- Check out this amazing video “🏝 The TRUTH about the 4-Hour Workweek (interview with Tim Ferriss)“
Join the other intelligent rebels by subscribing to the YT channel and learn how to be free and happy !
(Literal) Text Transcription of the video :
Olivier Roland: Bonjour mes rebelles intelligents. Today, I share with you an interview with the amazing Erico Rocha.
Now, if you’re not Bresilian, maybe you’ve never heard of him. But, he is super famous in Brazil. He is like the biggest infopreneur in Brazil. And like I shared in my video about Andrei Parabellum, an infopreneur is an entrepreneur who basically sells information products online, meaning like online courses or ebooks, these kind of stuff.
Erico has now a huge following online in Brazil. But, when I did the interview in 2013, he was still quite unknown but it was on the rise. And, he shares in this video how from a successful but quite bored and quite unhappy banker in London, he became a multi-millionaire in less than two years.
So, I’m here with my friend Erico. Hello Erico.
Erico Rocha: Hi.
Olivier Roland: Who is also a great entrepreneur. So, I’m here in Brazil in his awesome flat because he invited me for one week in his great city. And Erico really has an awesome story to share.
So, I wanted to interview him so that you can know his story and be inspired and perhaps, have some insight of how you can succeed online too.
So, Erico.
Erico Rocha: Hi.
Olivier Roland: Hi. I want to start your story. You were like a worker in London; you had this really well-paid job. What was it?
Erico Rocha: Well, I used to work as an IT consultant in the investment bank industry.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: So in terms, I would help traders, bond traders, which is European government about bond traders to calculate prices for those securities. I’m not sure if anyone’s a specialist, but that’s what I used to do.
So, it would be a big spreadsheet with pricing models and…
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: And I started working for banks like J.P. Morgan, Deutsche bank, UBS…
Olivier Roland: So, big banks?
Erico Rocha: Big banks, yeah.
Olivier Roland: And you had a big salary.
Erico Rocha: I did. At that time, I used to earn around… It depends like the service in investment bank is different. But, I used to earn an average of £10 to 15,000 thousand a month.
Olivier Roland: Wow, that’s a big salary.
Erico Rocha: This sort of a minimum of £10 to 15,000 a month.
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: Yeah.
Olivier Roland: All right. So, you decided to stop one day.
Erico Rocha: Yeah.
Olivier Roland: Why is that?
Erico Rocha: Well, I always… I used to work a lot. And despite being very well-paid, I didn’t feel that I love doing that. Like it was great but it wasn’t amazing.
I still have to ask from my boss for taking holidays, I used to deal with fairly high stressful situations and whilst that was okay, it wasn’t awesome, I wanted more. And, I start to…
Olivier Roland: You wanted more freedom.
Erico Rocha: I wanted more freedom, right. I didn’t want to do that for the rest of my life. That was…
Olivier Roland: How many hours did you work at these time?
Erico Rocha: It was… A typical day was… a good case was a 10 hours and a bad case from 12 to 14 hours a day. So, 10 hours.
Olivier Roland: For 5 to 6 day a week?
Erico Rocha: Yeah. We used to come to the floor before the market opened. In London, it is about 7 o’clock because the market opens in Europe at 8 o’clock. So, we have to be there at 7 o’clock.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: And then, we used to leave… A typical day would be 6 to 7 o’clock after the market closes, somehow.
So yeah, so it was a typical day.
Olivier Roland: Wow, okay. So, you wanted more freedom, more time for yourself?
Erico Rocha: That’s right. And what I did is like I had a lot of money. I mean not “a lot of money”, I wasn’t rich, filthy rich, but I had some reasonable money so I start buying property everywhere. So, I start investing.
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: And I invested all over place.
Olivier Roland: In real estate?
Erico Rocha: In real estate, yeah. At that time. I start investing in stocks. I wasn’t good at that.
Olivier Roland: Did you already left your job?
Erico Rocha: No no. Not yet.
Olivier Roland: You were working and you started investing.
