Last night as I was winding down after the soccer team I coach had their latest victory, you know checking email on my laptop while my wife watched TV… and out of the blue a full blown advertisement for Amway.  This was a corporate ad that highlighted all of their brands: Quixtar, Nutralite, etc. building their brand, trying to improve their image.

After I thought about it a while, I guess it kind of makes sense. Amway has been in the news with a rather negative light lately; usually doing the right thing but in our industry image a perception can have very large effects. They have a bit of work to do to gain their distributors confidence back maybe?

What do you think?

In 1970, Alvin Toffler’s book “Future Shock” predicted a world in which technology evolved so quickly society was stunned, unable to adjust, succumbing to “shattering stress and disorientation”. A decade later, John Naisbitt took a less cataclysmic look, focused on the next decade, with “Megatrends – Ten New Directions Transforming Our Lives”; he updated that in 1990 with “Megatrends 2000″.

Toffler proved to be both right and wrong. “Future Shock” did attack millions of people, but primarily those in the newly freed nations of the former Soviet Bloc, especially Russia itself. Hundreds of immigrants pouring out of those nations to the United States in the 1990s reportedly returned complaining about “too much choice”.

Even a worldly British author and high tech consultant who spent the 1990s living and working in Southern California and Washington, DC, will soon publish a book about his American experience that includes a chapter on how even Western Europeans can be overwhelmed by American-style consumerism. The working title? “A Cornucopia of Confusing Consumer Choices: Forty-Five Types of Shredded Wheat?”

What Toffler failed to foresee was the ease with which Americans, Canadians and, within the dominion of their own societies, the rest of the “developed” world not only would accept but often demand faster implementation of new technologies. Generations raised on Star Trek and Star Wars did not merely anticipate desktop computers, instant global information access, hand-held global “communicators” and robots, they built them.

Thank goodness I started my network marketing business a few years ago, well before I needed to.  My background is electronics engineering, and did very well with that career for 25 years, but the entire electronics industry is hyper competitive and most growth is currently happening in Asia. Like many people, my job disappeared in December of last year, but I had a nice solid residual income to fall back upon.

Today I read a disturbing article in the NY Times that talks about the economic tsunami I’ve been warning people about for months. The fact is, times are changing in the US. Hopefully the many of the 80,000 people who lost their jobs here in March, and 50,000 in February had their plan B well on the way.

If you know any one that is danger, by all means get them introduced to your MLM company today! When the economy is in the toilet, like it is now, network marketing can offer real hope for folks. That’s why the best MLM companies tend to prosper in bad economic times, and why we are in the best recruiting season in the past 20 years.

Don’t waste time;  Get to work now!

Building a successful MLM business takes commitment and persistence, but also a blueprint to follow. Here is a cheat sheet of the top 44 tips to keep you on track.

