Star Builder

Written by Andrew Wilkin

Background

Like me, you are probably are interested in tips for succeeding in network marketing, so in this article I put together my top 20 which I have collated from experience of others and some top notch books into the subject (please do check out the books section on the site).

My Network Marketing Top Tips

The following tips are not in a specific order, that is to say I am not judging one to be more important than another. Many of which are tied together, that is to say the tips cannot be taken in iscolation from one another, you will need to absorb all of them and act on them to achieve success.

Tip #1 - Choose your MLM network maketing organisation wisely

When you are looking for a network marketing organisation, realise that they are not all created equally, and are also in different stages in their lifecycle. Things you should be looking for are:

• Been established for at least 3-5 years (this means that it is more likely to survive as it model must be doing something right).
• Look for an organisation that has the potential for impressive growth, if they are already in hundreds of countries the rate of growth is likely to be slower, catching the curve at the right time is likely to mean greater success for you and those your sponsor.
• Does it have an appropriate product suitable for network marketing? Is it consumable and does it hold real benefit to those that use it.
• Does it have a decent support and training infrastructure in place, can you get in touch with distributor support easily?

This is why I chose to get involved with this network marketing organisation.

Tip #2 - Choose your sponsor wisely

Just as you look to choose a network marketing organisation wisely, it is important to choose someone as your mentor wisely. One of the benefits of network marketing is the support and mentoring you can get from your upline - this is why they have the potential receive a reward for your progress.

This is why choosing Star Builder as a team, is a wise choice, as we take out sponsoring responsibilities seriously.

Tip #3 - Resist the temptation to reinvent the wheel

You don't join a system to reinvent it, the whole purpose of joining a system is to leverage it for success for you and others. This is key, during my short time in network marketing I have made a number of mistakes, some of which cost me money, others cost me potential distributors.

Had I followed the system I would have not made these mistakes, read this article about avoiding reinventing the wheel for more information.

Tip #4 - Develop a proper candidate list

Workon your candidate list, using prompts to jog your memory (we'll post an article on this soon and update this article with the link), who do you know that you have worked with that would benefit from the products, do you play squash with someone, are there other parents were your kids go to school, you get the picture.

Include people on your list that you look up to, not just those that look up to you. If we only look towards people that have not achieved success or shown traits that are necessary to succeed, we should not be surprised if it takes them longer to achieve success and thus ourselves.

However don't rule out people because you think that they may not be interested, or that they don't have the time. This is a self limiting belief, and will hold you back, there are many stories of people who ended up being sponsored by someone else, don't let this happen to you.

Tip #5 - Learn how to invite

Inviting people correctly is key to success, after all it is only by inviting people that they get to know about the opportunity and decide whether they want to be part of our team or not. The key here is that if you give them no information they will feel like they are being deceived, conversely if you give them too much information they will try and make the decision on whether to join your team based on the information to hand (together with their pre-conceptions).

More often than not they will make a negative decision which not only does not serve you well, but also does not serve them well - as they have reinforced their own self limiting beliefs without giving it the proper time of day to evaluate. I too have made this mistake, and have vowed not to do this again, and have lost some true potential leaders in my team as a result.

Tip #6 - Conduct Home Business Reviews

You can grow your business purely in coffee shops and by taking people along to business opportunity seminars, but the stage is not under your control and you are less likely to be successful by adopting this approach. It has to be complemented by undertaking home business reviews.

Randy Schroeder's simple philosphy on this is that the person that undertakes more home business reviews wins, echoing Tom Hopkins view that the person that undertakes more activity with the chance of failure, has the more chance of succeeding - as in life it is not the number of times you fail but the number of times you succeed with the possibility of failing.

For a further discussion of the virtues of using your home - read this article.

Tip #7 - Become a product advocate

You cannot seriously expect to bring people on board into your business opportunity unless you believe in the products of your organisation. Simply put if you do not use and believe in your products you are nothing short of a snakeoil salesman, and you will find people will pick up your incongurence.

You have to use your products and have an understanding of what it has done for you.

Tip #8 - Act in a manner consistent with duplication

You have to act in a manner that is consistent with duplication, that is to say if people see you standing before an audience of 200 regularly presenting your opportunity they will subconciously think that they cannot do this. The next association is that they would need to do this in order to succeed, and as a consequence they will either not join or they will avoid the activity really necessary to achieve success.

For a longer discussion about the power of duplication read this article.

Tip #9 - What you do others will tend to mimmic

I know of one of the sponsors in our team that had issues in convincing a new distributor of joining the autoship program. Two things happened, one the distributor ran out of product for themselves and with which to build the business - which actually left them realising the benefits of the product. The second thing that happened is that he was not a product advocate at the time (he is now) and struggled to sponsor others.

An autoship programme is there for your convenience, to keep you on the right path. What you have to appreciate is that if you don't do it, those you sponsor are likely to do the same, they tend to mimmic your behaviour. This is true even if you tell them otherwise, it is just human nature, and do put yourself onto an appropriate autoship level as soon as you can.