Erico Rocha: Yeah. Because I wanted to one day not be able to work in that environment again. So…
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: And then, I start investing. But, I felt that if I although, maybe in 10, 15, 20 years, the hope would work.
Olivier Roland: It was your hope.
Erico Rocha: Yeah. But, it was my hope but it felt like it was… When the market was growing, I thought “Oh, that… One or two years more, like that.”
And as every market goes up and down, so I actually felt that this will take a lot of years, like…And then, okay. So, I start looking for other options and that’s when I actually stumble across a book.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: And the way I stumble across the book is that, we have like 15 rooms. We used to buy big houses in London and split into bedsits.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: For some people. And we rent the bedsits separately to increase the cash flow. And I come and I have a business partner there.
And then, I have a business partner and we come together and say “Hey, I could have my wife being the property manager and we could pay her a salary and stuff”. And he said “No no, we shouldn’t do that Erico. I just read this book called “The 4-hour Workweek” and this is not the right way to do it. You should read it”.
And, I think read it. And before, because we have to hire someone to do that instead of just making us another job.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: So, I bought the book straight away and I went skiing actually. And I went to ski in Austria. It was…
Olivier Roland: Ah, okay.
Erico Rocha: It was the end of….
Olivier Roland: When is the book?
Erico Rocha: I think it was end of 2009 if I’m not mistaken.
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: And, I read the book and everything was like exploding in my mind and “Oh my gosh!” After the book, I wanted to do a product; I wanted to do an online business. And that’s when I did the most craziest thing ever. So, I actually…
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: I came back. It was in January. And there’s a chapter in the book called “Fear” and it was the worst thinking that can do if you…
Olivier Roland: Yeah. How to define your fear?
Erico Rocha: Exactly. So, I define my fear. And my fear was that, one day I would lose my job and I wouldn’t be able to provide for my family and stuff. But I have like money in liquid assets to live for a year. Everything else was like in property that was devalued for some reason or the other. So, it wasn’t liquid. So, I said “Oh, I can live for a year and still do something”. So, I went to my boss and quit.
Olivier Roland: Like that?
Erico Rocha: Like that. You know, and that still…
Olivier Roland: You didn’t have any plan on what you will do after that.
Erico Rocha: No. I have a big saying. It is like well I’m not sure where I actually… I actually learned that in a personal development course I did before. And in this personal development, we’re taught that sometimes we have to throw the hat in the other side of the wall.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: And then, figure out the way to catch it. That’s the easiest and quickest way as though it’s very painful as well.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: Some people call it jump and then figure out how to fly. And, I’m not sure if that’s the right direction. But that’s what I did.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: So, I throw it and it was scary, it was scary. And I remember I was really scared. It was so scary. And that’s 2009, in the middle of the banking crisis. It’s not like I can come back easily because there’s plenty of jobs. My job was fine, it was secure but hey…
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: You know things were not going well in banking.
Olivier Roland: They are not like hiring a lot.
Erico Rocha: And I had a job, I still had the job. So, my area was doing great. But I dit it, I did it. It was scary and I was so scared that one week before… Actually I… Because when you leave, you tell that you’re going to leave. Then, you have some notice period and then you leave, right?
Olivier Roland: Sure.
Erico Rocha: So, one week before my notice period when actually I was going to leave, I had this nightmare. I wouldn’t sleep and I thought “Oh bloody hell, I did something really bad, I’m stupid.”
And, I went to my boss and tried to do something that… it’s not… Actually, I tried to unquit.
Olivier Roland: Oh really?
Erico Rocha: I did, yeah.
Olivier Roland: You told him “No, I want to…”
Erico Rocha: I tell and say “Shit, I want to go back. I want to go back. Sorry, I’m so sorry.” And he said “Erico, now we’ve lost your headcount, which is your place, and we can’t just have it. You know like, we lost it. And now, I don’t have a guy and…” Anyway…
So, I actually really had to quit.
Olivier Roland: Wow.
