12 Things my weight transformation journey taught me in business and marketing

I am an entrepreneur by accident, digital marketeer and fitness freak by passion. I was at 126 kgs and now I weigh 73 kgs. The way I handled everything has changed. In this journey of ups and downs, I have learned a lot on fitness, being a better entrepreneur and while trying to solve client problems through my digital marketing agency.

These different facets helped me cross learn by using some of the skill and mindset I used for both – business and fitness. I tried listing some of them.

1. Growth Mindset

Whenever I have tried to “maintain” my weight, I have ended up increasing it. Maintenance is the precursor to failure – for business and fitness. I talk growth marketing with all my customers as I try to influence every touchpoint and try to impact them. One should look at every touch point for self – social life, food habits, sleeping patterns, workouts and try to impact them with just one mindset – Growth. Once you achieve one goal, move to next. Constantly challenge self to be a better version. Maintenance mindset is de-growth for business, body and mind.

2. Discipline over motivation

"I don't have time or motivation" is the worst excuse ever. No matter what happens, I am at the gym at 6.30 AM. I don’t care how I feel about. I wasn’t always like that. Took time to build it. I have seen business owners with amazing discipline while at work. But they fail in their fitness regime. Roll over from the bed and get going. You got a late night at work, make sure you turn up. Have double espresso. But turn up. Just like you would for a client meeting no matter how you feel that day. I was morbidly obese. I wouldn't have got there if I had prioritized the right things.

3.?Know your triggers

In his book Atomic Habits, James Clear calls out 5 triggers – Time, location, preceding event, emotional state and other people. I won't cover that in detail here. Leaving the link to the book below. But that’s one book that made a huge impact on me. I recommend that for you to understand your triggers better. As a marketeer, understanding triggers helped me understand consumer behavior better and help convert them. As a fitness enthusiast, it kept me grounded and make sure I become more aware of forming habits that help me get better and avoid the pitfalls. Awareness of self and your triggers is step one. Why we do what we do.

4.?Have a Yes list

If you don’t have a clear yes list, then you will say yes to everything. Therein lies the challenge. I am in the digital marketing business. I am a specialist in that. That means I say no to a lot of stuff. It also helps me focus my time, energy, and learning to a single-minded focus – bring business to clients through digital. Same with fitness – if that is important and core to what you want, you will say no to unhealthy food or alcohol – no matter how bad your colleagues or friends feel. Just like you need to be known as a specialist of your business, just like you need to be seen out there as one who would do things right for your own health.

5.???Measurable Impact

What can’t be measured can’t be impacted. That’s a core habit that has been built into me starting from my early days in sales in FMCG, consumer durables. It has helped me a numbers-oriented marketeer. Of course, tempered with qualitative understanding. I measure every inch daily – be it in workouts or diet. It was either tracked on an app or Google Sheet. My stint of training at Ultimate Performance with daily monitoring also helped. Every inch counts. But you need to know where that inch lies to impact.

6.???A/B Testing

?In between, I moved away from Ultimate Performance where I was asked to report my weight once a week. The challenge in that system is that the impact cannot be ascertained to any specific thing. The variables that could have impacted over those 7 days on my weight could have been anything. That’s not ideal. You need to test out and look at the different inputs you are giving and how your body is reacting to them. Keep testing till you get it right for your body or business. But for that, you need constant monitoring and tweaking. Your business is just as unique as you. The recipes that I have tried and tested and perfected have got me here.

7.???Leave ego out

Don’t lift weights for ego and hurt yourself. Don’t let ego drive your business objectives and you hurt your business. Some of the major manifestations of ego I have seen of this being competition-focused rather than being consumer-focused. I understand the incremental growth that can be achieved in business is different from training. But whatever be the objectives, have a clear head based on solid business reasonings

8.???Use social media

I over-share on social media. Probably not the ideal way for a brand to overshare. But for myself, I just put myself out there and keeping myself accountable. But whatever I put was out there my true genuine self. Unadulterated me. I kept a balance of what I did and the progress. The biggest struggle is to do that for a brand. Be genuine and hold your brand delivers the promise that comes across in social media. For me, being constantly on social media helped me stay accountable. In today’s world, it becomes difficult to connect with consumers if you aren’t genuine.

9.??Accountability partners/Mastermind

Presently I have 2 accountability partners in the gym and for work. They keep you grounded, accountable, and become better. Due to my gym accountability, I have never missed my sessions, they have made me get better and stronger as they watch my back and that’s what takes you over the finishing line. You can get that accountability wrong; you will end up getting unhealthy or plateauing in ideas depending on which type of mastermind it is.

10.? Long term vs short term

My weight loss journey has not always been a downward graph in these last 4 years. There have been ups and downs. It’s tough mentally. Sometimes I fail in the short term. But one needs to have a long-term perspective on this. There will be bad days and good days. I started my agency 4 years back too. Alongside I kept cutting flab that I grew by taking on things I can’t manage and not core to the business. There will be days that the weighing scale doesn’t move just like a business. All that effort and damn the plateau. That also could be a time to pivot and grow in the long term. But, don't let short term failures bog you down.

11.?Staying positive

Entrepreneur life is a lonely journey. You need DOSE (Dopamine, Oxytocin, Serotonin, and Endorphin) which makes you happy or may I call it success hormones. Dopamine is the achievement hormone. Over time, regular exercise remodels the reward system, leading to higher circulating levels of dopamine and more available dopamine receptors. This leads to better performance at work. It’s a positive cycle of hormones.

12.???Education. Education. Education

There is 30% classroom training and 70% on-the-job training. No matter what you do, exercise, diet, job, marketing the need for classroom training is very high. Especially in my field of digital marketing. One of the key learnings I got from Naval was that keep reading about all the topics that you can. I went further in listening to podcasts, watching YouTube videos. I gobble up everything there is to learn to get my business and fitness journey right. I have learned so much these 4 years. I make sure that all those learnings are brought to life in my work, gym, and on my plate. Unlearn and learn.

The journey isn’t done yet. There will be more learnings on the way. If you have read this far, then thank you. I hope you have found value. There are many who have reached out to me to talk about my journey and then disappear. I wait for them to ask me the second time to see how desperate they are. You really need to want it.

You can’t achieve growth in business or fitness if you aren’t desperate enough.

?The question then is, how badly do you want this?