[powerpress]
Over the past month, I have been interviewing network marketers in various industries to figure out their similarities, differences and challenges. What I found was pretty interesting, especially to an outsider. I interviewed top leaders, I interviewed people who are around the 1-2 year mark, and I interviewed some real newbies. I’ve compiled all of my notes and I’ll share them with you and give some recommendations as well for each of you as you navigate this world that you live in. For the sake of simplicity in this podcast, I’ll review to them as “leaders” and “reps.”
I will share my findings in three parts. First, I will review what motivates network marketers and discuss what that means for you in your business. Second, I will share the challenges of the reps and share ideas on how to work through these. Third, I will share the challenges of leaders and give some recommendations there as well.
What motivates network marketers?
1, Hands down, it’s the product. I heard things like, “I became obsessed” and “I was hypnotized.” But this wasn’t with the business opportunity in most cases, it was the product. I heard “this product changed my life, I have to tell others.” There is a lightbulb that comes on, “I can sell this.”
Take-away: I hear people talking about recruiting people to the business opportunity first. I think that made sense for many leaders because when they rose up, this was a relatively new concept, this whole network marketing residual income thing. Now the concept is way more commonplace, and it seems like most people are joining the business because of their love for the product. So today, if you are looking to build your team, look to your customers. Show them the possibilities because it’s likely they are already talking about the product all the time. Recruiting is it’s own sales funnel. At the top, you have customers, then casual sellers, then casual business builders, then your rockstars. The more rockstars you want, you more people you need in higher parts of the funnel. Which means that some casual sellers turn into rockstars as they go through their journey. In fact, the most successful leader I interviewed started as a customer, then just wanted to pay off some debt, and now she and her husband work full-time on their business. Even leaders develop one stage at a time.
2. The flexibility of being able to choose when they want to work. Many want to be home more as their children grow u,p without being out of the house from 7am to 6pm. For a lot of us, myself included we were told in our early 20s that we could do anything. We got married and have dual income households. And now the second kid came and this isn’t working as well as we had hoped. Enter entrepreneurship as an option because Corporate America still doesn’t have part-time professional positions. I for one would take a huge pay cut to be able to work and contribute, but there aren’t a lot of options out there. Enter network marketing and entrepreneurship as an appealing option.
Take-away: Most people I interviewed want to run their business part-time. They are intimidated by the amount of work their leaders are putting in and wonder if leadership is even for them. Many leaders got to their rank through sheer hustle, and that is what they are teaching their people. How to hustle. But the rep today is different. The rep is constrained by their other job, their 2 children, spouse, etc. Today’s rep needs a different way. They need to see a leader that has built their business over time, on a part-time basis. Does this magical unicorn even exist? I am certain that although this rep is determined to make it happen, it sure would be helpful if there were a model for this. The other thing that this makes me think of is that people need to make more sales in less time. Productivity is key. Is there a true focus on building the productivity skills of the team members? Are the lessons of batching, boundaries, focus, and goal achieving taught and developed? Is there a great understanding that the time spent developing sales and leadership skills will lead to more sales in less time? So if you have 5 people in a group that you are selling to, you are already at three hours. You can have two people buy or you can invest time in a specific skill set and have four people buy. Double the sales in the same amount of time. This is what drive me to do my business. I want to help you sell more in less time. The same comes for leadership. By investing in your skills as a leader, you will retain your team at a higher rate and not have to run around to find more. Here is a pro tip: when you recruit someone new into your business, do a comprehensive schedule overview. Write down all of their responsibilities and block those off in their schedule. Put some relaxation time in there, and cut in 1/2 the time that is left over. That is how much time they will be able to invest in their business. From there as the leader you will need to guide them on the most important thing to invest their time in. Please don’t make them learn every thing! They don’t have the time for it and the result is that they lose faith, you do too.
3. They love helping people. Since the people are blown away by how the products and services have benefitted their lives, they want to help others get the results that they received. The reps and leaders alike have purpose which helps them overcome many of the challenges and inspires them to endure.
Take-away: Keep focus on helping people, and use that synergy to help more people. If this is what truly motivates you, keep the success of your customers and team members front and center. In the day to day grind, sometimes it’s hard to remember about the impact we make individually, especially when we are balancing it with the profit needed to run a successful business. Gather testimonials. You know that text you got from your customer thanking you? Encourage them to send you an email with more details, print it, and keep it for your records. When you go to visit a customer for a follow-up, have a notebook handy and have them write something out for you. When your team member hits a milestone, keep a record of their words and how much it means to them. Another way to keep the “helping people” front and center is in your team meetings. Many team meetings are about doing more, and what’s going wrong. I encourage you to start your team meetings with something different. Let’s say you have 8 people on live for your team meeting. Encourage them to share one success story from either a customer or team member. This will encourage and invigorate your team, while building a culture you will be proud of.
Quick recap for today: for most of you and your team members you are motivated by the product, flexibility, and being able to help people. I discussed recommendations to continue to have people fall in love with the product to build your recruiting pipeline, develop the skills of productivity, and promote the success stories of your customers and team members non-stop. Implementing these recommendations will ensure your well is full so you can continue to fill others up.
Thanks for listening today. There are two more episodes in this series, so make sure to subscribe to the podcast so we can always chat on the go. If increasing your customer base is important to you, check out emergesalestraining.com/start to learn more about Your Direct Sales Foundation which is my core training program to teach you the fundamentals of managing yourself, selling, referrals, and developing your team. Talk to you next week!
Tasha