Emotion & Reason
By now we all know that humans buy on emotion.
Perhaps less well known - but logical once we think about it - is the idea that business people run their businesses less on emotion and more on reasonable action.
All smart and successful business owners know this so they reasonably use emotion to appeal to buyers. Hence all the excitement and hype about products, services and opportunities. Not to mention advertising.
Many MLM business “owners” employ this very strategy: excite any potential business partners with the drama and the dream of owning their own businesses.
Question: Once the recruits have gotten “on board” with emotion, can they succeed with that only? In other words, how far can one get solely on emotion?
Adversity & Success
It may be a hard pill to swallow but if it were easy it wouldn’t be worth so much and we wouldn’t call it success. Seth agrees. Here’s his post and the link to his blog:
Adversity And The Route To Success
Resource-rich regions often fall behind in developing significant industrial and cultural capabilities. Japan does well despite having very few resources at all.
Well-rounded and popular people rarely change the world. The one voted most likely to succeed probably won’t.
Genuine success is scarce, and the scarcity comes from the barriers that keep everyone from having it. If it weren’t for the scarcity, it wouldn’t be valuable, after all.
It’s difficult to change an industry, set a world record, land big clients, or do art that influences others. When faced with this difficulty, those with other, seemingly better options see the barrier and walk away.
Why bother? The thinking is that we can just pump some more oil or smile and gladhand our way to an acceptably happy outcome.
On the other hand, people who believe they have fewer options take a look at the barrier and realize that even though it will be difficult to cross, it’s the single best option they’ve got.
This is one of the dangers of overfunded/undertested startup companies. Without an astute CEO in charge, they begin to worry more about not losing what they’ve already got than the real reason they started the project in the first place.
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2011/11/adversity-and-the-route-to-success.html
My Apologies
If you are a subscriber to my blog I thank you but also wish to apologize.
Over the past few days some cretins hacked into my blog and installed themselves as users. As a consequence you may have received notice of postings that are totally out of character for me – thank goodness they weren’t pornography.
The scoundrels have been booted, the postings trashed and I’ll keep a sharp eye out for any recurring offences.
Again, my apologies.
MLM Tip from ‘Big Al’: When You Decide
When you decide that you know too little about preparing your income tax return, you hire an accountant, bookkeeper or CPA.
When you have legal problems, you visit an attorney.
And when your pipes break and your house is flooding, you call a plumber.
Yet most new network marketers won’t attend their sponsor’s and upline’s training. Instead they complain that their business isn’t growing.
Remind your new distributors that they don’t have many network marketing skills from signing the application, so they should invest the time and energy to learn some skills at your trainings.
When you decide that you want more skills for yourself and your team to kick your business to the next pin level, register for an ongoing webinar series featuring the 25 Essential Skills for Network Marketing Success.
The series is live each Saturday at 1pm and will resume on November 19th. In the meantime you can review past sessions in the archive. All for free. Register here . . .
http://www.MLMreadysetgo.info and please use my name as your inviter ~ Tony Lauria.
This is not an affiliate program.
Too Sissy For Freedom?
The best writing appeals to us on several levels. This article by Frank J. Fleming, a political satirist, cracked me up and punched me in the gut at the same time.
The ‘Self-Reliance’ Menace
By FRANK J. FLEMING
At a San Francisco fund-raiser last week, President Obama warned the audience that if he’s not re-elected, it will bring a new era of self-reliance in America.
In this dystopian future, people wouldn’t be able to rely on the government to give them health care or college or anything else we now consider a need. That’s just an awful, scary thought these days. Which begs the question: Are we too sissy for freedom anymore?
Not everyone acknowledges how scary true freedom is. Sure, you get to make your own choices, but then government won’t be there to catch you when you fall.
Some people considered freedom worth that risk, though. When the Pilgrims came to America, there was no government to make sure they had food or shelter or even anti-bullying laws that kept others from making fun of their silly hats with the buckles on them.
Similarly, in the 19th century, settlers moved out West despite the complete lack of cellphone service there. Again, no government awaited to make sure they’d be all right, and if they were attacked by bears, they couldn’t call animal control to come help them (no cell service, remember).
But we’re a different kind of people now. All the federal government did back then was basically keep an eye on Canada and make sure it didn’t invade. Today, more than half of the federal government’s budget is spent on entitlements and safety nets. In fact, a fifth of federal spending is devoted to making sure we have crummy retirement savings that no one can live on.
