I have tried but have not been able to verify the veracity of the story I am about to relate, but true or not, it makes a very good point.
When the USA was falling behind in the space race to the their old foes, the Russians, President Kennedy made a trip to Cape Canaveral. As he toured the facilities he asked three janitors, “What is it you do here?” The three answers were diverse and telling:
1. “Earn a living.”
2. “I pick up the trash.”
3. “Mr. President, I’m helping to put a man on the moon.”

The fabulous book Brains on Fire says:

You can’t have passion without purpose. The two are intertwined. What are you passionate about? And why are you passionate about it? Now, how does that connect with a sense of purpose? That part of you that believes you’re making a difference or standing up for something you believe in?

Perhaps it is a time to do a passion check of your employees and see how it compares with the field. Do the newbies or those with less visible roles understand the importance of having passion and purpose? Does the field feel excited when they come to your office or do they feel it is “us against them”? Maybe it is time to find out.

I remember when I was first learning how to become a network marketer my upline encouraged me try the new raisin bran. The bran was bland and the raisins tasted like sugary rocks. They were terrible and never should have passed product compliance. When I told my upline I would never buy them again, I was reminded that it didn’t taste bad, it tasted like money…what?

Let me remind all of us in direct sales that we are still in the product/service business first, not the opportunity business. The most stable companies in economically hard times are the ones who create true product value. With only a small percentage of the marketers making high commissions even in good times, remember to look for value in the product first and your opportunity will always be safe.

I have four children and it never ceases to amaze me what they believe is possible. Andrew, age 4, can conjure up an entire world of impossibility and spend the afternoon imageering what surrounds him. I love to watch it because it helps me to remember how powerful our dreams and goals are. It also keeps me believing that I can make my world better no matter what obstacles seem to be in my way.

I was recently watching Jim Carrey’s Yes Man. In one scene his lively girlfriend, Allison, said, “The world’s a playground, but somewhere along the way everyone forgets it.”

This quote got me thinking about how crazy it would be to make a video of little kids saying ridiculous excuses that adults use to justify their mediocrity and lack of success in life.  What resulted was 3 days of hilarious outtakes and ice cream bribes. The video below is just a sampling of the most fun a guy can have with $5 ice cream coupons and bunch of hilarious kids.  Look for our complete compilation in a couple days.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Unfortunately for most of us, Siggy Marvin makes us laugh, but we are forced to confront the horrors in the world at work or we risk going out of business or losing our job. Not long ago I spoke with a friend who is in the awkward position of knowing what is best for his company, but is forced to play politics to keep peace. As he described the position a colleague was taking the business, it reminded me very much of an article written by TheOnion.com. Take-Charge, Can-Do Guy Makes Horrible Decisions, is a must read for anybody confronted with overachieving numbskulls on a regular basis.

“Matthew Stuart, an enthusiastic 33-year-old junior executive at Boston Tea Market, Inc., gets things done quickly, confidently, and terribly…” So frequently when somebody is new to a team, they want to leave their mark and save the day even when they are in way over their heads. They want to be seen as the hero. They want to get the job done. Great goals, but as the old saying goes, discretion is the greater part of valor.

As I write this post, I think to myself, “Jeff, Jeff, Jeff, you are a self-admitted fanatical entrepreneur. Don’t tell the good people to play it safe. Any challenge can be overcome. No obstacle is too big. Encourage people to get out of their comfort zone and make big things happen.” Admittedly, I am an adrenaline junky, I take chances, I start new businesses and I make them work. However, I have found few people that are willing to take responsibility when things go wrong and even less people are willing to risk their own personal security for the sake of making the business work. If you are not willing to lay your salary on the line for mistakes that you initiate, rethink your strong positions.

What we typically see in most businesses is a person that comes to us with the façade of bravado who makes terrible decisions just hoping that the chips will magically fall into place by their hustle. A small sliver of experience is exaggerated into a career filled with successes. Can-do guy crawls into a metaphorical fetal position, analysis paralysis sets in, financial disaster ensues, time is lost and money poured in all the wrong places.

For you can-do people, who put everyone else in a bind, just learn from what people who work with Mathew Stuart come to think about him. “Because of his positive attitude and boundless energy, Stuart’s frequent errors in judgment are generally overlooked. ‘Everyone here really likes Matt,’ Jordan said. ‘You never really notice what an idiot he is until you’re cleaning up his mess. He loves to roll his sleeves up, get in there, and screws (I edited this word to get it PG Rated) all sorts of things up.’

Eventually Mathew will get fired if he can’t back up his hustle with results. Guess what, if you are a can-do guy that makes horrible decisions, you’ll be fired too, but not before you have waisted a bunch of time and money.

P.S.

I was informed that I am not in the habit of leaving anything on a down note. Point well taken.

Business is rough and you can get bruised. Feelings can get hurt and finances dashed.  However, part of business and life is willing to push yourself to new levels.  I encourage my employees and clients to get uncomfortable and achieve more.  There is nothing quite like overcoming your fears, just have the courage to confront your mistakes when you make them.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I have enjoyed visiting many new and existing businesses, this was no exception.  HealthNation showed me that even in a bad economy, entrepreneurs can find a way to interest the public in their product or service.  It was great to see a new company be so well prepared for an event and have so many people show interest in their new company.  HealthNation had approximately 300 paid attendees from 23 different states.  It was well run and well attended.  I feel comfortable saying this company will have an impact on their customers and new members.

“Call me in the new year.” It’s a motto we entrepreneurs hear a million times this time of year. It’s as traditional as maxed out credit cards and a jolly fellow in red.

All successful entrepreneurs take the sales process seriously. Unfortunately, while our family and friends are slacking at their 9 to 5, we still have to meet payroll and pay for the expenses that come with the time of year. For an entrepreneur the holidays can make us feel like the Grinch with the added pressure of additional expenses and prospects that are more secured behind their excuses than the gold at Fort Knox.

Jeffrey Gitomer addresses the holiday stall with 11.5 lines and tactics:

1. Close on the stall line. “ What day after the first of the year would you want to take (would be most convenient to take) delivery?”

2. Firm it up, whenever it is. Ask, “When after the first of the year? Can I buy you the first breakfast of the new year?” Make a firm appointment.

3. If it’s just a callback, make the prospect write it down. Call backs must be appointed, or the other guy is never there when you call. Writing it down makes it a firm commitment.

4. Tell them about your resolutions. “ I’ve made a New Year’s resolution that I’m not going to let people like you who need our service, delay until after the first of the year. You know you need it.”

5. Offer incentives and alternatives. Invent reasons not to delay. Bill after the holiday. Order now, deliver after the holiday.

6. Question them into a corner — and close them when they get there. “What will be different after the holidays? Will anything change over the holidays that will cause you not to buy?” (Prospect’s answer — “Oh no, no, no.”) “Great!” you say, “Let’s get you order in production (service scheduled) now, and we’ll deliver it after the holiday. When were you thinking of taking delivery (beginning).”

7. Agree. Then disagree. I know what you mean…lots of people feel that way. Most don’t realize that the money wasted between now and the first of the year, will equate to a huge savings if they buy now. Are you sure you want to waste the money?

8. Get a testimonial letter. Ask someone who bought before the holidays and was glad they did to write you a two-paragraph letter. Get one paragraph about the value they received and how they originally wanted to wait. The second paragraph should be about how happy they are about your service after the sale. Similar situations are more powerful than your sales pitch.

9. Drop-in with holiday cheer. Use a small holiday plant or gift to get in the door. (No one says no to Santa — unless you live in Philadelphia. There they boo Santa.)

10. Create urgency. There’s a product or delivery back-up after the first — schedule now.

11. Be funny. Say, “So many people have said call me after the first that I’m booked until April. I do however, have a few openings before the first. How about it?” Making the other person laugh (smile) will go along way towards getting past the stall. An alternative joke is, “What holiday?”

11.5 Beg. Pleeeeaaase. I’ll be your best friend.

Gitomer always seems to have fun with the sales process. That is why he is so successful with what he does. Be bold, have fun and drink some eggnog. The season can still be fun, I just recommend you stay away from the Star Wars’ Christmas album. Nothing could quite take away from the spirit of the season than Christmas Darth Vader crooning his way through Away in a Manger.

When my Amway distributorship was in its prime, I would have case after case of soap, breakfast cereal and toilet paper delivered to my garage. It was not uncommon to have over $50,000 of product sitting where the car should be. It was exciting, but also overwhelming. I was a progressive, I wanted to use, of all crazy things…a computer spread sheet to separate and add the product costs among those coming to pick it up. Yes, even in 1995 they had spreadsheets that could add effectively. I was told by my superiors that was not duplicatable. They wanted me to use these outdated carbon copy forms (that I purchased each month from them) because not everybody had a computer or my skills to use them. By the end of the day, I had a huge stack of green carbon sheets, black fingertips and a headache. I stopped listening to their wrong advice and started using my computer again. With the computer, my math was always right again and I stopped regretting selling so many products.

When did we stop teaching our people to think for themselves? When did we stop creating a sales force that interacts with prospects instead of just making presentations?

I have four kids under the age of 12. When I come home, it seems they always are playing within ten feet of me. It makes it hard to make phone calls, but I also get to see a side of creativity that is rarely seen in the work place. I am amazed at how my house is full of dragons flying free, robots conquering inferior foes, airplanes that fly themselves and cars that break the speed of sound. When do adults stop imagineering their future? Why do adults stop using their imagination all together?

Time to stop worrying about whether you will fit in all the time. Time to start asking “why” once in a while. It is time you stop worrying more about being embarrassed and worrying more about creating something great, something special. It is time teach your people how to solve problems by letting them make some mistakes. It is time to truly lead people by getting out of their way once in a while.

It probably wasn’t the best thing to do in the office conference room, but it sure was fun.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Even for those people who are untrained in body language meanings, contradictions in body and words have a negative affect. When a person is saying one thing with their mouth and another with their body, the conversation feels awkward and insincere.  Awkward conversations will crush any perceived trust, and will doom any chance of a sale or follow up. For those trained in body language meanings, words are secondary to the message being sent by the body. When you study body language, you will be able to see clear contradictions between what a prospect is saying with their mouth and their body.

In many sales and prospecting meetings, the inexperienced salesperson or networker leaves a meeting with a prospect completely pumped about getting the sale because the prospect was saying all the right things. In reality, the only positive thing the prospective was saying was coming from his or her mouth. The prospect just wanted to get rid of the annoyance in front of her by feigning interest. The insincere words spoken by the prospect deceived the inexperienced salesperson, but with training, the salesperson could see that the prospect’s legs and arms were crossed, one hand was covering a portion of her mouth and the prospect was never able to look the perceived annoyance in the eye. An experienced salesperson and student of body language would have seen these warning signs and stopped the sales pitch to get to the bottom of the real problem or doubt. An experienced body language reader would have known that if the person did not begin to open up, this sale was doomed and a follow up would never have resulted in a sale, no matter how many times the salesperson followed up.

