MLM Secret Revealed – Does Cold Calling Work?

January 12, 2010
Amy Howard
It seems like everyone wants to market their home based businesses using online methods now.  And while I don’t blame them for wanting to use the Internet, it can be a bit of a technical challenge for some network marketing.  With that in mind, I want to talk to you about cold calling.
 
I get a lot of people telling me that they don’t want to do any cold calling because it doesn’t work.  I would like to take a closer look at cold calling with you and hopefully unravel the myth that cold calling doesn’t work, once and for all.
 
I’m sure that many of you have picked up the phone before and the person on the other end was trying to sell you something.  You know what I mean.  The phone company trying to get your business.  What did you do?  Did you immediately say “Not Interested” and then hang up the phone.  Did you even hear what the person had to say before you said that you weren’t interested?
 
So, when I tell you that you have to cold call to grow your MLM business, you probably don’t believe me do you?  I mean it’s pretty obvious that cold calling doesn’t work, when most people tell you they aren’t interested before they even have a chance to hear what you have.
 
Here is the thing.  Cold calling can work if you do it right.  The key to selling your network marketing product using the telephone is to call the right people in the first place.  You have to “target” your audience.  The best part of using the telephone to grow your MLM business is that it is the cheapest way to grow it.
 
Let me give you an example to bring home my point.   Let’s assume that you are a network marketer with business that you work from home.  What if I called you up one day and asked you “If I can honestly show you how to put 20-30 people a week into your business, week in and week out without fail, is that worth 45 minutes of your time to find out how to get that done?”  You would probably have an interest in seeing how to do that, right?  The reason is simple.  It’s because I have identified you as my target market and you have a need, want, or a desire to know how to grow your home based business.
 
You can do the same thing with any business.  Let’s say that I can help you to increase your gas mileage.  So, first you want to identify your target market.  Let’s go for SUV owners.  Then we want to get their attention in under 30 seconds.  So, let’s ask the question: “If I could honestly show you how to increase your gas mileage by as much as 30%, would that be worth 15 minutes of you time to find out how to get that done?”  Finally, you want your prospect to take action and go to your presentation.
 
So let me ask you again.  Does cold calling work?  It absolutely works.  Now I have to admit that it may not be the most glamorous way to grow your MLM business but it can be the cheapest way to grow your business and still get results.  I still pick up the phone everyday and make cold calls in my business.  I have to tell that I wouldn’t still be doing it if it wasn’t an effective way to grow a business.
 
What does cold calling really look like when it’s done right? 
Let’s assume that you can easily go through about 50 targeted leads in an hour. Targeted leads, by the way, that only cost you somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 cents each.  So, let’s get enough leads to be on the phones for 2 hours.  What’s that going to run?  Only $20.  Now let’s say that we only close 20%.  So, we could close 2 people by working the phone for 2 hours and $20. 
 
Would you say that cold calling is a lot cheaper and a lot faster than driving all over creation and chasing people around trying to convince them to just take a look at what you have?
Is Cold Calling Duplicatable?
 
I get a lot of people asking me if what I do is duplicatable.  I think that is a great question.  If what you are doing is working, are you going to share that with your downline or make it another MLM secret? 
You’re going to share, right, because you would be silly not to.  So, do you think that you could give your people a script that works (maybe even practice it with them) and tell them exactly what kind of leads you are using?  Do you think you could do that?  Of course, you could.
 
Can you imagine that you had a huge downline and all of them were dialing targeted leads every day and they were closing 20%.  How many people could you be adding into your business week in and week out without fail?

 

MLM Sales Secret Revealed – How MLM Companies Make Money

January 11, 2010
Amy Howard

As part of my new MLM training video course.  This video shows you how MLM Companies make money using traditional MLM marketing methods and why if you use these outdated methods your network marketing business will die while their business continues to grow.

Find out exactly what MLM marketing methods you can stop using and what you must know to increase your MLM Sales.

 

Network Marketing – Getting Started

January 6, 2010
Amy Howard

Are you just getting started in the network marketing industry? It’s a great industry if you have access to good MLM training. However, most MLM Companies train their associates using old outdated methods that just don’t work in today’s market. Get started with the best marketing methods before you decide that network marketing doesn’t work or is a scam.