1. Start with written goals and plans!
2. Don’t wait for everything to be exactly right to start. IT NEVER WILL! Start now, with whatever you have. The things you need will come to you as you work towards your goal.
3. Realize that “rejection” is natural. For every 20 people you contact, expect 19 “no’s” for every “yes.” You may very well do better than that, but expect 19 rejections. This way, the rejections won’t bother you because you expect them. Also, realize that they’re not rejecting YOU – they’re simply rejecting an idea. Just keep moving ahead. Be persistent, ignore the rejections, and you’ll get more than enough “yes’s” to build a highly successful business. Always remember: Some will. Some won’t. So what? Someone’s waiting. Next!
4. Treat your network marketing business as a serious, full-time business, and it will become one.
5. Follow-ups are just as important as the initial contact. If a person hasn’t joined yet, following up with more exciting information can turn the tide. Many people report that they get their best people after following up 3-5 times.
6. Be patient. You’ll work the hardest your first six months and get compensated the least. Big incomes never happen overnight in network marketing. They only come after you’ve properly shown your personally-sponsored people how to duplicate your efforts. Network Marketing is a numbers game.
7. Don’t give your Distributors unrealistic expectations.
8. Be willing to invest more money into your business than you get out of it in the beginning.
9. Don’t quit. The only way to fail is if you give up.
10. Contact your upline and get their help and suggestions on how to grow your business. They will expect you to listen and then TAKE ACTION based exactly upon the advice they give.
11. Ask for people’s opinion on the opportunity. It’s a good way to determine what objections they might have to joining and also allows you the chance to overcome those objections and sponsor them. You never recruit, you sponsor. Keep that in mind.
12. Formulate a plan of weekly activity and be persistent in following it (if you fail to plan, you plan to fail). Sticking to your plan is essential for success.
13. Assist those you sponsor as much as you can. Help them sponsor their first level distributors. Let them know that you offer your support. Teach your distributors the importance of doing the same. In helping others become successful, you help yourself become successful. It’s also a wonderful way to make life-long friends.
14. Don’t mail out a few brochures or contact a few people and expect the money to start rolling in. Expect to work your business consistently for 1-2 years before seeing a really substantial income.
15. Though network marketing is one of the few businesses where you can earn while you learn, think of your first six months primarily as a training period. Don’t expect large earnings until after you’ve educated yourself through experience.
16. Don’t waste time on skeptics or non-motivated people. They will NOT succeed in your business or any other. They do not possess the qualities of a winner (this includes “rocking-chair advisors” who talk and talk, seeming to know all the answers, but never act on any of them).
17. Always replace the people in your organization who do not succeed.
18. Don’t constantly whine and complain to your upline or network marketing company. Realize that what you accomplish is mainly in your hands – no one else’s. Also realize that, when you see a problem, 90% of the time there are factors you are unaware of. Don’t jump to conclusions. When you have a problem, present it in a concise letter as positive, constructive criticism. Offer solutions if possible, too. Not only will this approach get you better results, but you’ll be building your relationship with your upline/network marketing company instead of tearing it down.
19. Don’t do things for your distributors that they should do themselves – create INDEPENDENT Distributors.
20. FOCUS! You cannot become successful in network marketing trying to do many things at once. We know of people out there that are involved in 30+ businesses. That approach is utterly and totally doomed to fail.
21. Always present yourself and your business in a professional and ethical manner.
22. Stick to the facts. Don’t exaggerate the opportunity – it’s actually amazing anyway!
23. Lead by example. Do all the things you want your distributors to emulate.
24. Learn as much as you can about the company / business you are working. But do it while you build not before you start!
25. Be duplicable. Avoid promoting your business in any way that causes your prospects to say to themselves, “Oh, now I see how this network marketing thing works, but I could never do that.” In other words, if you are to succeed, your prospects must always be able to envision themselves doing what you’re doing.
26. Think BIG! Small desire produces small results just as small fires produce little heat. Start with MASSIVE all out action from day one. Do what you are told to do by your upline and do even more of it than you thought you were capable of. Some people spend 10 years trying to ‘be ready’ and never build a business at all!
27. Know that most people crave recognition. RECOGNIZE your distributors who are doing good things with praise and rewards. Keep the contact with them close.
28. Communicate constantly! Keep in touch with everyone in your downline regularly. For your key people, make it daily if possible. The methods you can use are numerous: voice chat, webpage, newsletters, meetings, phone calls, email, voice mail, faxes, postcards, Skype etc. …just stay in close contact!
29. Ask for referrals. Ask, E.g., “Do you know anyone who might be looking to earn some extra money?”
30. Always be ENTHUSIASTIC!!
31. When you come over new marketing / promotional methods that are PROVEN to work really well, share them with the people in your organization. Remember, DUPLICATION.
32. Build a list of contacts. Add to it daily.
33. Listen to tapes, CDs and audio files etc. on network marketing. Listen again and again until you’ve totally absorbed them.
34. Don’t become obsessed with sponsoring a “heavy hitter.” Instead, learn how to be a heavy hitter yourself.
35. Be organized, but don’t allow the act of organizing to keep you from the real important things: Marketing, Sponsoring and Training
36. Don’t let little challenges upset you. Concentrate on the many positives and the big picture.
37. Always remember that the only constant in life is change. There will always be changes to products, plans and initiatives to which you must adapt quickly. Like #36, don’t let changes upset you. Know that you will have to deal with changes and other obstacles, both big and small, continually. Be prepared to be flexible.
38. Don’t be a negative thinker and don’t let the negative attitudes of others (even if they’re family members, friends, or peers) influence you. All the great men and women in history had to overcome the ones that said it couldn’t be done – and then went out and did it anyway. Think for yourself!
39. Don’t be derailed by “perfection paralysis.” Realize that you won’t be able to do everything perfectly. Do the best job you can, then move on to the next person. Keep moving forward every single day.
40. Read books (such as Napoleon Hill’s classic, “Think and Grow Rich”) that will convince you how powerful your mind really is. Develop the tremendous potential in you (that we all have) that has never been tapped!
41. Have FUN! It’s infectious! People can’t resist someone having fun. Make your business so much fun that others will flock to you to join you.
42. Remember always…”IF IT’S TO BE, IT’S UP TO ME.”
43. Just go out there right now and GET ON WITH IT! Don’t analyse everything. Action pays but analysis costs.
44. Don’t bug your upline for answers you can get for yourself from either their or the company’s websites, brochures and information sources.
45. Say LESS to MORE PEOPLE, and do it MORE FREQUENTLY. – To quote Paula Pritchard, ‘there is no problem in network marketing which cannot be solved by going out and sponsoring 10 new people’.

