Targeting Potential Customers

When you are on the lookout for potential customers, you want to make sure you’re focusing your energy in the right places. Remember that not everyone fits the profile, so spending time and money on trying to attract those outside your target demographic will be a waste of your resources. An effective way to find potential customers for your business is to ask yourself the following questions.

Can they afford your products/services? Of course, it’s impossible to know everyone’s financial situation, but you can get a good idea by looking for certain clues. For example, a consultant for a high-end ladies’ jewelry company should consider factors such as which town the potential customer lives in, if she wears designer clothing, if she drives a luxury car, etc. If your company sells products that range in price, consider the average and build an ideal customer profile from there.

Are they the decision maker when it comes to the purchase? There are several different ways that people handle finances within their households. Some couples agree on a reasonable level of autonomy when it comes to making a purchase. Either person can buy groceries or even a new lamp for the living room without consulting each other, but neither would buy a car or book a vacation without both agreeing to it first. Be sure that the person you are targeting as a potential customer has the ability to make decisions about purchasing your products. This especially applies to products and services geared toward young children and teenagers. A skin care company’s acne treatment is mostly used by those between ages 15-21, but is almost always actually purchased by the parent. Whoever has the final say about a purchase is your potential customer.

How much do they need the product/service? Ask yourself if you are fulfilling a need or solving a problem for a potential customer with your product. Someone who will be returning to the work force after a long hiatus staying home to raise her children may need all new makeup and accessories to complete her professional appearance. A cosmetics or jewelry consultant would consider this person a potential customer because there is a certain level of need for the products and services offered. The most effective way to find out if a need for your product exists is to ask the right questions. Demonstrate a sincere interest in people by asking them questions about themselves. Give them an opportunity to talk about their family, interests, and hobbies. When you discover that the person needs your product, you’ll know you are talking to a potential customer.

Targeting your niche toward the right people will help you spend your time and marketing resources efficiently, which will in turn allow you to have long term success. By asking the above questions, you are creating a sort of customer profile that can be used to identify potential customers.

How have these questions helped you find your own customers? Are there any other questions you would add to our list? Please share your comments below!

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How to Get People to Join Your Team

How to Get People to Join Your Team

When you’re ready to take your direct sales business to the next level, recruiting others to join your team is the place to start. You have the potential to create a steady income stream while helping people achieve their own financial goals. In today’s post, we suggest some ways to build your downline and grow your business.

Share great ideas that help everyone. Whether the idea is your own or someone else’s, if you think it will help others, don’t hesitate to share it with your prospects. While presenting your opportunity to a recruit, for example, share an idea for having a successful launch party that worked for you. Your method will help the recruit by giving him or her a jump start on the business, and it will help you by finding customers for your downline. By sharing great ideas that are mutually beneficial, you generate excitement and enthusiasm about your opportunity, which will in turn increase your chances of signing your prospect.
Do both big and small things to help make your team members’ lives better. After a team member’s initial launch and first few months working the business, it can be easy to lose touch or at least frequent contact. One small way of making your team members’ lives better is to check in regularly with words of encouragement, a motivational quote, or even a little gift of appreciation. On a bigger scale, you might host a weekend brunch at your house or local restaurant to reward your team’s hard work and accomplishment. Take the initiative to be a positive force in their lives. You can recruit others to join your team by introducing them to people in your downline who will attest to your role in their professional lives.
Stay optimistic and enthusiastic. Even if a prospect seems skeptical, unsure, or even confused about the opportunity, it is important to maintain a positive attitude and enthusiastic outlook about the business. If you don’t falter, he or she will notice that you are confident enough not to be shaken by a possible rejection.
Always do the right thing. There may be times when you are faced with some sort of conflict or dilemma. One direct sales consultant was excited to sign her very first recruit, but it became clear during the presentation that this person was so eager that she didn’t think to ask a lot of important questions that might sway her decision about whether or not to sign with the company. The consultant was tempted to ignore that fact and let the recruit sign on the dotted line anyway, but she listened to her conscience and offered the important information to the recruit as well as a chance to ask more questions. The recruit wound up signing, but even if she hadn’t, doing the right thing will allow you to never have to look back at your past action and feel guilty. Direct sales is about helping people, so your actions should always reflect that.
Listen more than you talk. A prospect wants and NEEDS to be heard. He or she may want to tell you why joining this business is even a consideration. And although, he/she may have lots of questions for you and provide you with plenty of opportunity to speak, make sure that you are doing most of the listening. By truly listening to others, we can tune into what their message is, and find effective ways to help.
Stay humble. No matter how high you climb to the top of that proverbial ladder of success, ALWAYS stay humble. Remember that there are always improvements to be made and higher levels to reach. Continue helping those who are just starting out, take compliments with gratitude and grace, and pay it forward. Your sincere humility will increase your likeability and have a positive effect on your business.

