Here’s how the article broke down the pumpkin-growing process: STEP ONE: Plant promising seeds. STEP TWO: Water, water, water. STEP THREE: As they grow, routinely remove all of the diseased or damaged pumpkins. STEP FOUR: Weed like a mad dog. Not a single green leaf or root permitted if it isn’t a pumpkin plant. STEP FIVE: When they grow larger, identify the stronger, faster-growing pumpkins. Then, remove all the less-promising pumpkins. Repeat until you have one pumpkin on each vine. STEP SIX: Focus all of your attention on the big pumpkin. Nurture it around the clock like a baby, and guard it like you would your first Mustang convertible. STEP SEVEN: Watch it grow. In the last days of the season, this will happen so fast you can actually see it happen. (View Highlight)
In case you’re wondering if I’d officially lost it, here’s what I understood when I read the article: STEP ONE: Identify and leverage your biggest natural strengths. STEP TWO: Sell, sell, sell. STEP THREE: As your business grows, fire all of your small-time, rotten clients. STEP FOUR: Never, ever let distractions—often labeled as new opportunities—take hold. Weed ’em out fast. STEP FIVE: Identify your top clients and remove the rest of your less-promising clients. STEP SIX: Focus all your attention on your top clients. Nurture and protect them; find out what they want more than anything, and if it’s in alignment with what you do best, give it to them. Then, replicate that same service or product for as many of the same types of top client as possible. STEP SEVEN: Watch your company grow to a giant size. (View Highlight)
More isn’t better. Better is better. (View Highlight)
There are three types of clients, and their importance is ranked exactly as follows: 1. good clients, 2. non-existent clients, and 3. bad clients. (View Highlight)
YOUR BEST CUSTOMERSSHARE YOUR IMMUTABLE LAWS (View Highlight)
Mike Michalowicz, a serial entrepreneur who launched three multimillion-dollar businesses of his own and advises countless others, is a founding member of a unique business consultancy that takes an unconventional approach to freeing business owners from the entrepreneurial trap. By applying the Pumpkin Plan strategies through hands-on experts, your business will become the authority of your industry. (View Highlight)
Frank, my seventy-year-old business mentor, paused to make sure I was really paying attention. We’d spent all morning talking strategy and I was so overwhelmed my head felt ready to implode. Frank’s a “greatest generation” Regis Philbin lookalike who wears a suit every day, even in his own house. He’s so unassuming, you’d never guess he built a company worth eighty million dollars. “What guy?” I asked. “That old guy with only one nut left…hanging out of his shorts. The guy who works like a dog for fifty years and then ends up sitting in a rusty lawn chair, half-dead, with drool dripping down his chin.” Oh. That guy. Frank gave it to me straight: “If you don’t change your business strategy, you’ll never make it. You’ll kill yourself trying to build a multimillion-dollar business, but in the end you’ll be a broken, bitter man living off Social Security and looking back on a lifetime of disappointment.” Wow. Okay. That would suck. So much for my retirement plan of sipping margaritas on a beach somewhere, looking at a gorgeous sunset with my gorgeous wife. Worse, I knew I was already heading in that direction. Five years as an entrepreneur under my belt and I had nothing. Well, almost nothing—I still had both of my nuts…so far. (View Highlight)
