80/20 Rule: Plan The Most Impactful Work And Work That Plan

by Kate Engler

Pareto’s Principle states that 80 percent of effects come from 20 percent of causes, suggesting that while there may be a substantial amount of work to do to achieve a goal, the biggest results can come from a more focused fraction of the workload. We live by this principle and offer our clients insight into what can move the needle most for the smartest use of their budget. Based on our clients’ business objectives, we can prioritize a phased approach that will make a meaningful impact on any marketing strategy.

We approach each client program first with an understanding of the industry landscape and opportunities, then identify the areas with the greatest strategic potential. Our tactics focus on the attainable wins that can make the most positive impact, thus boosting our clients’ businesses and achieving pre-set goals.

Why An 80-20 Approach Is Better For Your Business
Think about it this way: if we focus on allof the little things we need to do to drive business growth via a marketing strategy, we would only slightly chip away at each vertical and see nominal increases in improvement. However if we instead focus on an acute aspect of these efforts that could yield the largest results, we are able to make noticeable and measurable change for the same or less budget.

Our focus is not on the flashy and short-lived marketing tactics, but rather the larger items that will ultimately make the biggest improvement to a business and its long-term success. For example, if our goal is to increase organic website traffic, we can go one of two ways – both of which (might I add) are good strategies. We can either deploy a monthly SEO backlinking program and see slow growth improvements over a year’s use of budget, or we can deploy a focused keyword content strategy that uses the same budget and makes significant improvements to the “findability” of the website in 6 months or less. Both of these avenues are great approaches, but the approach with the longer-term strategy will ultimately achieve the pre-set goal in a more all-encompassing and efficient manner.

Making the 80-20 Rule Your Life
So why is living the 80-20 rule not so common place in marketing firms, ad agencies and in-house teams today? Simply put, everyone is so busy blocking and tackling. On the other hand, the most impactful 20 percent of work that will make 80 percent of the improvement isn’t always the biggest budget.

We believe living the 80-20 rule is a mindset shift – it requires us to get outside of the box a little more, be a good partner to our clients, think about how all of the different tactics that would achieve the same goal. It’s the age-old “work smarter, not harder” concept.

Living the 80-20 rule life is attainable – it takes expertise, discipline, industry experience, creativity, time to brainstorm and a great team. From there, thoughtful tweaks and meaningful moves are born to help improve your overall marketing strategy, ROI and results.

We live and breathe the 80-20 rule as best as we can here at Parcon, and it’s what has earned the trust we have from each of our clients. Check in with us today to see if there is a more optimal approach to your marketing program that could really move the needle for you.