnight.
Many tears were shed by yours truly as I struggled with roadblocks and setbacks.
I spent many hours on my product, and finally I was ready to launch the product.
When it came time to launch, I was reluctant.
I couldn’t figure it out.
What was keeping me from taking the last few steps to sell my product?
I did a soft launch of the product, and there were no nibbles on the offer I made.
To be honest, I was a bit relieved when nobody showed interest.
If nobody showed interest, then my product could never really be rejected.
I gave myself a week to unwind and decompress from all the work I had put into my product.
I was exhausted, both physically and mentally.
After I got a chance to rest up, I knew my next step was to promote my product using a Facebook Ad.
My target customer spends lots of time on Facebook.
The other piece that appealed to me about using Facebook is that I could start with a small budget and scale my ad spending as I started to get sales from my new customers.
I set my initial Facebook ad budget at $10 a day.
My plan was to run the Facebook Ad for a week, so my maximum budget was going to be $70 for the Facebook Ad campaign.
I came up with the image and sales copy for my Facebook Ad.
For two weeks, I kept repeating the same thing to myself over and over again.
Today I will launch my Facebook Ad.
Yet when I got to the end of my day, I had not completed the task.
I was stricken with fear.
Even as I write those words now, I have to laugh at myself.
What in the world got me so scared?
I was flabbergasted.
Then I read a quote that someone wrote on Facebook.
“You should make a plan to fail and accept that you will fail. That way, you can get failure out of the way.”
Those words helped me realize that failure was not the worst thing in the world.
That same day I spent $17 on lunch.
And yet I didn’t want to risk losing $70.
Sometimes logic escapes me.
I finally mustered up enough courage to pull the trigger on my Facebook Ad.
Or maybe I was tired of saying to myself, today is the day I’m going to launch my Facebook Ad.
I got everything set and pushed the launch button.
I thought I would feel relieved.
I thought I would feel elated at finally taking the insurmountable step.
That’s not what I felt.
I felt miserable.
I broke down and cried.
I couldn’t believe how unnerved I was at launching a stupid Facebook Ad.
I found it hard to focus and was filled with the jitters.
I left my office to take a walk with the hopes that that would calm my nerves.
Later that day, I was emotionally drained.
I think I had the flu once, and it felt better than I was feeling that afternoon.
An early dinner and it was time to hit the hay for the night.
The next day I was feeling better.
The misery I had lived through the other day had finally subsided.
I felt some relief now that I had taken the next step towards promoting my product.
As the day progressed, I asked myself what in the world was going on?
What had me so tied up in knots?
That’s when I finally realized why I was so reluctant to launch the Facebook Ad.
It wasn’t a financial decision.
Losing $70 on a Facebook Ad was not going to change my financial future.
The real cause of fear was the fear of rejection.
As long as I didn’t promote my product, I could remain in my comfort zone.
I could continue to tell myself that the product will be wildly popular once I launch.
I could also tell myself that if I make this one tiny tweak, the product will be ten times better than it is now.
As long as my product was still in my safety and care, I didn’t have to worry about it being pronounced a failure.
Even worse than being a failure would be having nobody pay attention to my product.
My product would be invisible.
All the time, sweat, tears, and energy I’d poured into my product would be for naught.
That verdict was a bit too hard for me to swallow.
In an effort to protect my ego, I delayed my product launch.
I had prevented my baby from being exposed to a world of indifference.
Finally, I had to be willing to slay my baby.
It was the only way I could know if my worked mattered enough to somebody that they would be willing to purchase it.
I learned that I have to be willing to lose to win.
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