Tip #10 - Maintain appropriate activity levels

This is not a job, and others will not hand success over to you on a plate, you have to work for it. You will need to put in sufficient amounts of effort in to the business in order to succeed. Though not all effort is created equally, you can spend your whole time doing things that does not help you to achieve success.

For more information read this article about appropriate activity levels.

Tip #11 - Some will some won't

Do not align your success with one key candidate joining or undertaking the appropriate activity levels. As the saying goes, some will some won't, so what, there is always someone else who wants to succeed.

It a rejection or a failure can feel like a major failure, but remember this is not a get rich quick scheme, this is generally at least a 2-5 timeframe for you to achieve great success.

Learn to bullet proof yourself with this article on handling rejection.

Tip #12 - Keep in touch with your downline

You are a sponsor not a recruiter, and you do need to keep in touch with people that are in your downline to help them overcome their challenges. Their success is key to your success, that is why it is sometimes called Multi-Level Marketing, as you get paid at multiple levels, but in order for that to happen they need to achieve success.

You won't know that they have hit a road block unless you do keep in touch, ensure that they are following the appropriate levels of activity and help them to set realistic goals. As a general rule you should have contact with each person you sponsor at least once a week, this could be a personal email, a text message exchange or a phone call.

Tip #13 - Keep up-to-date with changes

Your organisation has just launched a new product, opened in a new country, there is some new scientific research advocating an existing product, a new celebrity endorsement, but you don't know about it because you are not keeping up to date with the relevant media channels.

These gives you the opportunity to approach people that you have previously been rejected by, contact people in a new market that you know and can be quite exhilerating. This is also very important for motivating your downline, positive news helps to keep your downline motivated, and is a nice offset from the news we consume on the television everyday.

Tip #14 - Invest wisely in your business

You do not achieve success by filling your garage with products, invest your money wisely in the business. You have to remember you are expecting your downline to mimmic what you do too. In short be spendrift, investing only in what is appropriate at the time for you to achieve success.

Likewise splashing out on newspaper adverts or other ways of generating leads without using your warm market is an expensive mistake. I know this is contrary to a normal business, but this is not a normal business model - a mistake I made in my very first week before being guided back to the correct path.

Tip #15 - Maintain your attitude

You have to be positive in your outlook on life, that is not to say you need to be false, however one outburst of negativity can ripple through your downline like wildfire. These people are looking up to you for guidance, and if they see that you are down about things or that you have lost belief in the system because of a set back they will probably lose belief themselves.

Tip #16 - Set goals and measure your progress

You need to set goals and measure your progress, if you don't know where you are going how do you know when you have got there, or indeed if you are even moving in the right direction. How will you know if an activity helps you achieve your goals or hinders them. If you don't measure you progress you cannot be honest to yourself when it comes to seeing if you have undertaken the appropriate activity.

Read this article on the importance of setting well formed goals.

Tip #17 - Avoid alienating friends and family

Notice I said avoid alienating friends and family, what I did not say was avoid approaching them about the opportunity. What I did say was learn when to back off, andleave it for another time. If it is not the appropriate time to talk about the opportunity leave it for another time, though please do not use that as an excuse to procrastinate.

If you get rejected, do not try an beat them into submission! This will leave you without friends and family, read this article on how not to alienate friends and family.

Tip #18 - Learn about your products

In order to be able to answer questions about your products you need to learn about them! You cannot rely on your upline always being there to answer for you, and you need to show an air of knowledge about what you are trying to get people involved with.

This is not to say that you can make over-inflated claims about the products, and indeed you don't need to get a medical degree in order to run this business. If you have one of those then great, but realise this - those you are seeking to sponsor don't and it has to be presented at a level that maintains duplicatability.

Our organisation has an excellent set of online training programmes to get you up to speed, though it is not the only network maketing organisation that understands the need for training. Some will hold product training days or weekends (though to my mind if it is that complicated it is too complicated for me to train the new sponsor).

Tip #19 - Network regularly

The clue is in the title, it is called network marketing for a reason. Those that fly to the heights of success in record time have already built a network of people around them. Networks come in many different forms, it could be a school committe such as a PTA, or it could simply be meeting up with friends from university or attending some alumni meet.

The more people you meet, and network with, the more people you will get to know, the more people you will have the opportunity to introduce to the opportunity, the bigger your team will get. It is really that simple, but do remember just as we come in all shapes and sizes, so do networks and they share different common interests - and one is not necessarily better than another.

Tip #20 - Attend seminars and training

You should regularly attend seminars and training, though do not use this as a substitute for appropriate activity! Not only does this keep you motivated, it gives you the opportunity to learn from others and they are generally very heavily subsidised.

I recently attended a presentation in another region, the price to me was some fuel and some time, but I learnt a different presentation style and got to meet people that had different experiences to me that complemented my existing knowledge.

To read more about my trip read this article.

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