This isn’t exactly cutting edge theory, but it’s something often overlooked, especially by new entrepreneurs: it’s called the 80/20 rule.
What is it?
Well, the idea is that 80% of your profits will come from 20% of your work. This generally applies to offline and online business in surprisingly similar ways, and it’s also why Dave and I are generally such big fans of outsourcing (besides the fact that we’re lazy).
To prove the point, how many people do you know of who have made a lot of money in business by being the owner and employee? I hear the same thing from my small business tenants, “we only make money when we’re out on the road getting the work for the guys back in the shop”. Those business owners who try to save money and do it all themselves often never improve their lives, and I know more than a few guys who think like this and are still making the same amount of money, in the same sized shop, and driving the same rust bucket they had when I first met them 5-6 years ago. At the same time, I’ve seen tenants hire employees and in the same time frame are now just out on the road getting jobs and letting the employees do the grunt work - and are now looking for bigger shops to rent.
What the 80/20 rule should mean to us webmasters is that you should sit down and come up with a list of everything you do for your sites, and then go through that list and come up with a short list of things that generate income for you. Finally, organize your short list into the most profitable things you do.
Now ask yourself, if I did these profitable things more, would I make more money? If the answer is yes, then the 80/20 rule applies to you!
You don’t necessarily have to run out and outsource from the get-go, but eventually as you build your business, you will find you just can’t make more money doing it all by yourself anymore.
