How do you leverage your time?
Filed under: MLM, direct sales, entrepereneurs, how do you learn to do network marketing, learning network marketing, network marketing, women entrepreneurs
In the previous blog, we talked about residual income. An even more powerful component of network marketing is leveraging your time.
We talked about enrolling your first person into your business, then your second, fourth, tenth, and so on. You can enroll people until you’re blue in the face, and your business will creep along. But if you start to leverage your time, your business will explode!
Take the time to train the people that you enroll to do what you’ve done. Take them under your wing and show them, step by step, how to talk to people, how to have fun at it, how to work in their back offices, how to meet people for lunch or tea and casually, naturally, bring up the subject of your new business, whatever it is that has made it so easy for you to enroll people. Guide them along until they pick up the idea and start going with it.
I went backpacking once with a good friend who was an expert fly fisherman. We sought out a river where the park service allowed only catch and release, which meant that every time someone caught a fish, they would release it back into the river, alive and healthy, if a little shell shocked.
This also meant that there were scads of fish there, and since my friend was so good at fishing, he was catching another fish every minute or so.
Now, when a fish first comes off the hook, it’s dazed and shocked. When you lower it back into the river, it lays there, motionless, listing onto its side. So while my friend had the fishing experience of his life, I opened a fish recovery pool.
I gently cupped a fish in my palm and slowly swished it backward and forward through the water, allowing the water to flow through its gills so the fish could still breathe. I would have 6 or 8 fish gathered around my feet, in their 8 inches of river water, gently swishing two fish at a time, then going to the next two, rotating through the group until they recovered their wits and could carefully swim away.
My friend would add a new fish, two would wake up and swim away, new fish, recovered fish, a cycle of success.
Now, we could have just let the fish fend for themselves. Back in the water, there you go! But by caring for them and helping them function until they could take over for themselves ensured their success. Our fish were successful fish!
Your new team members are like the stunned fish. You can leave them to flounder for themselves, but some of them might not succeed. By nurturing them and helping them function until they can take over for themselves, you ensure their success.
Now, what does all of that have to do with leveraging your time? Every person on your team who succeeds turns into another you. Instead of you enrolling every single person, you have a good friend out there enrolling people, too. You get credit for everything your team accomplishes, so their success is your success. Pretty soon you have two, four, ten yous, out there being successful and having FUN, swimming along naturally, happily.
Train your team members well, and they’ll be able to take their own teams under their wings, and teach the third generation how to succeed at enrolling people and teaching THEM how to succeed. Now you have hundreds of yous, swimming along, naturally, happily.
That’s leveraging your time. That’s true success.
There are other ways to leverage your time in network marketing. Which ones come to mind? Which ones would you like to know more about?
I can’t wait to hear from you!
I hope you’re having an amazing day.
Transformation or change?
Filed under: MLM, how do you learn to do network marketing, learning network marketing, network marketing, positive attitude
The concept of transformation is different from change. Change is uncertain. Transformation is evolution.
When something transforms you, you have become something new. The experience was profound, unforgettable, rare. You couldn’t go back to being the way you were before the experience, even if you wanted to.
Take something commonplace, like baking chocolate chip cookies. You get out the butter and the flour, sugar, vanilla extract, baking soda, walnuts, a little bit of salt and a LOT of chocolate chips; tons of them. You mix together the butter and the sugar, add all the other stuff, and beat it into a creamy dough, add the nuts and chips, and voila! You’re ready to bake.
You spoon the cookie dough onto a baking sheet and pop them in a hot oven for only 15 minutes, until they’ve transformed from cold sticky dough into hot, crumbly morsels of heaven. They have transformed. And I defy you to change them back into flour, sugar, and butter.
Change is reversible. You can change to oil or tires on your car, but you could then conceivably change them back to the old oil, the bald tires. You can change your clothes, take off the old tee shirt and jeans, put on an evening gown and heels, and change from a stay-at-home mom into a hot date for your enchanted man. But, at the end of the evening, you can also change back into the stay-at-home mom by kicking off those ankle-breaking heels and stop holding in your stomach once you’ve pulled on your sweats and relaxed. It’s all reversible.
Strive for transformation if you want your life to grow toward your dreams. Seek out experiences, such as classes, books, meetups, that touch your heart and help you discover who you are meant to be.
Transform yourself. Discover the profound, unforgettable, rare, inner you. Transform.
FaceBook empowers YOU!
Filed under: MLM, entrepereneurs, finding new prospects, how do you learn to do network marketing, learning network marketing, network marketing, prospecting
There are things that you can do to get a head start on your new network marketing business, even BEFORE you actually sign up and pay your entry fee and monthly overhead.