In The Definitive Book of Body Language we learn, “Body language is an outward reflection of a person’s emotional condition. Each gesture or movement can be a valuable key to an emotion a person may be feeling at the time.” If you begin to watch, your prospects will be telling you far more with their gestures and body then with words.

I pride myself in being able to connect with people and create enjoyable environments for productivity, but I have made some big mistakes addressing body language. I have had experiences with a person who could not stand me and it was evident whenever we met. My meetings with this person were never very comfortable no matter what I tried. In two of my meetings I made the big mistake of pointing out that the person’s arms and legs were folded and one of his hands was covering a portion of his mouth; all signals that this person did not trust me and or disliked me very much. The meetings were very uncomfortable and discomfort is a unproductive setting when you are trying to get things done. In our business dealings, this person definitely felt himself my superior, and he hated me trying to get to the bottom of his feelings during our meetings no matter how big of an impediment I felt it was toward a resolution. In fact my reads infuriated him and he was quick to remind me. I learned quickly that when a person feels he or she is your superior, be very careful pointing out that they do not look physically comfortable with how the conversation is going. Read the body language and do your best to address the problem with a different direction in the conversation. Not until you feel very comfortable with the person sitting across from you, do you point out that avoidance of eye contact and other body signals are causing a problem in the conversation.

Successful follow up meetings can be critical to your business. You owe it to yourself to avoid leaving a meeting thinking that you are further ahead than you really are. If you understand basic body signals, you will have a good idea of how the follow up will go before you even leave your first meeting. When you understand the basics, you can save yourself weeks of fruitless follow up.

• How long should you wait before you contact your prospect after a meeting?
• What did I do wrong they were so interested?
• Am I cut out for this?

Anybody who has ever read a book on sales etiquette or has experience in sales knows that the follow up is just as important as the meeting itself. As entrepreneurs enter the 21^st century is it ok to email or text the prospect, or should you just call? Even more important than how you get back with the prospect is when should you get back to the prospect? I have compiled a list of answers from some of the world’s best entrepreneurs in an attempt to give answers to when you should get back to your prospects without worrying if you are acting out of place or being a pest.

We’ll start this series of posts off with one of my personal favorites, Jeffrey Gitomer. In his book, The Little Red Book of Sales Answers, Gitomer asks, “Are you a sales leader or a sales chaser?”

“Chasing your prospect too hard? People not calling you back? Pushing too hard for orders? Try running the other way – let the prospect chase you. It’s the best follow-up technique I’ve ever experienced.”

“If prospects are not returning your call, whose fault is that? You’re chasing too hard. They’re running away. You couldn’t get their interest. You couldn’t get them to chase you.

Here are some tell-tale symptoms the chase is going the wrong way:

• You’ve followed up a few times, and now you’re searching for a reason to call them – but you can’t think of one.
• You are uncomfortable about calling, you are unprepared, you have not established the needs of the prospect, you are unsure of their status, or you don’t have much rapport with the prospect (or some of each).
• You call, get their voice mai, and hang up.
• You left your best message and they didn’t call you back.
• They told you a decision would be made Tuesday, and Tuesday has come and gone.
• The prospect is giving you a bunch of lame excuses. And you are accepting them!
• And the worst symptom of all – you are blaming the prospect for you inability to generate enough interest, create enough value, or for not having a solid reason to call you back.”

If you have never read any of Gitomer’s books and you are an entrepreneur, it is time to invest in your education. The guy is funny and he can cut right through the bologna. His books are short and easy to read. If you want to learn more from one of the masters on how to get prospects’ attention and more on how to follow up with your prospects, he is a must read.

I follow many different business writers on their blogs. It is no secret, I love to read Seth Godin. However, I also love to read the posts of Marc Cenedella, CEO of TheLadders.com. In his most recent post he spoke about “The Intelligent Entrepreneur”, a new book out from author Bill Murphy. In the book, Murphy distills 10 rules of successful entrepreneurship from the stories of several Harvard Business School graduates.

Much of Cenedella’s post is below:

As I read through the stories, and looked at Bill’s rules, it struck me that there are similarities between the successful entrepreneur and the successful job-seeker. You’re both trying to create something new — a new company or a new position for yourself. You’re both faced with the emotional challenges that go with any new endeavor. There are plenty of setbacks along the way in starting a company and getting a job. And success is dependent on sticking to it and seeing it through.

So with that in mind, I thought I’d share five of Bill’s 10 rules with you and show how they apply to your job search.

#2 Find a problem, then solve it.

It’s not enough in the 21st century to simply describe yourself to future employers as “I’m a finance guy” or “I’m a saleswoman.” Particularly in this difficult economic environment, you need to let your future boss know what kind of problem you can solve for him or her. So be specific about what you bring to the table: “I’m a finance professional who specializes in Sarbanes-Oxley and really enjoys working with internationally headquartered companies to meet American regulatory requirements” or “I’m a sales professional who loves working with biotech start-ups as they go from pre-revenue to $10 mm in sales.”

Find a problem, and then let your future boss know how you will solve it.

#4 You can’t do it alone.

The job search can be a lonely endeavor and you can’t possibly make it alone. You’ll need the support of your family and friends, and being honest with them about the trials and tribulations you’re experiencing is an important part of your emotional well-being during the search. You’ll also need to rely on your colleagues and contacts, and have them on the lookout for you during your job search. (See my advice last week on this topic: “Ask for a reference, not a job.”)

Enlisting the aid of the people you know for support, advice, and connections is the way to your next great job.

#5 You must do it alone.

But as much as you’ll need to rely on family, friends and colleagues, it is ultimately going to depend on you. You’ll need to make the calls, you’ll need to do the follow-up, and you’ll need to be prepared for the interviews. When it’s 10:17 a.m. on Tuesday morning and you’re staring at the phone thinking about making that follow-up call, it’s up to you, and you alone, to pick up the phone and dial the digits. Nobody else can do it for you.

Understanding that you’ll need to make the commitment, set aside the appropriate amount of time, and then fight through our natural tendency to procrastination, is key to your success.

#8 Learn to sell.

Take your annual earnings and multiply by five. That’s the value of the product you are selling — the next five years of your labor. It’s the most important sales job you’re going to have, and you need to learn how to sell. You need to qualify the buyer — make sure they need an expensive product like you — and then explain to them the benefits they’ll get by purchasing — how you’ll help solve the problems they’re facing in their business.

Too often we can allow ourselves to slip into focusing on what I need out of the job hunt. You have to remember that it’s not about you, it’s about what your future employer needs. And you need to sell them on how you fulfill those needs better than any other candidate.

#9 Persist, persevere, prevail.

The job hunt is filled with twists and turns — moments of hope and days of despair. That’s normal. Even the most successful, polished, high-priced executives and professionals that we work with here at TheLadders have those weeks when the phone is not ringing, emails go unanswered, and the creeping doubts seem to loom larger.

It’s all part of the job-seeking process, and in order to be successful, you’ll need to overcome those difficulties. It is only persistence and perseverance that will see you through the bad days and the tough interviews. Anybody who has started a company, and everybody who goes through the job search, experience tough times. Stick to it, know that you are valuable, and you will make it through to success!

To learn the other five rules of successful entrepreneurship, I’d recommend you go pick up “The Intelligent Entrepreneur” today.

“Level 5 refers to a five-level hierarchy of executive capabilities, with Level 5 at the top. Level 5 leaders embody a paradoxical mix of personal humility and professional will. They are ambitious, to be sure, but ambitious first and foremost for the company, not themselves.”

One of the most advantageous aspects of writing about leadership and team building is how much I continue to learn about myself. As I analyze myself compared to the great leaders that researchers study, I am not sure if I am more like the bumbling self-absorbed Michael Scott from NBC’s the office or if I have a shot at becoming a Darwin Smith of Kimberly-Clark who turned a failing company into a Wall Street darling. Will I be Michael and buy myself a coffee mug declaring myself the “World’s Best Boss,” or will I be ferociously dedicated to my companies’ success with the humility of Smith when he said, “I never stopped trying to become qualified for the job”?

Click here to view the embedded video.

As Collins writes, “Level 5 leaders channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal of building a great company. It’s not that Level 5 leaders have no ego or self-interest. Indeed, they are incredibly ambitious-but their ambition is first and foremost for the institution, not themselves.”

A couple of years ago I spoke to a person who had taken over a flailing company. I was excited about her vision for the company and how she intended on motivating its depressed sales force and confused employees. I was impressed with the plan, it was innovative and superbly thought out. However, I became disheartened in the future of her plan when she told me, “Besides, if it fails, I will make a nice stack of cash trying.” Ouch.

In a fast-food world, we are applying principles of convenient and disposable to our careers and our companies. Often times jobs are looked at as simply a stepping stone to pad the resume for the next big thing. No wonder our teams are uninspired and transient.

Good to Great found that Level 4 leaders often put their ambition and legacy ahead of the business. “In over three quarters of the comparison companies (underperforming companies), we found executives who set their successors up for failure or chose weak successors, or both.” How many people are truly more concerned about their legacy instead of the true health of the company? How many business Pharaohs are more concerned about building their personal Sphinx that will last longer than the kingdom?

Building a smarter team is not easy. Becoming a Level 5 leader is even harder. Something I do know, it is imperative that we take the attitude of Darwin Smith and constantly try to learn our position better. The minute you think you have it all figured out is when your foundation will begin to crumble.

Goleman studied successful leaders throughout business to understand the amount of technical skills, IQ and emotional intelligence they had as ingredients to excellent performance. He found that the ratio of emotional intelligence proved to be twice as important as the others for top positions in business.

So what is emotional intelligence? It starts with self-awareness, which can be difficult for many people. It is the age-old advice to “know thyself”. Goleman says that it is “having a deep understanding of ones emotions, strengths, weaknesses, needs, and drives. People with strong self-awareness are neither overly critical nor unrealistically hopeful. Rather, they are honest – with themselves and others.”

I recently read an article about Boise State football coach, Chris Petersen. Living in Boise and having attended BSU, I follow his success with admiration and awe. I find it astounding that Coach Pete has built upon the success of his predecessors in such a grand manor that the Broncos are consistently one of the country’s top football teams. Whether you like the Broncos or not, you must admit that what Petersen has done is incredibly impressive.  With an entire football budget that equals just the salary of other top coaches, Petersen has created a juggernaut that inspires love and hate from around the country. Pretty impressive for a team that did not even compete at Division I level 15 years ago.

