The Pumpkin Plan: A Simple Strategy to Grow a Remarkable Business in Any Field

by Mike Michalowicz

This

advantage of

Once you’ve moved passed the early stages of entrepreneurship, success isn’t a quantity game anymore. If I wanted my business to dwarf the competition, I would have to cut the clients who were actually holding me back, cut the aspects of my business that weren’t serving growth and find unparalleled ways to serve my best clients. Like a geeky, freaky farmer of mammoth pumpkins, I would focus all of my attention, time, love, support, creativity and energy on the most promising clients in my “patch.”

Work the Plan— Take Action in 30 Minutes (or Less) 1. Find the “why.” If your dream is to just be big and get rich, that’s not enough to grow a significant, successful business. Ask yourself why you started this business and not another business. What purpose are you serving? What gets you stoked? If you know your “why,” it will resonate with your clients. More importantly, it will be your compass, and boy oh boy, do you need one of those. (Have you ever tried to find your way out of a forest without one?)

To really make it, to become the industry leader you set out to become, you need a sound business to begin with. You need strong roots, a carefully planned, efficient infrastructure, a maniacal focus on the one thing you do very, very well. Rather than fix what’s not working, you need to cut it out like the cancer it is. Then, you need to expand on what is working.

Don’t waste your time planting seeds that may or may not work out. Plant the seed that you know has the very best chance of making it, and then focus your attention, money, time and other resources on that tight niche until all of your entrepreneurial dreams come true.

Your giant seed is basically your sweet spot—the place where your best clients and the best part of your business meet. This is the place where your favorite customers are able to derive maximum benefit from the systematized, core process that drives your business.