Don't Put All Your Eggs In One Basket vs. Focus On One Method

Where does one draw the line?

We repeat these two mantras:

One correctly suggests that we shouldn't waste all of our investment of time and energy|money on one project, as the well could dry up and you'd be back at square one. It's smart to look at various potential money making platforms to work on; expansion is good.

On the other hand, we regularly, and correctly, tell users who are struggling and have tried many methods to stick to one method. Unless they have found the method that fits their abilities and goals, or found their own unique twist of using a money making method that works for them, how could anyone expect a new or struggling user to seriously think that the best solution is to go slowly and work on a single method? They have become discouraged and could end up doing white hat.

What is the balance between these two ideas of not putting all of your eggs in one basket and sticking to a method?

I honestly don't know what to tell them, and would love some insight from people who have a better idea of how to achieve a balance between these dissonant ideas.
All I can suggest is, as you're running a business, first and foremost you need revenue or survival and expansion is impossible.

Either:
1. Work with your talents and resources immediately to produce a good or service that can generate revenue right now and diversify later
2. Try a little bit of everything and see where your results come from and as soon as you find what works for you, scale it up(build a 100ft statue from a 1ft model) and expand.

The second idea seems slower and more precarious, but it seems to be what is seen as a more true black hat approach.

Thoughts?

(Unrelated: I've seen a lot of mention of "White Hat" on BHW lately. It's almost like Black Hat is becoming a bad word.)

Well, i think when you master 1 method and make it to perfect and automate it, which means focusing on 1 method till you master it. When you have this one method mastered and automated and you make $$$ you can easily get your mind and time into different methods and diverse.

After some time you should have more methods working for you, and you are expert in them.

^^ya that about sums it up

Lately i am talking more on this subject. And my personal answer is to work on one particular method that is good to learn and to make a twist. After you make it work and reach your goal you can start thinking of diversify the income streams like buy blog, make them, buy links for other projects etc.
So start with all eggs in one basket and after first successful project diversify with high income projects(methods).

Diversifying is all nice and great until shit starts hitting the fan on more than 1 method and you have completely unrelated problems that you have to deal with.

I'd say the best would be a mixture a both. So diversifying inside a single method which you're trying to master.

The obvious example would be to build sites in different niches, all making money via 2+ different monetization methods and ranked via (slightly) different (but still blackhat) methods. This way you're diversified enough so you can't really get all of your income wiped out in a single day but you're still doing the same thing, churning out sites and playing with bots.

Focusing on a particular method and mastering it is good. But after you've mastered it and can manage it easily, its the right time to think about another method and start working on it as well.

I respectfully disagree. Learning one method that works well is important, but as many people here have learned the hard way, when the rules change, it sucks to have all your eggs in one basket. Mastering several methods is the key, and if you cannot master them all, being proficient at several is better than being a master of one. That's my take on this interesting question.

I think its more about a step by step approach. The first time you find something that works, scale it. When stable and giving you a decent income / no longer scales - experiment with other things.

Security only comes with the time it takes to diversify. (Or luck).

I think it depends more on what stage you are in at your IM career.

If you are a newb and have no idea how to make money online, you should try to find a method that you are good at and work at it until you are proficient. Too many newbs hop around from method to method and never get good at anything.

However once you can make a decent living online (ie intermediate to advanced marketers) then the next step is diversification.

It's all about crunching the numbers and dividing your time. When you are first starting, you're obviously going to be doing R&D 100% of your time, so break that up into different methods and test. If you hit a real money maker, just figure out how much it's worth to you and dedicate a percentage of your time to that. 50% if it's a little bit profitable, 75% if it's insanely profitable, etc. Then use the remaining time for more R&D and when you hit another one adjust how you budget your time accordingly.

The key to using your R&D time well is going to be figuring out how to use the resources you already have. It's easier to take elements of your already successful strategy and reshape them into a new one than have no proven resources and build it all from scratch. When you have nothing working is when the real problem comes in, so you don't want to let yourself get to that clean slate scenario.

Such discussions are merely philosophical. Simply put, different things work for different people.

The easiest way to lose is to play by someone else's rules.

sampath said:

Thanks for the motivating post which suggests the power you have is even more then you really have.

Click to expand...

Thanks for getting post counts up, you bring no value !

Enryu said:

Such discussions are merely philosophical. Simply put, different things work for different people.

The easiest way to lose is to play by someone else's rules.

Click to expand...

i guess that sums it up best...
...but within that sum i think there is a mixture of what others contributed before:

it really depends on what you are up to. if you use methods that will be saturated soon or just won`t work anymore due to fixes - you need to diversify. otherwise no egg`s. if you are going for a business setup in a certain field you`re really good at - focus to be effective.
if you are totally new to the game and can`t realy choose a path directly due to the lack of experience it will be what some members here have pointed out:

try something - focus on it an see if you get results...
...if "yes" - scale and try to automate/outsource it as far as you can to regain free time.
...then try something else and repeat the above.
...if you won`t get the desired results - try something else using the same rule.

at that point you are already "diversifying" - wether or not it may bring the desired results.
within this process you will find something that fit`s you and work for you.
which leads you to scale and automate/outsource...and so forth.

leaving you somewhere between running diverse methods - or running a business in a certain field.
(guess i have reached the "philosophical" part now.)
but nevertheless it is important to keep focus on the one thing you are doing right now and not to waste your time being uneffective, trying 10 things at a time. finding the way that fit`s you best is always a process - wether or not you will be ending up in running 6 methods at a time or running one method in a field you are really good at.

that`s how i figured out what suits me best...
...and after finding my main field to work in - it still leaves me time to try some other methods as well. depending on the time i got left over to care about them/the time needed to make em work.

In the early stages of IM, it's better to learn one craft inside out before venturing out into the hundreds of methods out there. Because 9 times out of 10, this one method you learn is going to be your bread maker and the other skills you pick up just helps you diversify a bit (unless you accidentally hit a home run with some random method, it happens).

To simply it, an example process would be:

1. Master seo
2. Outsourcing seo (free up time to venture out into other methods)
3. Learn ppc, media buys, etc. (Use profits from seo to fund ppc projects)
4. Go into product development (successful seo and ppc campaigns gives room to spend on this venture for copywriting, extensive testing, etc.)
5. Get serious, create companies, future ipo's, retire, etc.
(Before you move onto the stages, master the skill so you don't leave any money on the table.)

Compared to:

1. Learn a little bit of seo
2. Learn a little bit of ppc (because the person isn't patient for seo)
3. Learn random stuff about youtube
4. Learn random stuff about product development
5. Lesson learned: You spend a lot of time going nowhere like a hamster on a wheel.

One thing I know is, the reason the 1%'ers makes serious coin is because they know things 99% of their spoon-fed competition doesn't. And when you take the time to figure out that one skill, inside-out, you will become that 1%. Then you will start seeing progress instead of spinning your wheels dabbing a little bit in this method or in that method.

IMO,

I prefer to diversifying to short term vs long term

short term = black hat
long term = white hat or grey hat (go legit)