Yesterday I stumbled onto the earliest beginnings of what eventually became the 8 Profit Activators.
Today I can’t stop thinking about why they’ve been so valuable.
It isn’t just that they’re a marketing framework.
They’re a thinking framework.
For almost 30 years, every business I’ve looked at has gone through that same mental filter.
Within a few minutes I can usually spot where the biggest opportunity is…because I have a reliable chassis for thinking about businesses.
That got me thinking about other people who’ve built similar frameworks.
Max Martin has written more #1 hit songs than almost anyone in history.
If you listen carefully, his songs follow a recognizable structure.
He found a chassis for creating hit records and then applied it over and over again across artists, genres, and decades.
Wayfair did something similar.
Before it became the giant brand we know today, the company built hundreds of highly focused online stores, each serving a very specific niche.
Same chassis. Different products.
The pattern is everywhere.
The breakthrough isn’t having one brilliant idea.
It’s building a framework that consistently produces good ideas.
My friend Chad Jenkins describes creativity with three simple words:
Collect. Combine. Create.
Collect ideas from books, conversations, experiences, and the world around you.
Combine those ideas with your own models, experience, and heuristics.
Then create something new.
I’ve realized that’s exactly what these journals capture.
They’re the slow construction of a way of thinking.
Looking back from 30 years later, that’s probably the most valuable thing I’ve built.
Not a business.
A chassis for creating businesses.