Erico Rocha: And then, I was… I thought I just did something really bad, right. And then, my wife just said “Oh, you never took a proper, a long holiday for a while and you’re always taking these short holidays. Why don’t we just… Instead of just looking for a job right now, why don’t we do this trip?”
And in this trip, we went to visit all our friends in Europe and we started in Switzerland, in a place called Lausanne.
Olivier Roland: Lausanne.
Erico Rocha: Then, we went to Rotterdam to visit another friend we had there. We would spend like a week or two weeks there. And then, I went to Barcelona and every second of these trips and “Wow, what I’m going to do?”
“What I’m gonna do?” My brain said it a thousand times because, although I knew, I actually… Internally, I wanted to not could have to come back to my job. And that’s when I had my first idea of my first website which is called the “Proleilões.”
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: Which is, if you translate, is “Pro Auction”.
Olivier Roland: Yeah, because it’s important to note that you are Brazilian, you worked in London. But, you created your website in Portuguese to target the Brazilian market.
Erico Rocha: That’s right. Because I thought there was less competition.
Olivier Roland: Okay. Which is right.
Erico Rocha: And in that, I even named the website “Proleilões” where “leilões” means auctions which is about real estate auctions. And you know, there’s in the 4-hour workweek, his example of the web business. One example was something called “www.ProSoundWaves” or Pro something. And it was related to selling special effects, sound effects. So, that’s where I got the name of my product.
Olivier Roland: Oh, Really?
Erico Rocha: It was “Pro – leilões” because of that.
Olivier Roland: Okay. The book was your like blueprint at this time.
Erico Rocha: Yeah. As much as it… although the “how to do an online business” is not what worked for me there, but the idea was a blueprint.
Olivier Roland: So, you started your first website. And then?
Erico Rocha: And then, I did a first website. And then, I put my brother together and he was just graduating from University so, “Hey, you’re going to work on this with me and stuff so I’m not alone and stuff”.
And we built that, and we put it on market. I think that, I remember I quit, I left in April, put in on market in August. And then, “boom”. Until, like December, I had no sales.
Olivier Roland: Wow, no sales at all.
Erico Rocha: No sales. And I had some money in the bank, so it was like driving traffic through AdWords like 700 visitors a day, through paid ads.
Olivier Roland: 700 a day?
Erico Rocha: Yeah.
Olivier Roland: And you didn’t make any sell?
Erico Rocha: Well, I did like not enough to pay for the ads and the server.
Olivier Roland: Wow, okay.
Erico Rocha: You know, not enough at all.
Olivier Roland: So, your cost of the advertising was higher than the money you got.
Erico Rocha: The cost of the advertising plus servers, plus the whole structure that I have to provide my product which is a little bit…
Olivier Roland: So, it was not a good business product.
Erico Rocha: It wasn’t, it wasn’t and then…
Olivier Roland: Okay. So, what did you do?
Erico Rocha: Oh, my gosh, I was desperate. I was desperate because this is now November, and…
Olivier Roland: Almost one year after you quit.
Erico Rocha: Almost one year. My cash reserves, I was actually running really low and I don’t have time, like all my other assets were illiquid.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: And if I was to call them and I would lose some money, and I have to think about, and I did the unimaginable. I went there and I started looking for a job.
Olivier Roland: Wow.
Erico Rocha: And then, I actually found one. I found one; I didn’t earn that much money that I earned before. It was like 30 percent or something less.
Olivier Roland: 30%?
Erico Rocha: Maybe.
Olivier Roland: 30% less.
Erico Rocha: 30% less, yeah.
Olivier Roland: Which is…
Erico Rocha: I used to earn £700 a day and I came back at £450 a day. So, I was… they charge in daily… contracts.
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: But, yeah, ouf! I got enough money to not getting debt or to avoid the worst happening. And…
Olivier Roland: Yeah?
Erico Rocha: It was a time when I actually say “Hey, but now I can breathe. Now, I can provide my family with finance, I can survive and the worst hasn’t happened.”
