The 4 Most Important Entrepreneurial Milestones (And Why You Should Celebrate Each)

The path of the entrepreneur is hard.

You often go against the grain, often at your own expense.

You take on risks that the vast majority of people you know would never even dream of taking on.

And, worst of all, you are often wrong. Sometimes terribly wrong. Those can really hurt.

That’s why it’s important to celebrate successes. Even more importantly, it’s super-important to celebrate the important successes (a lot of importance there). Some of the successes can only happen once, and those milestones are an important part of every entrepreneur’s journey, so you need to pay some attention to them, celebrate them, and remember them in times of crisis.

These are the 4 most important milestones in every online entrepreneur’s story.

The Jump

The Jump can be a different action or set of actions depending on exactly what you’re doing. For most digital marketers, the Jump is that first piece of content you publish.

Whether it’s your first blog post, your first Youtube video, your first Instagram post, or your first email, it is an important point of transformation. Before you’ve performed the Jump, you were not technically an entrepreneur, but once you cross that chasm, it’s almost like there’s no going back.

It takes courage to get out there. People may hate your content, or just hate you, and you will have to face all sorts of negativity, unfair criticism, and worst of all, valid criticism (you need that one, but it still hurts).

Well, the Jump is where you make the decision to undertake that pain and suffering in the name of your business. The first time you put yourself out there, open for critique and feedback, is the first actual moment of courage.

Remember that day. Remember the first day you pressed that “Publish” button, when you first said “Here goes nothing”. Progress is built on the bodies of entrepreneurs, and the world needs you, so you shouldn’t take the Jump lightly. You’ve done (or will do) a noble, brave action, an action that is scary but may end up improving your own life and the lives of others.

The First Dollar

The importance of your first dollar of profit earned from your business cannot be overstated.

For most of us, it’s probably the first time that we start believing our own story in a way.

The time between the Jump and the First Dollar can differ wildly. For some, it’s the actual same day. For others, there may be a year in between.

Nonetheless, until you’ve earned your first dollar of profit, your business has been promises, clouds, and abstractions. It has been just you investing your precious time into something that you’re not sure it will ever work.

Well, that First Dollar is proof that at least it can work.

Of course, you’re still light years away from knowing full well that it will actually work. But the proof that it might work is there, and that is a very powerful tool.

Remember, entrepreneurship is often based on faith, and every bit of proof is precious. The First Dollar is the first time you get some solid proof, and while you will need more and more proof as you go (probably even every day after a certain poitn), the emotions you live through when you see your idea at least partially validated for the first time will never be matched.

Plus, if you’ve proven that you can earn money from your entrepreneurial efforts, now it’s just a matter of scaling and multiplying that, right?

Speaking of multiplying…

The First $1000 / Month

Out of all the entrepreneurial milestones, I believe the first month you earn $1000 or more is probably the most important one.

It is the first sign that you’re truly onto something here.

Depending on where you live, you can even start considering quitting your job and going 100% on your own business (not saying you should do this, but I think it’s a good place to at least start considering the option). $1000 per month can go a long way, even in Western countries, and we entrepreneurs are a tough bunch and don’t need a lot to survive.

Not only can $1000 per month start to play an important role in your real-world finances, and start contributing to your budget and maybe buy some food for your family and pay some bills, but that’s also a non-trivial sum of money for reinvesting in your business.

Man, I tell you, if you don’t know how $1000 / month feels like, you are missing out. I warmly recommend to all of you guys to get there as soon as you can. I was struggling for a long time to reach it, and when I first reached it a few months ago, it felt like finally finding that Holy Grail.

Now, $1000 per month from your own business is not the final level, and it’s not even close…

The First Million $

Well, honestly, I can’t say for sure how this feels like, because I’m not there yet myself. I should be there in a few years (I’m thinking 2), but I still got a long way to go.

All I know is, it has a great ring to it. Your first Million…

Even in the age of billionaires conquering entire other planets with rocketships, one million dollars still has a very good sound to it. It’s still the biggest financial threshold, the point after you are actually rich, and belong to that elusive club of people called “millionaires”.

I’ll try and update this post when I get there, and let you know how it felt. If some of you guys are already there, I’d love if you could try and share the emotion when you first found out you are an actual millionaire. The rest of us, let’s get back to the hustle and get there.


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Matt
I’m Matt, the man behind the Learn Digital Marketing brand. Find me on Instagram and TikTok if you want more.

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