Building a network marketing business is tough. Nobody said it was going to be easy.  Well, if someone did, they were not telling you the truth. It’s an uphill battle at first, but then it gets to the fun part…the part where “you can sleep when the wind blows.”

During that first part you are often tempted to quit. Don’t give in to temptation. Nothing worth having comes easy. In the beginning of building your network marketing business you do a lot of work and get only paid a little. But if you don’t quit if you keep your eye on the price and work hard then eventually you will reach a stage when you work very little in your business and get paid a lot.

Let me share a little story with you that will paint a picture in your mind you can pull up when things get tough, when you get frustrated, when doubt sets in and you are tempted to just “throw the towel.” Trust me, I’ve been there, plenty of times….

Do You Sleep When the Wind Blows?

Years ago a farmer owned land along the Atlantic seacoast. He constantly advertised for hired hands. Most people were reluctant to work on farms along the Atlantic. They dreaded the awful storms that raged across the region, wreaking havoc on the buildings and crops. As the farmer interviewed applicants for the job, he received nothing but refusals. Finally, a short, thin man, well past middle age, approached the farmer.

“Are you a good farm hand?” the farmer asked him. Well, I sleep when the wind blows, answered the little man. Although puzzled by this answer, the farmer, desperate for help, hired him. The little man worked well around the farm, busy from dawn to dusk, and the farmer felt satisfied with the man’s work.

Then one night the wind howled loudly in from offshore. Jumping out of bed, the farmer grabbed a lantern and rushed next door to the hired hand’s sleeping quarters. He shook the little man and yelled, “Get up! A storm is coming! Tie things down before they blow away!” The little man rolled over in bed and said firmly, “No sir. I told you, I sleep when the wind blows.”

Enraged by the old man’s response, the farmer was tempted to fire him on the spot. Instead, he hurried outside to prepare for the storm. To his amazement, he discovered that all of the haystacks had been covered with tarpaulins. The cows were in the barn, the chickens were in the coops, and the doors were barred. The shutters were tightly secured. Everything was tied down. Nothing could blow away. The farmer then understood what his hired hand meant, and he returned to bed to also sleep while the wind blew.

~Author Unknown~

I love inspirational stories like this one and I hope you liked it too. I think of it when I hit a rough spot, when things don’t go the way I would like them to go. It compels me to push right through; it reminds me to not give up. Quitting is not an option, no matter what.  Because for one I don’t like the alternative, and two, I would like to sleep when the wind blows, meaning never have to worry about money ever again….And I’m not there yet.

So, how about you are you willing to do whatever it takes, so one day you don’t have to worry about money ever again? Make some noise in the comment section below. You know I always love your feedback.

To Your Massive Success!

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

No related posts.

Are you catering to the needy ?

When I first started out in the network marketing industry that’s exactly what I did. When my sponsor asked me to make a list of a hundred people I made sure I included everyone that I could think of who “needed the money” that a network marketing business can provide.

Boy was that ever the wrong way to go about building my business.

What I didn’t know at the time was that “needy” people don’t have the right attitude. They don’t have an entrepreneurial mindset. They think differently. Believe it or not, some of them are actually happy with what they have and where they are in their life. They are content with putting in their 8 to 10 hours a day at work and then go home and cuddle with a six-pack in front of the TV. That’s why it is so important to qualify your prospects.

Here I thought I was presenting them with a great opportunity to help better themselves and improve their lifestyle and for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why they didn’t bite.

Then “lucky” for me, there were those that went for the carrot I was dangling in front of them and did join my business. But only to sit there and do nothing. Those were the kind of do-it-for-me people.

How frustrating! Have you ever tried to push a wet spaghetti noodle?

No, those aren’t the right people for your network marketing business. You will save yourself a whole lot of frustration and risk of getting burned out if you keep away from people like that.

But how can you tell the difference?

How can you tell who’s right for your
network marketing  business?

If you don’t know the person the best way to find out more about him or her is to ask questions. What do they do? How long have they done it? Have they ever thought about doing anything else? Do they have any networking experience? You get the drift.

You can tell by the answers you get if they are a prospect for you or not. You want to look for people that are self-motivated, hard-working,  people who are able to think out of the box  and are self-starters. People who read instead of watching TV, people who better themselves through personal development. Those are the people who are right for your network marketing business.

