Ugly? What could possibly be ugly about your down-line? Of course I am using the word ugly figuratively; but still, why use that word at all?
Fifteen years ago, I fell in love with the business model of network marketing- it was a far cry from that of academic medical centers where I had spent my entire career. A fundamental assertion about network marketing is that it is a very simple model: simply duplicate what your up-line teaches you and then teach it to your down-line and your business will grow exponentially or at least rapidly, right?
No, not right-not at all. If you are passionate about your products and an extremely successful recruiter, most of the folks you recruit will not duplicate your efforts, not even close. That fact took us two years to learn.
By nature, I are passionate and persuasive; within a few months of the new business my husband and I had a few hundred people in our down-line.
That's when we began making mistakes, over and over. To us, recently retired from health care, duplication translated to "see one" "do one" and "teach one"-we got it. We were sure we could teach each of our new recruits to do exactly what we were doing. And we were off and running.
We spent two years hosting Saturday morning group goal setting meetings, organizing job fairs, driving to the homes of our newest recruits to assist them in organizing their new business, buying and distributing leads, participating in three-ways to close their new prospect, meeting with them one on one to teach them our system, hosting live group calls where our group could listen in as we called prospects, answered their objections and most of the time, closed them.
We received awards for the highest number of recruits from two companies but our efforts were never duplicated. Not even close. Some of our folks were able to recruit the average of most network marketers: two. But many did nothing except come to the meetings.
Right, the majority of people in these businesses bring in two people-period. Were we doing something wrong? Are you?
Yes and no.
Here's what we had to learn:
You can't beat the average. In the initial goal setting sessions and during weekly meetings thereafter, we assumed that each man or woman meant what they wrote, whether it was quitting the day job to do the business full-time or accumulate enough money to but the house at the lake the family had been dreaming about for years.
And we assumed our new recruit was sincere were sincere when she pledged to follow the system as we taught it to them.
Although our people told us that they wanted and needed feedback from us regarding their approaches to new prospects, without exception, each time that we criticized- we called it giving feedback but they heard it as criticism-always-we caused hurt feelings which all too frequently led to the person's decision to quit.
We thought we could beat the averages and teach all of these people to become maniacal recruiters-like us.
What is the answer? Keep your down-line buying the product and leave them alone. When the recruiting maniac shows up, you'll recognize her right away, she'll look just like you.
