Im sure every person reading this knows at least one person working this type of business: Network Marketing, aka Multi-Level Marketing, aka Direct Sales, most commonly misdiagnosed as (gasp!) the dreaded PYRAMID SCHEME.
That dreaded, snakey, salesy business that everyone seems to be joining. Scripted, unauthentic, and a lazy man’s (or woman’s) job, right? This business draws in everyone, from the stay at home mom to the retired realtor. Everyone seems to be trying to find a product they love that they can sell to their family and friends. What’s more, they’re convinced they’ll get rich.
What a bunch of chumps, right?!
WRONG.
Now, before you roll your eyes and close your browser, please hear me out.
Because I’m about to shed some major light on these popular assumptions.
The Assumption: Network Marketing is an illegal pyramid scheme.
The Reality: An illegal pyramid scheme has no products or services. People are paid and according to the number of recruits they enroll. Legal network marketing programs offer products or services that are sold to consumers.
The Assumption: You have to recruit business partners in order to make a good income.
The Reality: You can make a great income just selling products! Not everyone wants to recruit a team, and with the networking company I work for, you don’t have to.
The Assumption: Only the top dogs make money.
The Reality: In good network marketing companies, your team is structured like a family tree, and each member of the family has the ability to surpass their family member in both title and earnings. There’s no polilitics, favoritism, or funny business going on like we see in traditional corporate America. With network marketing, there is an equal opportunity for success.
The Assumption: You have to cold call people or bug your family and friends.
The Reality: You certainly can, but you don’t have to. I have found that the best success I have had in my networking marketing business is from authentic sharing and word of mouth.
The Assumption: Eventually the program will get saturated.
The Reality: Saturation just isn’t possible. Tim Sales, in Zig Ziglar’s Network Marketing for Dummies, said it best: “Do you know anyone who doesn’t have a refrigerator? No? That doesn’t stop GE from selling more of them.”
I rest my case with this one.
The Assumption: The Business Structure of Network Marketing doesn’t work.
The Reality: The company I work with displays proof that it does. This company’s products were first sold in high-end retail stores such as Nordstrom and Nieman Marcus, and while there, they were the #1 seller in their category. Knowing it was word of mouth bringing in new customers, they decided to pull out of brick and mortar and CHOSE network marketing as their new business model.
And then, they became a billion dollar company, all the while maintaining their #1 spot in line.
My friends, this business model is legit, and the reason people are joining companies that have this business model is because they understand something really important: the world is changing. How we shop, communicate, and work is changing. Brick and mortar stores are running out of business, so they are either closing completely or keeping an online only business. Huge industry disrupters are taking over the world of retail as we know it. For example, Amazon doesn’t have a brick and mortar store…Uber doesn’t own any cars…AirB&B doesn’t own any hotels. And the list goes on and on.
The best network marketing companies, such as mine, are also industry disrupters because they understand this as well. Their representatives do not need to stock inventory, their businesses can be run entirely from their computer or smart phone, and their office is an online back office. All orders are placed there and shipped directly to customers.
The problem most of us have with the idea of network marketing is a result of the fact that we have been taught to look for jobs, but opportunities.
The world is changing. The way people work is changing. The way people shop is changing.
I’m just happy I get it.