And that’s when I did a course. But, I still thought that the product was good and then I couldn’t do online marketing. I just didn’t know how to do it. And, I knew that there must be a way, it’s not like…
Olivier Roland: It’s not like…
Erico Rocha: I just… you do a website and it will work. It’s just…
Olivier Roland: There are companies that make money on the internet, right. So,
Erico Rocha: That’s right.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: So then, I did a course and then it was a course by… I bought a course. And I got onto these lists like… And then, suddenly they sold the course and the first course was from a guy called Jeff Walker. And the course is about launching.
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: I said “Great, this is… this guy…”
Olivier Roland: How did you stumble upon it?
Erico Rocha: I actually saw an interview from Tony Robbins which in times of desperation, that’s who you read. Right?
Olivier Roland: Okay, Yeah.
Erico Rocha: So, yeah, when anything goes wrong, that’s me, when anything goes wrong, shit is hitting the fan, sorry about my French, that you try to find answers, you try to find because there’s nowhere to go. You just swim or die.
And that’s what kind of… So, I start reading Tony Robbins, I start reading that. And somehow it saved me, somehow, my mind, to survive on that.
Olivier Roland: Interesting.
Erico Rocha: Yeah. And one day, Tony Robbins send me an email say “Hey, I’m going doing some interviews with online entrepreneurs”. And one of these guys were a guy called Frank Kern, you probably know him.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: Great guy. And I said “Man, I would love to be a Frank Kern”, because what he says make sense. And then, I’ve started looking at every free YouTube video from him. Suddenly, I sign up from his list.
One week later, coincidentally he was promoting a guy called Jeff Walker and his product.
Olivier Roland: Yeah, okay.
Erico Rocha: And the name of the product was not “Product Launch Formulas”, it was “Product Launch Manager” which is…
Olivier Roland: Which was teaching people how to do product launches for their customers.
Erico Rocha: All this, yeah. But I wanted to do a protocol so I bought it anyway.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: And it was like $5,000 up front.
Olivier Roland: Not cheap.
Erico Rocha: Not cheap. And, it was my first ever product, actually my second ever product that I bought. It’s like gazillion. In 2005, I bought an e-book called “Google cash” that never…
Olivier Roland: Never applied.
Erico Rocha: Well, never applied, exactly. And then later, £5,000. I was in desperation. I was already invested so much. But those videos made so much sense for me. I thought this is the thing.
And I invested 5,000… A lot of people thought I was crazy to pay it. I never even met or spoke to anyone before I was handling, like a credit card payment.
But yeah, I started doing the course and God thanks, it was everything that I was really… really…And then, I traveled to LA as well at that time.
Olivier Roland: Because it was an event with a course, okay.
Erico Rocha: And Thank God, I did that because on that course, on that three days in LA and I’ve been to several other courses. But, that particular course was designed in a workshop way.
And although… I learned so much there. I learned because we were in groups, we were actually working launches. And all that knowledge, that was like in sort of actually ingraining and it really made sense for me, really made sense.
And, I came back. My brother was there, we came back and said “Wow, we’re gonna…”. I mean, from that moment on, I knew that we’re going to make it. If it wouldn’t be on that moment lone, I have…
Olivier Roland: It changes your belief.
Erico Rocha: It changed my belief, yes.
Olivier Roland: Because you knew what to do.
Erico Rocha: Yes and I knew I couldn’t fail.
Olivier Roland: Wow, okay.
Erico Rocha: I knew that I couldn’t fail. Even if I failed, I knew I wouldn’t fail for years because that is just a matter.
Olivier Roland: Did you believe in this method, so much?
Erico Rocha: Because it was amazing. It was amazing, it was groundbreaking.
Olivier Roland: You had a lot of proof that it’s working.
Erico Rocha: A lot of proof that it’s working. Not just proof that you see in the internet, I saw bloody guys walking nearby me that wasn’t selling me anything say “Hey, I applied this and I made it”.
