How to Focus On One Thing When Your Income Comes From 7 Places?

EricVonDoobie

EricVonDoobie

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Dec 23, 2009
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Fellow gay webmasters, I need your help.

I'm in a unique situation right now. I've been really good lately about trimming fat and focusing on a select few projects, but the problem is that now even after drilling down my focus, I'm spread too thin.

Basically, I need to focus on ONE thing as my bread and butter and scale it up, the big problem is that I put my fingers into so many different things that my income depends on ~7 sources/sites/projects/etc.

Anyone been in this situation before? I always heard people telling me that I shouldn't keep all my eggs in one basket, but now I have too many fucking baskets--so I can't focus on growing just ONE of them, or even any of them.

What to do? My biggest earners that I'm currently focusing on is email marketing (think Getresponse + bizopps, not like the guys in the mailer forum), iPhone app business (99% outsourced), one main "authority" affiliate site (~80% outsourced).

My portfolio on the other hand includes digital products (software, videos, etc.), brands, affiliate sites, etc. These don't earn as much though as my main 3 I've been focusing on, HOWEVER, they may be longer term more viable options if I were to simply focus on one of them exclusively.

So again, what the fuck to do? Anyone have some good advice on how to move forward and, as crazy as it may seem, put all my eggs back into one big fucking basket?

I'd seriously appreciate any real suggestions, been struggling with this for a long ass time.

inb4 op's a fag
inb4 ironic signature
 


This is an issue I have myself. If I would just concentrate on my biggest money maker, it could earn far and beyond what what my other ventures do combined. My biggest concern is I have been burnt with putting all my eggs in one basket before and I refuse to be put in that situation again. Internet businesses can be fickle and very unstable, especially with so many outside factors which can go wrong. Therefor I choose to diversify my businesses. This way if one loses it's revenue I'm not riding a mower for $12 an hour.
 
I'm in the same situation.

Make a list of all the menial tasks you perform and start getting a team of VAs together.
I think it's good to have loads of baskets.
 
Hire or outsource. I added 3 new employees this year just to cover new projects. Project goes belly up? Lay them off or move them to another project if they're good.
 
Try to figure out away to pick the basket that allows you to create more baskets. I will not get involved in a business in which I am dependent on a few clients/customers for the majority of my income.

Pretty much the rule of thumb I live my life by.
If I loose this customer how will it affect my life? You have major problems if the thought of loosing that customer/client/website makes you more than a little uncomfortable.

Just about any business can protect itself by diversifying their income streams.
 
Eric ( or w/e your name is ) -

Congrats, your straddling the fence. Time to put on the big boi pants and focus on the 20% that is making you the 80% you have right now. Sounds like the email, iphone, and 1 auth site you have.

Since the iphone app is 99% outsource and the auth site is 80% outsourced, you shouldnt have any issues with time on those anyways, amiright? If they are taking up a ton of time, they are not outsourced.

So, with that said.. looks like your emailing is taking up time since its not outsourced. If I was you I would start making plans to find out how to automate or outsource that email as well and then hire a PM to manage the iphone app outsourcers, the auth site outsourcers and also your email biz.

This will allow you time to work on those new projects bro.
 
You should delegate some of your ventures to trusted friends. That's what I do.

Make sure they're mature and have good work ethic. If there's a problem, try to work it out with them or remove them from that position immediately and tell them it's not working out. If you do a good job vetting them, you won't have to worry about that though.
 
jstover77 said:
This is an issue I have myself. If I would just concentrate on my biggest money maker, it could earn far and beyond what what my other ventures do combined. My biggest concern is I have been burnt with putting all my eggs in one basket before and I refuse to be put in that situation again. Internet businesses can be fickle and very unstable, especially with so many outside factors which can go wrong. Therefor I choose to diversify my businesses. This way if one loses it's revenue I'm not riding a mower for $12 an hour.
Click to expand...

Don't you save a good chunk of your income for a rainy day?
 
It's about being a visionnaire brah... Which ones do you see a lot of potential in, and which one fo you feel will eventually stagnate? Sell the latter ones if they can bring good profit, or keep them but hire a VA to take care of them.
 
When I first started in the IM game, I put all my eggs in one basket. Got fucked.

Having income from 7 different places isn't a bad thing as long as you're mastering all 7 things. If half-assing 7 things is keeping you from doing 1 thing right, then yeah, trim the fat. But if you're extracting all the juice out of all 7, fuck, you've got nothing to worry about.

Or basically what jstover said.
 
Let me give you guys some simple tips to focus on one thing at a time. Here's generally what I do to maximize productivity and stay focused:

The first step is... OMG LOOK AT THIS HAMSTER VIDEO:

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VuMdLm0ccU"]2 Hamsters 1 Wheel - YouTube[/ame]
 
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