Serial Entrepreneur Zeke Camusio Talks About the “Dark Side” of Entrepreneurship

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Entrepreneur Zeke Camusio talks about the challenges of running a business in the US

As an entrepreneur you need to stay humble, focus on your top priorities and have the discipline to do what your business needs you to do.

Portland, Oregon (PRWEB) June 26, 2012

Andrew Warner is the CEO of Mixergy, a website where he interviews successful entrepreneurs like the founders of Wikipedia, Groupon and LinkedIn. On June 13, 2012 Mixergy interviewed Zeke Camusio, a serial entrepreneur who built and sold four businesses by the age of 26. But Camusio didn’t spend much time talking about his successes. Instead, he talked about his failures, the lessons he learned and why being an entrepreneur is so challenging. The interview can be found at http://mixergy.com/zeke-camusio-outsourcing-company-interview/

When Warner asked Camusio why he was so open about his failures, Camusio said “I wish someone had told me how difficult being an entrepreneur is, how much work it takes and how lonely it feels sometimes.”

When Camusio was 23 years-old his debit card got declined at the grocery store. He checked his account balance and he realized he only had $32. All his credit cards were maxed out and he had over $100,000 in debt. Camusio said, “I had lost all confidence in myself. I went from making $20,000 a month to being completely broke. And I didn’t see any light at the end of the tunnel. I started thinking that I didn’t have what it took to succeed and that my early success in life was just beginner’s luck. All this self-defeating dialog in my head was killing me, but after talking to other entrepreneurs I realized I wasn’t alone.”

When Warner asked Camusio why his third business failed, Camusio gave a very insightful answer: “I made three critical mistakes: I got too cocky after my first success, I let irrelevant details pull me away from the core business activities and I wasn’t willing to get out of my comfort zone to do what needed to be done. As an entrepreneur you need to stay humble, focus on your top priorities and have the discipline to do what your business needs you to do.”

Warner asked Camusio about the lowest point in his entrepreneurial career. Camusio opened up and shared a story that most entrepreneurs wouldn’t want anybody to find out about. “Back in 2009 we lost five clients in three weeks. I was driving my car and I got a phone call from one of our largest clients at the moment. They had decided to close their account. That was too much for me to take; I just couldn’t handle it anymore. So I had a meltdown; I burst in tears. My expectations were completely unrealistic: I wanted to win every single battle. But in business (and in life) sometimes you move two steps forward, one step backward, two steps forward, one step backward and so on. I wish I had known this back then. Now I don’t get emotional anymore when we lose a client. I ask myself if we could’ve done something to prevent it and make sure we put the right systems in place so that particular problem doesn’t happen again.”

Camusio ended his interview giving business owners hope and encouragement: “Entrepreneurs need to know that running a business is very rewarding but it requires hard work, discipline and commitment. They also need to hear that other entrepreneurs are struggling as much as they are. And they need to hear that if they have a great product and work really hard to put it in front of the right customers, they can succeed. But it’s not easy and setbacks are part of the game. The secret is believing in yourself and never giving up.”

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