Yeah, and they made it in other niches, in competitive niches and I knew it. At that moment, I knew it. There was nothing holding. I may be bankrupt in the way of actually doing it but I knew that was no way. I don’t know how I would, but…
And then, we turned off our website at that time, and then we launched a squeeze page. Just like a website which has several pages of “bla bla bla bla”. We shut it off, put just one squeeze page, a squeeze page…
Olivier Roland: So, people can put their email in it.
Erico Rocha: Email, in exchange for something that used to provide some free information on real estate. And, I still remember today the 23rd of March 2010, and we have that in video by the way, that I was in London, still at my job, right? Coming back.
I was in London and we were like… It was very cheap to call Brazil from this call back number. So, I was with my headphone and we were opening card and we just like we did actually a six-figure sales in seven days.
Olivier Roland: Wow. So, more than $100,000. Okay.
Erico Rocha: …Dollars in seven days.
Olivier Roland: Wow.
Erico Rocha: And then, there is a video of them jumping up and down, it was the first hour this and the first hour that…
And then my life changed.
Olivier Roland: Everything changed, right?
Erico Rocha: Yeah, everything changed.
Olivier Roland: You realize that it was really true.
Erico Rocha: Yes.
Olivier Roland: That you made a lot of money.
Erico Rocha: And after that, I started having different problems. But, life wasn’t alike. One week later, I had my merchant account saying “Hey, this is not… I don’t know what’s happening. You had nothing and now, you have a lot and I think there must be some scam or something like that. So, yeah they were like reticent of the situation. So, they actually started calling all the clients and they said that if we can’t find the client for three days, then we’re going to cancel the sale”.
Olivier Roland: Oh, wow.
Erico Rocha: That’s really.
Olivier Roland: Oh it hurts.
Erico Rocha: It hurts, but in their mind that’s what they… Because in their mind, they were protecting themselves. They didn’t know what was that.
Olivier Roland: It was a merchant account in Brazil. That you had no money and then, in six days, you had more than 100,000 dollars…
Erico Rocha: And then, I got 4… you have money. And then a week later, I have 40% less. Because…
Olivier Roland: Oh, my God. Because they can’t sell.
Erico Rocha: And in their minds, they say “Oh no, we just can…” you can always make the sale because in their mind, they was not never this launching thing that drives through the process. It is just like “Oh, yeah. Just call them and make the sale again”. It doesn’t work like that. But anyway, I knew I learned it and I said “Great”. Then, I built from there and you know…
Olivier Roland: So, did you leave your job after that?
Erico Rocha: I did. I did leave my job. I know, like I live in Brazil right now, so as you can see, I live near the beach.
Olivier Roland: An awesome flat, yeah. We can hear the sea right here. Okay.
Erico Rocha: Yes.
Olivier Roland: Okay.
Erico Rocha: Yes, I have a one-year-old boy and one thing like… And I still work. I work and I work because I like it.
Olivier Roland: It’s interesting because it’s a good example of a leap of faith you did.
Erico Rocha: Yeah.
Olivier Roland: I mean, it was not easy for you. At the beginning, you failed. For one year, you didn’t make any money and you had to come back to another job.
Erico Rocha: Yeah.
Olivier Roland: But, at the end you succeeded because you chose the right teacher with a good method, something that really works, a real process that can be… that you can learn and apply in your business.
Erico Rocha: And, there is one bit as well that kind of goes unseen. I threw my hat on the other side of the wall.
Olivier Roland: Yeah, okay.
Erico Rocha: Because if I wasn’t, I put myself in such a situation that failure would give me big damage. And in my entrepreneur career, and whenever I didn’t do that, whenever you are in a survival mode where you put yourself in a more dangerous, not dangerous but more risky position, then you work better.
And from time to time, that’s what I do today. For example, it was like I wanted to do a live seminar. Then, I actually… I sold it before I could do it.
Olivier Roland: Wow.
Erico Rocha: And like…
Olivier Roland: You sold the tickets for the event before even organizing it.
Erico Rocha: I sold the tickets for the event. Yeah. Before I knew, I could deliver to my promise. But once the tickets were sold and there was like proper $200,000 tickets sold.
Olivier Roland: So, really pressure for you.
