Why Halloween is the Most Important Holiday for Entrepreneurs 🤔

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Before I jump into the topic for this week there’s 2 things I want to share with you:

1. We are hosting another free webinar next Friday, April 18th: Tax Law Changes: What We Know and What We Don’t. You can register here.

2. If you’ve ever wanted more access to my tools and trainings but don’t have the budget to work with my firm, I just launched The Solvable Problem® Method.

Alright, back to the show. Let’s talk about why most entrepreneurs hate the first step of the CASE Framework: COMPILE.

If you’re like the majority of business owners I work with, you probably cringed a little bit just at the word “compile.” You’re a visionary. You want to jump straight into strategy and execution. I get it. 

But there’s a reason why that’s dangerous…

Let me explain using Halloween. I call this the Halloween Candy Principle.

Take a minute and think about kids on Halloween. What is their end goal, their Solvable Problem, if you will?

On the surface, they might say “eating as much candy as possible.” But if that were true, they’d just wait a day and get the discounted candy at the local grocery store. 

The real intent is about the entire experience - the dressing up, acquiring the candy, comparing it, and then eventually, eating it.

Sure the candy is great, but it’s not the point.

This is why most cash flow management fails - we’re not clear on our intended outcome. 

For Halloween - the point is the entire experience of trick or treating.

For your business - well, that’s up to you.

So when we’re compiling the data for our cash flow engineering, we need to gather information with mindful intent. This means asking 5 critical questions about your data:

1. Is it complete?

2. Is it accurate?

3. Is it presented correctly?

4. Is it covering the correct period?

5. Is it relevant?

Here’s what most business owners miss. You need to be compiling your data across 8 specific categories:

1. Your Solvable Problem©

2. Revenue Data

3. Marketing Data

4. Customer Data

5. Employee Data

6. Expense Data

7. Asset Data

8. Liability Data

But… Most businesses get it wrong.

Our default tendency is to think “more” is the solution. More revenue. More marketing. More customers. More employees. 

In fact, more could be disastrous in some circumstances.

Let’s look at an area of cash flow engineering that is often overlooked: your expense data. While everyone is chasing the top-line revenue, the real opportunities often lie in understanding what you’re already spending.

Here’s what a proper compilation can look like:

• Pull the last 12 months of expenses summarized by vendor (not by expense type)

• Use rolling-12 windows (not calendar years - businesses don’t operate in neat yearly boxes)

• Analyze each expense:

  • Frequency (daily/weekly/monthly/one-time)

  • Behavior (fixed, variable, fixed-step, or variable-step)

  • Usage Rate (how often it’s actually used vs paid for)

  • Associated Savings (what it’s supposedly saving you)

  • Core Status (Is it essential?)

This might seem like overkill (at first). But here’s why it matters:

When you compile incomplete data, you make decisions based on fragments rather than the whole picture. It’s like trying to drive cross-country with only a partial map - you might be moving, but you could be heading in the wrong direction.

This is why we say that the COMPILE step isn’t just about gathering numbers - it’s about creating a complete picture of your business’s cash flow story.

Here’s your action step for the week.

Pull your vendor report for the last 12 months. For every vendor, ask yourself:

• Do I know the true frequency of this expense?

• Can I categorize its behavior (fixed vs variable)?

• Do I know how and when this is being used?

• Can I quantify its associated savings?

• Is it truly core to our operations?

If you can’t answer every question for every vendor, you’ve identified your first compilation gap.

Congratulations - you’ve done something most 7 or 8-figure businesses never do.

You’ve spotted a gap that, once filled, could unlock thousands in hidden cash flow. In fact, when my clients identify their first compilation gap, it typically leads to finding 3-5 more gaps - each representing an opportunity to engineer better cash flow without adding a single new customer.

Next week we’re diving into how to ANALYZE this data and find those hidden profit opportunities. But for this week, just focus on gathering complete data.

Because remember - you can’t optimize what you can’t see clearly.

Want the full compilation framework I use with my clients? Reply to this email and I’ll send you the Cash Flow Engineering spreadsheet I reference in my book.  

Here’s to your success and financial certainty,