Ever heard the saying “You get what you pay for?”

MLM Myth #7

Never a truer word was spoken. It applies in this context as well.

Now, certainly, if you are planning to build a business working from home, you have far fewer capital outlays than someone in a brick and mortar business, or even a franchise.

In either of those business environments, you will typically have expenses like a lease on a building and equipment, stock and wages. And if you are a franchisee, in addition to all of those costs, you will also have paid for the ‘privilege’ of doing business under someone else’s name.

Forking out money for any of these running costs is by no means a guarantee that you will make any money. There are many brick and mortar business people and franchisees who go out of business every day, despite having great products and services on offer.

Now it is true that you can opt in to a MLM or Network Marketing business opportunity and expect your capital outlay to be less than in another business model, but you still must understand that there are ongoing running costs associated with owning a business.

The home truth is that you cannot run a legitimate business on fresh air.

For starters, there will be a cost to opt in.

This is where the type of business model you choose will be incredibly important. While it may be tempting to join a company with a low cost product range, you must realize that this means the commissions on any sales you make will also be very low. It makes sense that you are not going to be paid a commission that is more than the product is worth.

If you opt in to a company with a range of low cost products, you are going to have to sell a very high volume of products before you will see a return on your investment.

Higher value products will yield you a higher commission on your sales, as long as you are positioned in such a way in the compensation plan to collect that commission.

If you are currently doing a due diligence on business opportunities right now, we suggest that you have these criteria in mind when you go looking:

1. Opt for Top Tier direct sales opportunities over MLM or Network Marketing.

Top Tier simply means that the buy in level is much higher, so while you will invest at a higher rate to get started, your commissions will also be higher and you will be targeting a niche in the market which has the money to invest. It is not an effective business strategy to promote your products or business to people who have no money to spend

2. Look for a company with a G.P.T. payment plan.

G.P.T. stands for ‘Get Paid Today’. This means that you get paid first when you make a sale, and after taking out your commission you pass the wholesale cost of the product back to your company.

Negative cash flow is particularly deadly for new business owners, and this type of payment structure means that you will have a cash flow as soon as you make a sale.

3. Avoid companies which have a “Two Up” compensation plan.

What this means is that no matter where you are positioned in your company compensation plan, you will be required to ‘pass up’ the commission on your first two sales to your sponsor. Most often, this type of compensation plan does not have a residual component built in, so beyond your first two sales, your sponsor has absolutely nothing to gain financially from mentoring you.

4. Look for companies which have a ‘dual income’ structure.

A dual income structure is one where you are paid for the sales you make at the front end, but also make a residual income on the sales of the consultants you personally sponsor.

Beyond the investment to opt in there are running costs, from membership fees, travel (if it is an International business), to communication costs, just to name a couple.

There is another saying that goes like this “Nothing ventured, nothing gained”, and that is highly pertinent to this situation.

From a psychological point of view, if you have no “skin in the game”, if you have nothing to lose, you are going to be far less motivated to lift yourself and do what it takes to get your business going.

We see many people opt in at the lowest level financially with a “I’ll give it a go and see what happens” attitude. They never last long. Frankly, it is not possible to make money with this attitude.

You do need to invest money to make money. If an opportunity presents itself as one where you can make money with no money, it sounds too good to be true…and it is.

Ahhh…another clever marketing ploy to appeal to the “get rich quick”, “time poor”, and just plain lazy prospect.

MLM Myth #6

Now this is simply a bald faced lie. Again, think about this logically.

Every person who steps into this industry for the first time (especially if they have no previous business experience of any kind), is faced with an enormous learning curve. We are not exaggerating, it is huge. Less a curve, and more of a Mt Everest in fact.

There is only one way to learn, apply and master new skills, and that is with time. And unless you are an exceptionally fast learner, you will need to be prepared to devote lots of it.

Now, don’t get us wrong, you can definitely start learning how to run your business in as little as seven hours a week, and if you have a very strong desire to start your own business, and that is all the time you have available to you, then you have to start where you are at.

There may be one exception to this statement, and that is if you have the capital to outsource your business set up, and your lead generation. But in any event, you will still need to invest the time in learning how to deal with your business once it has been set up and is running.

