Let me start off by saying that I am not suggesting that you don’t make plans for your business. A business without a plan is a dead business right from the start. But there is a time when you have to stop planning and take some action or you’re going to find yourself left out in the cold.

The big question that I am going to try to answer in this article is how to know when to stop planning and when to start to take action and do something. The truth is, this is a very gray area and it’s not always easy to decide when it’s time to stop planning and take action.

I guess the first problem we have here is defining what planning is and what action is. For example; if you are sitting down trying to figure out what product to sell, that is planning. If you decide you want to sell an ebook but don’t know what topic to write on, that is also planning. However, when you are finally in the process of writing that ebook, after you have laid out the entire format, that is taking action.

But what if you’re writing your ebook and don’t exactly know all the pieces that are going to be in it yet? What if you have half of it on paper and you’re deciding on the final half of the ebook. Is this planning still or is it taking action?

If you never get around to actually finishing the last half of this ebook, then what you have is a half baked product that is neither plan nor action. You have entered into what we call no mans land of online marketing and that is a nasty place to be.

This is where I have decided that a line must be drawn. No mans land is not an option for me. So I have decided that as far as I am concerned, if it’s not finished and can’t be released as is, then it is still planning. If the ebook, as it is can be released, then it is still taking action and thus a decision has to be made. You can let the book sit on your hard drive and collect dust or you can release it as it is. There is no reason you can’t add to it at a later date.

There comes a time when you have to stop planning and do something. Otherwise, you’re going to wake up 1 year from the date you started your online business and find out that you’re still not making any money because you’ve got all these ideas that you never finished. They don’t have to be perfect right out of the gate.

As a very wise person once said, “Ready, Fire, Aim.”

Meant that you should get out a new idea fast and early in its unfinished state, so you can get valuable market feedback before you fine-tune it.

© Neil-Harvey.com