Ben Roy

In Part 1, we talked about reasons to stay laser focused on a single project. But every coin has a backside, and in this case it creates a dissonance I previously mentioned.

There are a couple major opposing arguments for getting exclusively focused on one business, project, or effort. The biggest is the simple benefit of diversification. Especially in the realm of Internet Marketing, everything is subject to change.

The search engines are under no obligation to leave their algorithms as they are, nor are they required to even list your site at all. If your entire livelihood is derived from traffic from a single search engine, you are carrying a significant risk.

It would be akin to investing the entirety of your retirement portfolio in a single stock. Any financial advisor will tell you this is a terrible idea, that you should invest in a variety of different instruments to reduce your overall risk.

The same applies to your business: diversifying either the source of revenue within your business, or by having multiple diverse businesses is a great risk reducer.

For me personally though, there's another big driver. I just plain get bored. I need to be challenged on a constant basis, and always tackling something new and interesting. Having multiple pokers in the fire is an effective way for me to ensure that I'm steering clear of that dreaded boredom.

So what's the right answer? Focus? Diversify? The only right answer is 'it depends', or maybe 'both'. It comes down to each individual's ability to balance multiple priorities, the time and energy available, and your personal drivers.

For me, the sweet spot is to be highly focused on a couple of different projects. It's easy to get too many things going on and start to lose that tight focus; you have to know what you're capable of, and be vigilant that you don't stray too far from your target zone.