Imagine working 80% less…

…but getting the same (or even better) results.

Maybe you go to work for just one day instead of five – and still get the same salary… or work 2 days and DOUBLE YOUR SALARY.

Or you spend one day running a business each week instead of slogging at it all week… yet the earnings keep rolling in, just the same as before.

Work two days and you’d DOUBLE YOUR INCOME

Perhaps you slip open your laptop every morning while sipping a coffee, then close it an hour later and do nothing else all day – without putting a dent in your income.

That would be living the dream, right!?

Well, this might surprise you…

That is, unless you run a business already. (In which case you’ll have seen this in action!)

But the MAJORITY of your results will come from just a small percentage of the actions you carry out.

Most of your business depends on a small amount of your efforts.

And most of your sales will come from only a small percentage of your customers or subscribers.

It’s something known as the 80/20 principle.

The rule goes is that roughly 80% of your outputs (eg. results, sales, subscribers) are almost always down to roughly 20% of your inputs (eg. research, product creation and marketing).

At first glance, that statistic might seem bleak.

It means that most of your time and effort in trying to set up and run a home business goes to waste.

But there’s another way to look at it…

Because if you learn how to identify that crucial 20% – and focus most of your attention on it – you can work a lot less on your projects, for the same result – or even a better result.

Potentially, if you get it right, you could cut out as much as 80% of your effort each week!

Let me explain…

The Italian Who Became Obsessed With 20%

Vilfredo Pareto was an Italian economist and sociologist, born in 1848.

In his later years, he began to research land ownership in Italy.

He discovered that approximately 80% of the land was owned by about 20% of the population.

Intrigued, Pareto began to investigate other countries and found a similar pattern. It was always a small percentage of people who controlled the largest portion of the wealth.

He became obsessed with this 80/20 ratio, and began to see it play out in most economic, social, and business situations.

Of course, the ratio isn’t always precisely 80/20…

But the core principle is usually borne out – that small percentages of actions drive the largest outcomes, and that small percentages of people are responsible for the largest amount of income, wealth or sales.

I see it all the time as an information publisher.

Whether you have a list of 1,000, 10,000 or 100,000 subscribers, the vast proportion of sales come from only around 20% of those people.

Same goes for ‘open rates’ – which describes the percentage of your email database who actually click on an email when it is sent out.

Last year, the global average email open rate across all industries was 21.33% (according to Mailmunch).

That’s the 80/20 rule right there!

But…

As a seasoned email marketer and publisher, I also know that I can get much higher open rates of as much as 40%…even 50%….

And I can get much higher rates of sales conversions too.

Because when you know how to target the most important people who are likely to respond and buy, you can break that 80/20 rule.

And the same goes for the amount of work you do in any given week.

When you focus on the most important and profitable tasks (and ditch or delegate the others) you can massively shift the percentage, so that you work less for the same result… or an even better one.

Here’s how it can be done…

How to Get More Results From Your Efforts

The first step is to identify which activities are likely to deliver significant results.

Because it’s so easy to choose the easier tasks, or the ones you find more fun…

And it’s often the case that we spend a lot of time faffing with small things that seem important but don’t really count.

Like taking a day to mess around with a font or logo or website banner colours…

Or spending hours emailing a subscriber who never actually buys anything…

Or obsessively proofing and perfecting an email or blog that you could have just sent out without complaint…

The key is to make a list of THE most important and urgent tasks and focus on those.

Cross off all the other tasks – and if they are absolutely necessary, find ways to delegate them, outsource them, or use AI tools like Chat GPT to speed up the task (I’ll explain more about this in future posts!)

And if you’re currently starting or running a home enterprise…

How to Get Better Results From Your Business

Look at your products and services and ask yourself, “Which 20% are responsible for most of the income?”

Focus your marketing and sales efforts on these products as a priority.

If you can, compare the percentage of sales with the percentage of profits. For example, you might have a digital product that requires almost no costs, where the profit margin is super high, and a physical product or service that comes with lots of costs in terms of staff and materials, where the margin is really low.

In this case, focussing on the digital aspect would increase the results (and profits)b you get in exchange for your time and effort.

Same goes for your marketing…

Look at the email lists with the highest open rates and highest sales conversions…

Find the kinds of customers who buy the products you sell and work out what their needs and goals are, so that you can focus your messages on them.

See which modes of advertising get the highest conversions for the lowest cost.

For example your Facebook advertising might be far more profitable than your print advertising… or your webinar might be getting far more subscribers than your weekly blog.

So double your efforts on those things which work the most effectively, and get you the best results.

The same applies even if you haven’t yet got your own business or product…

How to Find the Most Profitable
Income Generator

When you are seeking a home business, there are tonnes of options available…

Offline enterprises like gardening and DIY…. freelance gigs like personal assisting, writing and design… ecommerce options like Amazon and eBay…. information publishing in the form of ebooks, membership sites, newsletters and blogs.

But if this is something you want to run as a side income alongside a day job, you need to find something that combines LOW levels of input and commitment with a HIGH return.

So look for the potential to leverage 20% of your time for 80% of your results.

An example might be a digital course that you spend some time creating, but which then sits online generating an income for very little extra work, potentially for years to come.

Or it might be an Amazon product that you set upon ‘Fulfilment By Amazon’ (FBA) so that the orders are processed and drop-shipped for you.

Or it could be a series of downloadable digital items that you list on Etsy, where you can gradually add to a portfolio of income streams without doing any stocking or posting.

The aim should be to make the same kind of income you might earn in a week of work, but only in an hour a day, or a day each week.

Ultimately, nobody wants to spend 80% of their time doing things that they don’t need to do.

We all deserve a life where we have the spare time and freedom to pursue hobbies, hang out with friends and family, or just take a break from the hectic rat race.

So if you ARE looking for a low input/high reward home business to run in your spare time, look out for more emails from me…

There are so many great opportunities out there, I have now decided to share more with you through my FREE What Really Makes Money email newsletter.

It means that every Monday, Wednesday and Friday I will share my latest discoveries, research and practical ‘how to’ techniques to help you make maximum profits in minimum time.

If there is anything you’d like me to look into, review or share in the coming weeks, just let me know by commenting to this post.