This article is credited to the Harvard Business School.

Network Marketing is being taught at more than 200 colleges, including Harvard Business School.  After Extensive research into the network marketing industry, Harvard Business School developed three criteria that a network marketing company must have in order to make it a most desirable opportunity. They are as follows:

1) The company must be at least 18 months old.

2) The company must have a product that is highly consumable. Having a product that is highly consumable means repeated sales, thereby guaranteeing customer loyalty versus a one-time sale and having to source new customers.

3) It needs to be a “ground floor opportunity”. Harvard Business School suggests that in order for the opportunity to qualify as ground floor the number of existing reps must be less than 1% of the total population of the country where the company is operating. In the United States, this figure is equal to 1.5 million people. If the company has less than 100,000 distributors, Harvard Business School considers it to be ONCE-IN-A-LIFETIME opportunity.

In addition, Harvard Business School states there are four distinct stages of growth in a network marketing company.   They are as follows:

1) Foundation- This usually last approximately six months and is when a company develops its products and marketing plan.

2) Concentration-This period lasts approximately 2 to 4 years from when the distributor network is started.

3) Momentum- This period lasts 2-4 years also. This is when the company experiences phenomenal growth and distributorships’ businesses explode. It is during this period that the company virtually sweeps the nation. When a company’s sales reach 50 million, it reaches what is called critical mass(Sales go vertically right off the graph)

For example, when Herbalife reached $50 million, sales jumped to $151 million in only 12 months and they added over 800,000 new distributors to their organization. Say an organization is producing a bonus check in the amount of $1,000.00 per month. When the company reaches critical mass, distributors automatically experience a 10 fold increase in their earnings. In other words a $1,000.00 check per month becomes $10,000.00 per month. This is the reason for getting involved on the ground floor, so you will experience the benefits of explosive growth

4) Stability- This is the period that lasts for the life of the company. A network marketing company that is dedicated to the success of its distributors will experience longevity, thereby insuring that an active distributorship will realize continued earnings growth

So, based on this data, the people that are preaching about waiting until a company is 4 years old lose out on the true, high dollar positions.  If you are NOT in by year 4, you will make money BUT the upline makes SUBSTANTIALLY more money…because of their position.

NOW… do you need another reason to get in??

GET IN NOW:  http://CB.MLMIntegrityMarketing.com

Many conversations have occurred on the concentration factor required to be successful in network marketing. Numerous articles have been written and published on why people fail in network marketing. The net effect of all of this attention is that this subject has been researched, dissected, and preached about.  Although many items occur on the list of distractions, the largest culprit or automatic income reducer appears to be somewhat unanimous and that is the television.

How the term, the automatic income reducer, was derived is really not important and who ultimately coined the word is hard to distinguish but it is an excellent term. What the term represents is one of the reasons that people struggle in network marketing. This term presents an idea that causes people not to concentrate on building their business because they are distracted.

So, is this term hype or is there really something with sustenance here?

Depending on whom you discuss this topic with, many different opinions surface.  The best discussion I have heard comes from Cedrick Harris of Team Takeover Marketing Inc.  His take on this topic is quite interesting. He believes most of the people struggling in network marketing do so because of a very simple calculation. In Cedrick’s opinion, people that have a large number of televisions and / or very large televisions in their home seem to struggle in network marketing.

In Cedrick’s opinion, many people with large televisions and / or a large quantity of televisions in their homes. Unfortunately, every hour that a marketer spends in front of the television is an hour that they are probably not spending on their marketing or their marketing education. Presuming that the average marketer spends 2 hours per day watching television works out to 56 hours per month or 672 hours per year.  Imagine what could be added to a marketer’s knowledge if those 672 hours were devoted to marketing training.  The thought is mind boggling.