Building your team requires a lot of preparation, patience, hard work, determination, and the right mindset. We hope our list above gives you some guidance in getting started. What would you add to the list? Please share your comments below!

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Three Keys to Establishing a Loyal Customer

When trying to establish loyal customers, put yourself in their shoes. Surely, you are a loyal customer of a business yourself. Perhaps you always get your hair cut and styled at the same salon, or maybe you grab your coffee from the same deli each day, even though you pass three other coffee shops on your way home. What is it about the business that keeps you coming back to only that place? When did you decide that you wouldn’t frequent any other competitor’s business? Asking yourself these questions and following our suggestions will help you create loyal customers.

Focus on the individual. From the very first interaction you have with the customer, demonstrate your genuine interest in him or her as an individual with unique needs and concerns. In making conversation, remembering one or two details about the person will serve you well in the future. A customer interested in skin care products for her teenage daughter mentions that this purchase is part of her high school graduation gift. In subsequent meetings, the consultant usually starts off by asking how the daughter is enjoying college and how the mother is adjusting to an empty nest. These types of details shows people that they are more than just customers to you, and your interest in their lives will make them happy to bring you repeat and exclusive business.
Make sure you have enough time for the person. Once your business really begins to grow, (this is a good thing!) you likely won’t have as much time to spend on each customer as you’d like. If this is the case, make sure that you make time for your potentially loyal customers. Make a personal delivery on your way to pick up your kids from soccer practice, send a quick text message asking how he/she likes the newest product, etc. If the person reaches out to you at a time when you can’t return the call right away, send an email to say you’ve gotten the message and are looking forward to returning the call; provide a specific date and time you’ll call back. In doing so, you are showing the customer that he or she is important to you and you appreciate the loyalty.
Ask; then really listen. Asking the right questions is a smart way to engage a customer, but it doesn’t end there. Truly listen to the answers, and consider going so far as to jot down a summary of the conversation afterward. Refer to your notes regularly to keep the customer’s needs in mind and stay proactive in satisfying them.

Always remember that whatever product or service you are selling, you are in the business of people. Be kind, caring, and genuine, and you’ll already be one step closer to achieving a loyal customer base.

What would you add to our list? Please share your ideas below!

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Four Quick Tips to Stay on Task

Direct sellers need to have a strong sense of self-discipline in order to succeed. When you are answering only to yourself, it is crucial to eliminate distractions and stay on task for both your daily and long-term projects. Here are our four simple suggestions for doing just that.

Get involved with activities that help your business. This means everything from professional development workshops held by those in your upline to more informal lunches with colleagues or prospects. Find ways to incorporate your business into things you already enjoy doing. For example, Heather, a direct sales consultant for a company that provides fitness programs and equipment, integrates fitness into her daily life. Aside from working her business, she follows her company’s exercise programs regularly and once a month, invites a few friends over for group workouts. She leads a small group of friends to try a new workout, then serves healthy snacks and bottles of water afterwards. By doing this, she is able to stay healthy, work her business, and make time to socialize with her friends all at the same time.

Make sure that your business utilizes your strengths and passion. Heather already had an interest in health and fitness, so it made sense for her to choose a wellness company to sign with. She enjoys learning about how to create and maintain a healthy lifestyle, and she is passionate about educating others who struggle with this to do the same. Because she gets so much joy out of helping others achieve their fitness and nutrition goals, it’s easy for her to stay on task. Even when it gets hard to stay the course, her passion for what she does and her ability to do her job well prevent her from getting off track.

Focus on small positive improvements. When there are things you want to improve about your business, it can be overwhelming to figure out where and how to begin. Start small to build momentum. It can be as simple as re-organizing your desk or purging a filing cabinet drawer, but once you get a few small tasks accomplished, you will be motivated to take on bigger, long-term projects.

Make sure the business gets you excited. As with any job, if you don’t enjoy what you do, it will be that much more difficult to succeed. Tap into your interests and passions to get excited about your business. When you can do this, you can get others excited about what you are offering and build lasting professional relationships.