“Rich people have small TVs and big libraries, and poor people have small libraries and big TVs.”  ―Zig Ziglar

This post was inspired by Oliver Tausend’s Facebook status up date from this morning. Oliver is a very good friend of mine and a fellow network marketer. If you’ve never been to his blog you are missing some incredible content….AskOliverTausend.com. Thanks, Oliver, for the great inspiration!

“Give the person with a need…a job. Give the person with a desire…an opportunity.” -Tom ‘Big Al’ Schreiter

You know I always love your feedback. So please add your thoughts below in the comment section. Maybe you have some other tips on finding the right people for your network marketing business.

To Your Massive Success!

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

Related posts:

1. 31 Killer Quotes about Networking and Network Marketing
2. 5 Things to Look For Before Joining a Particular MLM Team

You can’t just take the day off just because your biorythm chart says…

“Intellectual: The period of creativity is over. Your brain is in standby mode.”

Stand-by mode???? What in blazes do you mean? My brain can’t be in “stand-by mode.” Today is blog writing day. I NEED my brain!

That’s what I was faced with this morning.

Ha, stand-by mode, I’ll show you. I work right through this flippin’ stand-by mode.

What is a biorhythm anyway?

According to Wikipedia biorhythm is an attempt to predict various aspects of a person’s life through simple mathematical cycles. Most scientists believe that the idea has no more predictive power than raw chance, and consider the concept an example of pseudoscience.

Hmmm, interesting!

But whether it is fact or fiction, have you ever noticed that your mind as well as your body is on some sort of roller coaster? It goes up and down. You have good days and not so good days.  Maybe it has something to do with the moon. Close to full moon you find a lot more loonies out there than usual. They also say that more babies are born during that time.

I don’t know if all this is true, but what I do know is, that on some days I have more energy than others. And on some days I am more creative than others. And other days I’m more emotional.  It’s gotta have to do with something. Might as well blame it on the biorythm.

Does this biorythm thing work?

My husband swears by it. The first time I heard about this was about 30 years ago when I was dating Randy. He used to draw out his biorythm by hand and then plan his activities accordingly. Quite frankly, I thought he was nuts back then. However, I’ve come to realize that his biorythm “theory” worked pretty accurately for him.

When he was studying for his first Master’s degree we lived in Ft. Huachuaca, Arizona.  Right smack in the middle of the desert. Like clockwork it would get dark around 3 o’clock in the afternoon during monsun season and storms would be rolling through. You never knew when the lights would go out. I don’t ever remember that many power outages happening again.

We had just become the parents of a bouncing baby boy and Randy wrote his papers on an electric typewriter. (Remember those?) He almost religiously used to draw out his biorythm to figure out when his intellectual curve was up and then he wrote and studied as much as he could before the lights went out again. Oh yes, we also had a manual typewriter stand by just in case.

Randy is a firm believer that this biorhythm thing works. It’s always been working for him. I have to admit, I still don’t pay that much attention to it, but maybe I should. As I will be digging deeper into building a business with my husband again I can’t afford “off days” and I also need to plan out things better than I previously have. I can no longer afford to leave things to chance.

If this biorhythm thing really works I can schedule important things around peak days and the not so important things to off days.  I’ll be trying this out. What do you think, care to join me?

Here are two sources I found that let you draw out your biorhythm:

http://cycletourist.com/biochart/

http://www.bio-chart.com/

So, do you believe in biorythm? Are you using it to determine your highs and your lows? Please share your thoughts with us in the comments below.

To Your Massive Success!

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

P.S. How’s THAT for stand-by mode, lol?

No related posts.

Why is it that people who belong to a great MLM team do so much better than those who don’t?

Let’s face it, humans are social animals. We like to belong to something, be it a club, a tribe a community, family, team, whatever. We just do better. Yes we even thrive, when we are in a group together with other like-minded people.

“Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision.
The ability to direct individual accomplishments
toward organizational objectives.
It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.”

So, what is a (MLM) team?

A “MLM team” or any team for that matter, consists of a group of individuals with different strengths and weaknesses, working together to achieve a common goal.

I went over some of this already in an early blog post…“Why Is Teamwork Important for Your Network Marketing Success?”

So, even when we build our own home business, we don’t want to do it alone. We want to do it together with others who encourage, inspire and motivate us.

Of course the precursor to finding a great MLM Team is to join up with the right company first.

