Wednesday, March 31, 2010

BEN'S EXAMPLE OF PERSEVERANCE HAS BEEN AN INSPIRATION TO ME

Some years ago, a friend of mine announced that he was going to take part in a very popular, nationally recognised long-distance walking race in Darwin, Australia. He said that he intended to break the record for this race, and planned to raise a sizeable amount for charity. He said that he had nearly twelve months to train, and had already started a daily walk as part of his preparation.

Ben was in his late thirties, had never seriously walked or run in his life, was unfit, and was definitely NOT athletic by nature. Frankly, none of us took his announcement very seriously. We expected his enthusiasm to wane after a few days. And even if he kept on training for the whole year, we couldn't see him getting anywhere near the speed of the expert runners who we knew would be coming to Darwin for this big annual event. As for breaking the record, that was obviously a pipe dream.

However, as the days and weeks went by, it became obvious that Ben was very serious. He certainly hadn't given up, and was still doing his regular daily training. Later, when one of his friends checked his walk times, it became clear that Ben was walking very well and, if he could keep his speed up for the complete race, he had a good chance of being well placed. We began to take a greater interest....

When the day of the race dawned, Ben was fit, well, and ready to do the walk. And when the first walker came into view at the finishing line, we were delighted to see that it was Ben! Furthermore, when they checked his time, they found that Ben had indeed broken the race record, and by a significant margin.

I know this story sounds too good to be true, but these events did actually happen, and I have Ben's permission to recount them to you.

Ben's experience taught me an enormous lesson about life which I have never forgotten: if we make up our mind to do something, make plans to carry it out, and stick to those plans, we will almost certainly succeed. There is very little, if anything, that we can't do. The key is PERSEVERANCE.

The problem is of course that we usually have a great idea, work with it for a day or two, and then give up. Perhaps our friends and family discourage us (as, sadly, we did to Ben). Whatever the reason, we let "common sense" take over, and our great idea goes out of the window.

Never is this experience more common than when we set up our network marketing businesses. We are full of enthusiasm for a few days, then we get discouraged, and our friends and family, with the very best of intentions no doubt, advise us to give it up. So we do.

I've seen this happen so often with network marketing businesses, and indeed with many other businesses too. If the owners had only persevered, they very probably would have built successful businesses, just as Ben achieved success with his walking. But they gave up, and so never enjoyed the success they were entitled to expect. They simply didn't persevere for long enough.

So my message is that we should persevere with our businesses, and not give up just because things don't go well at some point. Of course, if things really don't go well, a point of time may finally come when we really should review our business, perhaps change our products, and in extreme circumstances close our business down. That's a possibility, but in most cases we stop because we don't persevere for long enough rather than for sensible reasons.

Like all of us, I have my times of discouragement in network marketing - it's guaranteed to happen to every network marketer. Sometimes I really feel like giving up and doing something else. Then I think of Ben... and I keep going.

Yes, if Ben could do it, so can I.... and so can you!

Thursday, March 11, 2010

THE 3-PART APPROACH WHICH I USE TO TRAIN MY NETWORK MARKETING DOWNLINE

In my last blog I emphasised the importance of effective training, and promised to describe my own method in a future article. So here goes.

After a heap of previous, costly failures, I finally came up with the following approach which works well for me. There are three distinct elements to it:

1. A Basic Training Presentation

We conduct a regular, usually weekly, basic training course. Whenever anyone in my downline shows an interest in taking up the business opportunity, no matter how far down the structure they might be, they are invited to take this one basic training course. (Obviously I can't prevent others in my downline from giving their own training, nor would I want to - but I hope and believe that everyone is being invited to my basic training course).

The material consists of a Powerpoint presentation which we have developed, supported by some in-depth videos about the product and how to present it to prospects. The Powerpoint presentation itself goes into issues such as how to set up a business, start-up and on-going costs to budget for, how to find and approach prospects, etc. Wherever possible we use material provided by our supplier, and in some cases we have developed material of our own built around some of the supplier's information.

In total the training takes about 2 hours. At the end, each trainee leaves with a considerable amount of both soft copy and printed material, which we ask them to study over the next 4 weeks. We ask them to come back for an 'examination' on the material about 4 weeks later, and in the meantime we advise them not to practice their new business.

In my experience the trainees leave this basic training enthusiastic and excited. They know that if they learn and follow the pattern presented to them they have a great chance of building a successful business. I think they also appreciate the fact that someone is really concerned to help them in this way.

To avoid variations and inconsistency, I always either give this basic training myself or arrange for a very trusted colleague to do it. Of course, not everyone lives close by, so we have recorded an on-line version which people can download as required.


2. The Examination

This is actually quite a simple written test which the trainees who have undertaken the basic training are encouraged to come and sit. Again, this can be done remotely if required.

Candidates who pass receive a Graduation Certificate and can feel confident that they are ready to begin building their own business.


3. Monthly Information Meetings

All our trainees and graduates are invited to a regular monthly Information Meeting. At this meeting we

* present new graduates with their Graduation Certificate;

* have a presentation on some aspect of our products or Network Marketing business.

* enjoy each others' company.

The objective behind these on-going Meetings is to maintain communication and enthusiasm within the team. It is all too easy for interest to fall, and when this happens one's business can disappear very rapidly. The Monthly Meeting is designed to minimize this, and does seem to help a great deal.


We have found this 3-part approach to work very well for us. It takes some work, but it's well worthwhile - and in fact I see training as probably my most important business responsibility today. Obviously, you may choose to follow a different approach, but I can certainly recommend the above to you.