Don’t get into a business that requires that you convince people they do something they aren’t already doing. The goal is to give people what they are already looking for and are already convinced they need or want. It’s easier to redirect money the money someone already has in their hands than to make them pull it out of their pockets.
Let me use an example. Let’s talk about Walmart for a second. Does Walmart care if its customers are into self-development? Does it care if they are business-minded? Does it care if they are educated? Does it care if they are looking for another source of income?
Walmart is not in the filtering business. If you are hungry, thirsty, need clothes, or electronics, you are welcome. What is my point you ask? Great question. If you are looking to join a business, make sure your product or service is not limited geographically or demographically. For the sake of the example, let’s say you are planning to join a business that offers health and nutrition products specifically. If that is the only product line their offer, who are the only people that would ‘possibly’ be interested in any of their products? ONLY people that are into being healthy.
Make sure that the business you are thinking about joining allows you to make large commissions upfront without requiring people to join you to make money. If you have ever been in a home business/network marketing business, you know that the key is to create teams in order to create a respectable residual income. The first issue you will run into is investing money on a monthly basis to keep your business running and active while you figure out how to breakeven and make a profit by getting people to join you. The issue here is that it takes time to create results that would give you the credibility you need for people to join you. It’s like needing gasoline to make fire but you don’t have the gasoline. Not many people want to join someone who is new in a business or isn’t already making money.
Furthermore, if you are planning on selling products retail, you better be good as selling and finding targeted customers that would even be interested in what you are offering. In the case of a health and nutrition business, how much of the population do you believe is into health and fitness ENOUGH to stop eating the wrong things and start buying the right foods consistently? Are you a health junkie? Essentially in this case, your business is determined on people’s discipline and desire to continue buying your product. It’s too easy for someone to stop being consistent and buy an alternate product instead which is usually cheaper or not buy any product at all. Relying on people to change their buying habits is not easy. In fact, it’s not smart. Why does the company pay you to market products for them? Because it’s not easy for them to market it.
Competition & Brand Loyalty – Proprietary Doesn’t Mean Exclusive
In many cases, the industries that network marketing companies are in are highly competitive. In fact, most MLM companies compete against each other and rely on their slight differences to be enough to create loyal customers. The issue is that they have too many similarities. How does this affect you? Exclusive products aren’t that exclusive. It’s only exclusive if nobody else offers an alternative. I remember being part of my first network marketing business many years ago. I realized early on that the first thing people look for regardless of the product or service is a discount. Here’s a tip, most people will always look for discounts and convenience over quality. If you are looking to sell people on the quality of your product, make sure you can talk about the others too. They would rather buy a soap they’ve been buying their whole lives that they feel gets the job done than to inconvenience themselves and buy an alternative from somewhere else because it’s “exclusive”. Think like most of your customers are thinking, soap is soap. It is better to be affiliated with the big boys than to fight them.
What’s The Solution?
Figure out how you can capitalize on the business that is going to take place anyway. It’s all about money redirection. Let it run through your hands first before it hits the supplier’s checking account. After many years affiliated with companies that have “exclusive” products and not being able to figure out why it seemed like a depressing chore to have people join me and like the benefits that were supposed to make building a team easy were useless, I see the underlying issues because I am on the outside looking in at the big picture now.