A company that resonates with you, whose products you love and which are unique, sizzle and are consumable.  A company with a compensation plan that is fair, easy to explain, and allows the average person to make money.

Once you have decided on the company that is right for you it’s time to find the right MLM team.

Qualities to look for in order to Find the
MLM Team of Your Dreams

• Who is the team leader? Does he or she exibit leadership qualities and is he or she the right kind of mentor for you, the one you feel can lead you to success? Don’t look for goo-roos they are often full of fluff. (I’m being kind here.) A true leader doesn’t lead by words but by action.
• Is the team using a duplicable system and do you feel comfortable using it?It sometimes happens, that the team leader will dictate exactly how you will have to market your business in order to remain part of the team. If you break out of the mold and try something creative of your own, you’re toast.Trust me, this is NOT the kind of MLM team you want to be on. (Also read: “It’s Our Way or the Highway | Are You Experiencing Upline Horror?”)You want to find a team where you get GUIDANCE on what to do and how to do it, but you still have the freedom to be creative and try some of your own marketing strategies. This is especially important because one day, you are going to be the leader your team will look up to and they want to keep their freedom to try some of their own techniques as well.
• Is there enthusiasm within the team? I don’t mean ra-ra-shish-ka-bob, rather genuine excitement and a positive attitude. Excitement is contagious; you want to catch that virus because the people you will be talking to about your business, your potential team mates, will sense that and who wouldn’t want to be part of a team of excited and fun people?
• How about the over-all team atmosphere? Are team members getting along or is there cliquing going on? Are team members supporting each other? Is there a sense of sharing ideas, strategies, experiences a sense of genuinely helping each other?
• What about team training? Are there exclusive team calls, webinars, product training, prospecting training, personal development training and/or help on how to use company or third party tools? What about help with 3-ways calls? All this is very, very important. The more you can learn from and with your team members the better. We are all motivated, (I hope at least) but learning together in a healthy team environment is so much more fun than learning alone.

Is it really possible to find a MLM Team like that?

Absolutely! I know it is. If you can find all these qualities on one single team, then my friend you’ve hit the jackpot like Randy and I have.  But even if you only find 4 of the 5 consider yourself very lucky.

Yes, there are teams out there just like that, encouraging, nurturing, lifting each other up, celebrating each others little and big successes and genuinely caring about every single person on the team. You don’t have to be the “Lone Ranger,” you  just have to do your homework.

I sincerely hope that you will find the MLM Team of your dreams, one that will help guide and support you and lead you to the lifestyle you desire and so truly deserve.

To Your Massive Success!

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

Related posts:

1. Who Are You Catering to in Your Network Marketing Business?

Most of you who are my regulars know how much I love quotes. I leave quotes everywhere. Here on my blog, in the comments I leave at my blogging friends’ blogs, on my Facebook Wall. Just everywhere I go I seem to leave a trail of quotes.

When I checked my first report at Tynt, a service I just recently installed that helps keep visitors on my site longer and improve my SEO, I found out that one of the most popular keyword phrases that people used to find my blog was “networking quotes.” (By the way, thanks to Adrienne Smith for writing a very informational post about this service….“How to Get Others to Build Your Links”)

I thought, wouldn’t that make an interesting topic? So, hence this post.

As network marketers we know that without networking and adding new people to our team on a continuous and consistent basis we have no business at all.

So I went out into cyber space and did a little research to find quotes about networking as well as network marketing quotes. And this is what I came up with ….

First some Quotes about Networking

• Robert Kiyosaki says, “The richest people in the world look for and build networks, everyone else looks for work.”
• “If you want to go somewhere, it is best to find someone who has already been there.” -Robert Kiyosaki
• “It’s all about people. It’s about networking and being nice to people and not burning any bridges.” -Mike Davidson
• “The bigger your rolodex, the bigger your business.” -Anonymous
• “The currency of real networking is not greed but generosity.” -Keith Ferrazzi
• “It isn’t just what you know, and it isn’t just who you know. It’s actually who you know, who knows you, and what you do for a living.” -Bob Burg, Best-selling Author of Endless Referrals and The Go Giver
• “Position yourself as a center of influence, the one who knows the movers and shakers. People will respond to that, and you’ll soon become what you project.” -Bob Burg
• “The successful networkers I know, the ones receiving tons of referrals and feeling truly happy about themselves, continually put the other person’s needs ahead of their own.” -Bob Burg
• “I like to define networking as cultivating mutually beneficial, give-and-take, win-win relationships… The end result may be to develop a large and diverse group of people who will gladly and continually refer a lot of business to us, while we do the same for them.” –Bob Burg
• “Networking is an essential part of building wealth.” -Armstrong Williams
• “A friendship founded on business is better than a business founded on friendship.” John D. Rockefeller

