Prospecting

Here is another email I received from another colleauge about prospecting

Greetings Paul,

I wanted to speak with you briefly on the subject of prospecting. You see, prospecting is the fuel that feeds a business. Turn off the prospecting, and you turn off the lifeblood of your business. Prospecting is what keeps the cash flow of a business viable and steady.

But how do you prospect for MLM business? What are you looking for when you prospect? What makes a person a "master prospector"?

Well, one of things that I do is lead with a product or service, not an opportunity.

The reasons I lead with the product or the service in an MLM business are many. They include:

1. You cannot separate yourself in the marketplace based on opportunity. Everyone has an opportunity, and in this day and age, the average 18 yr old has been hit over the head with so many opportunities that leading with your company's opportunity to earn compensation sounds just like all the other opportunities out there. Everyone has a way to get rich, which means that for you to sound halfway credible, you cannot lead with opportunity.

2. Retention rates increase dramatically when you lead with the product or service. You see, residual income means that you get paid later, not now. So when you are building a residual income foundation, it takes a little bit of time, and if a distributor signs up to market your product based on the potential to make a million bucks, then 3 months later when they're not making all the money they want, they quit. The only reason they were ever using the product in the first place was to get a paycheck.

3. People buy in the presence of expertise. What I am referring to is the concept of "positioning". Paul you simply cannot position yourself as an expert in the creation of wealth until you have actually created it. You see, if you are talking to somebody about making tons of money in your business, and you are leading your pitch with the opportunity to make money, and they see that you are NOT making a ton of money, it's over. It's like listening to a person that weights 700 lbs give you advice on staying in shape. There is a credibility issue there, and unless you have generated serious income with your business, you simply cannot effectively lead with your opportunity.

So...when you lead with the product, the reason a prospect is purchasing from you is to access a solution that your product provides them. Which means that if they do choose to market the product, then they won't quit while they are building the foundation for their business and they are waiting for the big bucks to start rolling in...because the whole reason they got involved in the first place was because they wanted the product or service. Both business builders and product users stay on the books longer...which means more income in your distribution channel.

So if you are leading with the product or service, how do you prospect?

When you do your prospecting, and you are leading with the product / service, you are looking for 2 key things in the prospect to determine if they would be a good fit for what you have:

1. They need to have pain - The best type of prospect that you could ever hope for is a prospect that is aware of a need for something else. For example, if you are marketing a health juice, you want to be talking to people who are actively aware that the type of health solution they are currently using isn't providing them with the benefits they are seeking. You don't want to convince them that they need what you have. You want to determine that they are already aware of a need, and if so, how you could help.

2. They need to have a desire - Have you ever heard the phrase "misery loves company"? Well here's a new one for ya: "sometimes, misery loves misery".

We all know people who, for whatever reason, seem to take pleasure in their pain. We have all had a friend that was involved with a relationship that was less than beneficial for them, but regardless, they stayed in the relationship. Well, if your prospect has given up all hope of fixing their pain, then there is nothing you can do for them.

So... if a prospect has pain, and a prospect has desire to fix that pain, then I simply show them how to get that done. I know that there are plenty of opinions out there on how to grow a business, but personally, I enjoy helping people to solve their pain much more than convincing them that they need what I have.

If you have a business, then go find some people to help! We live in world that is chock-full of pain. If your product has benefits, then go find the folks that are in need of those benefits, and help them out! Ease their pain. Make the world a better place.

If you don't have a clue where to start, don't worry, I'll talk about how to find people with pain in further emails. Stay tuned. I'll keep you posted.

Walking This Road With You,

Joshua Fuson
Business Growth Specialist