Changing Lives

Deep inside your heart of hearts, do you really believe that sales is a helping profession? Do you really believe that what you are selling is about changing lives? Over the years, its been a tough thing for me to accept at a visceral level.

If this is something that concerns you (and if you make a living in Sales it really should), check out this sort video from successful sales and network marketing trainer Ray Higdon. Then figure out how to help people stay "around the fire" and build a better life.

 http://bit.ly/M5T8ys

Leveraging That Holiday Lull

Despite the encouraging pressure of making year end goals (usually with a prize or a trip on the line), network marketing professionals often struggle around this time of year. Each day more and more people fall into their "holiday mindset" and essentially end their business year. It becomes more challenging than ever to schedule appointments, and often those that do get on the calendar fail to happen or don't accomplish much when they do. People are done with this year, and not ready to start the next one quite yet. Decisions seem best put off for a few more weeks. What is the ambitious network marketer to do?

Well don't join the herd in writing off the rest of the year. Even though it is unlikely that you will convince anyone to focus very much on your opportunity right now, in fact it is a great time of year to advance your business. How? Do the same thing everyone else is doing - look to next year. But do it with purpose. The year-end holiday season is the perfect time to meet new people. There are family gatherings, workplace parties, social outings and community events of all sorts going on, and there are people you don't know at all of them. But instead of trying to get them to a meeting or a sit down right away, beat them to the punch.

"Hey I'd love to sit down with you and share this right away, but with the holidays I am just slammed. What does your schedule look like after the first of the year?"

You will be amazed at how willing people are to schedule a meeting with you once they understand you aren't pressuring them to do it tomorrow. (Just make sure you schedule it, don't accept "I'll be in touch".) And having a full calendar is a really great way for you to start the new year. So don't slack off over the next two weeks. Instead, set yourself up for a running start into 2014. It won't win you that trip, but it will move your business ahead of everyone who has a "Gone for the Holidays" sign up in their head.

Type 3 Diabetes?

As if we needed another reason to "cut the crap" in our diets and lifestyle, new evidence is emerging linking Alzheimer's disease to insulin resistance. That is to say, the same mechanism that makes Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes so devastating. Since 2005, a series of studies have convincingly linked pre-diabetic and diabetic cellular insulin resistance to decreased brain function and memory loss. In short, to Alzheimer’s.

My mother is a late stage Alzheimer’s sufferer. The disease first robbed her of her ability to live her life, then of her memories, then rotted away her brain to the point where she could not even feed herself. Now it is finishing its work by killing her. It is a brutal, horrific disease that destroys not only individuals but entire families. How exciting would it be to discover that the same diet and lifestyle changes that we know will reduce our lifetime risk of developing Type 2 diabetes offered us significant protection from Alzheimer’s as well?

Read about the details here. And then do something about it. Before you forget.

Social Media vs Social Networking

Let's say you've decided to add traditional business networking to your marketing mix. You find a couple of local groups, schedule the time and show up at the meeting with a pocket full of business cards and a well rehearsed "30-second commercial". Now what? Do you rush around handing out your cards to everyone else in the room (Spamming)? Do you monopolize every conversation talking about yourself and all the quirky, fun things you do? Do you give your commercial and then sit in the corner waiting for people to approach you? Is your idea of relationship building squirming in your seat waiting for someone to shut up so you can talk about your business? Probably not. And yet this is precisely how many people try to use "social media" to attract new customers and grow their business.

Back in the days when AOL was credible and MySpace was cool, and Facebook and LinkedIn were just getting started, this whole online genre was called "Social Networking". The recent movie fictionalizing the dawn of Facebook was named "The Social Network". And that is what they were about, people connecting with other people socially online. There are over a billion people using Facebook alone today, and dozens of other popular social systems online as well. So its not surprising that before too awfully long, businesses and their marketing arms moved in. This is not entirely a bad thing. Someone has to pay for these things to exists, and advertising is a well established way of funding "free" systems. It wasn't long after the arrival of the marketers, however, before things morphed from "social networking" into "social media". And the distinction is anything but trivial.

"Networking" is all about establishing connections and building relationships. Its the sort of thing salespeople understand and gravitate toward. "Media", on the other hand, is principally a means of mass communication. A way of taking your message and broadcasting it to as large an audience as possible. A vehicle for advertising. And it is the province not of salespeople but of marketeers.

These days it seems like everyone is clamoring for instructions for "using social media to grow my business". And there is no shortage of consultants and trainers stepping up to meet the demand. Hey, at least someone is making money on social media! And what advice do we usually get? Be active. Post cool, interesting things about yourself - often. Slip in ads for your business every now and then but don't overdo it. Make your profile look like this. Say that. Avoid doing this other thing. Wait till someone says something related to what you do and then pounce. More followers is better than less followers. In short, good marketing advice and bad networking advice. And manipulative.

Let's go retro and start thinking of it as social networking again and leave social media to the social media consultants. Start to apply the same principles and approaches you would use at a networking meeting. Don't wait to be found, reach out to others. Don't just connect with the people you know, or hope people will find you, make the effort to find them. Connect with people you share meaningful common interests with, business or personal, and build on that. Build relationships, whether or not they ever lead to a sale. Have fun and let it show. Be yourself. Look for quality connections instead of just a lot of them. Give back, contribute, offer to help.

I've taken this advice to heart recently and its making a noticeable difference in how I use Facebook and LinkedIn and for the first time ever it is even producing some real business results. Give it a try yourself and see if networking doesn't beat advertising by 2 lengths.

Does Your Downline Have a Game Plan?

Its no secret that the actual success rate for new distributors (lets call "success" a distributor who is still in the business 3 years later and satisfied with their progress and results) in many network marketing companies is dismally low. Ten percent or so is not uncommon. With such a simple business, its reasonable to wonder why this is.

First of all, let us not confuse "simple" with "easy". Network marketing is work, and those lacking the determination and/or work ethic to put some serious effort into making their business successful are nearly always going to fail. (There is simple random luck of course, more on that later.) But what about the people who really take a run at it, invest significant time and effort, and still end up disenchanted and dropping out?

Often it is because they go into it without any sort of game plan for success. In my opinion, this is a failure primarily of their upline/
sponsor, who's job it is to train and support a new distributor and show them how to succeed. But too often this comes down to "Here, watch this DVD, make a list of everyone you know, call them up, set an appointment and let me know when you need my help."

A better way is to have a specific process you use to help your new distributors get off to a good start and experience some success in their first month or two. Network marketing guru Eric Worre calls this a Game Plan. Sitting down with your new recruits and making sure they have a plan for success, that they understand it, that it connects with their own hopes and aspirations and that they know exactly how to get started will go a long, long way toward making them successful and not another droppout. And isn't that what you, their sponsor, want? Their success?

What should a Game Plan address? Just a few basics may make all the difference.

1. Reinforce their decision to join the business.
2. Clarify exactly what their role and your role are going to be going
    forward.
3. Set realistic objectives for their first 15, 30, 45, 60 and 90 days in
    the business.
4. Map out, precisely, what they are going to need to commit to do in
    order to reach those goals and what you will - and won't - be
    doing to support them.
5. What their immediate next step is going to be, how and when
    they are going to get it done.
6. How they want you to support them when you see them starting to
    slip or backslide.

At the end of the day, it is entirely up to your new distributor how they are going to run their business. They don't work for you. But if you want to be successful yourself you need to maximize the chance that the people you bring in will be successful too. Having a clear, realistic plan for getting them a few wins quickly will go a long way toward keeping them out of the failure column. And remember, hope, luck and good intentions are not a plan.