Now, many companies use testimonials in their marketing and promotion, where top earners talk about how they earn X dollars working only 10 hours a week.

It is important to understand a couple of things about these testimonials.

Firstly, without exception, the people who have been very successful in their business dedicated a huge amount of time to learning their new business, getting set up, and then running.

And it may be true that they have relaxed the pace a little, and are now working far fewer hours in their business.

But we know that the person who is inclined to go hard to make that kind of money in the first instance, is not likely to be happy resting on their laurels. They are more likely to be planning and working hard to take their business to the next level. It is the nature of the entrepreneurial beast.

Which brings us to another home truth. If you do not have the time to invest in building a business, or you are not inclined to spend the time it takes to build a profitable long term business, you should reconsider your motivation to start your own business.

There is no getting away from it. Successful business requires work that is smart and hard. In this industry, perhaps like few others, you can expect to put in the hard work once, and be paid for life. But there is no way around doing the hard yards.

We would be lying if we suggested otherwise.

Making a six figure income from home and only working seven hours a week sounds like a business that is too good to be true…and it is.

This particular myth is twofold in its deception.

MLM Myth #5

Try and remember for a moment what it is that you are doing here.

Business.

And in business, as much as people in the same industry might network with each other and discuss what is going on in their particular market, do you really think that people who are in direct competition, in the same market place are going to share all their secrets?

It would not be the most savvy business strategy in the world, would it?

Now, you may put this proposition to a seasoned MLM or Network Marketer, and they will insist that this business model is different.

Because “If you make money, your sponsor makes money. It is in your sponsor’s interest to help you do well”.

And that is indeed the truth. Nothing untoward about that statement.

But stop and think for a moment. The top earners in any MLM or Network Marketing company have usually got very large teams of people under them. How else do you think they became top earners? And the way they generate their incomes (in the first instance) is from sales at the ‘front end’ of their business. This requires a substantial investment of time to plan and execute a marketing strategy that will yield that level of sales.

They have got their own businesses to run. Their own challenges and obstacles to overcome.

How much time do you think is left over to spend “holding hands” with new comers?

How many serious business people (in any industry), take the time to spoon feed their competition?

And to be blunt, a serious entrepreneur is not going to commit their time to someone who shows zero initiative or willingness to drive their own business hard. The fact is that ‘needy’ consultants will get the least amount of time from their sponsor.

There is a law called “Pareto’s Law” or the 80:20 rule that states that “80% of the results will come from 20% of the people”. In this industry, the 20% of people who are generating 80% of sales will get the highest level of attention from their sponsor.

Makes perfect sense doesn’t it?

Because “it is in a sponsors interest to have their consultants do well”. And a smart sponsor will soon see that if a consultant expects to have their hand held, they are highly unlikely to do well. They will not waste their valuable time on someone who is on the fast road to nowhere.

The home truth is that if you are going into a business with the expectation that someone will ‘hold your hand’, you should probably reconsider this as an option for you.

No-one else can make financial success happen for you. As we discussed in MLM Myth #4, your success in business will be 100% up to you.

If your sponsor lives in a different time zone, is not able to speak to you when you have a problem, or to be blunt, lied like a pig in a bog in order to make a sale and sign you up, you need to learn where to go looking and find your own solutions.

In business, becoming resourceful, solution focused and ready to fail fast and forward are pre-requisites to success. These are skills that can be learn t, and over time and with practice, mastered.

There is no business environment on the planet where someone will ‘hold your hand every step of the way’. The most successful business people are resilient, self reliant and fiercely independent. Without exception.

It’s a jungle out there.

So, if it sounds too good to be true…it is.

This one is a biggie from a mindset and personal development perspective.

MLM Myth #4

All MLM and Network Marketing companies will obviously put their best foot forward in their bid to sign you up. And to be honest, it would be a spectacularly stupid marketing tactic to point out all their short comings before you handed over your credit card and signed on the dotted line.

They want you to believe that you cannot fail if you join them, and the “secret ingredient” to your success or otherwise, is what they have to offer.