Erico Rocha: And then, I figure out, the brain starts working in a different manner. And then, one week before, I still didn’t think that I could do it the way I should do it. Then, you know the story. I flew to France to…
Olivier Roland: Wow. You went to Paris to another event, marketing event in Paris.
Erico Rocha: To be coached on how to do live events.
Olivier Roland: Like one week before your own event.
Erico Rocha: One week. When I landed in Brazil, I landed on Wednesday?
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: And my event started on Friday.
Olivier Roland: Wow.
Erico Rocha: And landed on Wednesday knowing that I had to change 100% of it. I was okay but there were other speakers and all… So suddenly, I knew I had a lame event. Everything was wrong with my event, a lot of things.
But, you know, It was the most… It is stressful, physically stressful because I hadn’t much sleep and in the middle of the event, I get high 40% fever. It’s strange. I get 40% fever in the middle of the event.
And, I knew that if I would drop there, I would have a huge impact because no one else could deliver. That’s about live events that I didn’t know about it. But imagine, something happens to me just before the event is a huge risk. But, I had a 40% and I delivered. And I delivered just because there was no… the price for failure at that very specific moment was very high. And, the brain understands, it is really important.
Olivier Roland: Yeah. It’s really important what you say. The price of failure is too high.
Erico Rocha: It’s high. It’s like trying to walk on a straight path. If you do it like half a meter from the floor, you just walk it. But once you… If it’s like a hundred meters from the floor, and it’s the same path, your level of focus increases 2,000%.
Olivier Roland: Yeah. That’s a great tip actually. You can do that for example by creating only like 10% of your product before selling it. Because, if you do like a big course on internet or an offline course, and you can procrastinate for a 1 year or 2 years perhaps.
But, if you already sold it and you have like 50 or 100 customers that are waiting for your content, I can promise you will not procrastinate, right?
Erico Rocha: No.
Olivier Roland: Because you have this pressure. People are waiting for you, they are waiting for your…
Erico Rocha: Hopefully, and if you do, man you’ve got to pay your price.
Olivier Roland: Exactly.
Erico Rocha: I know that you won’t do it.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: And I don’t advise you to do anything that would endanger your life or the life of others, like it should be controllable risks. Like if I had failed this thing, the most that would happen is for me becoming bankrupt and hey I didn’t have children at that time and I felt it was potentially an okay price to pay.
But what I’m trying to say is that, the biggest one action that I could do myself is to put myself in a situation where failure has a high price. For example, if I don’t go to the gym today, oh what will happen? I get a little bit fatter. I won’t die.
And then, maybe in 30 years, maybe I will if I don’t do it but, hey…
Olivier Roland: It’s about now.
Erico Rocha: Yeah. But, if I put myself in a situation where I actually make a bet with someone that I actually give, get, I don’t know, a reasonable amount of money which is reasonable for me. Say, I don’t know whatever, imagine, €1,000 is reasonable for you.
So, get this, €1,000. Give it to your worst enemy and say “Here’s the thing, this is €1,000, right? And if I miss one day, I do not want you to give this €1,000 back to me.” And that changes because now, there is a significant impact. And your productivity will rise and not a lot of people have the stamina to do that, but that’s what I did.
Olivier Roland: That’s a great tip. And there are websites that can actually do that, where you can you know, say “Hey, I give this money to this political party. The one you don’t like of course. If I don’t make this goal. You know, if I don’t achieve this goal, if I don’t go to the gym everyday, you give like 1000 to the political party that you hate.”
Erico Rocha: Some people are not fans of it, but that’s…
Olivier Roland: I think it’s a great return.
Erico Rocha: I think that’s one of my little secrets.
Olivier Roland: Yeah. So, you did it with friends?
Erico Rocha: No, I didn’t in particular days but…
Olivier Roland: You had this one strategy.
Erico Rocha: But, I did it in real life when I actually quit my job without having a job.
Olivier Roland: Yeah, sure.
Erico Rocha: And it wasn’t fun in the beginning. As I said, I tried to unquit and I had the worst stomach aches about it but I’m happy I did it.