In the article about Coach Petersen, we can learn a lot about his emotional intelligence:

“His football IQ has been much discussed during the Broncos’ ascension over the past few years, but Petersen’s emotional intelligence — his ability to relate to and connect with others — also seems to be off the charts.

This coach is as good at listening as talking. Maybe better.”

Coach Petersen empowers his people and takes the time to teach them. He teaches leadership and life principles, not just football. He has taken players that larger schools have rejected and turned them into an elite machine. Whether or not the football powers that be will ever find it in themselves to give BSU a shot a national championship is not up to Coach Pete, but under his leadership and cultivation of emotional intelligence there are few teams that would want to face his squad of formerly lovable underdogs.

In my next posts I will discuss looking for emotional intelligence in your people.

Predicting a team member’s success in business or sales is an inexact science at best. It can be difficult to determine who will have it what it takes and who will not. In a Harvard Business Review article by author Daniel Goleman, he says, “…identifying individuals with the “right stuff” to be leaders is more art than science. After all, the personal styles of superb leaders vary: some leaders are subdued and analytical; others shout their manifesto from the mountaintops. And just as important, different situations call for different types of leadership. Most mergers need a sensitive negotiator at the helm, whereas many turnarounds require a more forceful authority.”

In his article, Goleman tries to determine what traits a leader has to help identify them within your organization, but he emphasizes that, “Effective leaders are alike in one crucial way: they all have a high degree of emotional intelligence.”

In the coming days I will explore more of what Goleman and others have to say about identifying leaders. Although it is hard to put a checklist together, I believe it is possible to start improving how to find the right people who qualify to lead others.

My current business has been profitable from day one, but our revenue goals are much greater than what we are currently experiencing.  I believe that to achieve the lofty aspirations we currently desire, we must have the right people on our team. Unfortunately that means making some difficult decisions concerning personnel. Finding the right people and releasing the wrong people is something that has been difficult for me, because I have never wanted to hurt my people. However, as I have become a better manager that insists on accountability and performance, I have realized that keeping the wrong person on my team is not helping them or me. It is far better to release them and hope they will learn for their next venture or find an environment that better suits their skills. (Releasing a team member in Direct Sales may be as simple as moving on to another, more motivated person. I do not encourage removing them from your team, but instead, refocusing attention to someone else.)

Jim Collins, the author of Good to Great, says great companies, “don’t “motivate” people—their people are self-motivated. There’s no evidence of a connection between money and change mastery. And fear doesn’t drive change—but it does perpetuate mediocrity.” Concerning change within an organization, he says, “…dramatic results do not come from dramatic process—not if you want them to last, anyway. A serious revolution, one that feels like a revolution to those going through it, is highly unlikely to bring about a sustainable leap from being good to being great.”

Collins says that leaders of companies that go from good to great start not with “where” but with “who.” Collins compares a company to a bus and filling the seats with people. He says that companies should start by getting the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats. And they stick with that discipline—first the people, then the direction—no matter how dire the circumstances.

You should find the right people who can be motivated by excellence and are excited to make your business better. These people don’t work just for more money, but they work first for the satisfaction of accomplishment and the ability to be creative. Although this may seem obvious, few businesses make the right personnel decisions. Many so called leaders say they want self-motivated people who will work for the betterment of the business, but in reality, many business people have too fragile of egos to have a team member have a contrasting opinion. They are really looking for obedience to their word, not creativity and independence.

When you find the right people and release the wrong people, freedom to work within creative boundaries, and giving your people the freedom to make choices can be a very powerful tool. Freedom of choice is inherent in the spirit of man. Without waxing too political or religious, the agency to choose is our inherited and inalienable right. When your business reaches the point where your leaders are free to make creative choices within a mutually desired direction, greatness erupts. I believe in this and I am becoming more and more vigilant of this within my own company. I am confident it will take us from profitability to greatness.

The world’s greatest leaders have based their leadership on the principle of freedom or agency. Although poor decisions have consequences, such as loss of trust or dismissal from a team, the best leaders do not advocate forcing anybody to follow. They invite others to join them through living what they are preaching.

It is the responsibility of your team members to choose their own path to success.  You cannot force your path to success upon anyone. You will find that by concentrating on rewarding those who produce and releasing those who don’t, your business will achieve levels never possible with the wrong people.

Your role as a leader is not and should not constantly be a shoulder to cry on. Although it is necessary to understand your team and occasionally help them work through some of life’s problems, you cannot become your team’s psychoanalyst.  Your job and main responsibility it to help people help themselves. If you cannot develop needy people into strong, self-reliant members of your team, you will never grow a large and sustainable business.

As an entrepreneur and business owner, you may sometimes feel like a church priest or bishop rather than a capitalist. You will see in a short period of time as a business owner, that anybody who has a struggling personal life will be affected in the business. It is a rare person that can be going through a personal hell and still be unaffected in business. Understand that you will be thrust into the personal lives of your team members, but how you handle those situations is vital if you really expect to help them out.

Whether you are a manager in a traditional business, or you are a network marketer that is beginning to see his or her team member grow, understand that you should be proactively encouraging your people to participate in personal growth activities and studies. You cannot be expected to constantly help an individual who is looking for a quick handout or personal counseling system. You simply cannot grow a large and productive team by constantly taking a careful inventory of all personal outside influences to their lives.

By developing a sales team or networking marketing downline, you have chosen to be a part of people’s lives.  However, you are also in business, and it is not an unkind or an unfeeling business leader who requires a team member to buck up and become a little more self-reliant before you can spend too much time in their business development activities that are devoid of momentum.

Personal independence and self-reliance is a sustaining need for your business to grow. If you rob your team members of their ability to figure out their own problems, how will they ever become leaders themselves?  How can they ever have the strength to grow if you are not around? Worst of all, how will you ever have time to spend time with the people who are willing to be more self-reliant?

Don’t be afraid to let your team members make a mistake. Don’t be afraid to let them mess up a presentation.  We live in a fast food society that demands gratification. If we think that we can solve the problems for our team and still develop leaders, we are kidding ourselves. A new team member is going to feel some disappointment, fear, anxiety and failure. Not every call will result in a presentation. Not every presentation will result in a sale. Teach your team that a miserable experience now and then may just be a part of a profitable business. Help them understand that just because they are taking lumps now, that things will get better if they continue to self-improve and get better

There is enormous personal growth that your team members will obtain when they learn to overcome their obstacles. There is great power in becoming self-reliant. Becoming self-reliant will be fundamental to developing a strong team and ultimately a fulfilled life.

Self-esteem can be a powerful tool for both good and bad.  A member of your team with a poor self-esteem is not likely to ever be a big producer for you or ever fulfill his or her own personal goals.  In order to make it in any commission-based activity, money and self-confidence are forever blended together.  For many people, the inability to earn commissions or bonuses is directly related to their inability to believe in themselves. I don’t believe members of your team will be self-reliant until they learn to look at the mirror without wincing or constantly second-guessing their decisions. Doubt can truly cause a downward spiral and needs to be overcome.

Any true business leader understands that lasting profitability and growth comes from empowering people to become self-reliant. Having a bunch of robots that won’t function without exact instructions becomes exhausting.

To become self-reliant and to truly make money as an entrepreneur requires a person to understand something very basic: We are the masters of our own fate. We choose our path and we choose our destination. Our decisions determine our destiny. If you have a member of your team who never takes responsibility for his or her own success, you will likely need to move past that person and find somebody who will.

Each of us has an internal compass and the tools we need to succeed. Rarely is there a person born with perfect people skills or sales ability.  However, each of us was born with gifts and tools that will propel us to success. The truly successful people are the ones who accept the responsibility that they are the ones who must hone and sharpen their own skills.

When we accept the fact that we are our own agent, and that our success relies upon our own decisions, only then we will have the right stuff to overcome our inabilities. Before you can mentor a person successfully, that person must first understand that he or she must internalize and implement what is being taught, and that you cannot do it for them. Self-reliance can only start to grow when a person truly understands he or she is the captain of their ship, not you.

Success and self-reliance are fundamentally connected. To think otherwise invites short term wins at best. The first step to building a smarter team is to find people who will own their space and take responsibilities for their own personal development and not constantly shift blame to others.

In the Ultimate Sales Machine, Holmes gives us 6 steps to set you up for great follow-up after getting a client or enlisting a new member to your team. The 6 steps below are inspired by Holmes.

1 – Create rapport.  What professional goals did you note during the first meeting? How can you help prospects achieve those goals? What personal tidbit, common interest, or funny story can you refer to later to remind them of your bond?

2 – Qualify and establish need. Do you understand prospects’ needs and objectives? What are the dreams and aspirations of your prospect? What are their most pressing problems and how can you solve them?

3 – Build Value. What do they consider valuable? What benefits or addons would appeal to them and build the value around your product or service?

4 – Create desire. What are their hot buttons that can increase their desire? What is the pain point that you can use to remind them of why they bought and why they will want to keep buying from you? Remember that people naturally gravitate away from problems toward solutions. Is their current career matching up to their dreams and goals?

5 – Overcome objections. What are their objections and how can you put them to rest? Do they really want to join your team or buy your product but a small obstacle is keeping them from doing so?

6 – Close. What closed them or caused them to join your team? Do you remind them with regular contact or product updates?

The great book Linchpin talks about how the robber baron millionaires from the early 20^th century used uneducated people in their sweatshops to make themselves rich. Andrew Carnegie even decided that education caused violent strikes and hurt his business.  The robber barons decided about 100 years ago that if they wanted to be really really rich, they needed compliant uneducated factory workers.  Workers who will be productive and willing to work for less than the value that their productivity creates.  This system worked for a long time, but today, the factory system is breaking down, just ask General Motors.

Linchpin says that schools should teach two things:

1. Solve Interesting problems
2. Lead

Memorizing is what is taught in school today, not problem solving or leadership. The whole education system is based upon passing an exam, not creating leadership skills or decision-making abilities.

Leaders in direct sales organizations have been teaching their “factory” workers for years to say the same things, memorize little sayings and get together once a month for a shot of enthusiasm to keep them from quitting too early before they can sell them some more presentation tools or product.  Many entrepreneurs and members of direct sales organizations mock traditional education. Let me tell you, direct sales has a failing grade in real education too. It is time to start teaching our people to solve real problems and lead, not just memorize if we want to thrive in the new economy.

Times are changing my friends, we live in the new economy of an information age. Just teaching a budding sales person or field marketer to follow an easy presentation will not build that person into a leader. Entrepreneurs who are taught to memorize a certain pattern and copy it exactly are no better off in the long run, and neither is your business.  If you want to keep churning people, teach them to follow a set, non-thinking presentation. If you want to build a business that lasts, teach them to think.

