Network Marketing as a Business Model is Misunderstood

People have preconceived notions of the business model based merely on he-said / she-said opinions or stories they have heard from someone else.  Maybe their mom or dad got excited about starting a network marketing business, only to quit for some reason months later.  The hyped-up big dreams of thousands of dollars flowing in passively every month didn’t happen, so it must be the fault of the business model.  It couldn’t be because the person who joined didn’t take the time to learn this new “trade/skill” or put in the activity to get their product or opportunity in front of enough people to find people who wanted it… could it?! LOL

I have learned to laugh or shrug it off each time someone blames anything or anyone but themselves for why they did not succeed in their network marketing business.  They won’t take ownership of the fact that they were not coachable, or not willing to give it enough effort over time to improve their skills.  If you’re not making the amount of money you want to make in this business, you’re either not doing the right activity or you’re not doing enough of the right activity.

Please, my friends, stop making yourself look silly by saying demeaning things about a brilliant business model.  If a company wants to sell a product or service, it can run ads and do all the hiring and training corporately.  Or, they can let the existing sellers recruit and train people (in the field, hands-on training, sharing their best secrets because they will get compensated when their recruits make sales).  Letting their people in the field attract and train others to do what they’re doing creates an aligned interest, a real win-win.  The company can grow much faster, without spending more money to do so.  They just have the field compensation model already as a fixed percentage of sales revenue that can scale without limits.

Case study: EXP REALTY

EXP Realty grew from just a few thousand to over 86,000 agents in about 6 years.  Using a traditional brokerage model where only the owner/broker or office managers are the ones reaching out to recruit agents to come to the company, how many agents could they have recruited per year?  Dozens or maybe 100’s at best?

EXP instead embraced network marketing and created a comp plan where agents could recruit their fellow agents they meet in the marketplace when doing deals together, and can earn a small piece of the company dollar on each home sale commission as a reward for bringing the agent aboard AND teaching/supporting that agent in their career.  It creates collaboration and teamwork, an alignment of interests.  The recruiter has a big reason to help the agents they recruit to do better and close more sales, and therefore is willing to share their secret sauce for generating business.

Network marketing works for those who WORK IT (doing the right things consistently over time until you get better and gain traction).  BE THE STORY.  You can sign up and quit… or you decide to finish what you started and become yet another of the many thousands of industry success stories.  Be willing to learn and grow.  You will need to adopt some new philosophies, mindset and attitudes, and develop an attractive music that attracts people.  You will need to learn selling, recruiting, team building, and leadership skills.  But all of this will pay off.  And you can apply these skills in any area of life and in other work or business endeavors.  So lean in, put in the growth time.  Plug into your team’s system.  Attend the calls and events.  Talk often with your mentors.  Do the daily prospecting and activity that will lead to signing people up.  Remember your Why and never lose sight of your VISION.  Residual income (passive income) is your key to freedom.