Olivier Roland: So, what… yeah. So now, you are…
Erico Rocha: I prefer to die quick than to die slowly in my job.
Olivier Roland: Exactly.
Erico Rocha: Well, I’m not saying I’m going to die, but I’d prefer to go through it, suffering in a quick way but take it like it’s a bandage. Right?
I prefer to lap it really quick and get what I get than actually to trying to really slowly die. And I think that’s what I was. I was slowly dying. I was… my soul was dying every day I had to go to that job.
Olivier Roland: How do you feel about your life right now?
Erico Rocha: I feel really good.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: Now, I feel really good. I don’t work less, I actually worked more than I should work.
Olivier Roland: Wow.
Erico Rocha: Yeah. And not in the sense of… but, I actually love when I do it. I have like five companies right now and I love starting up. I live whatever I want, I work. And that’s one thing.
For example, on Tuesday and Thursday, actually in the middle of the day like 10:30 – 10:50, I take my son to swimming classes because I could. So, there’s degrees of liberty I never had as an employee.
Olivier Roland: Do you have a way more freedom?
Erico Rocha: Yeah, I fly to France. I fly to France.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: I don’t have to ask anyone and I love it.
Olivier Roland: You have time to receive friends.
Erico Rocha: And the one thing is that, I actually build assets. When I quit my job, I used to earn that amount of money. When I quit the job, they say or the contract they say “Hey Erico, that’s it. You quit and you have nothing.” I had no asset. Just the money.
Olivier Roland: Sure. You build the business from something else. Right?
Erico Rocha: However, when you build a company and if you build it the right way, different companies with different potentials, you actually have an asset that is actually, you know, it’s worth something. I’m building something that’s worth it.
Olivier Roland: And you can sell it.
Erico Rocha: And I’m making a difference.
Olivier Roland: It’s what happened. I sold my first company after ten years and my employees didn’t get anything. I mean, it’s a normal life because I built it, I took the risk of doing it. And so, I had the benefits. So yeah, okay. Great, Wow.
So, it’s a really interesting story. I think you already share a lot of your great tips for entrepreneurs. It’s the mindset that is really important. But, do you have like one or more tips for beginners that want to start now on internet? How he can succeed?
Erico Rocha: Oh, here’s what I would do if I were them. So first, I would find the best guys in the market doing what they, in the particular area, that they want. I mean, guys that are actually doing it and actually making money.
I will buy their courses, but I don’t think that’s enough. Well, maybe that it is but I would actually try to know them personally. I would try to somehow do a relationship with them like trying to help them or trying to… You know, in a blog environment, commenting to their blog, sending an honest testimony when they asked you like…
And hopefully, grabbing their attention as a potential partner. And I would like, if you could, I would try to ask them to be my mentors. And it’s not always possible, but I think one of the things that… And I would go to live events.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: Live events, real live events where you meet people that actually do this. Yeah, I think when your brain… Again, I believe my brain and myself are different people.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: Because sometimes, I control, sometimes I don’t. I believe it works when I actually see something happening and it’s like touchable when I actually can see it.
Like your story for example, when I actually you know we all know about these bloggers that claim to do all sorts of thing we all know it’s possible. Actually, when I tried and I saw you, I actually say “Hey, this is actually possible”.
And I started blogging late in my internet career. I had just wrote…
Olivier Roland: Yeah. I bugged you for three years before you started it, right?
Erico Rocha: That’s right. But, when I actually went to… that’s when I went to Paris, at that time went for that “Leilões.” I actually saw you then, “The 4 hour Workweek” is actually a possibility that you actually travel the whole world and stuff. Because you know, I made a lot of money in the past, right. And make a couple of millions, right? Like per year.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: But actually, when I saw you having success, I actually did my blog. So, my brains stop procrastinating and start producing because it started seeing. So, I would actually see people, or I actually befriend them or try to find a partnership with them. I would contact them, help them out hopefully getting to their circle.
