The 80/20 principle states 80 percent of your results will come from 20 percent of your efforts. However, that’s just the starting point. 80/20 applies to everything, even itself. If you can master and apply 80/20 thinking to everything you do, then you’re armed with all you need to excel.
[inlinetweet prefix=”” tweeter=”” suffix=””]Figure out which 20 percent of your marketing is currently working in your marketplace and then progressively pour more of your resources into those areas[/inlinetweet]. Keep doing this over and over and you can achieve 100X improvements in your sales productivity. Results 80 20 Efforts Even more importantly, don’t treat all your customers as equals. The top 20-percenters can be incredibly profitable. If you keep offering them products which are 10 times as expensive but which deliver 10 times or more the value of your existing products, then 20 percent of those 20-percenters will buy. That can work out well because usually it costs you less than 10 times as much to deliver that added value. Plus, it’s always easier to sell more to your existing happy customers than it is to find new customers.
The 80/20 Principle states your customers are always unequal. A few of them will generate most of your results but that’s just the first level. The same dynamic will exist over and over again. The real leverage power of 80/20 lies in its layers.
Specifically, consider this:
- One or two customers who alone generate between 20% and 40% of your overall revenues.
- 80 percent of your business comes from 20 percent of your customers – that’s 16:1 leverage.
- Now of that 20 percent of productive customers, 20 percent of them will generate 80 percent of that overall 80 percent. Think of this as 80/202. That works out to be 250:1.
80/20 marketing works just like that. You send out one calculated signal into the marketplace which most people will ignore but a few will respond to. You separate the 80 percent who will never buy from the 20 percent who will by doing that. You then devote all your persuasive efforts and resources to those who have self-identified themselves as the right targets.
Pure and simple your USP must articulate why people should buy from you (rather than anyone else) and why they should buy today rather than next week (or any other time.) Your USP must specify what you alone can guarantee.