Warning! 97.3% of everyone who starts an MLM business with the intent of making money from home, never succeed. It’s a sad but simple truth that doesn’t get talked about that much in the network marketing industry.

Why is that? Why do so many fail in the greatest industry in the country? What causes the dismal performance?

Well after years of study, we’ve discovered three key elements that cause this dilemma:

1. Distributors don’t know where to find their next customer or distributor
2. There is a lack of a effective marketing system that can be put into use immediately
3. The plague of the downline raiding pirates

Of all three, the third is the worst. If you’ve been around the industry for any length of time you realize the fact that with a new company starting every day, rep’s are easily and foolishly persuaded to change companies… abandoning their current one before they even really get started, only to start the cycle all over again.

That’s a sure prescription for MLM failure, and actually failure in any venture.

Well we have great news! We’ve solved all three problems with our new strategic mentoring system. I will never try pull you away from what you are currently working on — that flys in the face of problem number three above! I love this industry and want to help as many people succeed as I can.

We will help you build your current business bigger, better and faster than you ever thought possible. Feel the pleasure of a truly exponential growth that’s possible if you develop a permanent downline!

Visit the strategic mentoring site, read the page and see if it makes sense to you. If it does, download the ebook and read it. I think you’ll find your perception of MLM turned on it’s head like mine was.

I found this interesting, so thought I’d post it here for your review.

The End of Delusional Capitalism

Mark Yarnell, the author of Random House Bestseller, “Your First Year In Network Marketing,” believes that North Americans have less than ten years to acquire wealth. He spotlights what he calls “The End of Delusional Capitalism,” and offers practical wealth strategies to a rapidly declining middle class.

After nearly a decade of silence, the best selling Network Marketing author of all time is back. Following his last appearance on the O’Reilly Factor and seven years of extensive research, Mark Yarnell, author of “Your First Year In Network Marketing,” has returned to the spotlight with his first of sixteen volumes entitled The Holy Grail of Network Marketing. Yarnell contends that North America has a rude awakening in store for its citizens following what he calls the “Fifty Year Float.”

Yarnell is referring to the years from 1950 until 2000, “When the U.S., one of the few countries left standing after the World War II, began to experiment with delusional capitalism. All we found out by attempting to think ourselves into riches was that there is a definite correlation between leisure, victimhood, and declining intelligence. And now that captains of industry are turning toward India, Eurasia, and China to find people with brains and work ethics, it’s going to take more than Lou Dobbs to save the middle class.” A strong warning from an unlikely source.