To be absolutely fair, there are some companies (very very few, we hasten to add) that do indeed give you a comprehensive home based business “tool kit” to help you get up and running. The better companies even teach you how to use the tools they have provided, and do indeed run “in house” marketing training programs for new members (bear in mind that the vast majority of these will be “old school” strategies, and as such are not useful to you at all in the Internet marketing age).

But to our mind, the entire claim that the company has everything you need to succeed is very shaky. And this is another reason why so many people struggle and ultimately fail in this industry.

What is the difference between the person who makes $50,000 per month working from home, and the person who maxes out their credit card and eventually gives up? How can that be so if they both sell the same product, have the same compensation plan, and access to the same training?

There is a reason why some people do well in this business, and others do not.

And it has nothing to do with the comp plan, products or training.

The home truth is that the “secret ingredient” to your success in this or any business is… YOU.

If you are desperately looking for a business opportunity because you want out of a job that you loathe, or you are in a tight spot financially and it is causing you distress, be aware that you are in a highly emotionally charged place.

Now, all buying behavior is essentially emotional. But you are not buying a pair of shoes to make you feel better because you are having a “bad hair day”, or a flat screen TV so you can feel proud and impress your friends when football season rolls around.

You are making a decision that will have an enormous impact on the way your life plays out from the moment you hand over your money.

If you are serious about going into business for yourself and working from home, take a deep breath, put your credit card away, and ask yourself these questions.

1. Do I have the commitment to learn, implement and master a new skill set?

We all have to go through a steep learning curve when we enter a new profession, and there is a generally acknowledged rule of thumb that it requires 10,000 hours to hit “tipping point” – or the point at which you have mastered your new skills.

Few people have the personal discipline, focus and patience to go through this learning process. Do you think you have this type of discipline?

Too many people are so busy trying to “get rich quick” that they forgo the hard work necessary to make money in any environment.

2. Do I have a realistic idea of what it takes to be self employed, specifically in Network Marketing?

And if not, who can I talk to, to find out?

3. How much time do I have to commit to my new business?

4. How much working capital do I have available to get my business started?

5. Am I receptive to new ideas?

This is VERY important. The more you learn, the more you grow, and if you are really smart, the more you will understand how little you know.

Being open to new ideas, and ready to change some long held beliefs will be critical to your success. The people who fail first and fastest are those who cannot or will not be taught anything new.

If you are looking at a business opportunity as a way of ‘saving’ you from a situation that is causing you pain, understand that your search needs to start inwardly first. If you answered the questions above in the affirmative honestly, and you have a burning desire to be in control of your own financial future, it may well be that self employment is a positive first step to making this happen.

But ultimately you will make this happen. Not a company, a product or a killer compensation plan.

We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again. If it sounds too good to be true…it is.

Seems like a ridiculous thing to even say, but there it is…

MLM Myth #3

MLM companies know that most people hate the thought of selling anything, and the reason why this is so, is because their consultants are not taught how to sell effectively and professionally.

But use your head for just a moment.

What is a business? Any business?

A business is an environment where goods, services or information are exchanged for money. Yes?

And there is nothing dishonorable about this process. There is nothing terrible or shameful about accepting money for quality products or services.

I’ll digress for a moment and say that if you have a problem with this concept, I would suggest that you possibly have a little work to do on your mindset about money (this is terribly important – money issues will hold you back in your business if left unaddressed).

The home truth is, all business is about selling. There is nothing wrong with that.

But consider this.

People hate to be sold. They do however, like to buy stuff.

Now, if MLM and Network Marketing companies were even remotely interested in the success of their consultants, they would be teaching effective sales techniques. Mostly new consultants are taught to “share” their products and opportunities with everyone they know. This sets them up to fail from the start.

The first and most critical thing to understand about great salesmanship, is that it is NOT about convincing. It is not about talking people into buying your ‘life changing’ product or ‘ground floor’ business opportunity. Frankly, they could not care less about either of these things.

People want to know one thing only. Pay attention now.

This is the only thing you should be concerned about, and it involves putting yourself in your prospects shoes.

WIIFM – What’s In It For Me?

That’s right. Your prospect is only concerned with how your product, service or information can help them in their life to solve a problem, meet a need, or get what what they want. And that is all.