As network marketers we often run into doubters, dream stealers, yes even ridicule. So we need inspiration, encouragement, approval and assurance. We need those bigger than us strengthening us in our belief that we are in the right place doing the right thing for US.

And who better to listen to and look up to than those who are successful and have inspired millions before us.

So here are some
Network Marketing Quotes I came across…

Some of these I have quoted in blog posts, on my Facebook Page or on Twitter before.

• “Of all the entrepreneurial opportunities available today, one of the most important is direct selling, also called network marketing.” — Paul Zane Pilzer, Famous Economist and Best-selling Author
• “If I had to do it all over again, rather than build an old style type of business, I would have started building a network marketing business.” -Robert Kiyosaki, Investor, Entrepreneur and Best-selling Author.
• “Network marketing gives people the opportunity, with very low risk and very low financial commitment, to build their own income-generating asset and acquire great wealth.” -Robert Kiyosaki
• “Network marketing is the fastest growing business model in the world today.” -Robert Kiyosaki
• “If you are a person with big dreams and would love to support others in achieving their big dreams, then the network marketing business is definitely a business for you. You can start your business part-time at first and then as your business grows, you can help other people start their part-time business. This is a value worth having – a business and people who help others make their dreams come true.” -Robert Kiyosaki
• “Take responsibility for your finances or get used to taking orders for the rest of your life. You’re either a master of money or a slave to it. Your choice.” -Robert Kiyosaki
• “I am often asked if Network Marketing is a Pyramid Scheme. My reply is that corporations really are pyramid schemes. A corporation has only one person at the top, generally the CEO, and everyone else below.” -Donald Trump, American Business Magnate and Co-author of “Why We Want You To Be Rich”
• “Network marketing is based purely on relationship selling, which is the state of the art in selling today. Small and large companies throughout the country and the world are realizing that individuals selling to their friends and associates is the future of sales, because the critical element in buying is trust.” — Brian Tracy, Author and Motivational Speaker
• “No one lives long enough to learn everything they need to learn starting from scratch. To be successful, we absolutely, positively have to find people who have already paid the price to learn the things that we need to learn to achieve our goals.” -Brian Tracy
• “All successful people men and women are big dreamers. They imagine what their future could be, ideal in every respect, and then they work every day toward their distant vision, that goal or purpose.” -Brian Tracy
• “Nothing happens until somebody sells something.”  -Mary Kay Ash, Founder and CEO of Mary Kay Cosmetics
• “Success in this industry is not in finding the right person, but in becoming the right person.” –Dr. Forrest Shaklee, Founder of Shaklee
• “I would rather earn 1% off a 100 people’s efforts than 100% of my own efforts.”  -J. Paul Getty, American Industrialist
• “Every single successful entrepreneur I know has studied and accumulated information on their industry that is the equivalent of a Master`s or PHD”. ~Mike Dillard
• “Don’t let the opinions of the average man sway you. Dream, and he thinks you’re crazy. Succeed, and he thinks you’re lucky. Acquire wealth, and he thinks you’re greedy. Pay no attention. He simply doesn’t understand.” -Robert G. Allen, Businessman, Financial Writer, Real Estate Investor and Motivational Speaker
• “No matter what your product is, you are ultimately in the education business. Your customers need to be constantly educated about the many advantages of doing business with you, trained to use your products more effectively, and taught how to make never-ending improvements in their lives.” –Robert G. Allen
• “Take action every day. It doesn’t have to be dramatic action, but every day, stick with it. Spend time on things that make you proud, that stretch and strengthen you.” -Phillip Humbert
• “Win with your heart, not your head – win on emotion, not in logic; have a passion about what you do; nobody wants a boss , everybody wants a coach.” -Art Williams, Founder of Primerica Financial Services
• “Don’t wish things were easier, wish you were better.” –Jim Rohn
• “Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune”. _Jim Rohn

I hope these quotes about networking and network marketing soothed your network marketer’s soul and gave you the lift, inspiration, motivation and encouragement you need to keep going.

