Network Marketing in a Global World
Traditionally, the Network Marketing industry has been won or lost based upon the amount of people you interact with on a frequent basis. Building up a network of good contacts has been an industry in its own right, and certainly there is no real substitute for working the contacts you have. If ever you decided to move businesses, the ability to broadcast to your network about your new initiative would be the only way to hit the ground running. But mostly this will require you to have met with everyone individually at least once.
The absolute master in my opinion on how to acheive this is Harvey Mackay whose legendary book Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty is unparalled in this space. In it he describes the concept that you should build up your network before you have cause to need it, and goes on to explain a foolproof method for actually acheiving this.
Yet this idea of regular interaction presumes that you have the ability to get face-to-face from time to time. Well, probably like you, my business model has a global reach, and I regularly work with people across the globe with little hope of ever actually meeting all of them. So what then?
I believe that the networking model is still as relevant, probably more so, only we have to work that little bit harder to get our relationships established. Internet-based communications make it a doddle to actually reach anyone we want to, but the ability to really ‘hit-it-off’ with someone takes a new skill set. You can tell a huge amount from someone within 3 seconds of actually coming into contact with them, You simply can’t get the same positive or negative feeling by reading 3 seconds of an email.
Networking in the Internet era therefore requires a new rule book. Programs like Skype allow you to video-conference with someone for little or no cost. So use it! Treat it as a business tool in the same way you would otherwise arrange a meeting. Use email and phone conversations to arrange a time to ‘meet’. And stick to it. OK, the picture may be a bit fuzzy occasionally, but the subconscious messages you both will pick up from each other will more than make up for any quality issues. Other tools such as Twitter and Facebook are great for then keeping up with developments in your network. More than anything however - networking when remote from your contacts will take more time. You have to understand that the ‘trust’ element, which can be almost instant when meeting someone, will take careful and continual work to get right.
When prospecting, this often starts with having to make a call to someone. If you are worried about calling a lead, and leading them through to a close (after all you want them to be part of your new, improved network) you could do worse than trying Mike Dillard’s Black Belt Recruiting program. For more details visit the site.
p.s. I recently discovered a web site that is dedicated to bringing together people in your local area. http://www.meetup.com is a fantastic tool for finding and joining groups of like-minded people.