The 80 - 20 Rule
I have no idea who earns what at WA, it’s none of my business. But, I do know what the numbers should be. In a Sales organization, 20% of the people do 80% of the business and the bottom 80% do 20% of the business. So that means that Top 20% earn 16 times what the bottom 80% earn. The top 20% of the top 20% or the Top 4% make 32 times what the bottom 80% earn. The Top 1% earn 54 times what the bottom 80% earn.
Now again I don’t know what the top guys earn or what the bottom guys earn, but I do know that nobody is twice as smart as anybody else here. Why are some folks earning, 16, 32 or 54 times what somebody else doing the same business earns? Why such a discrepancy of income? The playing field is level, we all have free will, we share the same training… why the difference?
Now, some of the Top 20%ers may have been doing this longer, but they are a little bit smarter, they make better choices. One of those choices is to work a little bit harder. Before they choose a niche, they do their homework, they do the research and they don’t bet on any dogs. They work a little harder on keywords and content and getting visitors to their site to take action. They catch them at the right point of their buying cycle. They retain more of their traffic, they build trust and an email list. They do all of the things we all know we’re supposed to do, but sometimes don’t.
The biggest difference is 80% are not Experts in their business and the 20%ers, 4%ers and 1%ers are. The 80%ers are here to Make Money, but unless you’re the Mint, it’s illegal to make money. 20%ers, 4%ers and 1%ers know they have to Earn Money and they do it every day. It just takes a little more effort.
Vince Lombardi said, “Winning is not a sometime thing; it's an all time thing. You don't win once in a while, you don't do things right once in a while, you do them right all the time. Winning is habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.”
Do you think that a little extra work and success and winning is too hard… try failing. Don’t fail, don’t quit. Find the people that are getting the results you want, read everything they’ve written or look at everything they’ve done. Success leaves tracks, follow them. Do what they’ve done to the best of your ability, today. Then tomorrow do it even better.
I’m not in the top 20% yet, I haven’t even got off the bench. But, I know my #1 job is to find out what those 20%ers, 4%ers and 1%ers are doing and what they’re thinking and do likewise.
I’ve been thinking about this blog for a couple of days, but I was inspired to put it up because of reading TJ Books “Profile” page today.
Recent Comments
11
I like your reference to Lombardi. Why? He was adamant about teaching the fundamentals of blocking and tackling. He knew that in football those are core, foundational skills that are required for success. I really like the approach at WA. To continue with the analogy, we are getting taught how to block and tackle . We are learning the fundamentals . No shortcuts . No instant overnight riches or crazy promises . A simple slant off tackle and three yards and a pile of dust. Four of those.... First down. Do it again; and again. Hmmmm...... All of a sudden the crowd is cheering....touchdown! How 'd that happen ?
Carla, you know what's cool, play this before you start work http://youtu.be/bJzF8_df1R8
Great blog! It sure puts thing into perspective and also is very motivating because it is so true! Thanks so much for righting something very useful. I will star this blog so that I can refer back to it in the future when I am frustrated while learning. We need to learn from the best and it's all here for us to absorb and transfer to our online business.
Thanks again Phil!
DES
Des, thank you for reading it. You are right it is all here waiting for us to make it happen, just waiting for us to ask. Nothing that you ask for will be refused. How can it get any better than that.
Thanks Melody. I put this up last night and I wasn't sure anybody would read it, with the Labor Day weekend coming up.
See more comments
Interesting point on the 80/20 rule. In the last company I worked for, I always kept an eye on this metric. We skewed to almost 90/10; almost 90% of our business was done with 10% of our accounts. Used to get me a bit crazy at times; we had too many of what I called one amp wonder accounts ......guys that would buy 1 amp a yr.