Student Question: Hello Master Chi. I recently started working at an insurance company. I previously heard your teachings about building a side business — that if you have the energy, you should develop a personal brand. I’ve now made some money from my side business and found a group of like-minded friends. How can I amplify my current advantages?
Master Chi’s Response:
1. Most people will never grow wealthy from a side business. The primary reason is that what they do is too easily replaced.
If what you learn and what you do looks the same as everyone else — no distinctive angle, nothing that sets you apart — you’ve already eliminated yourself from 90% of the competition.
2. Even if you develop something distinctive, you still need to promote it, build your brand, and establish a certain level of shared recognition. That filters out yet another large portion of people.
3. Once you have something unique and a brand behind it, there is one final and critical step: you must consciously control your supply to create scarcity — and through scarcity, command a premium and maximize your profit.
Why? Because you are irreplaceable, your supply cannot be easily substituted. Because you have a brand and recognition, there is demand. When irreplaceable supply cannot meet demand, scarcity emerges — and with it, enormous premium pricing. This kind of extraordinary premium is something many people, blinded by their own biases, are unwilling to understand, incapable of understanding, and will never understand.
4. Yet most people only want to acquire more skills or improve their efficiency. While these things can generate traffic, they don’t necessarily produce scarcity or premium value.
In other words: you cannot keep your eyes fixed solely on the product itself. The product can make you money, yes — but you must engineer a sense of scarcity if you want to charge higher prices.
Make what you offer stronger, build a more complete ecosystem around your platform, and its influence grows. Scarcity increases, premium grows larger. This is the positive feedback loop.
5. To put it simply: first, be distinctive and build your brand. That generates scarcity. Build your own ecosystem. The financial rewards follow.
No one can rise to the top overnight — but the longer you walk the right path, the wider the gap grows between you and ordinary people.
Some may say: What if I feel I can’t do this right now? Then look around — there are people and companies who clearly understand this and are executing it well. All you need to know is how to participate and share in the fruits of their growth, rather than watching opportunities pass you by.
When you become a distinctive and scarce person, you have essentially seized your own license to print money. Think of Zhang Daqian, Charlie Chaplin, Warren Buffett. From this perspective, they are all doing the same thing — only the scale and degree differ.
Start becoming a distinctive and scarce person today.
One important note: most people do not guard their private time adequately. When someone you barely know invites you to dinner or a meeting, don’t just casually show up — only to waste hours on commuting and small talk, exhaust yourself, and earn no respect in return.
Handle things over the phone when possible. A face-to-face meeting isn’t always necessary. I’ve encountered people insisting on meeting in person, and when I told them to simply say what they needed over the phone, they couldn’t come up with anything at all.
For those who are extremely persistent about meeting in person: require a consultation fee. Anyone with genuine intent will be more than happy to pay.
That is what it means to have a style — knowing who you are, knowing what you want to say, and not concerning yourself with how others see you. Your value will always come from the small minority of supporters who truly recognize you and are willing to pay the highest price.