One thing that you can do is increase your internet visibility through facebook. Here’s my suggestion:
Start a new facebook account. All you need is an email address that’s different from the one you’re using for facebook now. Start out fresh, and find some facebook groups that share your interests. Maybe stay at home moms, work at home moms, knitters, gardeners, whatever kind of things that describe you.
Then start inviting the people who also belong to those groups to be your friend. You can only invite 30 or 40 people a day, without getting a warning from facebook, so it takes a while to have a BIG group of friends.
Some people will send you a message asking if they know you, and you can just answer back saying that you’re trying to connect with people that are interested in the same things you are. Something like that. Some will decline, but most will accept.
The reason you want this to be a separate facebook account from your friends and family account is that this one is going to get HUGE. You don’t want your friends’ posts to get lost in all of the other ones that you’ll start to receive from this new group.
If you start this now, it will cost you nothing, and you’ll be WAY ahead of the game once you take the plunge and sign up.
We’ll go over your NEXT step in a later post.
Ready? Set? GO!!!
Two ways to ask the question
Filed under: MLM, entrepereneurs, how do you learn to do network marketing, learning network marketing, network marketing, positive attitude, solving problems, talking with friends
Pay attention to the way that you ask a question. There are two ways, using exactly the same words, which carry completely different motives. By paying attention to the way you ask the question, you can double check your motives, which helps keep you on the right track.
Why are there only men at the upper levels of my company!!!
Why are there only men at the upper levels of my company???
The first question demonstrates frustration and anger, foot stamping at the way things are. Whenever you ask a question with this motive, perhaps you’re not really looking for an answer. Perhaps your main motive is to rale against the world, shaking your virtual fists at invisible enemies. It doesn’t get you very far.
The second question, however, demonstrates a genuine curiosity, a thoughtful wonder at the way things are. Whenever you ask a question with this motive, you are actually asking for an answer. If you ask the second question of another person, you might gain some insight. If you ask the second question thoughtfully, inwardly, you might gain some insight as well, from your intuition.
Intuition comes to you through your heart. Ideas occur, fully formed. It may take some time to put words around the idea, to explore the nuances, but it’s all there, ready for your contemplation.
Are there mostly men at the top levels of your company? Why do you think that might be?
I’ve pondered this question, and the answer that comes to me is that men do business differently than women. Or to put that another way, women do business differently than men.
Network marketing is a field predominately composed of women. Look around at any of your conventions or training meetings; are there mostly men or women sitting around you? And then looking up at the stage, are there mostly men or women sitting up there?
The techniques that we learn in network marketing are changing; the industry is becoming more and more solidly structured around relationships. Rather than handing out 20 brochures to strangers every day and hoping someone will call you back, we’re finding that what really works is to call up a friend and sit down and have chat over a cup of tea. Relationships.
So why are there more men at the top levels of your company? Because women are starting to come into our own, and we’re doing it by discovering what works for us. We’re changing the structure of network marketing a step at a time, which is our nature. Because we’re gentle and caring and nurturing; because we include others in our success; because we embrace a balanced life.
We’re getting to the top levels of our companies. Things are changing. Look how much things have changed in the last 20 years. Think about how much things will change in the next 20 years.
None of that would have occurred to me if I had demanded Why are there so many men at the top levels of these companies!!! I would have continued on, frustrated and angry, never getting any answers.
I know a lot more now, because my motive has shifted. I’m happier now, not because I’ve learned to be content with what I have, but because I’m content with the journey that is taking me where I want to go. It’s all about the journey; the goal is simply what happens along the way.
Three Steps to Handling Objections
Filed under: MLM, entrepereneurs, handling objections, how do you learn to do network marketing, talking with friends
It can be hard to know what objection a friend is going to raise when you start to talk with her about network marketing. You can know a lot about the people with whom you spend time, but you probably don’t know everything.
Perhaps you have a clue as to why she might think it’s a bad idea, so you can be better prepared, but she still might surprise you with something that’s stirring around deeper in her gut.
And, you’re going to want to talk to a lot of people, not just those few people that you know really, really well.
So, the point is, how can you possibly have a ready reply for the dozens of possible objections that your friend might raise during your chat over tea?
Well, you could memorize a bunch of responses that you heard that made sense to you and then go into jukebox mode with the correct replay when your friend pushes one of the prepared key combinations. But there’s an easier way, a way that is natural and stress free.
