As a young entrepreneur at eighteen, I made just about every mistake in the book. The thing was, at the time, by achieving early success I thought I had it all figured out.

Like so many entrepreneurs first starting out, I was hungry for success and eager to make my mark on the world being my own boss and starting my first venture. I had all the right intentions, but unfortunately, I didn’t have the perspective to stay grounded in what really mattered.

In some ways, I lost myself in the pursuit of success, working impossibly long hours, swept up in the “hustle and grind” mentality. I drilled my health into the ground, neglected relationships, and was unable to feel fulfilled when the time came to actually celebrate having “made it”.

78% of successful entrepreneurs today say that learning from previous failures is essential. Having the foresight to avoid costly mistakes can save you years of wasted time, life force, and energy, as well as help you to make informed decisions that result in maximum ROI.

That’s why I’ve consulted a fellow millennial entrepreneur with five successful companies under his belt to shed some light on what matters most as an entrepreneur, so you can find the right footing from the beginning.

Meet Zion Kim, the president of Maverick NEXT, a network for exceptional entrepreneurs age 25 and under. In addition to operating an impressive portfolio of ventures, he’s developed marketing strategies for namesake brands like Dell, and served as an advisor for tech startups to 7, 8, and 9-figure companies. Kim is also the inaugural recipient of the prestigious Rutgers University Entrepreneur Award.

This week on the Unconventional Life Podcast, Kim lends his perspective as a seasoned entrepreneur, sharing what he wish he had known when he got started and what he would have done differently on his way to the top if he could have had the foresight beforehand.

Below, see Kim’s five tips to keep in mind as you prepare to ascend the summit of entrepreneurial success.

1. Do What You Most Love Doing.

It’s a common misperception that in order to be doing work, or “getting something done,” the task needs to be hard. We have had it drilled into us that work is a “grind,” so we seek work from this place and measure our performance or output by the amount of hard exertion we have done.

Kim encourages us to embrace that work and achievement can be fun, playful, effortless, and the thing we love doing most, because this is where we can access our most valuable gifts and thus where we can provide the greatest contribution.

“We have those things that when we’re doing them they come with such ease. Being in flow. Time passes and you don’t even notice. Certain gifts you have are unlocked easier and pour out of you easier—this is where you are meant to work,” Kim says.

2. Don’t Do It For Validation.

Here’s a sobering dose of truth—if you’re looking to achieve success for your ego, or to feel like you’ve finally “made it,” no amount of external praise will satisfy you. Why? Because you are coming from a place of emptiness, a place of proving, as if your own worth is not self-stated.

Be honest with yourself about the place you are coming from in your pursuit of success. When you catch yourself seeking validation, remember to press pause and ground yourself in the truth of who you are.

3. Be Open To Trying New Things.

When you’re first starting out, knowing exactly what you’re meant to do or where you’re meant to serve can be unclear. Kim recommends to try as many new things as possible. You don’t know what you love until you try it, and you might be surprised by what arises when you give something a chance.

Eventually, Kim says, you’ll land on the thing that’s meant for you and you’ll be ready for it. The diverse skills you will have accumulated along the way will have prepared you for it perfectly. Each skill you develop is an asset and will serve you in unexpected ways.

I remember many years ago when Tom Shoes debuted their “buy-one-give-one” business model. It was revolutionary at the time and no one else seemed to be doing it.

Back then, I was developing a business idea for my business school’s pitch competition. Two classmates and I decided to model after Tom Shoes and pitch a business called “Rice2Rice,” which would give a bowl of rice to those in Nepal for every curry bowl sold.

Our idea won by a longshot and we received first place. Why? Because we put forth something into the world that was deeply needed—a business that partnered with consumers in making positive change.

It’s 2017 and we now confront even more global challenges than we did when Tom’s Shoes was launched. This type of business model is no longer an early adopter approach, it is a necessity.

While giving may seem counterintuitive to profit, it’s actually proven to increase earnings. One 15-year study found businesses who supported a good cause outperformed the S&P 500 fourteen to one.

That’s because 83% of consumers today are making conscious buying choices and selecting companies that support social and environmental causes over those that don’t. Millennials, who represent $2.45 Trillion in spending power, are 66% more likely to purchase from brands who do good.

So just how do you make your business a force for positive change in the world?

One co-founder has created a step-by-step methodology to start a business or adapt your existing business to this “do-good model.”