“Never give up!”

To your massive success!

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

Related posts:

1. Who Are You Catering to in Your Network Marketing Business?
2. How do you overcome fear?

Imagine for a moment…

You are a Grammy Award winning musician who has played for royalty and sold-out audiences around the world. You normally get paid over $1,000 dollars per minute, but because of a few marketing mistakes you only earn $32 for a 45 minute performance.

This really happened.

Fortunately it didn’t happen by accident, but was an experiment conducted by The Washington Post in 2007.

What was the purpose of this experiment?

To find out if people when they are busy and distracted would notice that something special is taking place, would they be paying attention?

Grammy Award winner Joshua Bell, one of the most talented musicians in the world, was to play a 45 minute concert in a D.C. subway station at the most busiest time of the day –early morning.  This wasn’t an ordinary street musician. People would fly all over the world to listen to him play. He even played in front of royalty and sold millions of CDs.

On this particular morning he was playing one of the most elegant pieces ever written and he was playing it on a 300 year old Stradivarius valued at $3.5 million dollars and often referred to as the most perfect instrument in existence today.

Watch this! You won’t believe what happened.

Joshua Bell played for 45 minutes. Over 1,000 people walked by him, not even giving him the time of day. Only 7 people stopped to listen.

That would normally have been a $45,000 performance. Instead he only earned $32.

Wow!

From over a thousand people who walked by, there was only one single person who recognized him and said hello. That’s incredible, given his talent and fame!

That’s less than a 1% conversion ratio.

There is a valuable lesson to be learned here about marketing mistakes.

Although this experiment wasn’t meant as a marketing lesson in particular, there’s one in there. A big one! From a marketing point of view, Joshua Bell’s concert in the subway was a complete and absolute disaster.

1) First, his timing was totally off.

At morning rush hour, people are preoccupied and busy. They have only one thing on their mind…their destination, which usually is work.

2) He performed for the wrong target market.

People in a subway usually aren’t the right audience for classical music. And if there were a select few, like the lady who recognized him, they certainly wouldn’t expect a musician of such magnitude as Joshua Bell to perform a concert there. He was totally out of place.

3) No branding.

Nobody knew who he was. No signs, no flyers, no posters, no announcements or third party introductions. Nothing!

What can you learn from these marketing mistakes?

1) Timing is everything!

People are busy. Your fellow networkers are busy. So if you want their undivided attention you have to give some thought to when the best time for your marketing will be.

According to 60 Second Marketer the best day of the week to send out email campaigns is Friday. What a coincidence, I have found this to be the best day to send out blog posts as well.

2) You have to target the right market for your product or service.

Just revisit the example above. Out of over 1,000 people, only 1 person recognized Joshua Bell. If you market to the masses, you will yield the same results.  Not good and very expensive on top of it.

Think about the junk mail that comes through your inbox or in your postal mail box. It is clearly not targeted to a specific niche, is it? It’s a total waste of advertising dollars. You have a much greater chance of making a sale if you target a specific niche, people who search for and want your products or service.

3) Branding is key!

If you want to be successful in your network marketing business then branding is Key. For one, you want to differentiate yourself from your competition. Stand out from the crowd! Be different. Make a name for yourself. You are uniquely YOU and you want to convey that to your audience with your unique selling point.

In time, people will get to know you and connect with you because you have what they want. They will recognize you by your brand and they will recommend and refer you to others.

Do you agree that making these 3 marketing mistakes can absolutely be fatal for your business? I always love your feedback so please leave your thoughts in the comments below.

To Your Success…

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

P.S. If you liked this post and found it of value, please share it with your friends using the share buttons at the top and to the left. Thank You!

No related posts.

I have known Mavis for about a year now and have learned a great deal from her about blogging and marketing online. Giving must be her middle name, because she always provides great value without asking for anything in return. A true Go-Giver!

So I dedicate today’s blog post to my good friend Mavis Nong. It is with great gratitude that I thank her for all she has been doing and continues to do for me as well as many others around the world.

Whether she knows it or not she has been a tremendous blessing to me over the past and especially during the past view weeks as I have learned a lot from her about improving my blog and how to reach higher rankings in search engines.