An effective salesperson will listen to what their prospects want in the first instance. If what your prospect is looking for does not match what you have to offer, move on immediately. To try and persuade someone that you have what they want, even though it is transparently clear that you don’t is disrespectful, unprofessional and a complete and utter waste of your time and theirs.

You will go NOWHERE in your business engaging sales strategies like this. Great salesmanship is about developing an intelligent and appropriate response to feedback from your prospect.

If you do feel that what you have to offer is a great match for what your prospect is looking for, then you supply them with all of the accurate and relevant information they need to arrive at this decision on their own. Remember, you are not selling a commodity in this environment. Your prospect cannot ‘try before they buy’. They must be very certain in their own mind that they want to proceed.

If someone is looking at your business opportunity, they are going to need to be given the time and space to complete a thorough due diligence before they make the commitment. If they have been given a ‘push’ by you to sign up in your business, believe me when I say that the chances of them forging ahead in their own business are slim to none.

Now all of these techniques are dependent on you having a highly targeted marketing system in place in the first instance. One which qualifies your prospects before you even speak with them. So your time is not wasted by “tyre kickers” who are ‘just curious’.

In the Internet age, learning how to market online will be the key to creating this type of automated system.

Being told that there is ‘no selling’ involved in a business opportunity should raise the alarm bells in your mind. If you are told this by a potential sponsor, be aware that you will most likely receive sales training that will equip you nicely to do business…in 1980.

If it sounds too good to be true…it is.

So we have arrived at MLM Myth #2

And this one is a beauty. In fact, I think this is the most dangerous myth of them all. It ties in perfectly with Myth #3 (which I will get to next).

If you have been involved in MLM before, or if you have made inquiries into a company, you are highly likely to have been told something like this.

“These products change people’s lives. Imagine how many people will want to buy these products from you when they see what they can do for them“.

I’ll never forget the ‘sales training’ I received in my last MLM. It was never actually called ‘sales training’. For some reason (that is now fairly obvious to me), the truth of what the business involves is skirted around, and never called what it really is.

Companies seem to think that if they dress the sales training up as something less ‘offensive’ consultants will be happy to do it.

So the primary sales strategy that most people are taught is to make a list of your family, friends and work colleagues. And then “take massive action” and “share” the products with as many of these people as you can.

Our trainers actually used to say lame things like “How would the people who are important to you feel if they knew you had these life changing products/ business opportunity, and you didn’t “share” with them?”

And this is how the Amway style home meetings started. Desperate new consultants who didn’t know any better (and some that definitely did) roping in everyone who was unfortunate enough to make eye contact with them to attend “opportunity meetings”, and “share” the products and opportunity, whether they were in the market for either of these things or not.

The home truth of this matter is that products do not sell themselves. Ever. Strategic and targeted marketing sells products.

MLM companies will not tell you this, because the top earners in most of them do not know how to use focused and leveraged marketing techniques to promote their products or opportunity to an appropriate niche. In fact, most of them would not know what this means.

You see, instead of targeting the people who are actually looking for what they have to sell, they pitch to everyone they come into contact with, and hope that if they churn through enough numbers, someone will eventually buy from them.

In all fairness, twenty five years ago, a small handful of people made a lot of money doing this very thing. But in the age of technology and information marketing, this ‘business strategy’ will not fly.

And even back then, it was not a professional or leveraged strategy to build a business on.

So remember this. If you are looking at a business opportunity, and you are told that the products “virtually sell themselves”, keep looking. This is an indication of how you will be taught to market your business.

And trust me, you will not have a hope of even getting your business off the ground if you proceed this way.

If it sounds too good to be true… it is.

And so to “MLM Myth #1″.

Sorry to burst your bubble so early in the piece, but such a business simply does not exist.

If you have been involved with MLM or Network Marketing before, no doubt this was almost the first thing your ‘sponsor to be’ said to you. By the way, usually this person is quite new to the industry themselves (they tend not to hang around too long before they discover that they too have been mislead, or they have maxed out their credit card – whichever comes first).

This is how it all begins. You will be shown the product range. You will be told that the products are “revolutionary”, “life changing” and “so powerful that everyone will be knocking down your door to get their hands on them”.

You will be told that even with absolutely no previous experience of any type in business it is possible for virtually anyone to build a residual income by “sharing” these products with anyone and everyone you come into daily contact with.

