In the good old days of MLM, the prevailing advice for getting a
newcomer off to fast start in their brand new, shiny business was this:
Get
a piece of paper and a pen and write down everyone you know — don’t
prejudge, just write down all the names of all the people you know —
your family, all your friends, relatives, high school teachers,
dentist, doctor, your kid’s teachers, your lawyer etc. Don’t stop until
you have at least 200 names.
If you asked why you were doing this
(as if you hadn’t guessed already!), your new sponsor just asked you to
relax and follow the process. Once your list was complete you were told
the good news — that you were going to contact everyone on this list
(your warm market) and offer them your fantastic opportunity — one by
one.
What do you think happened next? — the brave ones actually
did contact at least 5 people on their warm market list, but after 5
no’s and lots of rejection — they were beginning to wonder what they
had got themselves into and if this was really the business for them.
Now,
I know that many people still like to use this system of prospecting,
but I think that it is the WORST possible way to introduce an MLM
newcomer to this business. Why? These so-called warm market prospects:
family, friends and business associates are actually the hardest sell
of all for an MLM newbie. These people already have a pre-conceived
idea of who you are and they are often skeptical and negative when
approached in this manner. They did not solicit this attention from you
and the most common response you will get from a lot of people is the
dreaded question: “Is this one of those pyramid things?”
I think
a kinder and gentler approach is to teach your new recruits how to
prospect to people who actually are looking for a business opportunity
and let them practice their techniques on these strangers (cold market)
before they tackle the really tough warm market.
In the past the
warm market method was used by most experienced MLMer’s because it was
a holdover from other sales professions (insurance, investments, etc.)
and was a sales technique that had worked well for them. And it does
work, if you are an experienced sales person or if your sponsor is an
experienced sales person and is willing to help you do two on ones or
three ways calls with your prospects. But how many sponsors really are
capable of doing this for their new people?
The sad truth is that
this technique fails for the average person 9 out of 10 times and
leaves them with a very unfavorable impression of the MLM industry. In
the 21st century we have lots of other proven sales techniques that
work well and have no personal rejection associated with them — what
with the various leads programs, direct mail, audio and video tapes,
the Internet and a host of other marketing tools available at a
reasonable cost.
So do your new recruits a favor and teach them
to get warmed up by marketing to the cold market first and go after the
ice cold warm market later!
Linda Locke
MLM Marketing Blog
One of my pet peeves are people who reverse
recruit other network marketers who advertise on the net or in offline publications or post in
online forums.
You know the type, "Hi, I love your post. And I wanted to tell you
about my great XYZ company that you need to join right now!" Yuk! This
is such an annoying way to do business, yet some people insist on doing
it anyway. Go figure. 
If you've been attracting prospects that constantly sit on the fence about making a decision to join your business or buy your products, here's an article by Jeffrey Gitomer, author of the Sales Bible, about what really makes people decide to say "Yes" to a sale.
For those of you using DVD or video tapes for sponsoring - here's a tip
for you if you are having difficulty getting people to watch your video
presentations. 