Olivier Roland: Yeah, exactly. Develop the relationship by giving value. And it’s awesome because when you are on the internet, it’s easy to forget that there are weird people behind the website, the computers.
And it’s not because you walk on internet that you can’t meet people. It’s really important to meet physically like you said because they are real and they can inspire you in a much better way I think than only on digital.
Erico Rocha: Yeah. And the other thing that I would say is that, we all dream. We buy this ebook of $47 or say a $100. And without nothing and we get built this massive thing.
And I have a different approach. I think I like to invest, you know. This is actually I like to see whatever is internet as a business. I invest on it, really. It’s not like I don’t try to build a business with nothing. I actually look at it as a business. Okay, it’s cheaper to build an online business than it’s an awful lot of business because you don’t have to do brand contracts for years and stuff.
But, you’ve got invest. If you want to be a top dog, you have to invest or you’re going to be bloody lucky which I never was to my life. So, you need to invest, you need to find the best guys, you need to find the best courses and you need to befriend and be part of their circles.
You know, there’s a guy that sort of says that your income is usually…
Olivier Roland: The average income of the five people you know.
Erico Rocha: Plus or minus 20% and I believe like… I don’t believe that just with the income. I believe for your weight as well. I was seeing a TED talk that, that if you have a best friend who becomes overweight, it increases the probability statistically of you become overweight by 57%.
Olivier Roland: Wow. That’s a lot.
Erico Rocha: There’s a Greek guy that did the research. So, it’s all about the connections, it’s all about people and it’s all about meeting them. And before you meet them, just take action.
I don’t meet them with questions like something that they don’t take care. The typical guy that’s interesting is a guy “I did that and I failed, I did that and I failed and I didn’t give up and I did that and I failed.”
And the guy that is going there until he does it.
Olivier Roland: Yeah, exactly.
Erico Rocha: Unstoppable.
Olivier Roland: Yeah. There is this good comparison because you taught me some surf lessons the previous day and I mean, I failed miserably in the sea dozens of times, right?
Erico Rocha: Yes, dozens.
Olivier Roland: But now, I can be on the board for one or two seconds which is great for me.
Erico Rocha: Yes.
Olivier Roland: I mean, in every activity when you start, you fail and you fail and you fail again, until you start succeeding.
Erico Rocha: I’m yet to find one guy and I know a lot of successful entrepreneurs right now. When I was in banking, I knew no one. I just knew successful employees or successful career makers.
Olivier Roland: Which is really different.
Erico Rocha: And now, I am yet to meet one guy that actually did it. He was… He just hit a jackpot and he did it. I’m yet to meet one guy that set up the website and it exploded. And I’m yet to meet them.
Olivier Roland: Yeah, exactly.
Erico Rocha: I don’t know, maybe there is. But, none of the people that I actually…
Olivier Roland: It’s not common.
Erico Rocha: Yeah, not common.
Olivier Roland: Yeah.
Erico Rocha: Not common for the people I know.
Olivier Roland: Wow. So, really great tips I think. Yeah, as you can see, I hope that you took a lot of the mindset of Erico which I think is really great. Please I want you to choose at least one action after this video, that you will apply in your real life if not, like I love to say, it’s more masturbation for your brain than really acknowledge that you can use to change your life.
Don’t hesitate to see this video again and again if you want to be inspired and really take all you can from the mindset of Erico. Thank you for seeing this video. Thank you Erico for these great tips and see you next time. Bye.
Erico Rocha: Bye, bye.
Olivier Roland: Voilà mes rebelles intelligents. I hope you liked this video and you learned some useful tactics and strategies to succeed also with your business. To complement this video, you are free to receive an extract of my upcoming book in English and the extract is “3 Principles To Succeed in Every Field In Your Life.” Seems too good to be true, I let you see by yourself. So, to receive it, just click on the thumbnail. You can also watch this complementary video and don’t forget to subscribe to the channel so you don’t miss any amazing video. Thank you for watching; see you soon and in the meantime, don’t forget: be intelligent, be rebel and be part of people who build an empire online. Tchao!