Work First, Plan Later

There are two things we get wrong before we start building a business.

• We have to make a business plan before we start.
• Once we have business experience, we will know how to make a better plan.

The second is the opposite of the first, and both are mostly just lies we tell ourselves to put off doing work which is the actual thing needed to succeed.

Plans without evidence of success are just excuses in place of work

1) Why Plans Suck

Everyone, who has done nothing, will tell you before starting a business that you need a business plan (or ask you what your plan is)

PS. I'll tell you the secret to a winning business plan in a minute.

If you have never run a business before, I promise you have no idea how to make a plan. You can not possibly account for the 1 Gazillion variables that are going to change or need you to change them.

A plan means you have a predefined set of rules to follow.

Problem is, those rules are based on zero evidence of success.

So… You have a program to stick with that keeps you on track.

That is a great idea IF “on track” means following the program.

But, If being on track means making money, improving the product and the offer, so your business can succeed, then a plan with no evidence is extremely likely to slow you down or kill your company completely.

The worst thing about starting out in business is uncertainty. It eases the burden of decisions to know you have something specific to do that should lead to an outcome that's desirable.

Plus, if you have a plan, and it fails… You have a fall guy. You can blame the plan, the training, the advice etc. that got you that plan so it’s not your fault.

But that doesn't cause winning.

2) The Plan That Works

1. Have a product or service (an offer) that is good. I talked about this last week (read here)

2. Convince as many people as possible to pay you for it.

That's the plan…

If your offer is bad, no one will pay you. This gives you a chance to change the offer until people will pay you. — The best advice here is, “Make the offer so good, they would be stupid to say no.”

Unless you accidentally have a great offer, with the right market fit and the perfect customer base, just getting people to buy will be a challenge.

You will need to adjust everything about the offer until you do find the right fit. Then, once you find it and people start buying it, you can come back and address the areas that a plan was supposed to cover. Only now, you can make a plan (really just a set of rules) that has evidence of working.

Next week, I am going to send a break-down with three examples of a fantastic offers that are impossible to say no to.