If the Founding Fathers ever found out about that, they’d probably shoot us with muskets. But the fact is they’re dead, and we’ve decided we have other needs as a people.
Right now, getting rid of any entitlements is unthinkable. If left to our own resources, we’d be too worried about starving to death or not having access to broadband.
We’re just used to the government taking a larger and larger portion of our paychecks while putting lots of regulations on us to ensure we’re all safe and minimally cared for. It’s not quite all-expansive liberty, but then again, how often do people get mauled by bears these days?
Entitlements keep increasing, though, as we keep finding new things that we all need and that the government should have a hand in providing. A lot of people consider health insurance a right, while the people who founded this country never even heard of it. Of course, they never heard of electricity or running water, either — other necessities — and probably had to fight off lots of bears while wearing silly hats. No one wants to live under those conditions anymore.
Problem is, an ever-expanding amount of America’s wealth is tied up in just making sure we have whatever it is we consider necessary now. When settlers relied on themselves, they devoted all their resources to getting ahead. That eventually led to this awesome country that has Disney World, the Internet and cheap and readily available nachos everywhere.
Maybe the fact that more and more of our resources are used for maintaining the status quo is partly why we’re in such doldrums: With so much of our wealth spent making sure we get basic necessities without having to be self-reliant, we have little left to put toward succeeding.
Because that’s what freedom is: a chance to succeed — married with a chance to fail. As a country, we’ve decided that success just isn’t worth the risk of failure. Or bear attacks.
MLM Tip from Big Al: Close your prospect with the “truth” guarantee
Prospects are afraid to take risks. That’s natural.
We attempt to soothe their fears by saying things such as:
- “Try our business. We have a 30-day money-back guarantee.”
- “Try our product or service. We have a 30-day money-back guarantee.”
Did you ever notice that these guarantees seldom close the prospect? The prospect feels embarrassed to take advantage of a refund, so the prospect never makes the initial commitment to try the product, service or business opportunity.
You’ve noticed that, haven’t you?
So why not try this? Give your prospect the “truth” guarantee. It will shock your prospect and create a “fear of loss” motivation. Say:
“I have one guarantee about our business. If you don’t try anything, you are guaranteed that nothing will change. The commute time to your job won’t change. The limited time you have with your family won’t change. Your current paycheck won’t change.”
Want more neat prospecting ideas?
There’s an ongoing webinar series devoted to the skills Big Al teaches. You can register for it and get all the details at http://www/MLMreadysetgo.info and please use my name, Tony Lauria, as your inviter.
And No, this is not an affiliate program.
MLM Tip: Don’t blame your sponsor … yet
Big Al knows we all like to gripe about our upline, and lord knows many of them ARE worthless, but this will help you get a better idea of whose responsibility is whose.~~~
When you join network marketing, it is important to understand the responsibilities of your sponsor, and the responsibilities you have to yourself.
Your sponsor is responsible to give you things such as:
* A couple “icebreakers” to help you easily get presentations.
* A “One-Minute Presentation” so you can look professional in explaining your business.
* Some opening sentences to prospect your warm market without risking objections.
* A fool-proof sentence or two to get appointments.
If your sponsor gives you a few of the basic skills above, then what are some of your responsibilities?
* To consistently prospect to build your business.
* To invite prospects to meetings, three-way calls, two-on-one appointments, etc.
* To study and attend trainings to learn the skills to be a professional network marketer.
* To take personal responsibility for your success.
It is a two-way street. You can’t expect your sponsor to do it all for you.
Once your sponsor gives you some of the basic skills, it is up to you. You can whine and complain that you have no one to talk to, that no one will listen to you, that you don’t know what to do … but it is your business.
Your choice to abandon responsibility and to invest in self-sabotaging thoughts is your decision, not your sponsor’s decision.
You will have to take the initiative to learn and solve these problems in your business. It’s not your sponsor’s responsibility to make you successful. ~~~
If you find yourself without the Icebreakers, a 1-minute business presentation or a fool-proof sentence to get an appointment, you’re in luck.
There’s an ongoing webinar series devoted to the skills Big Al teaches. You can register for it and get all the details at http://www/MLMreadysetgo.info and please use my name, Tony Lauria, as your inviter.
And No, this is not an affiliate program.