Cedrick has a unique point of view concerning televisions and the struggling network marketer.  He believes that the total horizontal inches of televisions in the home should equal the total horizontal inches of marketing training materials in the home. For instance, if there are three 42 inch televisions, that would be 126 inches of television.  If the marketer would have 126 inches of marketing material, that would be a quite large book shelf.  A quick walk through the house would determine if, in fact, that book shelf existed. Very seldom will that book shelf be found.

A different but similar fact seems to put validity into this discussion.  For years, research on wealthy individuals has proven that these people, almost without exception, have large reading libraries in their homes. It appears that the larger the library, the wealthier the people seem to be. Here in lies the eternal “chicken and egg” question, did they person become wealthy because they read many books or did they read the books to become wealthy?  The answer seems rhetorical but the result is the same.  Large numbers of books in a personal library USUALLY equal large amounts of wealth.

So, according to some of the current theories, if you want to be successful in network marketing, get rid of your televisions.  OK, not all of them, but if you have a large horizontal total of televisions, they are probably hurting your marketing.  Decreasing the time in front of the television will allow you to put more hours into your marketing and marketing training, which will increase your marketing income.

So, turn off your automatic income reducer, the television. Get the training material out of the pile and continue to increase your marketing education. Your wallet will appreciate the extra padding. Need some training material, go to: http://www.MLMIntegrityMarketing.com

According to a recent survey, over 80% of the population is committing a serious lifestyle error. They are banking their entire livelihood on a single income. If that one income stream is disrupted, they will face a serious financial situation.

Throughout history, many financial experts has extolled the need for financial diversity.  They understood the risks of only having a single source of income and have written many books and articles explaining that risk.  Unfortunately, a large percentage of the world still doesn’t understand diversifying. They understand the concept but are afraid to deviate from the status quo for fear of alienating their friends and family.

Many of the decisions people make throughout their lives are predicated on their upbringing. They have been taught to do what their leaders (parents and grandparents) are doing and not to try new, risky adventures. This concept has its roots in early creatures where survival of the individual was necessary the good of the group. The larger the group, the better the chances of surviving an attack from predators or other clans.

The risk of this style of upbringing is that new concepts are considered exceptionally risky, whether they are or not. Because the clan dictates what is acceptable and unacceptable, new thoughts are quickly ridiculed and dismissed. It takes an unusual amount of effort and fortitude to survive the efforts of the clan to kill an idea. Not that the idea is good or bad, it’s just different and that is unacceptable.

In today’s world, that used to mean working a job for 30 or 40 years and retiring. People who moved between jobs who called job-hoppers and usually felt the wrath of the clan. They were ridiculed for failing to stay in that one position, like their ancestors did. Whether they were able to improve their lifestyle was irrelevant. They were different and that was not acceptable.

People who worked in direct sales seemed to be the people that were disliked the most. Because of the quantity of true scam artists, the salesman was considered a scam artist whether he was legitimate or not. These salesmen, because of their nature, were also people that understood the benefit of having multiple products to sell.  That way they almost always had something of interest to everyone. This allowed them to make a sale when other people that didn’t have multiple products would walk away empty handed.

As sales and marketing evolved, these people taught their protégés the way they were  selling and how to incorporate that thought process into their lives. As this passed from generation to generation, more and more people began to understand the financial benefits of having these multiple income sources. At some point, this process came to be called multiple streams of income.

Unfortunately, because this concept is different from the traditional, single income source, many people today still don’t understand.  They don’t understand that multiple income streams will allow fluctuations in the market to occur without impacting the total income. The more streams of income that exist, the better the chance of having your lifestyle survive market changes. You don’t have to panic because something changes.  You also have less financial risk of being laid off or downsized because you are not dependant one only one income source.

The vast majority of today’s marketers have been taught to develop multiple income streams for the reasons listed above. In review, they will have a more stable financial picture. They usually will develop a larger gross income. They tend to have a standard of living that is higher than the people around them.  Usually they will be risk takers, chasing the new opportunities that come on the market to try to grab their piece of the pie before it gets out to the masses.

