Although many aspects of multilevel marketing are covered when a person signs up, the sponsor is often evasive about how to source the best fresh leads. So, while the new recruit is usually provided a comprehensive introduction to exactly how network marketing works, including how to get promotional material and work with a support group, there is little to no real information about lead generation. The reason for the sponsor’s unwillingness to discuss lead generation is because the sponsor does not have a clear answer. Other than suggestions about calling a warm list or recommendations about speaking with as many people as possible, a novice is not offered much useful information. This ambiguity leaves the new recruit, eager to get started in the business, no clue on exactly how to recruit other individuals and build a downline.
Yet this omission is a fatal weakness. It condemns the new recruit to failure before he or she even starts. The plain truth is that lead generation is critical to success in network marketing, and without it an individual has no business.
The Slippery Issue of Generating MLM Leads
Most sponsors generally skirt the concerns newcomers have about getting fresh leads. Generally, they don’t know the answer. Some, however, those who have actually had previous marketing experience may suggest trying out numerous marketing and promotional approaches until the newcomer finds that works for them. This turns out to be useless information because it offers no specific remedy. It’s like telling someone who has an illness that they may get better if they try out different doctors. One of them might have an answer.
This evasiveness hides a deeper issue: the difficulty in finding out effective ways to market and produce significant results in sales. Eventually, disillusioned new MLM business owners declare that all MLMs are frauds. The issue is not fraud, but the prevalence of ineffective systems. The traditional MLM selling methods taught to new distributors are insufficient. In fact, they are not really selling, but merely talking about their product in the hope that it stirs up some interest in the listener. These personal recommendations do not generate enough leads to make an MLM business successful.
No Single Method
MLM reps try all sorts of things to generate leads. Some use classified ads in newspapers. Some try inviting people to home or hotel meetings for a product demonstration. Experimenting with different methods is the main preoccupation. Unfortunately, as of yet, no single method has been proven to produce significant success. If it did, it would be widely copied. Instead, failure, rather than success, appears to be the norm.
Further Problems: Conversion And Duplication
a. Conversion
Unfortunately, simply getting a supply of fresh leads by trying out different online and off-line lead generation methods is not the whole story. The new recruit must also become very skillful at converting these leads into sales—either persuading people to buy the product as a retail customer or signing up as a business builder.
b. Duplication
There is yet an additional issue that new sales representatives must eventually deal with– training their downline to do exactly what they do. Usually this approach of passing information down the pipeline does not work very well. Numerous books and multimedia courses have already been created to help MLM reps, but the failure rate remains high.
The Current State of Lead Generation Training in MLM
It’s an ironic fact that the worst way to develop skills in lead generation is to follow the company training. This is due to the plain fact that this kind of training is created to appeal to the lowest common factors. All these are attempts to patch up a system that is not working.
What passes for lead generation training is weak stuff– suggestions like calling a warm list, using a badge with a slogan to provoke questions when shopping or dining out, or prowling around parking lots and sticking photocopies of $100 bills with the time and day of the next home or hotel group meeting. The only reason people follow these methods, is because they can’t think of a better way to promote.
These very simple methods require little intelligence and rely on emotional resilience and physical stamina to work. In actuality, these methods are based on the gumshoe sales methods utilized by hard-boiled salesmen since the 18th century. You could even call these rather simplistic techniques “as the walk and talk gumshoe lead generating method.” Basically it consists of walking around and talking to anyone who looks in your direction and is close enough to hear you. The odds of success are slim, but they are slightly higher than staying at home watching old sitcom reruns on television.
Five Reasons Why “the Gumshoe Walk and Talk Method” Is Highly Ineffective
1. It is exhausting
Walking around every day, all day long, canvassing supermarkets, department stores, and shopping malls trying to casually strike up discussions with strangers is physically very strenuous. Usually within less than a month, someone who follows this procedure, walking miles every day, is too weary to continue.
2. It is emotionally draining
While some people may be courteous and actually listen to a distributor, most people will become irritated when they find that the distributor has an ulterior motive in befriending them. It is emotionally draining to be rejected all day, day after day, week after week.
3. No sales training
It is tough to encourage somebody to buy an item when the distributor has no idea about the psychology of selling and does not actually know ways to interact in a persuasive method. Enthusiasm and hype are not sales techniques.
4. Alienation
It is unsettling for the distributor to discover that friends and family members are now starting to avoid them. They are tired of dealing with the distributor’s desperation and constant cajoling to consider the opportunity one more time.
5. High Overheads
It is extremely discouraging to do something that does not work and fail to earn enough of an income to keep paying for products to remain qualified as an independent sales representative.
Further Challenges in the Quest for Leads
Now that we comprehend why the conventional approach does not work, let us consider three other barriers to successful lead generation: Most reps have little business experience; there is a high rate of downline attrition; and only a few show interest in learning effective marketing and sales techniques.
Most New Reps Have Little Business Experience
In the final analysis, those who do succeed in MLM generally have adequate business experience to know exactly how to advertise and promote. Sadly, only a few new reps have any business experience, with the majority of individuals who join a multilevel marketing opportunity having little to no business experience.
A High Rate of Downline Attrition
The statistics for the number of individuals who stay in a network marketing opportunity are rather disturbing: generally speaking, most new independent sales representatives stay in the business for only about 90 days. Moreover, 90 percent of people fail not because of the products they are promoting or the because of a weakness in the structure or culture of the MLM company they are representing but because of the systems themselves. Even the much championed Attraction Marketing, hailed as the solution to walking the streets in search of prospects, is nothing more than a variation of Internet Marketing. What’s more, in Internet Marketing itself, as high a percentage fail—90 percent to 97 percent. All these so-called new systems are merely a variant of the old systems because all still rely on the rep following the same process.
Ineffective Marketing and Sales Techniques
MLM reps are not exposed to marketing and sales training, although this is the purported reasons for the meetings. If the meetings were as valuable as endorsed, then there would be a much higher number of people who would be successful at promoting their MLM opportunities. Due to the hype associated with MLMs, many people are not even aware that some solid business training is necessary. They are under the mistaken impression that the product will basically sell itself and all they have to do is show it to someone.
What’s the Solution?—The Tru180 System
Sales aren’t for everyone. When you contract the work out, you don’t have to try to fit MLM you’re your schedule because you aren’t doing the work. There is a better way. The better way is to approach income generation in MLM more as a simple referral program or as an investment, much like investing into an IRA or retirement account, the only difference is that you receive income monthly without penalty. The Tru180 system can help even average sales reps become top earners in MLM by employing a simple and easy to follow system. Join the new launch at http://www.25todrive.net and learn just how easy it is to get the best fresh MLM leads…as well as have those leads be converted into and new enrollees.