Meet Dmitriy Kozlov, the co-founder of Vision Tech Team and the founder of Maverick NEXT, a network for exceptional entrepreneurs under age 25. He’s also a contributor to the newly released book “Evolved Enterprise” by Yanik Silver that has been endorsed by Sir Richard Branson that teaches entrepreneurs how to start companies that make more profit by making more impact.

Kozlov calls these do-good companies “evolved enterprises” because they are leveraging business as a vehicle to create powerful global solutions.

This week on the Unconventional Life Podcast, Kozlov shares what it takes to create an evolved enterprise.

Align With A Cause You Stand Behind

With more global issues than we can count, it shouldn’t be hard to find a cause that works to combat an issue you care about. It’s essential that you have a personal stake in it, whether you or someone close to you has been personally impacted the issue, because otherwise your business will lack real drive—if you find yourself in a rut, you may not be able to withstand the pressure and withdraw from the cause altogether, appearing inauthentic to consumers.

“Choose wisely where you invest your heart because that’s the life force that will matter most,” Kozlov says.

Make A Real Impact

The bigger the impact you make in the world, the easier it is to rally consumers behind your product. In other words, don’t be stingy—donate a significant portion of profits to your cause.  Consumers can sniff out when you’re only supporting a cause for the sake of the badge from miles away, and it may have the opposite effect of deterring them from your business.

Some of today’s most successful evolved enterprises include Bombas, a sock company that netted $2 million in revenue in its first year by donating a pair of socks to a homeless shelter for every pair sold, and Barnana, a banana snack company growing at 130% annually by eliminating waste on food farms.

Be Transparent

90% of consumers want to be informed about the concrete ways you’re benefiting your cause. They are partnering with you in using their dollar to make an impact, and it’s your responsibility to inform them about the results.

Be transparent and notify your customers when significant milestones are achieved, whether through your website, your product label, or your email list. When you share your achievements, your customers participate in the positive feeling and will continue to buy from you.

The book “Evolved Enterprise” sold 12,000+ copies within days of its release at more than double the shelf price by partnering with buyers to lift an entire African village out of poverty. In being transparent about his intended results, Kozlov was able to enlist others in his cause who were happy to help.

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This article originally appeared on Forbes.com

We live in the age of the smartphone. Just about everyone and their mother has one, and it is attached to them at the hip.

Most of us can’t go anywhere without our phones, let alone go just fifteen minutes without checking them. One study found the average Millennial checks their phone five times an hour, every hour, and spends a third of their waking day on their phone.

By 2020, 70% of the global population is expected to own a smartphone—that’s 6.1 Billion smartphones!

With so much of our time and attention being poured into these tiny devices, the least we can do is make positive use of it.

That’s exactly what one entrepreneur is doing with his new software that empowers smartphone users to report crime and assist in rescue efforts.

Meet Jon Fisher, the founding CEO of CrowdOptic, a cutting-edge technology in partnership with Hewlett Packard Enterprises that is leveraging the smartphone revolution to create a safer world. Fisher is a veteran inventor behind several well-known technologies with multi-million dollar acquisitions. He’s also the author of “Strategic Entrepreneurism,” and one of American City Business Journal’s 40 Under 40.

This week on the Unconventional Life Podcast, I interviewed Fisher about his latest for-good software, CrowdOptic.

Fisher says the idea for CrowdOptic came to him one day when he was watching boats race across the water, his favorite pastime. He wanted a way to determine the location of the moving boats, but he realized the technology didn’t exist yet.

So he did what every ordinary person in that situation would have done—he decided to invent the technology himself.

With three successful exits under his belt, the Silicon Valley tycoon is no stranger to tech startups. He’s got a trusty team of engineers who have worked with him on every project for the past 25 years. That kind of trust, coordination, and partnership is invaluable.

“These 15 people I work with, most of them I date back to 20 years. And we wear that as a badge of honor,” Fisher says.

In 2015, Fisher and his team launched CrowdOptic.

It’s essentially a software for your smartphone that lets you determine the precise GPS coordinates of a moving target.

Pretty cool, right?

Here’s how it works—”you have a couple of satellites that look down on your phone and know through triangulation the location of your phone,” Fisher explains. “You know how you hold up your phone to take a video of something significant in the world? With this new software, we know where they’re aimed. We can find the precise location of what you’re looking at through your device, where the object of interest is.”

In layman’s terms, CrowdOptic kicks in when several phones are aimed at the same thing. In the event of a threat to public safety, like a fire or a bombing, it’s natural for people to take out their phones and hit record.

