Sunday is spiritual day. 
When I first got started in network marketing some 17 years ago, my upline all ran ads that were variations of "Making $10,000/mo. Need help."
So I ran them too.
I didn't have any other ideas, and they said do that, and I did. I was excited.
I got hundreds of people to reply. And even some good orders from potential recruits. But almost no one stuck.
After almost 9 months, I finally decided maybe I should try something else.
At the time, I figured it was maybe my area, or that the ads just happened to pull the wrong sorts of people - they all wanted $10,000/mo but for some reason, they didn't have any staying power. All I could think was, "What is WITH these people?! Why isn't there anyone coming who's like me?"
I decided right then that maybe I'd try asking for people like me, in the hopes that maybe if they were more like me, they wouldn't quit so fast. After all, I was still there...
That's when I started writing ads asking for people with "experience in marketing, teaching, public speaking, owned their own business before...", i.e. people like me.
Immediately the number of respondents dropped. There were fewer of those types, I guess. But the good news was that the ones I got helped me build the fastest growing organization in the company's then 25-year history.
Moral: Don't give up on the whole business of NM if what they told you isn't working for you. Nothing works for everyone, even if it IS working for your upline. Always try something different, more suited to you, before quitting.
"Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who has said it, not even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense." -Buddha
And your own experience...
8 comments :
Finally, I feel I've found a home.
Nancy
Nancy, me too! thankfully...
We appreciate you, KIM, and all you do for us, daily.
Carolyn
Hi: Valentino here in NYC.
Kim-Thanks for all the great information you share with us consultants.
-------------------------V.--
Yep... it's a lesson people are still slow to learn.
If you appeal to ignorance, greed, laziness, desperation or gullibility, it's not hard to work out what kind of people you'll attract.
"Birds of a feather flock together" applies equally to network marketing.
Good stuff, Kim. :)
John
http://www.AllAboutMLM.com
Excellent, Kim, this is the right kind of behavior that deserves being rewarded. I know that in the past I was guilty of following blindly along, fearful that any deviation from what an upline told me I should do would result in failure.
Now I know there are no "shoulds" in NWM. Do what works, and when it stops working, do something else. So simple, yet so brilliant.
Keep this up and we might yet fix some of the problems in this industry.
This brings up an interesting point. Should we really be pushing duplicatablility in this business?
Sure, it has worked for franchises in a big way but even franchises don't push it the way they used to giving the owners much more freedom than in days past (you don't see all McDonald's decorated with red vinyl seats and yellow countertops any more).
Perhaps we start sharing that this or that method (the one we are having success with) has worked very well for us and would be a great place to start but also be aware and point out some of the other ways people have successfully built their business with said company.
Do we really want to attract the kind of people that can only be successful if they are given a script to follow and can't think on their feet if there is any sort of deviation? How succesfull will they ultimately be if they can't find their own way to overcome a road block they face?
Just think, Kim, if you weren't the kind to deviate from that script. You would have either continued to place those $10K ads and failed or you would have given up right then thinking they said you had to do it that way to be successful and it wasn't working so the business must not be a good one.
My ad would ask for free thinkers with an entrepreneurial spirit that love working with people.
Thanks guys.
And Nicole, yes, I believe duplication is overrated particularly the way it's been done in the past few years where upline insist on downline duplicating "systems" of leads and websites that the upline are selling. In most cases this is not known to the new recruits. It's covert.
As to methods of reaching out, 3-5 methods gives someone some variety and also encourages them to test things. One never knows for sure what is going to work for a person until they test is and see how it feels. I have taught that for the last 15 years, ever since I discovered years ago that what the upline and sideline were doing wasn't working for me.
And wasn't for many others apparently. I was quite surprised at how fast my business grew when I started doing it differently and running different ads from others.
It wasn't until later I realized for how few those ads WERE working. Pulling people, yes. Pulling people who stick, no.
There are several posts here about my take on duplication...
My 'Truth' book has 11 different methods of reaching out in it...and the 'If My Product's So Great' book offers buiding up a customer base as an alternative to the 'just recruit' model which has failed so many good people.
I agree with Nancy, "finally, I've found a home".
Thanks, Kim, for your refreshing, AUTHENTIC self.
Diana
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