Grand Canyon Times

Entrepreneurship is about “creating value out of thin air,” according to writer, investor, and entrepreneur Mike Johnson. 

“It can be as simple as walking down the street and going, ‘what’s needed?’” Johnson told members of the Freedom Circle men’s community, hosted by Sedona, AZ-based CEO and coach Curt Mercadante.

“That house needs to be painted. That trash needs to be picked up. Those trees need to be trimmed. That dog poop needs to be scraped. I mean, it's an endless list of what people need,” Johnson said.

According to a 2021 Harris Poll, 61 percent of Americans have “had an idea for starting a business, but 92 percent of those “didn't follow through with turning their idea into reality.” 39 percent of respondents said “they didn’t know how to get started.”

Johnson said new business “opportunities are all around us.”

“Let's say you want to narrow your opportunity down to something that's easy, viable, profitable, enjoyable, lawful, and moral,” he said. “All right, so you get the biggest, fattest phone book you can from the biggest city. You sit down with your cup of coffee in the morning when you're nice and fresh and you look at every damn business because the yellow pages list every damn business there is.”

“You make the list, you go through it,” he said. “If it's a thousand pages, it's great because it's a thousand opportunities times how many businesses are on each page and you make a list. Anything that lights you up that you think would be interesting. Now you've got this massive list of hundreds of opportunities.”

Johnson said you can now go through the list and mark your favorites. 

“Those are your honey holes, those are your sweet spots,” he said. “Those are your best ideas. Those are your best opportunities.”

Johnson is a writer, entrepreneur, and former journalist. His Web site says he has been “social distancing since 1957” and that he “learned how to retire early and does his best to help others escape the employment wheel.”

He claims to have “sold more than two million words” as a writer since 1991, and he and his wife, Margie, have started and exited multiple businesses, including the creation of Cody Trolley Tours and a thriving mobile home park investment business.

The Freedom Circle men’s community is run by Sedona, Arizona-based CEO, entrepreneur, and author, Curt Mercadante. Mercadante is CEO of Advantage Informatics, LLC, and founder of Freedom Rising Enterprises. He is author of the bestselling book, Five Pillars of the Freedom Lifestyle.