If sales are up everywhere else for nutritional products, besides price, what else could be wrong with network marketing? Why would sales be down for network marketers if they were up everywhere else? Is there something wrong with the leadership in network marketing for sales to be lower across so many companies?

According to Nutrition Business Journal the Internet and other non-network-marketing direct sales companies had a banner year in 2009. As people lost their job and benefits, they turned to preventative health, which means increases in supplements. So, once again, why are sales for nutritional supplements down for network marketing?

There are many network marketers who claim that when the economy is slow, network marketing booms.  In 2008 MLM author, Rod Cook, wrote, “When recession hits the economy, network marketing booms.” Cook even claims that during past recessions network marketing showed explosive growth.  Not so in today’s recession.

I am a small business entrepreneur.  I have made money in ventures inside and outside of network marketing.  I have many friends involved in network marketing and I am a major stakeholder in a network marketing company. I do not write this article to try to hurt network marketing. I write it to show that network marketing is not currently capturing the hearts and minds of consumers. If this trend continues, network marketing will be set back many years.

In my next post I will explore some of what I have seen across multiple companies that I believe to be hurting network marketing. I believe that government agencies can try to stop bad practices all they want, but in the end, the market corrects itself and that is what I see happening right now.

It is time to get a little real, network marketers. Yes, I am talking to the big distributors and company executives here.  It is time to acknowledge what the public is saying with their checkbooks. The public is buying more health and nutrition products, but not from you. Few network-marketing representatives encourage retailing and instead tell their downlines to focus on the business opportunity and personal consumption. The problem is that there is only a small percentage of people that make sustainable money with their downlines. When people don’t make money, they look at how much they are paying for their $30 bottles of juice and switch back to Wal-Mart multivitamins and $4 orange juice.

The CEO of Dominos pizza recently said, “We are going to learn and we are going to get better.” Dominos even has the guts to post customers’ pictures of bad pizza and apologize to those customers. It is time for network marketing to step up and admit that, although we have a great form of distribution, we also have some issues that need to be addressed.

We can get better, but we better start looking at some facts. In order to pay commissions of 40-50% on a product, network-marketing companies must mark up their cost 6-10 times. As a result, the product value can suffer at the expense of the opportunity.  We can preach product value all day long, but if it is too expensive, the public will stop buying.  Network marketing works because of the opportunity. I am not encouraging that to stop. On the contrary, I am saying that the days of over priced supplements for the sake of the opportunity are fading quickly.

Before you start thinking I don’t know what I am talking about look at these numbers. Packaged Facts shows that supplements continue to grow steadily in sales with the market steadily progressing from 5.5% annual growth in 2007 to 6.5% in 2008 to 7.5% in 2009, bringing U.S. retail sales to $9.4 billion in 2009. However, as supplements continue to increase in sales, network marketing companies’ site traffic continues to decline during the economic hard times.

Company   –  Monthly Unique Visitors  - Yearly Change

Tahitian Noni (tni.com) 15,277               – 36.13%

Monavie (monavie.com) 63,847              - 59.39%

Xango (xango.com) 29,259                       – 40.46%

Amway (amway.com) 453,490                  +165.68%

Melaleuca (melaleuca.com) 390,923       – 30.80%

Usana (usana.com) 74,994                         – 12.93%

Getting people to buy product with the pitch that they will eventually make a ton of money is not statistically sustainable. However, selling a great product that people want regardless of opportunity will always improve the bottom line.

For you new business owners and also you job-laden entrepreneurs seeking to strike out on your own and throw so-called security to the wind in hopes of achieving the seductive dream of riches and independence, I speak to you. I embrace you, my fellow entrepreneurs, and applaud that fire in your belly that keeps you up at night seeking something more, but I also have a couple of suggestions and warnings.

Wallace Wattleswrote: “[S]ociety is so organized that man must have money in order to become the possessor of things…” Whether you are a fan of Wattles or not, he is right, the days of trading a pound of butter for a bag of wheat are a little past us now. Randy Gage wrote recently that money is a measuring stick. “If you do something at an extraordinary, exemplary and world class level in the marketplace, the market will make you rich. Because that is the way prosperity works.”

The problem is not money, but how people use it and view it. Money is a symbol and a powerful one at that. Money is not just paper to most people. According to Richard Trachtman, Ph.D., the problem for most people is that money represents such a wide area of problems including anxiety, depression, paranoia, impotence, impulse spending, gambling, social isolation, suicide, and murder. Most people have been taught that it is a taboo to talk about money. There are even books such as Etiquette written in 1922 and its new 17th edition, Emily Post’s Etiquette, that tell us it is rude in most cases to talk to people about personal finances. In 1908 Freud even connected money with feces and connected it to anal eroticism… WHAT in the world? No wonder people are so afraid of money.

No question that money surrounds us. Money can be influential, tempting and seductive. It is a main motivation in our world today. It is a primary reason for divorce and the love of money is for many one of the strongest moving forces in life.

The philosopher, Jacob Needlemansays that money must become a tool for any modern man or woman seriously wishing to find meaning in their lives. “We must use money in order to study ourselves as we are and as we can become.” Money is just a tool and it is about time we studied how we feel about ourselves.

Randy Gage is right, money is a measuring stick (a tool) and most people subconsciously know that. That is why it scares the heck out of them. People feel that money proves they are worth little and accomplish almost nothing. Why do you think people run from the topic of money and are secretive, embarrassed and conflicted about the subject of money?

If money scares you to death, join the club. It is so hard to talk about, the majority of newly weds have yet to even discuss it in any depth before the big day. However, to be successful in business and especially in network marketing, it is time to comfort your fear and understand what money can become to you, instead of how you think it defines you today.

What do you think?

In network marketing we build romantic stories about the successful leaders. We imagine that they hit home runs every at bat, throw 90 yard touch down passes and sink hook shots from 50 feet out on a consistent basis. It reminds of the Mel Gibson Classic Braveheart, where a young soldier doubted Wallace’s identity because he looked too ordinary:

William Wallace: Sons of Scotland! I am William Wallace.

Young Soldier: William Wallace is seven feet tall!

William Wallace: Yes, I’ve heard. Kills men by the hundreds. And if HE were here, he’d consume the English with fireballs from his eyes, and bolts of lightning from his arse.

Click here to view the embedded video.

It borders the absurd how we describe the accomplishments of ordinary people (Network marketing icons are really just normal dudes like the rest of us). This improper characterization is bad for new people and discourages rather than keeping them going. Who in the world really ever built their business without getting the crud beat of them?  New people get discouraged if they think they have to live up to impossible feats of marketing. In reality network marketing legends become what they are because they do the little things well. In an Eric Worre video post, he accurately tells us the secret to retention in network marketing is really just small victories. He is right.

Jenkins Lloyd Jones summed life up pretty well when he said, “[The fact is] most putts don’t drop. Most beef is tough. Most children grow up to be just people. Most successful marriages require a high degree of mutual toleration. Most jobs are more often dull than otherwise… Life is like an old?time rail journey delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed.”

The people who think they will build their businesses with 4,000 people at every meeting and sponsoring only superstars do not understand how real success is achieved in MLM. Only marketers who consistently and diligently achieve small successes will create extraordinary profits in network marketing or make a lasting difference in the lives of their downline.

If you want a group of successful people in your downline, teach them that you will not fill coliseums without filling out a ton of names lists with newbies, teaching them to get passionate about a great product and sharing it with others. Great accomplishments are rarely achieved by overcoming the impossible with a miraculous effort in a short period of time. Great success in network marketing comes from creating habits over time that allow you to build persistently and which allow you to consistently improve your performance.

Great marketing leaders such as Eric Worre, Dexter Yager and Doug Wead are often credited with making a giant impact on groups. These icons within network marketing became who they are because of their ability to do the small things every day. I would even go so far as to say that the icons in network marketing are who they are because of the thousands of people like you and me who are doing the small things each day in their downline. The ultimate downline does not consist of just an incredible leader, but a group of people dedicated to the same goal. May I be so bold as to say that our main goal should be to deliver small victories every day to our new people.

It is time to dispel the myth of the network marketing Hail Mary which is the false belief that we can skip the growth pains and create the foundation for our business instantly and painlessly.  Hail Mary’s almost never work in American football and it does not work in MLM either. True success comes from the small and simple things done continuously. When we do the basics of network marketing consistently it can lead to exhilarating moments when we fill an arena with people.

Great leaders in network marketing are just simple people. I have met so many of them and what makes them geniuses is the fact that they know they are not geniuses. Our industry will become respected and our incomes sustained when we realize that we too can create extraordinary results by consistently doing the ordinary.

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”

– Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Rule 2 – Four hours a week won’t create much profitability. Read my last post in this series. Monavie distributors that put in 4 hours a week made almost nothing. Monavie distributors who put in 9 hours a week were making pretty good money. You know that you don’t have a superstar if he or she is not willing to put in the time.

Rule 3 – Test your people who say they are committed. Many marketers cringe at this rule. “I want everyone to be comfortable,” they think. “I don’t want to blow anyone out.” Well fine, have an underachieving group that never gets big if you don’t have the guts to ask more from your people. You have to know what your people are really doing each day in their business. Are they really showing the business as much as they say? If you know that your pseudo star is not really showing the plan as much as he claims, say this, “I don’t think you are nearly as committed as you say you are. I want everybody in my group to succeed, but I spend my travel money and the bulk of my time with those who are really committed. I don’t know if that is you or not. Are we going to do this or not?”

Holmes says that most HR departments encourage a loving and nurturing environment for businesses, but superstars must be challenged. I believe that is the same for your downline for the most part. You should gently encourage the 97% who are not ready to really commit to your business. However, if somebody claims that they are a 3% club member, you better test them before you spend 3 months dedicated to building their business traveling across the world for them when they are lollygagging. If you challenge a possible superstar; no matter age, sex or experience, they will rise to the occasion and disagree with you if you tell them they are not a 3% member. The 97% person who claims to be a star will not challenge you. A budding superstar will tell you she is committed and challenge you back. When the person rises up, challenge them to new levels of commitment. When they do not challenge you, love them, help them and encourage them to stay at it because they can learn how to become a superstar over time. Either way, you need to know what you have.

Rule 4 – Ask lots of questions. Interview your people on what they are doing each day, week and month. Know what is happening in their groups and if the rising leader is doing what is necessary to help them become a superstar. Do not hurt your 97% people in any way, but know you must take measures to know what your people are really doing. Smart uplines have an idea of what their downline is doing each day. Real superstars will not be afraid to be accountable. They want help and they will work hard to gain your respect.

