🏆 Your dream 100

“The story starts in California. 1981.

Charlie Munger hires Chet Holmes to sell magazine ads. He's given a list of 2,200 potential advertisers and a bunch of flyers.

Chet doesn’t send one flyer.

Instead he backorders hundreds of issues of competitor magazines. And realises 167 companies are responsible for 95% of all ad sales.

So Chet ditches the list and goes all-in on the 167. Free gifts, lunches, dog-eared determination.

A few months later Xerox order 104 full-color spreads. “The biggest deal in the history of the industry”.

In three years Chet takes the magazine from 16th in the market to double their closest competitor. At this point Munger calls him into his office.

“Now Chet. In all my years, I’ve never seen anybody double sales three years in a row. Are you sure we’re not lying, cheating, and stealing?”

He wasn't. The Dream 100 was born.

“Write down your dream 100 clients. Do anything you can to win them.””

This excerpt is lifted directly from Harry Dry’s newsletter: https://marketingexamples.com/sales/dream-100. He took it from Chet Holmes’ book “The ultimate sales machine”. Harry summarised it better than I could. Don’t fix something that isn’t broken, and don’t duplicate work unnecessarily.

How can I add to Harry’s succinct summary?

Just by saying that I have implemented this concept with some of my clients and it works. If you cannot name 100 potential individual dream customers or dream partner companies then it is very likely because you are not clear enough on your target audience.

Ghayth, who I have featured a few times in this newsletter recently (I.e. here and here), applied this principle and yesterday signed one of his dream clients within 4 minutes of meeting him for the first time.

The concept works.

A dream client list helps direct strategy, and it helps you capitalise on opportunities when they arise.

Take a few minutes right now, try to write out 100 dream clients or companies to work with (as a client of yours or a referrer or a partner of some kind!). Use the list to guide your actions. You will find it useful.

Ghayth signed a dream client with millions of followers within 4 minutes of meeting him yesterday (14th January 2025). 1 minute 29 seconds video:

I shared this in my Work Smart Wednesday newsletter. Want the full set of related insights? You can read them here: https://worksmartwednesday.substack.com/p/work-smart-wednesday-january-15-2025

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