But I’m getting ahead of myself here, more of MLM style “marketing strategies” in MLM Myth #2.

There are many reasons why people are attracted to the MLM or Network Marketing Industry. These might be some of the very same reasons that you are looking.

The promise of making money from home.

Sacking your boss.

Choosing when, where and how much you work.

No more office politics.

No more commuting.

More time with family.

More time doing the things you love.

Achieving financial security.

These are all highly valid reasons for wanting to pursue this as a business. Unfortunately, these benefits are almost always combined with marketing strategies which lead prospects to believe that the business is easy.

The marketing tends to focus on the income claims of the top earners (and these people usually represent about the top 1% of the total number of active consultants in the company).

And so now you are to believe that not only is the business easy, you need no previous experience, and only need to do the minimum amount of work to realistically generate a six figure income at lightening speed.

Now, what this style of marketing does, is attract the wrong type of people to the industry in the first instance. People who are looking to “get rich quick”. People who have a “lottery mentality”. People who expect that the money will come flooding into their bank account by osmosis.

People who think that any legitimate business can be built this way should not even be considering self employment.

The simple home truth of the matter is that in many ways, this business is even tougher than a “brick and mortar” business.

Just think about it for a moment.

Let’s imagine that you have opened a shop in a busy part of town. You lease a building, put up signs, bring in stock and then advertise your new business.

If you have done your market research well first, you will have positioned your business in a place where your niche market is likely to be walking past your shop every day, and there is a pretty good chance that at some point, they will walk in your front door to see what you have to offer.

Not so in a home based business. There is just you, your phone, and often a cupboard chock full of your ‘life changing’ new products.

No boss to answer to.

No deadlines (except perhaps those imposed by your bank or lending institution).

No daily routine to work to.

No need to even get dressed if you don’t feel like it.

It may all sound idyllic, but it takes a particular type of drive and discipline to build a business out of nothing under these circumstances.

Our experience has been that people who have had previous business experience in either brick and mortar or MLM have a far greater understanding of the consistent and focused effort that is required to build a business. People who have been career employees tend to find the learning curve far steeper.

So if you are looking at a “business opportunity” and it all sounds too good to be true, keep looking. Because if it sounds too good to be true… it is

Ahhh…one of my favorite topics. I love the concept of video marketing for many reasons. And video marketing is rapidly gaining in popularity thanks to the emergence of You Tube, and distribution tools like Traffic Geyser. More online business people than ever before are utilizing video marketing as a powerful means of free lead generation.

But don’t get discouraged that so many people are using this medium to promote their business. The good news (for the emerging savvy Internet marketer – that would be you , is that most people are doing it pretty badly. I see far too many people online commiting the business equivalent of hari kiri with poor quality videos.

And for someone who understands how a) the medium works b) attraction marketing works and c) information marketing works, this will narrow the pack substantially.

Alright, down to the nitty gritty. Why is video marketing such a powerful medium?

Internet video is now the most sought after commodity on the search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.). These search engines love video content and will generally push your posted videos up in the free search results (also known as the “organic” or “natural” search results).

30,000,000,000 web videos are watched every month in the United States. That’s right, videos. In fact, videos now comprise THIRTY BILLION. This represents 60% of all web traffic.

Not only is there tremendous video traffic on the internet, but surfers who are looking for videos are a highly desirable demographic. 71% of You Tube viewers are employed (repeat after me – we don’t want to particularly target broke people – sad for them, not much use to you). 15% are students. The median income of a You Tube viewer is $75,000. Almost 50% are married ( not totally relevant, but interesting fact), and 70% are college educated.

When you combine and apply the fundamental principles of attraction and information marketing in your videos, along with smart keyword research, you can learn how to dominate the search engines.

So, what to talk about in your videos. Here, I am going to direct you to the Carbon Copy Pro training under the Resources tab -> Training call archives. There are a series of five calls, hosted by John Jackson, with Traffic Geyser co-founder Mike Koenig. You will find that I will continually refer to these calls, because every principle that you will need to understand, implement and master in your online business is represented there.