With this, I would like thank Mavis by giving back to her, as well as introduce her to those of my readers who may not know her yet.

Mavis is THE authority as far as optimizing your blog for the search engines. On her blog “Attraction Marketing Online” you can find tons of information about online marketing strategies, and amazing blogging tips to help you build a successful business online.

And that’s not all …Mavis also just started a new series called “Ask Mavis” where you can ask her any burning questions you may have about blogging and she will answer them for you. How cool is that? I tried that just the other day and Mavis answered my question about how to get indexed by Google.

With things constantly changing on the worldwide web it’s hard to keep up. Mavis however, seems to be always on top of things.

So be sure to head over to “Attraction Marketing Online” and bookmark it as I’m sure you will not want to miss any of the great information there.

Trust me, Mavis Nong’s blog is a very valuable resource and if you follow her suggestions you will be well on your way of having a successful blog yourself.

Mavis, a heartfelt thanks for all you have done! You are a true inspiration and I am very blessed to have you as my friend. Wishing you a bright and successful future!

Be blessed,

Ilka
The Enlightened Networker

P.S. Please tweet, bookmark and share this. Thank You!

Related posts:

1. 7 Value-Packed Internet Marketing Blog Posts I Had to Share with You

So what’s the difference?

Let me ask the same question a different way. Would you rather get paid for your own time and efforts or receive a share of other people’s time and efforts?

Let’s look at a couple of LINEAR income examples first:

If you have a job and get paid hourly wages, that’s called linear income. You put in your time and you get paid for the hours you work. If you have a day off or you are sick you don’t get paid. Doctors, lawyers or anyone who is self-employed earns a linear income as well. If a doctor doesn’t see patients or goes on vacation, he doesn’t get paid.

Now let’s take a look at some examples of RESIDUAL income:

Elvis made a lot of records during his lifetime.  Although he’s been dead for a long time now, every time one of his songs plays on the radio his family still receives “royalties.”

The same goes for movie stars. Regardless of how long ago they made the movie, every time it plays on TV or is sold on a DVD they receive royalties for it. Just like Elvis, they get paid over and over for it forever.

You may ask, …”Well how does earning residual income
vs linear income relate to me??”

If you have a MLM home based business you are creating a “royalty income” aka “residual income” of your own. You do something once, like acquiring a new customer for your company, and you will get paid on that customer as long as he or she stays with you. Every time that customer places an order, you get paid a percentage.

You can also leverage your time and efforts by inviting people to join your team and teach them to do the same … acquiring new customers for your company. Then you also get paid a percentage on their efforts.

Residual income happens when this royalty income starts to grow. Let’s say your customers love your products so much they start telling their family and friends and they all become your customers too. And then they in turn tell all of their friends as well. That’s kind of like how AOL grew so big so fast. Word of mouth is the fastest and most cost effective way of acquiring new customers.

Once this happens, things take on a life of their own. You can’t stop your business from growing, even if you tried.  When you’re sick or on vacation your business just keeps growing as one happy customer tells another.

Now, that’s the difference between trading time for money like with linear income, where you work a certain number of hours and get paid for those hours. And residual income where you do something once and get paid for it over and over again and also where you leverage your time with others.

Again, the question … would you rather earn residual income or linear income?

If you answered RESIDUAL INCOME than I would suggest you start working on that. Start today! You can do it part-time while you are still earning a linear income from your job.  Commit a certain amount of hours to work your network marketing business every week.  Set realistic goals. Remember, you eat an elephant one bite at a time. Be consistent. Be patient. And never, ever give up.

No related posts.

How Big is Your WHY?

When you started in your mlm home based business, one of the first things your sponsor probably told you was to establish “Your WHY,” the reason you are doing whatever it is you are doing. You’ve got to have the desire. You’ve got to have passion. You’ve got to dream and you’ve got to believe you can do it.

It is very important to find out what your “WHY” is, because there will be times when things get tough, when you get frustrated and discouraged. And if your “WHY” isn’t strong enough you might not have the drive to go through when things get rough.

If your “WHY” isn’t strong enough you also might never get started in the first place … which reminds me of a little story I heard not long ago.

