A lot of people talk about 80/20 rules and apply them to situations. You’ll hear it often in business as well. In fact, you can also apply the same principle to your network marketing business; 20% will achieve network marketing success and 80% will always fail.

It is sad but very true, and it can all come down to a person’s ability to motivate themselves. In network marketing, this is particularly true because people suddenly become their own boss and can’t adjust to that responsibility.

Self motivation isn’t rocket science, but it is difficult for some people to grasp. To keep yourself motivated, it’s important to have a dream (or even a few). It could be some mansion in the hills, a red sports car, a boat or holiday somewhere special. Some people have many dreams, some short term and others long term. There will be times in your network marketing career when your confidence is low and you have to rely on yourself to get through those rough seas.  A dream or goal is a good place to start, but don’t have it as your only success tool.

It’s A Business So Treat It That Way

Planning is essential for any type of success, not just in business. A goal is just the ‘why’ part of your success, it’s the picture you keep on your wall at home to make promises to each night and remind yourself ‘why’ you’re working so hard. But what about the ‘how’?

In the second Pacific Rim edition of the Fundamentals of Management by Danny Samson and Richard L. Daft, their overview of the chapter on planning outlines examples of how sport applies plans to each individual’s game. It says that, ‘Without a game plan, a lot of random actions will occur, and players would be far less effective than those who have focussed on a plan and strategy.’

Start Your Plan Today

The best way to start a plan is to look at the way organizations do it and then try to apply it to your own situation. A common method is Management by Objectives and is defined by Wikiperia.org as the ‘process of agreeing upon objectives within an organization so that management and employees agree to the objectives and understand what they are in the organization.’

This could be tough when you’re your own boss, but it can be done. Here’s how:

Set Goals: Start with the question of what it is you are trying to accomplish? A goal should be a specific target with a time frame. Your goal could be a number of sales each week.

Develop an Action Plan: Don’t be unrealistic and set huge goals. Start off by working out what you need to achieve to be viable. Then, increase your goals as you grow in confidence. If you need to earn $1000 a week, then work that out in terms of sales and set that goal.

Review: Sit down at the halfway point (perhaps Wednesday if you’re looking at weekly action plans) and review your progress. If things need to be changed do so.

Appraise: Be tough with yourself when you go over your results. But don’t get to the point where you’re hurting your own confidence. The idea is to achieve you goals.

Once you’ve set your game plan, and gone through the process above, you put yourself in the league of the top 20% who will always do what’s necessary to achieve network marketing success.

With all the people in network marketing businesses around the world, you’ve got to be good to survive. To be in that group at the top of the game, you have to be prepared to do more than just, ‘the best that you can’. It has to be all or nothing. You have to do whatever it takes to achieve network marketing success. You have to be certain that failure isn’t an option and that anything less than success is a waste of time.

Many people are in network marketing game for the wrong reasons. They give it a try because they thought they wouldn’t have to sell anything. After all, the advertisement they responded to said,’ No selling’.

No selling doesn’t mean you just sit at home and watch television, though. It should, but is doesn’t…sadly. Life is about selling something to someone else. It doesn’t matter what game you’re in. You will have to close a sale. You could even be at home and have to sell; whether it’s a case of asking a neighbor to come over for dinner, phoning your boss to ask if you can take a vacation or even one of the kids crying because they want an iPhone like everyone else has. Everybody is trying to sell the result they want.

You’re selling an idea when you ask that special person on a date, or when you go to a job interview and want to convince the recruitment officer that you fit the essential criteria for that dream career you’ve always wanted. You’re even selling when you suggest a movie to friend. Humans are born to communicate and negotiate. We’re born to sell. It’s just that you need to understand the different ways it’s done.

Learning to sell the correct way isn’t rocket science. However, you still need to be prepared to put some work into it.

It’s all a matter of continuous improvement; you have to be ready to sell, you have to be prepared to learn and you have to be willing to teach. When you have that done, maybe you can get the kid’s those iPhones.

First things first, you need a great concept or a killer angle. You network marketing business can work no matter what it is you are selling. However, if it’s a great product, life can be so much easier.

Selling a business brand to someone can be challenging and is not helped by some low-brow selling techniques employed by unscrupulous marketers. You don’t need to try and build pressure to sell something. People will buy from you because they like you, not because you’ve managed to back them into a corner.

Once you’ve created an honest and compelling picture of your brand and yourself, you’ll find it easier to convert prospects into sales. Don’t allow yourself to believe that people don’t like to buy things. It’s the opposite that is true; people love to be sold to. It’s just that they want to deal with someone they can trust.

After you’ve converted a prospect, you need to teach them the same things that you’ve learned. This will motivate them. Developing sales techniques and helping them all to learn from their experiences is part of developing teams in your network marketing business. Then, when you have created a sales powerhouse, you need to maintain it. From there, network marketing success will be at your fingertip with sales figures blossoming and your team will be a force to be reckoned with. Oh, and iPhones for everybody!