I'm a member of SendOutCards, because I absolutely love the ease with which I can send a follow-up, thank you, congratulations, invitation, etc. card. Using this tool makes me a better salesperson. (Not to mention a better grandson-in-law -- see the invitation Cindy and I created for her grandmother's 100 birthday party.)
As a member of SOC, I occasionally get advice emails from people in my SOC upline. About five minutes ago, I got one that contained the following advice on how to build a successful downline:
Here is my suggestion...
- Make a list of 100 people you know.
- Get every one of them to watch a DVD.
- Those who are interested, let them send a card, tell them the 3 ways to get started and explain to them the 4 types of people who purchase SOC. Then ask them which type are they?
- HAVE THE PEOPLE YOU SPONSOR DO THE SAME.
While I have no problem with number 1, numbers 2, 3 and 4 are why people hate multi-level marketers.
Number 2
The vast majority of those 100 people in your list don't want to watch your DVD, yet you are advised to "get every one of them to watch it." The fact that what you want is in conflict with what they want is what creates sales resistance. And once you encounter that resistance, your only means of achieving this stated goal is to guilt them into it, manipulate them into it, and so forth.
In other words, this tactic does not allow people to easily say "No." (And you wondered why people stopped replying to your e-mails.)
Number 3
"Which of the 4 types of people are you?" is an assumptive close, which is a classic manipulative tactic. The theory being that if you eliminate "none of the above" from the answer options, you'll keep these people in your sales funnel.
Guess what? People don't like their options to be limited and will naturally resist your attempts to do exactly that. (And you wonder why people stopped returning your phone calls.)
Number 4
Not only are you advised to use these garbage tactics, you are encouraged to pass them along to everyone else. This results in exponential growth of salesdrip behavior, and exponential growth in resistance to all MLMs. (And you wonder why it keeps getting tougher and tougher to find people willing to actually take a look.)
Question: When are the top people at MLMs going to take ownership of this stupid behavior and stop it dead in its tracks?
Devil Gill's Answer: When the world tells these salesdrips to stuff their DVDs where the sun don't shine.
Angel Gill's Answer: When the world tells people who use these tactics "No thank you." And when these people don't take "No thank you" for an answer, tells them something like "I like you, so I'll be honest. When you refuse to take 'No' for an answer you come off as a sleazeball salesperson. I don't know who taught you how to sell this way, but you really need to re-think whether they know what they're doing. I wish you success, but I would never introduce you to anyone if this is how you're going to be treating them, because that would reflect poorly on me."
Start spreading that word, and this salesdrip behavior will eventually die.
Of course, there's no guarantee it will be replaced with the type of honest selling I advocate to MLM and affiliate participants.
But one can hope.
Gill E. Wagner, Sage of Selling
President of Honest Selling
Founder of the Yellow-Tie International Business Development Association