Yarnell bases his conclusions on books such as, “The World Is Flat,” “Think,” “The Hundred Year Lie”, “The Twilight of American Culture” and “The Future of Success.” He’s in good company by frequently quoting some of the best minds in business, science, technology and government. Where he does depart from popular public opinion is when he asserts that Network Marketing could bail out the middle class. It is hard to debate his premise that legitimate networking has allowed millions to prosper with virtually no capital investments. Avon, Mary Kay and Amway are hard to ignore and Yarnell obviously believes what he preaches, as do millions of others worldwide who have read his Random House best seller, now published in more than twelve languages.

If initial sales of The Holy Grail of Network Marketing Volume One or the massive recent traffic to www.markyarnell.com are any indication of a receptive audience, Yarnell is well on his way to creating another best selling series. He attributes most of the web traffic to a thirty-minute speech “The End of Delusional Capitalism” delivered recently at the University of Illinois at Chicago and posted to his site

Although Yarnell tends to enrage the sensibilities of those who demand political correctness, his social policy concepts obviously strike a chord with many. It’s hard to discount the millions of Google links to his bestseller, “Your First Year In Network Marketing.”

Yarnell claims that the solutions to most global problems are much easier than people realize, but admits that because they involve personal sacrifice and the unseating of many people in power, the solutions are not popular.

Yarnell On America’s Health Care Crisis

“Impose a health care tax on big pharmaceutical companies to be earmarked for health care to uninsured Americans. The top ten drug companies earn more profits than the other 490 Fortune 500 companies combined. Eliminate all cash bribes, (lobby money for politicians), and require Big Pharma to divert the salaries and overrides they now pay to their 675 lobbyists into a health care pool for the uninsured. Also, disallow the cash “bounties” being paid as overrides to school districts who put children on Ritalin. Yes, big drug companies are paying schools to put children on drugs. That money should be used to help insure the uninsured. By diverting excess profiteering into health care funding, 50% of all bankruptcies in America will be eliminated. Remember half of all U.S. bankruptcies are the result of medical expenses.”

Yarnell On Politics

“This one’s a no-brainer. Eliminate all cash bribery (lobbying). Cap campaign spending. Elect no lawyers to any local, state, or national office for eight years (two full election cycles). We need our elected officials serving the people, not fund raising and creating the need for more lawyers. We also need more diverse sectors of our society represented in our form of Democracy. Lawyers control all three branches of government and everyone can see where that has gotten America. Honest people can serve if there are caps on funds and everyone in America agrees to stop voting for lawyers for a few elections.”

Yarnell On Global Hunger

Again, Yarnell calls it a no-brainer. “Impose a calorie Mc tax on all fast foods (based on fat and calorie content) and create a U.S. branch of government like the I.R.S. to assess, collect and disseminate fast food taxes into food programs for malnourished citizens in the U.S. and abroad. It’s a huge win-win. Thousands could be employed in America. Many citizens may opt to switch to lower calorie food which will lower clinical obesity and diabetes and least of all, 10,000 kids get to stop dying each day of hunger.”

Yarnell believes that many intelligent people are angry, but can’t seem to figure out solutions. To him the solutions are obvious.

“We have rapid communications now. Nobody has to do anything but share these facts on-line, begin a revolt of common sense and ignore the special interests groups when they trott out “paid experts” to persuade the masses to ignore these facts. Lawyers, huge pharmaceutical companies, fast food giants and lobbyist should be removed immediately from positions of power and influence. They won’t change voluntarily or without a public relations fight. The reality is – no one needs to fight. We all need to vote.”

The guy makes sense, but intelligent solutions are usually the most controversial. One thing’s for certain: Yarnell treasures his anonymity and loves his privacy so don’t expect to see him on any media talk shows or political ballots. You’ll just have to be content to experience his commentaries as he rolls them out between trout fishing and paragliding. But Yarnell’s back…and this time he seems to enjoy turning a spotlight on what he calls “The End of Delusional Capitalism.”

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Web Site = http://holygrailnetworkmarketing.com

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