The longer you work your business with focus and passion, the easier staying on task will become. Involve yourself in business-related activities, make small improvements, and create excitement within yourself about what you’re doing. What would you add to our list? Please sound off in the comments section below!

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4 Ways DSA’S Code Of Ethics Protects You And Your Customers

Ethical conduct is at the heart of good business decisions and these videos demonstrate this premise to consumers, entrepreneurs, direct selling executives, educators and public policy officials. Abiding by DSA’s Code of Ethics protects both the interest of consumers and sellers.

To learn more about direct selling ethics, please visit Direct Selling 411.

Ethics Initiative Videos

What Is Direct Selling?

What is direct selling? Let us show you what an ethical opportunity is all about!

What Is Direct Selling? (en Español)

What is direct selling? (en Español)

Intro to DSA Code

Learn more about what the code is, and why ethical companies comply.

Product Claims

Any claims a direct seller makes about a product must be truthful.

Ethics Initiative Videos

Meet a Direct Seller

Meet a direct seller who is learning to navigate the DSA’s Code of Ethics.

Product Buybacks

Learn about the buy-back policy that all DSA member companies adhere to.

Cooling Off

Learn how the “cooling off period” protects consumers from buyer’s remorse.

Earnings Claims

When recruiting someone into a direct selling opportunity, be honest.

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How to Increase Your Luck And Opportunities

There are many things in life that we cannot control, but your business doesn’t have to be one of them. Of course, luck does have a small part to do with success, but you can take actions to increase it. Don’t treat your business like a lottery ticket, doing nothing while hoping it works out. Take a look at our list of suggestions for increasing your luck and coming closer to realizing your dreams.

Lead with and focus on what you do best. Being aware of your skill set allows you to identify your own personal strengths. Use those strengths to make positive, memorable first impressions as well as integrating them into as much of your business as you can. For example, if you are quick-witted and easily make others laugh, don’t be afraid to lead off sales presentations, opportunity meetings, and even one-on-one introductions with a joke. Go a step further and integrate your unique sense of humor into all your business relationships when appropriate. When you can bring your strengths to the table, others will take notice.
Always be prepared. Although luck does play a small part in our lives, you can increase your chances of success by preparing yourself as much as possible. You wouldn’t go in to a final exam simply hoping that most of the questions are about topics you remember from the textbook; you would prepare yourself by reviewing the material, highlighting important points, and quizzing yourself before the day of the test. The same concept applies to your direct sales business. Rehearse your presentation before each party, even if you’ve been doing this for years. Create possible scenarios that might catch you off guard if you’re not ready. Calling a referral to book a possible opportunity meeting? Find out about the person’s interests and aspirations. Adequate preparation can be your most effective tool for finding success.
Be a connector to people and businesses. When you have a good experience with someone in business, take the initiative to share that experience with others. Be the one who refers friends, family, and customers to others without prompting. Put in a good word about your hair stylist to your cousin who is looking for a new place to go for a cut. Perhaps a customer is seeking out a service that you can’t provide; be the person who finds someone who does. Your role as connector will not be forgotten when an opportunity arises for someone to do the same for you.
Develop authentic relationships. This begins with showing a genuine interest in and sincere caring about others. Not all your relationships can or should be close ones, but they should all be authentic. People involved in your business in any way need to be able to trust you, be open with you, and want to be around you. Give others your full attention when interacting, and always follow through on your promises. Building good relationships is the foundation of a career in direct sales.

How do the items in our list apply to your business? Do you have any ideas to add? Please share your comments below

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Three Tricks to Improve Your Communication

The advantages to living in this digital age are nearly endless for your direct sales business. It only takes a few seconds to send an email or text to a customer or colleague. However, face-to-face communication is still an extremely important part of how you interact with others. Emails and text messages are convenient, but they cannot convey tone of voice, emotion, and other non-verbal cues. As you continue to build professional relationships, make it a priority to improve your face-to-face communication skills.

