Choose a Better Life

I don’t usually do this, but today I am going to use my post to highlight a friend of mine, Ryan Allis.  He is an amazing guy, who at age 23 has not only built a $10 million company, but has developed a heart for truly changing the world – a passion I also share.

Today his book, Zero to One Million published by McGraw-Hill, launches.  He is using this book not to make money, but to share knowledge and to raise funds to help end world poverty.  I will let him share in his own words …

While I am optimistic, I am distressed by the state our world is in today. I am distressed by two simple facts…

First, while we have prosperity and opulence in many parts of our world–49,000 humans, people just like you and me, die each and every day from starvation and preventable diseases like malaria, tuberculosis, AIDS, and diarrhea. Second, while we live in comfort, 2.7 billion humans live on under $2 per day.

These numbers are Purchase Power Parity (PPP) adjusted–meaning that 42% of the humans in our world must live a FULL day on the same $2 that you and I would use to buy half a latte at Starbucks. These facts come from the World Bank and the World Health Organization, respectively.

When I learned these facts in Economics class at Manatee High School at age 17 from an inspirational teacher Robert Fletcher, I couldn’t ever afterwards pretend as if “I didn’t know.”

I’ve read a lot over the past six years about the topic of human poverty, global politics, and economics–inspirational books like The End of Poverty, The White Man’s Burden, How to Change the World, The Bottom Billion, Globalization and Its Discontents, The Lexus & The Olive Tree, The Road to Serfdom, Atlas Shrugged, Confessions of an Economic Hitman, The Secret History of The American Empire, The Fortune at The Bottom of the Pyramid, and The Mystery of Capital.

I’ve come to one singular conclusion…

I am going to dedicate the rest of my life to reduce poverty and hunger and increase access to education, healthcare, technology, and entrepreneurial opportunity here at home in North Carolina and the U.S. as well as in developing countries. This is not charity–this is humanity. We will never have a secure world when half of our brothers and sisters do not have access to basic human needs like shelter, food, primary education, and preventative medicine.

Personally, I believe entrepreneurship is an essential part of the solution–commercial entrepreneurship, public sector entrepreneurship, and social entrepreneurship.

But being an entrepreneur is NOT easy. The knowledge of how to build a successful organization isn’t easily learned.

Building a new ’start-up’ of any type whether a non-profit or for-profit is definitely not simple. I’m only 23 and I feel sometimes like I have developed the scar tissue of a 45 year-old building iContact to $10 million in annual sales.

It’s truly been an absolute bliss to come in every morning and know that I’ve played a big role in creating 85 jobs. I get so much energy from being around our team. Being an entrepreneur is truly my passion. I love it, but the experience is what I can only imagine raising a real child would be like. What one has to sacrifice, to give, to devote to the effort is immense. I never thought it would be THIS hard when I started six years ago.

What I can say is that I’ve learned so much more than I could have ever imagined.

I want to share everything I’ve learned about business, about opportunity evaluation, about raising venture capital, about product development, about marketing, about sales, about finance, about managing people, about creating systems with as many entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs as I possibly can–and not just commercial entrepreneurs, but social entrepreneurs, corporate entrepreneurs, and public service entrepreneurs in every part of our world.

Writing this book for me is part of spreading a message of entrepreneurial possibility and social change.

I believe that every person in this world should have access to the knowledge of how to be an entrepreneur.

I believe that anyone in this world should be able to become a successful business, social, or public service entrepreneur–if they set their mind to it and have the right tools.

I also believe that IF the knowledge was spread far enough and the financial structures existed in our global society for anyone regardless of location or class to become a successful entrepreneur–our world would have the entrepreneurial talent at the grassroots level to address the biggest challenges of our generation–how to eliminate extreme poverty, get food to the hungry, medicines to the sick, and microcredit financial resources to the ambitious youth of our generation–so that they can productively solve the needs of humanity with their talents, not fight in political or religious wars driven by a lack of hope.

This is why I wrote Zero to One Million: How I Built A Company to One Million Dollars in Sales… And How You Can Too.

It’s not to make money–all the proceeds from the book are being donated to my non-profit organization, The Humanity Campaign, which works to reduce poverty and hunger by increasing access to education, healthcare, technology, and entrepreneurial opportunity.

This Tuesday, February 5th, is the big push day that we are trying to become #1 on Amazon. If we can sell 2,500 copies of the book on Tuesday we should make it to #1. If by chance you have an opportunity to spread the word about the book after Tuesday, please do. We are also working to sell 12,000 copies during the first full week so that we can make it on the New York Times Bestseller list for the week.

For everyone, would you mark your calendar and buy a copy or multiple copies of the book yourself this Tuesday morning as well as spread the word? The book costs just $11.53 on Amazon and I’ll email you $750 worth of gifts if you email your receipt to bonus@zeromillion.com.

When you buy Zero to One Million on Amazon on Tuesday I’ll send you six bonus gifts including a video from me on how to raise $5 million in venture capital at age 22 and valuable DVD and PDF report bonuses from Buck Rizvi, Derek Gehl, Carlos Garcia, Shawn Casey, and Tom Bell. Just email the Amazon receipt to bonus@zeromillion.com to receive the bonuses.

If you want to buy multiple copies for your friends, company, or local libraries–I am providing additional bonuses. If you buy five copies you’ll receive a video from me on how to access the world of institutional capital. If you buy 25 copies you’ll receive a signed copy of the original version of the book. If you buy 50 copies you’ll get a 15 minute strategy phone call with me. If you buy 250 copies I’ll invite you to visit me on-site in Durham for a day-long mastermind strategy session with the other large buyers. If you buy 500 copies, I’ll invite you to join my mastermind group of millionaire entrepreneurs for a quarterly meeting.

Thank you very, very much for your help and assistance. I sincerely appreciate your help and look forward to working with you for many decades to change the world together. Please let me know if you have any questions or if I can be of any assistance whatsoever to you now or in the future.

You can buy the book starting 12:01am on Tuesday at http://www.amazon.com/Zero-One-Million-Built-Company/dp/0071496661/. I will post a reminder here on Tuesday morning.

Love, hope, peace, prosperity…

Cheers,
/RPMA
Ryan P. Allis