Mike will take you through advanced keyword research techniques, and then go into how to create content relevant to your keywords and your niche. His favorite strategy is to use the 10 x 10 x 4.

In short , you will kill two birds with one stone here. You will attract the people who are looking for what you have to offer, by positioning yourself as a leader and an authority in your industry, through the delivery of the valuable, useful and relevant information they are searching for.

Now would be a great time to discuss what you don’t do. This is very simple and easy to remember – and hopefully, you will have already guessed what I am about to say…

Don’t talk about yourself, and pitch your business. Ever. I mean it – EVER.

This is an ‘old school’ offline marketing technique. Leave it in 1980 where it belongs.

Remember why people are online looking for information. They are not looking for you, or your business in the first instance. They do not care about you (they don’t even know you yet), or your ‘next best thing’ biz opp.

They are looking for information that will help them to answer a question, solve a problem, or make a decision.

So, to the content you will post. Answer people’s questions. Deliver high quality, accurate information that your niche might be searching for. Be generous. Don’t hold back your best stuff. Serve it right up front and centre. This is counter intuitive, I realize, but it will establish your expertise, and more importantly, trust between you and the searcher. People will be more inclined to take the next step in your marketing process, if they can see that your primary intent is not to blatantly pitch them.

Now, I don’t want to give you the impression that your story is not important. It is. Vital, in fact. But not right up front. The purpose of your personal blog, website or social media profile is to allow your prospects to get to know you better. And this is the appropriate place to tell your story.

You do not want to be posting lengthy “War and Peace” style videos, two to three minutes long is plenty. Aim to cover one Q and A per video.

Your videos will serve to educate your prospects, establish you as a person of value and allow you to direct your viewer to take the next step in your marketing process.

All you are EVER trying to “sell” is the next click. Where you send people to next will depend on how you have designed your pipeline. It may be to a landing page, or your blog. But, and this is also important – they should find what you tell them they will find when they get there. Make sure you transition your viewer in a smooth and logical way to the next place.

Video marketing is particularly powerful when you combine it with a PPC strategy. The idea is to build your list relatively quickly using PPC, and then communicate with your list on a regular basis via your autoresponders. In this way, you can let your list know that you have posted a video on topic “X”, provide them with the link to view the video, and invite them to comment on your post.

This will increase the views of your video. And if people have been invited to leave a comment, they will have had to watch your video through to the end. If the viewer actually leaves a comment, pat yourself on the back. This is a marketing trifecta, because Google rewards all of these elements by giving your video a higher ranking in the organic search listings.

You will not need any fancy equipment to record your video, in fact $150 will get you a snazzy Flip camera, which will do the job perfectly.

Now, just a couple of other snappy tips:

Choose a quiet location to record your video. The sound of background noise (traffic and wind in particular) is very distracting.

Outdoor locations are great, but make sure you are not squinting into the sun, or wearing sunglasses (we made the sunglasses mistake in our first videos – people like to be able to see your eyes).

If possible, make sure the viewer can see your hands – again, a trust issue.

Make sure you are confident about your subject matter before you start. Speak with authority.

Never use the words “thank you” “please” or “just” ( an excellent little tip from Andrew Cass).

E.g. “I’m just making a video to tell you about X” or “thank you for watching my video”. Sounds needy.

Near enough is NOT good enough. If you are not really happy about your video, don’t post it. Practise is the mother of mastery, so practise this skill until you are very comfortable about what you are producing. I personally think that a poor quality video does more harm than good.

Create some “interview” style videos. If you are part of a couple, have your spouse ask you the questions you want to cover. The presentation tends to be more relaxed when you work this way.

Try to avoid walking and moving around too much as you film – it can be very distracting, and detract from the material you are presenting.

So there you go, some ideas to get you going on a video marketing campaign.

Make today a great one.

Cheers,

Tan

by Terry Zadow

Joining a network marketing company, on the basis of “it’s such a good product” (like I almost did) is the caryard equivalent of buying a van without checking under the hood. Let me explain.

Like it or not, the primary purpose of any business, network marketing companies included, is to move product.

Similarly the primary purpose of a van is … (you guessed it) to move product.