Bring a friend or partner for confidence. Meeting a friend, acquaintance, or even a stranger for a sales presentation or opportunity meeting can be intimidating and anxiety-inducing. Don’t be afraid to ask a friend or colleague to tag along for moral support. For example, you are about to do your very first home party hosted by someone you only met one other time. All the guests at this party will be strangers to you, and you don’t feel completely comfortable going it alone. Ask someone in your upline or even a close friend to accompany you. Introduce him or her as your assistant, for instance, and you’ll not only have someone to help build your confidence, but you’ll have someone to help you set up, pass out catalogs, and answer questions if appropriate. Sometimes just the feeling of having a friend in the room can boost your self-esteem and make you appear confident to others.
Practice your conversations. This can be done alone in front of a mirror, by recording yourself on your smartphone or tablet, or even by role-playing with a friend. A direct seller named Vanessa always rehearses the introduction of her sales presentation in her bedroom mirror right before she leaves for her parties. In doing so, she pays attention to her facial expressions like making sure she’s smiling, and her tone of voice to make sure it stays warm and light-hearted. Another benefit of doing this is that she will notice before it’s too late if anything about her outfit interferes with her presentation or just doesn’t look and feel right. Find a way of practicing that is comfortable for you, and make a habit of doing it often.
Make eye contact naturally without staring. Eye contact is an essential part of face-to-face communication, as it signals to the other person that you are in fact listening and giving your undivided attention. Looking directly into someone’s eyes can be intimidating, however, so use some techniques to avoid staring. Tip: Look directly in between the person’s eyes instead of right into the eye when talking. It won’t be detectable by the other person that you’re not looking into the eye, and you will feel more at ease while giving your attention. As with any skill, you will become more proficient and comfortable with practice and experience.

Possessing strong communication skills will serve you well in any career. When you can appear confident, demonstrate good listening, and use proper eye contact, you can begin to build and maintain the relationships that are so important to your business.

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Three Ways to Reach New Customers

Growing your business and achieving success requires you to continually increase your customer base. Retaining existing customers and acquiring referrals alone will not translate into long term success. One of your goals should be to introduce more people to the benefits of your product or service. Here are three ways to start finding new customers right away.

Find a new niche and build a market around it. Within your obvious target market, there likely lies a smaller, specialized one that has potential to become the spotlight of your business. Find out what this is, and make it the center of your customer search efforts. For example, after a few months working for a direct sales company that sells women’s fitness products, one consultant met a pregnant guest at a home party who purchased a starter kit in preparation for shedding her pregnancy weight after the baby arrives (under her doctor’s supervision, of course!). This gave the consultant an idea for how to market some of her products to this very specialized population of potential customers. She chose a select handful of products that were deemed safe for post-partum women to help them ease back into a safe and effective fitness regimen. In order to build a market around this niche, the consultant used word-of-mouth and chose a few places to advertise where expectant and new moms could be easily reached (the fitness club child care room, Mommy & Me classes at the local library, etc.). Concentrating your efforts on a niche market can have long-reaching benefits for your business.
Use events and gamification to engage people. Your social media presence can be a very effective tool with which to engage people and start conversations about your business. Hold contests on your Facebook page that require people to share in some way, from which random winners will be chosen. Amazon Mom, a program from Amazon that allows members to save on baby & children’s products, frequently holds themed photo contests. Members post a photo relating to the theme (one recent theme was May Flowers). They choose a “Top 20” list where each winner’s photo is featured on their page for their hundreds of thousands of followers to see. Get creative with how you engage people, and keep in mind that you don’t need to spend money or give something away to do so.
Do things differently to generate curiosity. Thinking outside of the box will almost always serve you well in this industry, so create a bit of mystery around a new product, perhaps, that will get people interested and talking. One direct sales consultant ends her presentation with a question and answer session. Before she starts, she asks guests to retrieve their cell phones because the questions will be asked via text message. This piques guests’ curiosity, and after the Q & A ends, she instructs them to add her phone number to their contact lists so they can reach her if they have any questions, concerns, or want to reorder. Furthermore, she reminds them that she also now has each of their phone numbers as well to make getting back to them and reaching out much easier. When seeking feedback about the party afterwards, this text message Q & A is what people report as the most memorable and fun part of the presentation. Use your unique qualities and have fun with finding different ways to do things.

Reaching new customers doesn’t always require casting a wider net. Look within your existing base for niche markets, engage people in innovative ways, and think outside the box. In doing so, you move your business forward and come closer to achieving your long-term goals.

What would you add to our list? Please share your ideas below!

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How to Mentally Prepare for a Successful Business

When tackling any difficult task or project, preparing yourself mentally is crucial to accomplishing your goals. Sufficient mental preparation allows you to stay the course, handle obstacles that arise, maintain motivation, and follow through to the end. In today’s post, we suggest a few ways for you to mentally prepare yourself for a successful direct sales business.

