I have been real busy lately and have been thinking about the 80-20 rule. As an adult webmaster with a degree in Mathematics, I tend to be a little number orientated. WikiPedia says the following about the 80-20 rule,

The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, 80% of the effects comes from 20% of the causes. Business management thinker Joseph M. Juran suggested the principle and named it after Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who observed that 80% of income in Italy went to 20% of the population. It is a common rule of thumb in business; e.g., “80% of your sales comes from 20% of your clients.”

So, what does that have to do with us adult webmasters? Quite a lot actually. Think about your whole business model. Look at it from all parts. Are you “stuck” in the Pareto principle? For example, if you are a TGP submitter, free site builder, and AEN builder, does anyone make 80% of your sales with only 20% of your time. Are you an affiliate owner and find that you spend most of your energy on certain promotional material that only bring in a small percentage of sales? The list goes on.

In a future post I will go into more details of how to turn this to your advantage. It is actually what most successful companies do. But, first you need to think about how you are stuck somewhere in the Pareto principle. Don’t think for too long, however, as 80% of the time you spend thinking about it, will give you only 20% of the answer.