If you want to maximize your efficiency and capitalize on performance, consider Pareto’s Law. Here’s what Wikipedia says (bolded for emphasis):

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. Business management thinker Joseph M. Juran suggested the principle and named it after Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who observed in 1906 that 80% of the land in Italy was owned by 20% of the population. It is a common rule of thumb in business; e.g., “80% of your sales come from 20% of your clients.” Mathematically, where something is shared among a sufficiently large set of participants, there must be a number k between 50 and 100 such that k% is taken by (100 ? k)% of the participants. k may vary from 50 (in the case of equal distribution) to nearly 100 (when a tiny number of participants account for almost all of the resource). There is nothing special about the number 80% mathematically, but many real systems have k somewhere around this region of intermediate imbalance in distribution.

Social media and other online tools have already allowed many of us to apply this rule whether we realize it or not. Rather than going to 20 different websites throughout the day, for example, we go to one place, like Google Reader or Twitter, for the latest from several selected sources. For many, though, these same tools have presented a new problem.

In the past year, a few friends who use Twitter have said at one point or another that it has become overwhelming to them. Following an increasing number of participants and sources all shouting 140 characters of information at them on subjects ranging from lunch to the latest White House briefing can do that. But how much time did the tool consume of their life last year? How much time did it take to sift the good stuff from the minutia?

Do you want to try something different in 2010? What if Twitter could enhance your goals for the year instead of detract from them? What would you say if I told you that using Twitter less can be more for you and your friends?

Using Pareto’s Law, take a look at the people you follow and decide which 20% of users contribute to 80% of your fulfillment from Twitter. That fulfillment can be anything from providing useful information related to your work, to your life passions, or simply be status updates from friends and loved ones. Somewhere in the blizzard of tweets is that 20% of the good stuff.

Once you come up with the short list, create a private list on Twitter and add those users. Now I want you to try something for a week. When you have five minutes of time for Twitter, only check your good list, and only check your full list when you are using leisure time.

You can do the same on Facebook and other online tools. When you see how well this principle works, ask yourself where else you can apply this principle, and start cleaning house.

Something useful: There are a few sites that will give you good Twitter metrics, but try TwitterFriends. I like it because it doesn’t require you share your password with them to use some of the basic functions. If you have a prefered Twitter metrics client, share it in comments.