Today’s marketers are living in the best financial times.  They have the opportunity, and because of online marketing, the total number of opportunities available is almost mind boggling. Any marketer that does not have at least three different income streams is missing the boat.  Only marketing a single product or service is grossly inefficient and limits their total income potential.  As with the true direct salesman, the more products one can offer, the better the chance of putting money in your pocket.

If you don’t have multiple income streams of income, it’s time to get with the program.  Your financial health is at risk.  To add a new income stream, go to: http://www.Millionaire-Marketing-Plan.com If you are interested in adding new life and marketing to your existing business, Bill can help at: http://www.MLMIntegrityMarketing.com

For years people have direct marketed to potential customers by randomly distributing business cards. Sometimes, they would “drop” the cards so that someone would pick up the card to see what was on it. Usually these cards would have something on them to make the bystander curious about the card so they would pick it up.

Recently, a new version of the dropcard has become famous. The dropcard has been redesigned to look similar to currency but with an advertising message on the back of the card.  The most effective dropcards have been printed to resemble the look of a $100 dollar bill.  These bills have been very effective in many different strategies because they resemble US currency.

To make the dropcards very effective, there must be a compelling message on the card. This will cause enough curiosity so that the person picking up the card will take action on the message. What the message includes seems to be up for discussion on a regular basis but most marketers agree on several items.

First, the message on the dropcard must include a compelling call to action. The message needs to be short and precise so anyone reading the message will know exactly what to do. Typically, the message would be a short statement or question, such as, “You need to check this website NOW” or “Number 1 Home Based Business”.

Second, most messages are better if a phone number is not included on the dropcard. Although this may seem counter productive to many, not having a phone number forces the person with the card to log into the marketer’s system to have their curiosity resolved. This gives the marketer another chance to reinforce his message and to start to build some trust. It also provides more time for the prospect to review the marketer’s information before starting a conversation.

Third, the message on the dropcard must include a website for the prospect to review. Typically, this will be a page that presents an overview of the opportunity and a form to record the prospects contact information.  There is sometimes a phone number for contact since the prospect now has an idea of what product or service is being promoted.

Much has been written and discussed about the most effective marketing strategies for using dropcards but there appears to be a short list of the most effective strategies. These include: gas pump credit card slots, newspapers, tollbooths, clothing stores, and bookstores.  Each of these marketing areas require a specific technique to be effective.  All of these strategies can be implemented most anyplace in the country and are equally effective anyplace.

Now for the disclaimer.

Unfortunately, the dropcard techniques will not get you hundreds on leads everyday.  They will get you a steady, reliable stream of leads, of which most will be highly qualified since they took the time to track you down. These are the type of leads that you are looking for anyway. They will also understand how effective dropcard marketing is since they were discovered using the exact technique.

Unfortunately, most people will start out strong with the dropcards but slowly lose interest. The primary reason is that dropcard marketing is not high glamour.  It’s easy to lose interest since you are not getting the type of leads that you would with pay-per-click, for instance. However, you are also not paying the high cost of pay-per-click with a dropcard marketing strategy. Consistency will make this strategy pay well with time and the cost to get started is quite low.

This is truly a low cost marketing strategy that can be implemented by most everyone.

Order Your DropCards and  learn how to Market Your DropCards Effectively

OK,  Lets dig in…

*** The MAIN Reason Most People FAIL ***

LACK OF MARKETING TRAINING & SUPPORT.

It is ridiculous to think that bugging
your friends and family could be a solid
foundation for ANY business.

Why? Read the rest of this entry

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We have all seen the ads stating that they have the facts that show which companies are scams and which are not.  When you read through the site, you will see many facts and “testimonials” giving details about how unfair the business treats people. There are typically two or three graphically Read the rest of this entry

In traditional MLM companies, the marketing program hasn’t changed in years.

People who join an MLM opportunity are instructed to contact family and friends to “convince” them that this new opportunity is the answer to all of their financial problems. Next they are told to make a list of “acquaintances” Read the rest of this entry