Open your heart and really listen to what your friend is saying. Let her say it all. Once it’s spilled out of her mouth, it won’t be bouncing around on the inside of her skull, bashing up her dreams of what could be. Listening also gives her the chance to get to her true objection, so you’ll be able to talk about what’s really going on underneath.
Once you know her real objection, you simply follow three easy steps:
1. I know how you feel.
2. I used to feel that way too.
3. This is what I found out.
So simple.
What you’re really doing is:
1. You connect with her.
2. You stand on her side of the argument, shoulder to shoulder.
3. You point out an alternative based on your own experience.
“I hate everything about network marketing.”
“I know, I know. I used to hate it, too. But a friend that I really trusted told me some things that I hadn’t known before, and I decided to research it a little bit. What I learned is that network marketing is the best business, ever, for women like you and me.”
Match her energy. If she speaks softly and off-handedly throws it off, then you speak softly and set it gently back on the table. If she glares at you and throws words at you, widen your eyes and grin hugely, while you enthusiastically tell her “I know!!! I know!!! I used to hate it, too!!! But I couldn’t BELIEVE it when a friend that I really trusted. . . .”
It’s simple. Open your heart, listen, 1,2,3, match her energy.
Then your jukebox can sit there and softly hum the background music, which is what it’s there for anyway.
I hope you’re having an amazing day.
Did you learn how to walk?
Filed under: giving up, how do you learn to do network marketing, learning network marketing
Sometimes when we don’t get it right, we think, “Oh, I’m not good at this.” “I wasn’t cut out for this.” “This isn’t for me.” We’re tempted not to try again. It’s too hard.
Have you ever watched a parent encourage a child to walk? Have you ever watched a child learn to walk? The child rolls over onto all fours and scoots her butt up in the air and tries to balance and stand up. Oops! Over she topples.
She crawls over to the couch and uses the edge of the seat cushion to pull herself up. She teeters, then steadies. She tromps along and eventually can let go of the couch and balance on her own. Oops! Over she goes.
Have you ever heard a parent say “Well, I guess you’re just not a walker. . . “
What if the child just gave up? She’d have to learn to live with not being able to move from here to there, to reach the thing she wants to pick up. She’d live a diminished life.
When you’re learning network marketing, practicing is what makes you learn how to do it.
By practicing, I mean actually talking with people. If you’re sitting in your living room thinking about how you’re not sure what to do or who to talk to, that’s not practicing. That’s sitting on your butt wishing you knew how to walk.
Come up with a strategy that you think will interest a specific person and then try it. Learn from it. Talk to the next person. Learn from it. Talk to the next person. Learn.
You will get to the point of ease and enjoyment that you’re sitting wishing you had now. But wishing doesn’t make it so.
Practice makes it so.
Imagine what it would be like if you never learned to walk.
Imagine what it would be like if you practiced talking to enough people that they started to listen to you, intrigued.
Did you learn to walk?
You can learn this, too.
They have to love you back
Filed under: MLM, entrepereneurs, finding new prospects, how do you learn to do network marketing, overcoming obstacles, prospecting
Back in my dating days, I was open to all kinds of ways to meet men. I liked being in a relationship, the companionship. I was actively looking for someone with whom I could share my life.
We all have to kiss a lot of frogs before we find a prince. I met guys for coffee. I went to dinner with them. I ran into them at bars. I kept telling myself that if this guy were in a comfortable relationship, he wouldn’t be this nervous; he wouldn’t be this fragile. I tried to see the real person behind the don’t-know-you-from-Adam facade. I tried to be as open and as accommodating as possible. I decided to give each guy at least two chances, 2 dates. Sometimes I went on as many as 10 dates with a guy before I’d finally accept the fact that this was not a good fit.
Then I met a guy who was crazy about me. That’s when I finally realized that no matter how accommodating, no matter how patient, no matter how attentive I was, if the guy didn’t love me back, it wasn’t going to work.
Prospects are like guys. They have to love you back, or it isn’t going to work.
What I mean is that you can’t accommodate someone into the business. If you do all the work, you’re always going to be doing all of the work. You’re always going to feel inadequate and frustrated.
We are actively looking for people with whom we can share our businesses, our products. By all means, handle the objections. Find out their why. Qualify them. But at some point they have to start moving toward you, or they’re just going to feel harried.
Connect with people. Find out what makes someone tick. Be sincere. Be real. But if they don’t respond, move on. There are so many people out there waiting to here about your opportunity, and if you spend all of your time and energy harrying the few that you really really really want to join you, even though they’re not interested, you’ll miss the chance to find the ones that will love you back.
So get out there and start talking to the frogs. You will find princes.
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