Rule 5 – Know your people. Have your people take personality tests. A great book is Personality Plus. My upline, when I built an Amway business, loved using this book to understand us and how to better help us succeed. Certain personality traits are necessary to succeed in network marketing, they can be natural or learned. Either way, it sure helps to know your people and how to help them succeed.

Rule 6 – Superstars are not easy to find. Whether you personally sponsor a possible superstar or you find them in your downline, you will have to work to find them. Give your superstars and possible superstars your time and your attention. It breaks my heart to not be able to spend equal time with everyone who wants it, but you cannot spend a lot of time with the people who are not rising to the occasion. When you are new, you must have the discipline to sponsor everyone but search aggressively for superstars. If you are not looking diligently, you will miss some of the great ones right in front of you.

Rule 7 – I reserve the right to change my rules as I get better. If you think you have all the answers in this business, you are fooling yourself. Learning is the name of the game and it never stops. However, finding superstars is vital to your success and if you follow the rules above, you WILL find some real stars.

It’s amazing how so many marketers allow themselves to think that by protecting their people from having to work hard that they can somehow find someone to step up. Protecting your people from responsibility and accountability will only give you average people. Average in network marketing is not good. For example the average Monavie Distributor’s check in 2008 was $30. In 2009 that average check dropped to $23. Ouch. Expect the highest possible commitment from your people and some of them will step up, others will wash out. Many of your marketers will quit even if you don’t challenge them, what do you have to lose?

If you study income disclosure statements you will see something pretty amazing. Take Monavie again as an example. Monavie claims that the average Distributor works 4 hours a week. Four hours a week in Monavie will gross you $1,214 a year. Not good. That check will barely cover your gas expense going to meetings. However, step up your weekly productivity to 9 hours a week and they claim you will gross $53,413 a year. Getting pretty good. The small difference of 5 extra hours a week makes an exponential earning difference in Monavie (if their numbers are accurate). What is even more amazing is that they claim with an additional 3 hours a week to a total of 12 and your average annual check will be $104,759.  Triple that number and they claim you will gross a cool $1,486,366. They do not say how many years you have to work 27 hours a week to earn this kind of cash, but my point remains: top earners are willing to do more, don’t hold your people back.

When we focus on creating networking studs we will have an elite corp of superstars that overcome obstacles by themselves without being dependent on a stretched upline. Chet Holmes claims that when we have a few right people who will step up to a challenge, they can be put in a bad situation with poor tools, no training, and bad resources and still, within a few months, they begin to outperform your best people or build your company in ways you never dreamed possible. Sponsoring or spotting the right people in your downline is not about luck. It’s about understanding the personality characteristics that fit elite network marketers and having the guts to challenge your potential superstars to see if they possess those characteristics.

If you challenge someone and they fail, continue to love them and encourage them. With encouragement and attendance at training events, hopefully they will continue to put in a couple hours a week. Maybe some day they will grow into a new level of production. However, you must continue your search NOW for superstars that will commit at least 20 hours a week to the business. Superstars are hard to find, but they do exist. Your job is to find them and train them. You can’t do that by fooling yourself into believing everyone is ready for that role now.

My next few posts are going to be very real. I have developed curriculum’s that can point people in the right direction, but they are not for lazy people or someone who finds excuses. My suggestions for extreme profitability in network marketing are only for the person that is mentally ready to take their psyche to peak levels needed to succeed in network marketing. If you are going to easily give up, you will become a part of the 97% who are never profitable in network marketing.

Network marketing involves sales. Anybody who tells you that you do not have to be good at sales to succeed at network marketing is telling half-truths. Success in network marketing can come as a result of finding a great product and meeting great people. However, if success is defined as profitable, then you must learn to sell.

A strong ego is vital to success in sales. Just because a person has a strong ego does not mean that person has to be viewed as pompous or arrogant. Everybody knows Donald Trump has a healthy ego, and some people cannot stand how he carries himself. His ego has served him well in business, but few people can act the way he does and not be punched in the face.  Some very successful people, such as George Lucas and Bill Gates, made their fortunes with strong egos that would allow them to get past rejection without appearing brash and overstated the way that Trump does. However, Lucas and Gates never would have made their fortunes if they were timid and did not sell their new ideas to whoever would listen to them. They are rich today as a result of not letting a “no” get them down.

Confidence and a strong ego are very necessary in network marketing because of frequent rejection. In his book The Ultimate Sales Machine, Holmes writes that a superstar salesperson must have a strong ego, show a great ability to influence others, is empathetic, has a psychological need to bond with others and a need to find something likable about every person. However, if the person is too empathetic he will be too understanding and never close a sale. The salesperson and the network marketer must be able to push with empathy. If you believe in your product or service, you should passionately push, but do so in a manner that does not offend in the process. This takes practice, study and time for most people.

When you are looking for future superstars, many times you miss them because they may seem annoying. They are always hanging around, asking questions and sometimes seem way to eager. Many potential superstars that have not honed their craft seem to need way too much attention and tend to never shut up. They can come on way too strong. Novice superstars in training have an audacity that can be off putting. However, audacity and bravado are essential ingredients needed to achieve greatness in anything.

My next post I will talk about how to test your downline to see if they have natural skills to be a superstar or if you have a lot of teaching to do.

Most network marketers go by instinct on who will be the next superstar in their group. Hate to tell all you superstar spotters, you are typically wrong. These wrong decisions cost you a ton of time and money. In network marketing your bad choice not only wastes your time, but you typically lose sight of the real stars while you are toiling away with someone who will never live up to superstar status. Chet Holmes, a master business trainer, believes that in traditional business an average bad hire can cost a company $60,000. In network marketing the cost is more difficult to put a dollar number to, but realistically we lose a lot of money and time trying to force the wrong person into a superstar role.

Many superstars make the mistake of thinking that everyone else wants success as much as they do. As a full-time network marketer, I was shocked that not everybody wanted to show 45 plans a month and drive their wheels off to get to meetings all across the country. Holmes describes business superstars as people who are eager to please, always looking for more to do, always wanting more responsibility, always wanting to know more than you think they need to know. I would say that your future superstars in network marketing could be described similarly. Because a budding superstar has characteristics that can be viewed by some as annoying, we lose many of our future leaders by crowning the wrong person as our future star.

In network marketing we think that all of our downline can eventually turn into superstars. My advice there, stop it. Stop thinking the impossible. I believe that we need to improve the experience of all our downline the best we can, but not everybody in your downline will ever be a superstar. Never. I agree with Holmes when he says that superstars are an incredibly rare breed. You will be much better off learning how to spot superstar characteristics and then hold your future stars to a whole different level than regular distributors. Regular distributors will quit long before they will ever do what a superstar will naturally want to do.

My following posts will teach you how to spot and train future stars and how to hold them accountable until they don’t need you everyday. When your stars burn bright without you every day is when you know you are on your way.

Most people that join your group will never do anything other than attend a few meetings and buy product.  Welcome them.  Love them. Encourage them.  However, there are also people that are hungry and want to succeed at high levels.  Those people should be pushed, held accountable and lovingly guided into success by expecting a lot from them.

These future leaders are not afraid to do whatever it takes ethically to succeed.  But many times their upline is trying to protect these future leaders from doing too much.  This is crazy, because top leaders get to where they are because of their attitude of doing more than what is expected.  Top leaders only create true stability when they truly replace themselves.  They will create generational income only when they ask the same from their leaders and future leaders that they ask of themselves.  If not, when they go away or die, so will their groups without their presence.  Longevity is created by creating leaders.  Leaders are made through accountability to themselves and their mentors.

One who is committed to a cause will not simply “go through the motions” in becoming a leader.  A committed distributor will not be satisfied with just making a visit to one of his downline so he can report to his mentor that his job is “completed” or “done.” A committed distributor would not be content to merely “give” a presentation but would want to teach with passion. The result, if your leaders have the guts to ask for it, will be making a real difference in the impressionable lives of the new distributors entrusted to his or her care.  It will create real leadership.

The training programs we make are done in a way that asks little from the 97% but much from those who say they want to be leaders.  Responsibility and accountability will show you who really deserves your time. Companies and top leaders need to create more leaders, and learn to identify and love the 97%, because you need them in your business too.  However, to ask little from your future leaders is a big mistake.  Leaders want to be accountable, leaders want to feel empowered, and to ask anything less is creating a house of cards that will crumble eventually.

Approximately 80 percent of the top network marketing companies sell health products or cosmetics. Give me $30,000 and two months and I can have you branded inventory of a health product or cosmetic item.  It is not hard to do. And guess what, it will probably be made in the same location as some of the world’s top brands.

It is time for network marketers to be more courageous. It is time to create more movements and to quit trying to sell a product with an economic opportunity. We don’t just need great products, because they are everywhere.  We need courageous people taking those great products and quit selling them based upon an economic opportunity.  That model is failing.  I repeat, THAT MODEL IS FAILING. Look at the following graph put out by the DSA. 2008 and 2007 had less sales than 2006.  And, if you account for inflation, we had less sales in 2008 than we did in 1999.  Some companies are growing, but network marketing is not in the United States.  All we are doing is stealing from each other as marketers jump from one fad company to the next. And marketers are jumping ship because corporations are failing on their product and opportunity promises. It is time to start creating product movements that stick based upon the merits of the movement, not just a commission.

I meet with a lot of marketers from many different companies now.  I am currently involved with no companies.  I am a network marketing lover affiliated with nobody on a day to day basis. One thing I can tell you company executives, your people would leave you if they had the guts to do so or if another opportunity that says the right things comes their way.

I am really shocked at how fearful so many field marketers are at “losing” something by staying with a company that treats them like a commodity. Let me tell company executives and top marketers how to create a movement and keep your people happy.

1. Quit treating your product as commodity that is sold because of an economic opportunity.
2. Make stuff worth talking about. If you are just one of many similar products, you better be really, really, really, really good at telling an authentic story.
3. Understand the new leverage in today’s network marketing.  Live your story, yes live your story. Give me happiness, not ingredient lists. Give me joy, not promises of riches I don’t really believe in. Give me a way to feel younger, with people that build me into greatness not scare me into submission. Give me life, don’t take it away from me.  Don’t tell me you care about how much money I make and then threaten me if I think the opportunity is better else where. Give me a reason to stay other than the lottery ticket chance of $10,000 a month. LIVE your story.

I love the movie Gladiator. My favorite part in the movie happened when Maxius found his small group of fellow gladiators in the Roman Colosseum about to be under attack. The attack came from a more numerous army of better armed warriors on chariots.  Maximus compelled his men by saying, “Whatever comes out of these gates, we’ve got a better chance of survival if we work together. Do you understand? If we stay together we survive.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

I can say I love network marketing.  I love what it can do for people and what it does to people. It is time to make our profession better.  It is time to have the courage to work better together in our companies. It is time for companies to empower their people, not threaten them to stay or suffer the consequences. It is time to grow our industry, our companies and our downlines. We better get better at creating a movement worth following.

