Need help managing social media? Use the Pareto Principle!

• We know the importance of social media. But the time commitment is still something we are struggling with on a daily basis. How much is too much to spend on social media and where should this time be spent?

Answer: You've hit the nail on the head: time waits for no man (or woman) and it's easy to get lost in the sheer volume of conversations, engagements, and updates required to stay active within your social media circles.

The good news is this is a common problem AND as such, solutions are many. Social media does not need to be a time suck and although there is no "hard and fast" rule as to how much time YOU should spend daily on your social media efforts here's a thought:

Give someone a full 8-hour workday to complete a task, and it will USUALLY take that full 8 hrs to complete.

However, let's say you give that same person (or staff) new tools, more resources, or a different way to approach the problem and similar results may be accomplished in a fraction of the original time.

Enter the Pareto Principle!

"The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few, and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes." - Wikipedia

This isn't a new principle; it was most famously covered by Timothy Ferris in his 2008 book The 4-Hour Work Week.

When applied to your social media methods the Pareto Principle says that 20% of your social media audience will produce 80% of the results. Find that 20%, spend some time each day cultivating it, and your time suck vanishes!

So how do ...