CrowdOptic is able to find the exact GPS location of what those phones are aiming at at so law enforcement and safety efforts can arrive at the scene in record time.

Fisher says the good CrowdOptic is doing is thanks to its new partnership with HPE. The Fortune 500 giant specializes in intelligent livestreaming, which, paired with CrowdOptic’s software, has applications for virtually everything imaginable: ambulance, emergency response, military, medical, and even sports events.

74% of Millennials say they want to make a difference in the world, but don’t know how. Today’s global problems can seem overbearing with no practical or tangible way to go about solving them.

Next time you see something that might be a threat to public safety, know that you’re equipped to help—the power to save lives is at your fingertips.

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This article originally appeared on Forbes.com

When I was twenty-three I had an idea to start a yoga retreats business.

I spent weeks building a website, finding business partners, and getting business cards made. I was sure it was going to be a big hit. The day we went live I expected the bookings to start flooding in immediately… but nothing did.

Thousands of dollars on advertising later I still hadn’t made even one sale. It wasn’t until talking to a yogi and asking for feedback that I realized my offer wasn’t what she wanted.

My story is all too common—so many entrepreneurs go all-in on an idea they thought would work, but ends up being a huge bust in the market. After putting so much time and money into their idea, they feel defeated. 

The good news is, if you’re considering starting a business, this doesn’t have to be your story.

You don’t have to go into business blindly. In fact, the most successful entrepreneurs never do.

“The most dangerous word in business is to guess. The most important word is predictability,” says Dane Maxwell, a serial entrepreneur who’s founded multiple 7-figure companies, primarily in the world of software.

At age 32, Maxwell has over a decade of experience in business, and he swears by one thing: predicting the success of a product in advance. He’s developed a methodology around idea validation that has proven to sell products with no guessing involved.

Maxwell has recently shifted gears to the music industry as a singer and songwriter, but the entrepreneur at heart is still applying the same methodology to sell albums. No matter your industry, the applications are endless.

This week on the Unconventional Life Podcast, Maxwell shares the five-step methodology to validate business ideas that has earned him millions.

1. Identify Who You Want To Serve.

Choose to serve somebody who you believe is doing real good in the world, somebody who you want to support and see succeed. In helping them, you align with their cause and become a force for that same cause to take flight in the world. A good way to decide who you want to serve is to look to your core values. For example, if you value health and personal empowerment, you might serve yoga studios.

2. Speak To Real People Within The Scope Of Who You Want To Serve.

Once you’ve figured out who you want to help, get in touch with them. This will take your business idea from abstract to concrete, by putting it to the test and actually seeing if your client finds it valuable and would be willing to pay for it.

Maxwell says the quickest way to do this is to call them. For example, if you’re serving yoga studios, you might select a specific yoga studio chain and call one hundred studios within that chain.

3. Get Your Foot In The Door.

When someone answers the phone, you might say, ‘I’ve got this idea I’m working on. I’m not sure if it’s any good, but I wanted to pitch it to you to see if it’s good.’ “I use that opener ever time,” Maxwell says. “I’ve never gotten a no from that.”

This line is powerful because it sets the other person up to listen from a place of gratitude and appreciation. They immediately shift gears into being open to receive value, willing to work with you to develop an idea that they would benefit from.

4. Find Their Biggest Pain.

Pitch your initial idea to the person you’re speaking with, but don’t be attached to it being the product or service that’s the most needed by your client (and thus the most profitable). After you propose your idea, listen to what the other person says—does your idea solve their biggest problem, or is there another problem they’d really like help with? Your goal is to identify your client’s deepest source of pain and to develop a product idea that will remove it for them.

“Here’s the truth about real businesses,” Maxwell says. “The common thing is that they all solve a painful problem. If you’re not solving a painful problem, you’re coming up with this nice-to-have idea. As soon as you come up with something painful you’re in business.”

In Maxwell’s new music venture, he’s still solving pain with his music. His newest album, The Vow, is designed to help people discover their life purpose.

5. Price Your Product.

While you’ve still got your potential client on the phone, ask them what they’d be willing to pay for your product. Does this price seem fair to you? If not, have a conversation to negotiate a fair price.

“You want to charge based on the end result you deliver,” Maxwell says. “You generally want to charge about 10% of the value. Say that you want to gravitate towards what feels fair for the both of you. With that you build so much trust. If the person says a price you don’t like, say you’d feel taken advantage of at that price. Be honest. You can literally just say that.”

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This article originally appeared on Forbes.com