Darrell Taylor
03-14-2011, 09:28 PM
A Personal Search For The Perfect Network Marketing Opportunity
The endless recruiting treadmill is what made me step back and take a good hard look at network marketing and where, exactly, I fit into the industry.
I had read Mike Dillard's famous Coffee House letter and it resonated with me. I liked the idea of getting paid up front for my efforts, especially with the high rate of attrition in today's networking landscape.
I had become a member of a couple of the currently-popular direct sales companies, but the products just did not resonate with me. They were of the "Financial Freedom" type of package and somehow I just never felt comfortable selling them. It was hard to explain, and still is, exactly what the person received for the $1500 or $2,000. (Other than the opportunity to sell the same package to someone else so they could do the same thing)
I sat on the sidelines for quite a few months. As I did, I was naturally approached by quite a few networkers that wanted me to join their team for this or that. Maybe I was just jaded to all of the different products but nothing had much appeal, no matter what the pay plan looked like.
I decided that I would approach my next company differently, if there were to be one, that is. I began to formulate a list of the ideal attributes a company should have to attract me, and therefore people like me.
Here is my List:
1. I like getting big commission checks, so I wanted a high-dollar direct sale item. Especially, I wanted to eliminate the autoship nightmare from my life.
Receiving $1,000 or larger commission checks is habit forming and I wanted to get into the habit as soon as possible!
2. The product must be a physical product. I did not want to receive a binder filled with information telling me what a bargain it is. Therefore, the
product must have real, tangible value.
3. This is a tough one....I wanted to represent a product the people actually WANT to purchase. This factor eliminates most of the Networking
Opportunities. Don't start screaming at me, but just think about it for a minute. Prior to joining your present company, did you really, truly spend $150 or more per month on vitamins, skin care products or juices? Probably not.
There are, however, a lot of Network Marketing companies that have fantastic products such as legal insurance, skin care, vitamins, nutritional powders and drinks, or juices. I have tried a lot of them and still purchase some of them for my own use.
The difference is that, in general, it is extremely hard to make any serious money just selling the product to interested consumers without selling them on the opportunity and getting them on autoship.
This meant that, ideally, most of the people I wish to sell to should be customers rather than distributors. Usually, in the MLM world, a customer is
automatically a distributor so they could sell if they wanted to but they buy the product primarily for personal use. I set my sights on finding a product
that would let me have approximately 60% sales to customers with 40% to distributors. I would like the customer percentage to be higher, but I determined that I could live with 50/50.
In short, I wanted my customers to be cheerleaders for my product. This creates an unbelievably strong referral base.
4. Downline Commissions. Call them residuals, overrides or whatever, I wanted them. Lots of them. In huge dollar denominations. Many of the direct sales opportunities have an opportunity for large up-front commissions and a small or tiny residual. I know I sound greedy, but I wanted a big commission and a big residual. Did it exist? I determined to look for it.
Let's face it, helping your downline is a lot more fun when you make money from their efforts.
5. Number 5 is another tough one, I was not sure if I could actually find an affordable way to do this. I wanted a physical product that would allow me to let people try it before they made a purchase. Until you have experienced it, you would not believe how much pressure this relieves from the whole sales cycle.
If people can become educated and knowledgable about your product, they are likely to make the purchase. (That is, if it is worthwhile in the first place.)
When i finally got this list compiled, I knew I would know the program for me when I saw it. I would encourage anyone to go through this exercise as it
provides such clarity. It is truly liberating to be able to objectively evaluate opportunities in the light of your own stated parameters.
The endless recruiting treadmill is what made me step back and take a good hard look at network marketing and where, exactly, I fit into the industry.
I had read Mike Dillard's famous Coffee House letter and it resonated with me. I liked the idea of getting paid up front for my efforts, especially with the high rate of attrition in today's networking landscape.
I had become a member of a couple of the currently-popular direct sales companies, but the products just did not resonate with me. They were of the "Financial Freedom" type of package and somehow I just never felt comfortable selling them. It was hard to explain, and still is, exactly what the person received for the $1500 or $2,000. (Other than the opportunity to sell the same package to someone else so they could do the same thing)
I sat on the sidelines for quite a few months. As I did, I was naturally approached by quite a few networkers that wanted me to join their team for this or that. Maybe I was just jaded to all of the different products but nothing had much appeal, no matter what the pay plan looked like.
I decided that I would approach my next company differently, if there were to be one, that is. I began to formulate a list of the ideal attributes a company should have to attract me, and therefore people like me.
Here is my List:
1. I like getting big commission checks, so I wanted a high-dollar direct sale item. Especially, I wanted to eliminate the autoship nightmare from my life.
Receiving $1,000 or larger commission checks is habit forming and I wanted to get into the habit as soon as possible!
2. The product must be a physical product. I did not want to receive a binder filled with information telling me what a bargain it is. Therefore, the
product must have real, tangible value.
3. This is a tough one....I wanted to represent a product the people actually WANT to purchase. This factor eliminates most of the Networking
Opportunities. Don't start screaming at me, but just think about it for a minute. Prior to joining your present company, did you really, truly spend $150 or more per month on vitamins, skin care products or juices? Probably not.
There are, however, a lot of Network Marketing companies that have fantastic products such as legal insurance, skin care, vitamins, nutritional powders and drinks, or juices. I have tried a lot of them and still purchase some of them for my own use.
The difference is that, in general, it is extremely hard to make any serious money just selling the product to interested consumers without selling them on the opportunity and getting them on autoship.
This meant that, ideally, most of the people I wish to sell to should be customers rather than distributors. Usually, in the MLM world, a customer is
automatically a distributor so they could sell if they wanted to but they buy the product primarily for personal use. I set my sights on finding a product
that would let me have approximately 60% sales to customers with 40% to distributors. I would like the customer percentage to be higher, but I determined that I could live with 50/50.
In short, I wanted my customers to be cheerleaders for my product. This creates an unbelievably strong referral base.
4. Downline Commissions. Call them residuals, overrides or whatever, I wanted them. Lots of them. In huge dollar denominations. Many of the direct sales opportunities have an opportunity for large up-front commissions and a small or tiny residual. I know I sound greedy, but I wanted a big commission and a big residual. Did it exist? I determined to look for it.
Let's face it, helping your downline is a lot more fun when you make money from their efforts.
5. Number 5 is another tough one, I was not sure if I could actually find an affordable way to do this. I wanted a physical product that would allow me to let people try it before they made a purchase. Until you have experienced it, you would not believe how much pressure this relieves from the whole sales cycle.
If people can become educated and knowledgable about your product, they are likely to make the purchase. (That is, if it is worthwhile in the first place.)
When i finally got this list compiled, I knew I would know the program for me when I saw it. I would encourage anyone to go through this exercise as it
provides such clarity. It is truly liberating to be able to objectively evaluate opportunities in the light of your own stated parameters.