There is nothing wrong with telling stories if they are true, or you can make them true under scrutiny. The best companies in the world are the ones that are constantly staying ahead of the crowd with their stories.  They are willing to admit when their story becomes tired or doesn’t resonate the way that it used to.

In 2007 I founded a juice company with my brothers. At the time there were a few different multi-juice blend companies, but today there are even more with “the best juice.” We decided to base our story on an unstory. The unstory was based upon my family’s desire to have a product made by nature and assembled by science. We did not want a story based on a mystical adventure in a rain forest and happening upon some indigenous people saving us from malaria with a magic potion. We believed people were too smart for that kind of story that was popular for a while.  Our juice was a great formula and our unstory had legs for quite a while. However, today I believe that most juice company stories have run their course, and like BMW did with its Joy Campaign, it is time to find a story that will resonate anew amidst all the new and continuing noise of “The best juice on the market.” Everybody preaching the same message that they are the best is frankly being lost on consumers who have heard it ad nauseam for the past 5 years.

Click here to view the embedded video.

If you watched the video clip above, you will see that BMW is a master at story telling. Masters because they are passionate about making their story true. BMW understands that people do not buy facts, they buy emotions that stories provide. Seth Godin says, “The facts are irrelevant. In the short run, it doesn’t matter one bit whether something is actually better or faster or more efficient. What matters is what the consumer believes.” “Stories (not ideas, not features, not benefits) are what spread from person to person.” For juice companies as a whole, I recommend a new direction instead of trying to prove that you have more of this or more of that, it doesn’t resonate any more. Does the number of phytonutrients you have really capture the imagination of large or important audiences. I would say no it does not, most people really don’t know how something with a phyto in it even affects them enough to care deeply.

“A great story is true. Not true because it’s factual, but true because it’s consistent and authentic. Consumers are too good at sniffing out inconsistencies for a marketer to get away with a story that’s just slapped on.” Let me give you an example of a new juice company that did something smart.  Rain Nutrition is a small company that started selling juice in the beginning.  Too small and too late to capitalize on the juice fad, they have recently taken a very important step to becoming significant.  They added a couple products and started a basic fitness program that also included a diet that featured their products.  They focused more on the emotional needs of their consumers. To me, their new story is, “Rain is Fitness”. I was told that their recent program has been a smash hit and at a recent convention they saw a huge spike in product sales as a result. Nice work separating yourself from the juice noise.

Time for more of us professional networkers to listen to Seth Godin and less to ourselves and the glory days. Great stories make a promise. They promise fun. The promise is bold and not just very good, it is exceptional or it’s not worth listening to. Time for all of us to ask if we are fulfilling on our promise and not just saying, “Oh yeah, my product can beat up your product!”

Seth Godin says, “Be remarkable! Be consistent! Be authentic!” Ask yourself, “Is my company remarkable, consistent and authentic?” Of course you are going to say yes, but is it really? Is your company based on a good product story that is priced appropriately for its target market, or is your product just an excuse to have compensation plan? Ask yourself how many marketers stay on the product for a year after they realize they aren’t making any money?  Ask yourself how many people say yes to the product when they say no to the opportunity? Finally, ask yourself how many people out of a hundred, who say yes to the opportunity, actually have the opportunity promise fulfilled?

If you are promising a great product experience first, you are more likely to be able to deliver on your story. You cannot make a person profitable if that person does not cooperate.  You cannot force a person to show plans and enroll people into your company. If your opportunity presentation alludes to the fact that a high percentage of people are making money with your company, you are not being authentic. However, if your product story resonates, it can become true immediately in the eyes of people and they will buy your product. Aren’t we really about moving product or services any way?

Seth says, “So, go tell a story. If it doesn’t resonate, tell a different one.” If people are not asking for your product when you finish your presentation, it is time to change your story. Very few people have what it takes to make it big in network marketing, but many people have what it takes to make a $150 a month profit if the product story resonates. How much better off would the masses be with an extra $150-$300 a month. How much better off would a company be that has many multiples of people telling a PRODUCT story that resonates with the masses? How much better off would health food companies be if they were told how to tell a PRODUCT story that didn’t focus on ORAC, roving radicals, unpaired electrons and catechins? (I too was once guilty of this boring health speak that nobody understands and few really care about.) How about a story that really resonates with what people will always listen to; how to lose weight and look younger? Then, actually have a product that actually delivers on that story.

As Seth says, “Either you’re going to tell stories that spread, or you will become irrelevant.” My advice, listen to Seth.

I would say that network marketing, just like other means of marketing is chuck full of liars.  It is too bad, because it is counter productive. Godin says that lying doesn’t pay off anymore in marketing.  The problem with lying is that when you “fabricate a story that just doesn’t hold up to scrutiny, you get caught. Fast.” Godin is right, it seems so simple.  If we lie, people will catch on and then we are doomed. Trust breaks down, attrition gets out of control and leaders get burned out trying to maintain their past incomes. Yet so many network marketing leaders, executives and those profiting from big commissions ignore the lies when it will ultimately burn them. Why?

Let’s list a couple of the big lies: everybody can succeed in network marketing, all you have to do is sign up 3 people and you don’t need to know how to sell to succeed in network marketing. Those lies may have worked 10 years ago, but consumers are getting smarter and the reality sinks into new marketers pretty fast that you can’t make a profit just by buying a spot in a downline.

I was speaking to a marketer last month and I asked him how much money he wanted to make.  He told me $10,000 a month (I think that is what he was taught to say).  ”Wow,” I thought, “I wonder how much money he makes in his job and how big was his best commission check in a year of building his business?” This great guy has never made close to $10,000 a month at his job and his biggest commission check was less than $250.  Some people may say, “Good for him, he has a big goal to get him through the discouragement.”  I say, bologna.  This guy needed help understanding to get to $10,000 a month, he needed to get to $500 a month first. If he has never made $500 a month in 12 months, how discouraged is he going to be when he realizes he may never make $10k? He’ll quit before he ever makes it at this pace.

I am going to explore the silly lies that we tell ourselves in network marketing for a few days and a better way to go about our stories.  Seth Godin says, “So, go tell a story. If it doesn’t resonate, tell a different one. When you find a story that works, live that story, make it true, authentic, and subject to scrutiny.  All marketers are storytellers.  Only losers are liars.”

Hallelujah Seth. People are joining us in network marketing, but statistically speaking MLM has not grown much faster than inflation in the past 5 years. Ouch. For such a great distribution methodology, perhaps its time we start telling a story that actually resonates.

Most people say they are dedicated to real training, but they are not willing to put in the time to do it right up front.  Consequently, they never have enough time to do what they want to do.  Their business owns them, they do not own a business.  If you don’t put the time in now, you will have even less time as your business begins to consume you.

A real training system must involve more live and automated weekly training followed up by mentors holding new marketers accountable to what they are learning.  If you want your people to grow in skills and confidence, they must have interaction with mentors or upline on a regular basis, preferably 5-6 times a week.  Without the interaction, your people will find other things to take up their time and energy.  To turn an employee into an entrepreneur does not happen overnight, but it does and can happen.

Training without accountability will fail most of the time.  To ignore that most marketers are not making a profit is just sticking your head in the sand.  We need each other to succeed in almost everything.  When we teach a new marketer a skill, we must reteach that concept again and again until it sticks.  In addition to repetition, the new marketer must also have contact from somebody in the upline 5-6 times a week to ensure that the new concepts are being implemented.

As soon as a new marketer leaves a training, there is immediate falloff of skills or ideas taught.  Skills improve in the short term, but will drop shortly thereafter. By teaching core principles on a consistent basis and repeated, skills improve now and become habits through repetition and accountability.  When your marketers are saying the same thing on level 35 as they are on level 4, your message to future prospects is the same no matter where you go on the globe. You become less burdened because you were disciplined to insist on proper training through all levels of your organization.

Vital network marketing training concepts:

• Teach new marketers in small chunks each day through:
  • A curriculum based Written Guide
  • Course of 500 word short emails sent 5 days a week to new marketers with a daily action to assigned.
  • Upline and Mentor accountability 5-6 days a week
• Video Curriculum – 3 minute teaching videos sent according to a curriculum once a week.
• Conference Call Curriculum – based upon the written guide.
• Accountability
  • Automated tools for top mentors/leader distributors.
  • 60-90 second calls 5 days a week to a building upline
• Mentor RSS feeds to show proper actions and “living the life” examples.

New marketers can succeed.  We just need to understand marketers better to really help them.  When your people have sharpened their skills, your downline and company will build better, faster and will be surprised you how much extra time you have.  Chet Holmes says, “Train or feel the pain.”  I agree, whether you are new or already have a big group, you better start real training now before your people leave you for someone who does.

1. They don’t know what to do.
2. They don’t know how to do it.
3. They don’t know why they should do it.
4. They feel there are obstacles beyond their control.

When people join network marketing to make money, they need significant training to make large checks.  To think otherwise is ignoring the obvious.  There are many people who have short term success who are fooled into thinking they have all the answers before their group begins to fall a part.

Profitability in network marketing is achieved by doing simple things 5-6 days a week.  When I say simple, I mean it.  However, simplicity is usually what trips most people up.  Leaders should track these simple activities of their proteges.  With thousands of people in a downline this may seem daunting.  All the more reason to train your people quickly so they are taking much of the load off of you.  If you fail to put the time into proper training of basic business building, you will be overwhelmed and stretched too thin to ever have a big group that sustains.

Here are 4 basic things that a new marketer should be doing 5 or 6 days every week.  They are very simple but “for precept must be upon precept, line upon line, here a little, and there a little” is how great things come to pass:

1. A minimum of 15 minutes everyday of reading from books, goal planning and daily activities planning.  One hour would be better, but most people struggle with 15 minutes in the beginning.
2. Upline accountability call.  Every day a call should be made to hold themselves accountable for these 4 daily items.  The call should not be more than 90 seconds most days.
3. Business development.  This may include showing the plan, making a prospect call, a follow up call or even just having lunch with a friend to reintroduce yourself. People need to learn to talk to each other again, businesses will grow when we make an effort to be with people, not just talk business.
4. Downline development. Once a day someone in your downline should be called, encouraged, trained and promoted.  If your group is new, don’t overwhelm your new people by calling the same person over and over again.  Use some common sense.

When proteges start to be active each day as an entrepreneur, they will start to program themselves to do what is needed to be profitable.  Be patient with new people as they have years of employee programming to overcome.