The Story of the Howling Dog Sitting on the Porch

A salesman was going door to door in a neighborhood where just about on every porch there was a dog either sitting or just lying around enjoying the day.  They would all bark to greet him as the man walked by. But on this one particular porch there would be a dog just whimpering and whining and howling like he was in some sort of pain. Every time the man walked by that dog would just whine and howl and it just wouldn’t stop. He couldn’t figure out why it wouldn’t just bark like all the other dogs in the neighborhood.

So after a week curiosity got the better of him and he couldn’t stand it any longer. He walked up to the porch and knocked on the door.  An older gentleman opened and asked if he could help him. The man said, “Sir, is there something wrong with your dog?   Every time I come by here he’s just moaning and groaning, whimpering and whining. It’s been going on for an entire week. He should be barking like all the other dogs on the street, but all he does is just moaning and groaning. What’s wrong with him?

“Well, he’s actually sitting on a nail“, the owner replied.  Quite puzzled the salesman asked, “Why is he sitting on a nail and why doesn’t he just get off?”  The owner replied, “Well, it just doesn’t hurt him bad enough.”

A lot of us get caught up in that situation. We’re sitting on a nail, but it doesn’t hurt bad enough yet. Our situation doesn’t make us uncomfortable enough to do something about it. To change things. But if our “WHY” is strong enough and if we really want it with every fiber of our being, it will move us off of that nail and make us take action.

Think about “YOUR WHY”. Better yet, write it down. Studies show that if we are just thinking about something, we have a 50/50 chance of accomplishing whatever we think about. However if we think about it and then write it down it jumps up to 75%. If we think about it, write it down and then tell somebody else that jumps up to 85%. Pretty powerful, isn’t it? So make sure you write your “WHY” down.

Why did you get started in your mlm home based business?

Of course “YOUR WHY” would be unique to you, but here are some examples…

Maybe you would like to pay off your car? Pay off credit cards? Buy a new, larger house? Send your kids to college? Bring your spouse home to be with your children? Quit your job? Maybe you are about to lose your home to foreclosure and desperately need to make some extra money to keep it. Now that would definitely move you off of that nail, wouldn’t it?

If your WHY is big enough, powerful enough it will not only move you off of that nail, but it will also provide you with enough motivation to keep going when things get rough.

To Your Success!

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

No related posts.

What is a Pyramid Scheme?

According to Wikipedia… A “pyramid scheme” is a non-sustainable business model that involves promising participants payment, services or ideals, primarily for enrolling other people into the scheme or training them to take part, rather than supplying any real investment or sale of products or services to the public.

People often label MLM or Network Marketing, which is absolutely legal, as nothing but a pyramid scheme. However, a pyramid scheme is based solely on recruiting new people and no product or service is involved. That is illegal.

With a legitimate MLM or Network Marketing company the emphasis is on selling products or services, not on recruiting.

Where a lot of people get confused is, when you draw out the organization structure of any MLM or Network Marketing company it looks like a pyramid. So they conclude that the people at the top make all of the money and you have to get in early to even stand a chance of making any money at all.

That is not so.

Unlike with traditional businesses every person has an equal chance to make as much money as they desire in their network marketing business. How much that is depends on how much effort they put into it. If you put in more effort than the person above you, you can make more money than he or she does.

“According to the US Department of Labor and the Direct Selling Association with the same time and effort I’m five times more likely to earn over $100.000 in Network Marketing than in my life-sucking job.” (Quote from video below.)

How come traditional companies aren’t labeled a pyramid scheme. If you draw out the organization structure of a traditional company it looks much like a pyramid as well. It’s kind of not fair, is it?

Go ahead, draw out the organizational structure of the (traditional) company you work for and see what it looks like. And while you’re at it, go ahead and do the same for any other organization as well. What do they look like? Oh no, it’s a pyramid scheme!

Question: Would authorities like Robert Kiyosaki, New York Times Best-Selling Author of one of the top-selling financial books of all time; Donald Trump, and Warren Buffet, the most successful investor of all time be supporters of Network Marketing if it was illegal? I really don’t think so. Yet they are, because the see it as the brilliant business model that it really is.

If you have a MLM, Network Marketing business you’ll get a kick out of the video below. If you are thinking of joining this industry it will shed some light on the myth that multi-level marketing is a pyramid scheme. It definitely is NOT!

Enjoy!

To Your Success!

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

P.S. If you got a good laugh out of this please re-tweet and share it with your Facebook friends. Don’t forget to leave your comments below. Thank You!

No related posts.