READY? FIRE! AIM.
In his book The Ultimate Marketing Plan, copywriter and marketing consultant
Dan Kennedy said:
Personally, I detest planning. Ive got the classic entrepreneurial nature
Ready? FIRE! Aim. Plan? Geez. Lets just go sell something.
I can certainly relate. That entrepreneurial spirit has always been in my blood,
too.
Sure, I had the standard lemonade stand when I was a young child. But I later
opened a stamp and coin shop in my basement at the ripe old age of
11complete with billboard signs across my neighborhood. Once I cleared my
inventory, it was onto the next project.
For Halloween, Id stage my own haunted house. For a dime (later a quarter),
kids could wander through my labyrinth of terror, complete with props and
actors in costumes.
Sometimes when I was bored Id do things like set up an obstacle course and
dare the neighborhood kids to try to get through it. Theyd win a prize if they
could do it, but it would cost them some spare change up front. In retrospect I
was pretty lucky no one got hurt.
When I saw the older kids selling candy for their school or some other event, I
came up with the bright idea to buy a bunch of candy at the store for cheap and
sell it at a higher cost, earning a profit. That might have worked, except I ended
up eating most of my profits.
I even learned how to borrow money at zero percent interest. My father still tells
the story of when he gave my brother and I each a dollar for the penny candy
store. After we emerged from the store, my father asked me how much money I
had left.
None, I replied.