Stay with me as I discuss automation tools to simplify this process in upcoming posts.

Network marketing fails when untrained marketers use up their credibility collateral with friends and family and think they have nobody left to talk to. New marketers are often not skilled enough to sell enough product or to enroll sufficient distributors into their business to make money. As network marketing leaders we must get better at mentoring our people to gain the skills needed to become profitable.

Last year I attended a Zrii function where Anthony Robbins addressed the audience.  He told the crowd that if you can influence yourself first, then you have power. He said that if can you get yourself to do what is necessary, you will have power to succeed.  The problem that most new marketers have is that for most of their lives they have had employee patterns stamped into their psyche. A person that has been told when to be at work and when to go home will not likely start off well without someone there to guide him or her every step of the way.

In my last post, I wrote that to be happy we must develop our psychological muscles that determine good or bad patterns. We determine our happiness and we can change our mood and demeanor.  We get into patterns in our life. These patterns can make you succeed, fail or even create despair.  I believe a problem that we have in network marketing is that those who have been profitable in network marketing do not spend enough time with the new person to help them establish proper patterns because of being stretched too thin.  However, we must make time or systems that create time for the new people.  You simply cannot change years of programming with one motivational weekend.  It can take many repeated trainings to get our new people to where they need to be mentally in order to make network marketing a career.

Robbins also told the crowd that we must act during the time of decisiveness. I agree with him and the time when most people make the decision to build is right when they sign up with a company.  However, most new marketers wait too long after enrolling to act due to fear of the unknown.  We must get better at establishing success patterns with our new people from day one with regular training.  Huge group meetings are great, but daily patterns are not influenced by occasional motivation.

We need to teach our people to make more moments of decisiveness.  Big marketers are paid big commissions because the make many right decisions.  If you are going to lead, you must make decisions, even if some of them are wrong.  Most new marketers are too afraid to make decisions day in and day out.  We can help them learn to be a leader, and we must commit to regular training to grow now and long term.

Join me on my next post when I talk about what we should have our people doing each day to establish proper patterns and after that I will discuss how to implement regular training and still have a life.

To add to Churchill’s famous quote, when you are going through hell, just walk faster, you’ll come out.  Understand though that while you are going through your difficulties, you will find out who your real friends are and who your facebook friends are.  While we felt abandoned by many of the people we thought we had helped, we also realized how much our family loved and supported us.  In times of difficulty, you can worry about those who left you, or embrace those who stick with you.  We were lucky to have a great family.

Right around the time we lost our jobs, my plane ticket was cancelled for our distributor promotion trip to Hawaii.  With no job or prospects of money, I sat at home feeling hurt and betrayed while many of the distributors and employees we brought into the company were on a fancy company trip.  I had a decision to make.  Was I going to start studying for the bar to be an attorney or was I going to figure out a way to stay in network marketing? Either way, bankruptcy was staring me in the face.  To stay in network marketing was to stay in an industry that had embarrassed me and had brought a ton of negative emotions.  It also meant staying within an industry that is full of some of the most incredible people on the planet.

I decided to stay involved in network marketing in a way that would not distract from our company. My future aside, I wanted our distributors to remain unaffected.  I stayed in networking because I believe you must have the GUTS to be in an environment that makes you feel alive.  When you feel alive you don’t have to fill your life with food, alcohol or sports hero worship to make you happy.  Network marketing, with all its bugs and greed-based decisions, is also full of integrity, stories of greatness and most importantly it makes me feel alive.  Where else can I work with so many people and help them achieve something more than they thought possible financially, emotionally and spiritually?  There are not many ways outside of network marketing.

As the dust has settled, I have been honored by many of my friends and distributors that have come looking for my help again.  I really love being involved in their lives.  My new mentor business is booming and it feels great to be helping people.

To be happy we must develop our psychological muscles that determine good or bad patterns. We determine our happiness and we can change our mood and demeanor.  We get into patterns in our life. These patterns can make you succeed, fail or even create despair. To regain my confidence I had to recognize some patterns and change them in my life quickly to those that would enable me to help people again.

I have known how to build downlines for a long time, however, my experience has helped me understand how to overcome adversity even better. I am not the only one who had their heart broken by network marketing.  It didn’t do me a bit of good to feel beaten.  I determine what I want and I determine my happiness.  I strongly believe that when you know what people need and show them how to get it, you will make a difference in your own life and the lives of many others.

So, when do you give up…never. If you are going through hell, duck your head and run.  You’ll come out a bit toasty, but you’ll be better for it.

Join me on my next post as I explain how to improve your psychological muscles to get yourself to take action.

Not all new networkers will take accountability seriously.  Some networkers will think they have all the answers right when they start, but we know what happens that that person after a couple months, they end up coming back for help or quitting. Some networkers simply do not have the stomach to do what it takes on a consistent basis.  However, the most hungry future leaders will do what it takes to succeed and they will attack any obstacle in front of them to achieve success.  These networker proteges will only hold themselves accountable to a person that is where they want to be and who is truly doing what he or she is preaching.

I discussed the pain points that top leaders from different companies have told me are obstacles to their success.  For review those pain points are:

• Lack of accountability from downline.
• Stretched too thin to spend quality ?time with real leaders.
• How to effectively identify ?future leaders.
• System adulteration in depth.

To achieve great results in your downline, you must be willing to take time now to replace yourself.  To relieve your pain as a leader, you are going to have to dedicate yourself to consistent training every day.  The tribal method of training does not work.  Tribal method is rampant within network marketing and consists of information being passed down the levels or generations without a formal daily, weekly and monthly curriculum.  It is done similarly to ancient Beowulf and the story keeps changing with each generation in depth.  I have felt the pain points above and having spent the last year visiting with network marketers across the globe, I can tell you they do too.

As a result of hearing the same pains over and over, we decided to build a system that helps, we call it Mentor DNA.  At its heart, Mentor DNA is focused on giving the right people, the right time with leaders who care about their success.  The most impressive result will be  that by measuring the daily activities of marketers, the leader mentor has direct insights and empirical data showing them if their proteges are really doing what it takes to succeed.  It can all be measured on a dashboard that shows their daily activities.  Knowing what a marketer’s commissions are can be helpful, but it is incomplete data and does not tell you what you need to know to help them succeed. Mentors and leaders need to know details of what a marketer is doing to understand why commissions are going up or down.  When you add accountability to an automated and integrated curriculum, what you get is a pure system that does not adulterate, measurable results and the benefits of live mentors working with proteges proving they deserve the time.

I love helping truly hungry people succeed.  I even loved driving hours to help a marketer grow the business.  I simply wanted to help others like me who believe in other people and want them to succeed.  Sadly we often miss the true future leaders by helping the wrong person.  That can be fixed and Mentor DNA can help.

Most top network marketers and company executives rarely work “on” their business, instead they are always working “in” their business.  They are so busy putting out fires, that they can’t put up a firewall.  The problem is that to truly keep growing, you must be able to be more strategic and differentiate yourself from others consistently.  You need to carve out the time to work “on” yourself, and “on” your business.

According to Audiotech.com, very few traditional companies do what’s needed to be successful, as 600,000 of them go out of business every year. Over 75% of the products launched every year fail. 38 corporations fell off the Fortune 500 in 2009 alone and only 71 of them from 1995 are still on it.

Just like there are traditional companies that do succeed, there are also networkers that are thriving also.  So why do some networkers thrive while the majority fail to make money?  How do they differentiate themselves?  I believe that Audiotech’s analysis of Fortune 500 companies applies to network marketing leaders.  ”They are run by entrepreneurs and executives that consistently consume the right information and act on it.”

• The average CEO reads about 60 books a year, 60x what the average person reads
• Bill Gates read 30 books on one recent vacation
• Warren Buffett credits his success to spending the majority of his time reading business books, periodicals, and company annual reports

It is clear, titans of business read much and often.  Top networkers must also do the same.  The problem is that most new network marketers are out of the habit and frankly do not have the drive that the world’s top performers do to hold themselves accountable to learning and reading. Leaders in networking spend many hours teaching people to do the following things over and over:

• Teaching of a distributor’s why
• Name List building
• How to sponsoring someone new
• Basic performance metrics
• Basic understanding of product or service
• Basic understanding of compensation plan

The problem that newbies and advanced leaders face is significant loss of information after it is presented.  Worse, just because it is taught, there is no guarantee that a newbie will act on what is taught.  How often does a newbie need to be reminded to make a names list before it is done?  Usually more than twice and many new marketers never make a list.

Network marketing training usually comes in a huge blitz.  Many times it is done on a big weekend with thousands of other networkers.  Everybody gets all jazzed up, their is a great feeling of value after huge doses of information is dumped on already loaded down minds.  Within days, information is forgotten and very little sticks.  This is where mentors come in.

Information dump training is better than nothing.  However, if you want lasting results you must have continuous follow-up and accountability.  Truly eager proteges will listen to a mentor and do what is recommended.  The proteges who want to succeed will allow a mentor to congratulate them as well as correct poor performance, even if the correction comes much more frequently than the accolades.

Top leaders can only effectively mentor 10-12 proteges at a time if it is done manually.  Having built large groups I know that I am guilty of being spread way too thin and spending less and less time with the ones I thought were the future leaders.  As a result, my company has created automation tools that will help a mentor automate the learning in smaller chunks.  We have created an accountability system that tracks daily activities.  As a builder I was always curious before my 4 hour drive if my “future leader” was really doing the small things each day that lead to large results.  I typically did not know until I drove all day if I was going to find an empty prospect meeting.  In addition to automating the bullet points above that help a protege start correctly, we also have created a way to track daily activities such as:

• Business building – contacting, inviting, etc
• Downline training
• Time spent planning and reading
• Upline or mentor contact

To be a leader and profitable in network marketing, new marketers must learn more.  Leaders must automate many of their activities so that they can spend quality time with the networkers actually doing the daily activities needed to grow.  When constant training and accountability is loaded into an automated system that frees a mentor to spend belly-to-belly time with those actually doing the right things great things will happen.

When frequent and even daily training is actually implemented correctly, the benefits to an automated daily training system will result in:

• More time for leaders
• More time to spend with achievers (future leaders)
• More time to live life
• More time to keep sponsoring
• More time to have more time

You want to earn more money?  Well, help your people learn more.  You will need to learn to hold them accountable.  You will need to have bullish desire to stick with accountability.  The benefits are too big to ignore.  You may be able to take a vacation without worrying your business is going to burn to the ground.

Accountability is the secret to success.  Not-so-sexy secret you may think, but I am here to tell you it is true.  People respect what you inspect.  People join network marketing wanting to succeed but have never been properly educated on what it takes to succeed.  Consequently, most people end up failing, some stats even go so far as to say that 97% of those who are a part of network marketing fail to ever make a profit.  This does not have to be the case.  There is a way to improve performance but it takes discipline and bullish desire to help your people be better educated.