• Establish and project an unshakeable confidence that you’ll achieve your goal. You may not genuinely have this confidence in the beginning, but “fake it ‘til you make it.” Achieving your goal should not be in question; think of it as something that WILL happen no matter what. Projecting this idea onto others will make them want to follow you because we are naturally attracted to those who are successful. For example, a fairly new direct sales consultant, eager to sign her very first recruit, is meeting a prospect to present the opportunity. When the prospect asks about incentives for building a downline, the consultant shares the company’s numbers and states very confidently that she herself plans on reaching the first recruiting level (4 people in her downline) in time to earn a free trip to this year’s national convention. The prospect is impressed with her certainty and therefore becomes confident in the company itself. Apply this same idea to sales presentations and networking events to provide a well-rounded business for yourself that is successful in all areas.

• Get used to being uncomfortable and excel in it. Remaining in your comfort zone and stepping away from every risk will not get you very far as an entrepreneur. Embrace those aspects of your business that cause you a bit of discomfort. Feel uneasy asking for referrals? Do it as often as possible in as many ways as you can think of. Dread the phone calls to follow up with a prospective hostess? Make those calls a strength of yours. After awhile, you’ll come to recognize this discomfort as an opportunity for big success and you’ll excel in trying new things all the time.

• Always keep moving forward and never give up. Accept the fact that there will be setbacks, you will experience frustrations, and you may even consider throwing in the towel. Tough times can truly test your resolve so do not even consider giving up for a second. If you make a mistake, fix it and learn from it. If you lose your motivation, set new goals that reignite your ambition. Use all the resources at your disposal to move your business forward, learn and grow as a professional, and see your goals come to fruition.

• Go all in 100%. Everything you do in your business should be done with every ounce of effort you possess. Whether you want to make this business your full-time job with a full-time income or you want it provide just a little bit of extra wiggle room when you pay your bills each month, put in 100%. If you only go halfway and find that it is not working out the way you want, you’ll never know what your true potential is.

If you are committed to doing all of these, then you are ready to build a successful business and all the ups and downs that come with it. Just as an athlete stretches before a game or a piano player runs scales before a concert, you must put in the preparation required to run your business.
Is there anything else you feel is necessary to mentally prepare for success? Please share in the comments section below!

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Leveraging Your Strengths and Advantages

Because the direct sales industry is such a people-centered business, it is extremely important that you find your motivation and ambition from within. Tapping into your interests and desires will give you an advantage over your big business counterparts by allowing you to connect with your clients and recruits on a personal level. If you are just starting out in direct sales, looking to reinvigorate a business that has reached a plateau, or seeking to maintain your success, find ways to use your strengths and advantages to achieve your goals.
Choose a product/service…
• you can be passionate about and maintain focus. Finding your passion is where it all begins. If you choose something that doesn’t evoke a strong feeling, the chances of success with that product/service are slim. Having been a public school teacher for close to a decade before staying home to raise her children, a prospective direct seller named Robin knows she is passionate about education. She has been researching several popular direct sales companies for which many of her friends are consultants. Robin enjoys attending these parties and shopping the catalogs of these companies, but since her true interests lie in the education field, she decides to sign with a company that specializes in educational books and other materials. Because she is already knowledgeable in this area and cares about providing children with quality literature, Robin can grow a profitable business by focusing on her passion.
• in which you can be an expert. Robin chose something in which she has solid expertise, and that can be a great foundation for a business. Even if you have been a direct sales consultant for a long time already, find a product or service within your company to learn as much about as possible. If you become an expert in this item, your sales presentations and opportunity meetings can include an emphasis on it. Prospective customers and recruits will notice how proficient you are on the subject and can feel comfortable looking to you for guidance about it.
• in which you have a strong community. Ask yourself: how can this product/service build ties to my community or strengthen existing ones? One of the innovative ways that Robin gets involved in her community is by volunteering to be a guest reader at local elementary schools. She chooses books that align with the curriculum and plans a themed activity to connect to the book. It’s a wonderful way to give back to the community while simultaneously using her strengths to help educate children and gain some exposure for her business. Find ways to build your own community ties with your product/service by using your existing strengths.
Your passion for the product/service that you offer should be the foundation and motivation for all you do in your business. Your expertise will help you take the action needed to achieve your goals, and a strong community will allow you to grow. If you have all three of these, you’ll be unbeatable.
What other ways do you think you can leverage your strengths and advantages? Please share your ideas below!