Probability theory is a branch of mathematics that attempts to understand random events and predicts them so they aren’t that random anymore. For example, some will use probability theory to guess lottery numbers, others will use it to guess flu outbreaks. Some will use it to increase their chances at a desired outcome.

They do this by identifying all of the random variables in a given environment and predicting the outcome based on their relationship to other variables such as size of the environment.

I think a lot about probability theory. In fact I use it to make most of my decisions. Yes, I am crazy like that. Sure, I often am able to throw caution at the wind and take risk. But, isn’t it better if those risk are calculated, first?

Being a good entrepreneur many times means just taking calculated risk. And, probability theory tells us, that the more risks you take the higher probability for success. Which is why there are so many “serial entrepreneurs” out there. They understand that the more risk they take, the more likely they will succeed.

The same goes for blogging. Here is a list of some of the desired outcome that I want from this blog.

• More direct backlinks.
• More Page Views.
• Larger personal brand awareness.
• More engagement.
• More opportunities.

So how do I get all of those things? I take more risk. Or in other words, I blog more often. I used to believe that it was smarter to only blog when you have something really valuable to say. That way your best work stands out the most. But then I looked at some of my favorite bloggers and realized that they have everything that’s listed above because they take more risk.

Sure some of their post aren’t the best out there, but because they took the risk they are closer to being outstanding.

So, because of that, I have decided that I am going to start and take more risk with my blogging. For starters, I am going to try and blog here more often. In a perfect world I would blog everyday, but I don’t think my duties with the company I run will allow for that. But, I do have a few tricks up my sleeve.

Remember a few days ago I mentioned that to be productive you need to work your “get things done” items into your “work flow”. Well blogging is no exception. To help me blog more I am now using BlogDesk. BlogDesk is a desktop application for Windows users that allows you to tie in all your blogs and write and post all from one application. Its great because I don’t have to login to my blog to write, I just click the icon in my task menu and start writing and it automatically publishes when I am ready. I have tied all my blogs into it and its been working great. Oh and its free, so that’s cool too!

Next time you are faced with taking a risk, don’t shy away from it. Instead use probability theory to calculate the risk, and go for it. Because risk taking is the path to success.

[photo credit]

One of the things that I learned in 2010 was that to get things done, many times you have to work them into your “work flow”. For example, I started responding to support issues faster and more often after I piped them into Thunderbird. I just started using Evernote and I can already see a giant increase in productivity as a result of being able to enteract with all of my notes in a well organized system accross different platforms. Freshbooks competely transformed the way I invoice clients in 2010 and as a result I made a bunch more money because it integrates into my work flow well.

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