If you are like most people who get started with a network marketing company, you think that it will be easy to get people to join your company. It looks so easy, when you see how good the network marketing product is and the compensation plan; it really was not hard for you to make the decision to sign up at all.

Now that you are in and your upline or the MLM company training is telling you that you are going to have to talk to people, you are having a few butterflies roll around in your stomach at the thought of screwing it up. There are some marketers that will do anything to make a sale and there are some marketers that will not. They wouldn’t for any amount of money look like a fool trying to grow a home based business.

Some of the people who get started with their home based business think that they can grow a massive business using their computer. They will try sending out mass email, using voice broadcasting, pay-per-click advertising, or anything else they can thing of to avoid using the telephone and calling up a stranger.

Here is the truth about network marketing. Using the computer is a great way to grow a business IF you have the skills and IF you have the money and IF you are not in a hurry to make it happen.

Listen to me for a minute, please. If you want to grow a big home based business and you don’t want to go broke trying to make it happen, then the telephone is the least expensive and the most effective method for making sales. The best part about using the telephone is that since there are so many network marketers unwilling to use the phone, you can actually distinguish yourself from others.

With a good prospecting script, a good presentation, and some good leads (aka, a target market) you can do what others in this industry don’t get to do. You can actually make money being a network marketer.

Don’t worry if you aren’t sure how to get started but do yourself a favor and don’t spend yourself out of business trying to avoid the phone. Even if you decide to use the Internet to grow your business, you will eventually have to talk to someone. It would be better to develop your speaking skills sooner rather than later.

 

MLM Secret – Limitations of Traditional MLM Marketing Methods

January 4, 2010
Amy Howard

When I first got started in network marketing, I was taught by my MLM Company’s leaders to make a list of my friends and family, get more names from those people, talk to anyone close to me (known as the 3-foot rule), and hand out business cards and flyers.  The crazy thing is that I actually did it.  Once, I made it to the bottom of my list (that only took about one or two weeks), I asked my sponsor what I should do next and he said to make another list or prospect the list I already had again.  Using your warm market is a traditional MLM marketing method but it has it limitations.


The first limitation is that using warm market prospecting is untargeted.  It’s untargeted because you are talking to people that didn’t request more information about your network marketing product or service.   When it comes to marketing your business that is probably one of the biggest mistakes that you can make.  Can you find customers and business builders using this method?  Yes, you can and there are some that grow a large organization using just their warm market but that is the exception not the rule. 

One fundamental rule of marketing is to target your marketing.  The more your message relates to your prospect, the more likely you are to convert that prospect into a customer.  The problem with using your warm market as your leads is that you are trying to create interest in your network marketing product (or if you do what your MLM Company preaches, in the business opportunity) instead of them already being interested to begin with.  This traditional MLM marketing method requires a lot more time and energy to get sales. 

Another problem with using the traditional marketing methods that are taught by MLM companies is the limitation of using your warm market.   How many people do you really know?  Even if you can write a list of 100 names and you got everyone on that list to give you 20 more names (which isn’t likely to happen) you only have 2000 leads to work with.   And remember these are just names and numbers of people, they aren’t people that already have an interest in your network marketing product or service so you are going to have to try to create that interest. 

It doesn’t matter what business you are in, leads are the life blood of that business.  Without leads, your business is dead.  In order to grow your business to where you are making a good living every month, you will have to make a substantial number of MLM sales.  I can almost guarantee that you will NEVER close 100% of the time. 

Let’s say that you can convert 5% of your list into customers.  (I’m assuming that you are very good at sales when I use a number like 5% because the reality is that it would be closer to 1% when you are using untargeted prospects.) At a 5% conversion rate with your 2000 names, you will have 100 MLM sales.  Sounds pretty good doesn’t it?  But this is assuming that you actually get to talk to all 2000 people on your list, NOT likely to happen.  You would actually be lucky to talk to half of those people.  (Remember that the majority of those on your list are referrals.)  Let’s go with it anyway.  50% of 2000 = 1000 and you can convert 5% of them.  That gives you 50 MLM sales.  Still sounds good doesn’t it? 

It sounds good but the reality is that you will maybe get 3 sales from your warm market.  Assuming that you can make a list of at least 100 names.  3 MLM sales does NOT a business make and what do you do when you run out of names on your list?  Do you go selling door-to-door?  I’ve done door-to-door sales before, I can tell you that you have to have a very thick skin to make sales that way.


 

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