There are some truisms in business that very few can argue with. One of these is the Pareto Principle, also known as the 80/20 Rule. Originally developed by Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian economist and sociologist who lived from 1848 to 1923.
I wrote about its impact on our business in my new book Authentic Intelligence: The Other AI. I didn’t talk much about Vilfredo, but he was an interesting fellow.
Pareto observed that approximately 80% of the land in Italy was owned by 20% of the population. He noticed similar distributions in wealth and income across other countries. This led him to theorize that wealth distribution tends to follow a predictable pattern, irrespective of location or time.
The principle gained broader recognition in the mid-20th century when Joseph M. Juran, a management consultant and quality pioneer, applied Pareto’s observations to business and quality control. We’ve been using it in the business world ever since. Today, the Pareto Principle has become a foundational concept in operations management, decision-making, and productivity improvement.
But that doesn’t mean you can’t beat it.
Getting Past the Pareto Principle
In sales, Pareto’s Principle says that 20% of producers are responsible for 80% of results. In the mortgage business, this principle plays out clearly, with top-performing loan officers consistently driving most of a company’s revenue.
When I was just starting out, I noticed that those top producers often had a decade or more in the industry, but I was too impatient to wait another eight years to reach that level of success. I wanted to join the 20% much sooner and was determined to find a shortcut.
My search for answers led me to The One to One Future by Don Peppers and Martha Rogers. Their book inspired a new way of thinking, where marketing and customer relationships are built one-on-one, treating each person not as a transaction but as an individual.
The challenge, however, was in the how. The common answer I received from seasoned producers was to build “long-lasting relationships,” but no one could explain the practical steps to achieve this.
Building Trust Fast at Scale
I realized that if I wanted to beat Pareto’s Principle and scale my success, I needed a different approach—one that would allow me to build deep relationships with more people without relying on memory alone. This is where technology came in.
Tools like Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems and automated marketing platforms allowed me to replicate a personalized approach, even with hundreds of clients. By capturing client details, tracking interactions, and setting up automated follow-ups, these tools helped me keep up with each client’s milestones, needs, and preferences, making it possible to maintain a high level of personal attention and relevance.
CRM tools are essential for mortgage professionals aiming to build long-term relationships. They enable us to keep track of crucial client details and interactions, storing everything in a digital “memory” that we can access instantly.
For instance, instead of trying to recall a client’s specific preferences or milestones, the CRM holds all that information at my fingertips, enabling me to engage meaningfully and offer relevant support when the time is right.
Automated marketing further strengthens this approach by handling routine follow-ups, thank-you notes, and periodic check-ins. By automating these touchpoints, loan officers can remain present in clients’ minds without feeling overwhelmed or impersonal. With CRM and automation, I could nurture hundreds, even thousands, of relationships effectively.
And today, thanks to Usherpa, any loan officer can duplicate those results, whether they are currently in the top 20% at their company or not. Find out more by reaching out to us at Usherpa today.