I spent 6 years as a full time Amway distributor, significant time as a company founding executive and CEO, and 2 years helping network marketing companies succeed in everything from training to brand consulting.  Most recently I have been visiting companies learning about what is out there, going to their meetings, listening to their sales pitch, reading their material, researching their building tools and  generally speaking, just listening. No matter what company I visit, no matter the product or service, the majority of people enroll in a company with the hope of making money.  I wish that more people would join due to the sheer excellence of the product, but unfortunately that is not typically the case which means we must truly be dedicated to educating our people on what they must do to achieve profitability or even have a better product experience.

I have been able to speak to some of network marketing’s top distributors.  I asked many of them what were their top pain points to building a successful business.  Outside of product problems and silly corporate gaffes, the top answers are:

1. Lack of accountability from downline.
2. Stretched too thin to spend quality time with real leaders.
3. How to effectively identify future leaders.
4. System adulteration in depth.

I can’t tell you how many times I drove four hours to have nobody show up to an opportunity meeting.  I wasn’t too surprised to hear top distributors from other companies experience that all the time.  So how can accountability help solve the problems above?  How can proper accountability solve the age old problem of spending a month with a person who says the right things and does none of them?  And, how in the world do you get people on level 42 to teach the same thing that you want taught on level 2?

So many questions, but so little time.  I will address each of the pain points above, but because I know people don’t like to read a lot and I am now 560 words into this article, I’ll start my answers tomorrow and teach you how implement accountability into your downline. Stay tuned, because it works.

I was lucky, I had a great upline.  I eventually built a big group and I have enjoyed many great years as a network marketer.  How many casualties are out there as a result of lack of mentors in network marketing.  What would have happened to me if I did not have a great upline?  I can only wonder, but I do know how important having a mentor is to each of us.

The most common reasons people fail in network marketing have nothing to do with the product or compensation plan.  F.F. Fournies says that most people fail to succeed in any given opportunity because:

1. They don’t know what to do.
2. They don’t know how to do it.
3. They don’t know why they should do it.
4. They feel there are obstacles beyond their control.

Individuals that have mentors are 500% more likely to succeed than going about it by themselves.  The good news for mentors is that mentors are 600% more likely to succeed if they choose to mentor others.  These are amazing numbers and speak to the fact that we truly need each other to succeed.

Network Marketing can be a fruitful career, but like anything of value, it is not something that happens automatically.  Success in any career takes time and preparation.  In my next post, I will begin to talk about what the interaction between mentors and proteges should look like.

Dedicated to your success,

Jeffery Boyle
Network Marketing Guru

People are truly seeking for good experiences in life.  I would even be so bold as to say that they are looking for great experiences.  People want to feel alive and money is often too difficult of a concept for most people to truly believe they can achieve “lots of it”.  The belief of big money is hard because most of your prospects have never had more than a 9-5 job.  However, if you can truly help people achieve a good experience at your meetings and with your product, you will attract the masses.  When you attract the masses and not just MLM junkies, you will have a business that is built to last generations, not just a couple years.

If you want to a business that is built to last, we as corporate managers and top distributors must strive to improve the lives of our employees, our distributors and our families.  Network marketers are great because they can learn to think bigger than just 9-5 if they stick with it.  When we begin to think big, we want accomplish more in our lives.  When network marketing is done properly, we can have meaningful lives by truly concentrating on a joyous experience for the people around us.

Robert Brunner and Stewart Emery said, “Humans strive to improve their situation with the ultimate goal of ongoing happiness and joy in their lives.  Everything we do, difficult or easy, fun or painful, has something to do with having a better experience of being alive.  We want this for us, our loved ones, and on some level for society at large.  And along the road traveled, we want to make the actual traveling the best it can be.”

So, how do we create better experiences for our groups and ourselves?  First, start with a goal of creating a superior experience in our products.  Unfortunately, many companies have a product that would never sell in a traditional retail location without an “opportunity” behind it.  If you are selling a product for a company that has very small percentages of retail sells, you should probably be concerned.  If your product has no emotional impact beyond money, your product will not sell itself.  If you must rationalize, compare and measure your product to others, you may not have a product with a true emotional impact for the masses.  If people need to look up scientific journals to understand your offering, you are not likely to create true emotional impact.

To attract the masses, you must understand one thing very quickly; your prospects and downline are human beings.  They are far more emotionally driven than you give them credit for.  People can feel when you are full of it and when your product is money driven and not experience driven.  Make no mistake, there are currently some products that are not very good that are making their companies millions of dollars, but those products will not sustain the decades a good product experience or company experience would need to create generational money.   A money driven product will eventually run its course and be replaced by the next money driven product and your downline will go with it.

For your downline to pass the test of time, you must embrace the emotional side of people.  You must understand most people continue to attend meetings because they feel accepted and are having a good experience. They quit buying the product when they stop feeling accepted or that the promise of money is gone.  When we address the question of what people want from life, you will gear your meetings and events toward insuring that people have compelling information that makes their life better regardless if they make money or not.  When we address our product offering, we must accept the fact that most people do not make money in network marketing and they will take their business elsewhere if it is based more on making money than enriching their lives.  Your prospects want products and events that are insightful, gainful even if they aren’t making money and most importantly, FUN.

When network marketing companies and top distributors truly understand what their people desire, they will last the test of time.  Understanding the humans in your group is not easy and it is not something the accounting side of your mind will ever understand.  Just remember first, you are human too.  What makes you happy?  When you are alone, focus on your own happiness and how to help others get more happiness in their lives.  When you are with your group, focus on their happiness.  Really focus on their happiness and not just making money.  When you truly find what makes your group happy, you will matter in network marketing, and frankly of more importance, life.

Last night, on the way to Sun Valley with my pregnant wife and three kids, we totaled our car.  As we rounded a corner on a country highway, a large male mule deer walked across the road.  Because we were already turning while driving at least 55 miles per hour, I surprisingly told my wife in a calm voice, “Hold on, there is nothing I can do!”

As soon as we impacted the large deer, the hood of my car crumpled badly and parts of the car began falling on the highway and under my car tires.  My wife was scared but composed and my kids remained surprisingly calm until we came to a stop to inspect the damage.  As we came to a stop on the side of the country road, I stepped out into the crisp mountain air to inspect the damage.  My engine was smoking aggressively and there was evidence of the poor creature on the gnarled metal and plastic that used to be my van.

As it became evident that we were in the middle of no-where with a totaled van full of now screaming kids, I had a huge calm and happiness fill my mind and heart.  My pregnant wife and kids were safe.  I had made the proper decision to not foolishly swerve and possibly over turn my car in order to save my van.  I was blessed to have the calm to stay the course and we walked away safe.  Now I just have to figure out how to get a totaled van home that is in the middle of nowhere.

Most network marketers and management teams have no idea how to be authentic. I continue to be amazed at how we in network are marketing make claims and statements that assume people will simply buy into our ridiculous one-liners. People are smart. To believe anything other than the idea that people are smarter and more perceptive than the way we have been treating them is a recipe for disaster going forward. If you want dumb distributors, treat people like they are dumb.

Let me give you a couple phrases that are very tired and overused in our industry:
• Ground floor opportunity
• Once in a lifetime
• Family values and integrity

In my years as a network marketer I have had about four chances at “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.” I have found that everyone, including some of the biggest thugs on the planet claim to operate with family values and integrity. The most fun claim of all is presented to us once a week, the ground floor opportunity. Unfortunately ground floor usually just means a dirt floor. New companies can be a great opportunity but there is a ton of work for the management team and field leaders to make it legitimate.

I love network marketing, I intend on being a part of it in one form or another for the rest of my life, but people, let’s work on some real authenticity. Authenticity in network marketing requires that corporate and distributor behavior is consistent with our claims. It requires that we really care about people and have a true commitment to improving our own bottom line by really, I mean really, bringing people with you. Network marketing is not just business as usual. No matter what your sell, your real product or service is built on the backs of your downline’s faith in you. Do not underestimate how much you can help or devastate those who buy into your message.

Network marketing is rarely philanthropic, but few businesses really are. However, there is not a problem with wanting to make money and network marketing allows you to truly help people when you do it correctly. If we fail to become authentically interested in bringing people with us, our prospects and downline will see right through our one-liners and disingenuous statements. People see through empty words and partial truths more than ever before. Our downline has many options today and can sense if we are not being authentic.

Here’s a way to start being authentic. Ground floor is fine if you are willing to work through the difficulties in the beginning. Tell people the advantages and disadvantages of not having a system built yet. Demand management teams be accountable. Demand true product value at real prices. If your company says one thing and does another, hold their feet the fire. Help people recognize that the opportunity is in how we make it, not in what others give us. Show people you have integrity and values by committing to it over the time, don’t just say it.

Network marketing is the real deal and is coming of age. Let’s quit screwing it up.

A few years ago I was consulting with a company founder and told him that developing his people with true leadership concepts was the most important “tool” investment he could ever make.  He disagreed and believed that the perfect brochure and video set would sponsor the thousands he wanted in his business.  I believe that many management teams fall into the trap that tools make the group grow.  I believe tools are important, but developing leaders is the future strength of any company whether they are already at a billion dollars of sales or just starting.

The most effective distributors I have seen in any company need few if any tools.  The only tools they use are the ones that they use to appear duplicatable.  Frankly speaking, these leader distributors could sponsor with or without tools and only use the basic tools so that newbies will also.  Leaders focus on the person or group in front of them.  They watch their prospects facial expressions and they hear the doubts expressed during their conversations.  True leaders have conversations with prospects, they don’t spew out a memorized speech.

To be a leader, distributors must own the message and must improve themselves over time until they have the characteristics they need.  A leader is made over time with self-improvement, not by having the perfect tool.  A true leader studies sales techniques and finds a mentor no matter how high they are in their organization.  A true leader understands people’s fears and adapts the presentation depending on the audience in front of her.

Don’t expand your number of tools and company messages aimlessly.  Your company must focus on quality, not quantity.  Your basic prospecting tools should be viewed as a crutch for the new person but your emphasis should be first on helping develop leaders amongst your management team and distributors so that tools become secondary to the person.

Let’s cut to the chase and boldly claim that there is not such thing as the perfect tool.  The best tool however, is a leader that understands people and owns the company message psychologically, physically and emotionally.  The leader understands the company limitations and addresses them head on in the appropriate times and places.  The leader was not always a leader and can empathize with the new person that wants to improve and become somebody special.  Your company will fail without the proper field and corporate leadership.  Your goal should be to create better leaders first and good prospecting tools second.