Trouble is, most companies offer a great “looking” vehicle, but on closer inspection, the home business owner finds it doesn’t have an engine capable of driving sales. You pay your money and get your van back home — loaded to the brim with product, hopes and dreams.

You put the key into the ignition, turn it clockwise and … click … nothing … It won’t go anywhere. The van you bought won’t move, let alone move product.

It’s a shell … a souffle. All hot air. The used car salesman didn’t say anything about this?

So what do most people do?

They push their van around the block a couple of times, hoping it will somehow gather momentum.

They try putting more fuel (money) into it.

But it doesn’t make any difference.

In the end the clever ones realize they have to buy or build their own engine (and then cross their fingers that it works with their particular vehicle).

Meanwhile, the company puts on “rah rah” training sessions and meetings all about their “products” and their “success stories”.

Of course, they rarely mention anything useful about driving sales.

This is what you really need to know.

The core problem here is this. When looking for an opportunity, most people only focus on the product or service they will be selling. This is natural and understandable (the companies bank on that). But it is a HUGE mistake.

There are some incredible products out there. There’s no doubt about that.

But the product is only half the equation.

If you don’t believe me try ordering a pallet of any product in the world.

Have it delivered to your garage. Are you rich yet?

Of course not.

It won’t move itself. It needs to be marketed (no matter how good it is). And no amount of affirmations, no law of attraction, no “awakening” or “abundance mentality” is going to shift that sucker.

You see, the most important — and the most often overlooked — criteria for choosing a business opportunity is being able to crawl under the hood and check that it has a powerful and automated sales and marketing machine.

Without an engine to drive sales, most home business owners quickly find themselves at the side of the road — alongside the rusted out wrecks of the 97% of other independent distributors whose dreams stalled.

And you know what the real tragedy is? Those 97% of people never realise what went wrong. No-one tells them you need an engine to drive a home business. They blame themselves for not “pushing the van” hard enough. “Maybe if I’d done another lap of the block, another meeting, bought more leads, listened to more training calls?”

They never realize that the bright and shiny “shell on wheels” they were sold was never going to get out of first gear.

And that it wasn’t their fault.

Meanwhile the companies and their “heavy hitters” ignore the wreckage — somehow managing to put it to the back of their minds, as they welcome a new round of eager members ready and willing to test drive a shiny new van.

I want to share with you today, a story that is all about love, hatred and betrayal. It is an inspiring and gripping tale that will leave you wondering what the next chapter will bring. You can rest assured that there will be no end to this saga.

At it’s core, this is a classic story line. You know it very well, I’m sure. It is the quintessetional “boy meets search engine” tale. For those of you who are unaware, it goes something like this: Boy meets search engine, boy becomes besotted by the power and unparalled reach of the search engine, search engine kicks boy to the curb (for no apparent reason), boy’s account is suspended and his once thriving business is shut down overnight.

What I have just described, is the most recent round of ‘slaps’ for Adwords advertisers. For the purposes of this story, we’ll refer to the boy as “Cam” and the search engine as “Google” (this is actually based on a true story .

From the very start, we could see the unbelievable power of Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising to drive traffic to our landing pages. It is fast, targetted and when done well, yields an extremely high ROI. We knew that the top earners rely almost exclusively on PPC to generate the number of leads necessary to build a profitable business in this industry. So from day one, Cam immersed himself in learning PPC. After a couple of months of full throttle study, he unleashed our campaign, and within four months, we had been recognized with a master marketing award by CCPro. It was a giddy ride. Cam loved the science and precision of PPC. We could see immediately which of our campaigns were working, and which weren’t. Our campaigns delivered us highly qualified leads within hours of turning them on, almost more than we could handle in fact.

But then the rules of engagement changed. Google, partly at the behest of the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) went on the rampage in the home based business industry. Any Adwords campaigns that drove traffic to landing pages which were replicated, or obvious “biz opp” pages, were shut down. Use of trademarked company names in Adwords campaigns, such as Liberty League International, Lifepath or Global Resorts Network, also led to the shut down of the campaign.

Now, in some cases, accounts were ‘slapped’, and advertisers received a warning. In other cases, accounts were suspended (definitely more serious). Worse, some advertisers were advised in writing, that Google would not accept any advertising from them ever again.

Obviously, this is pretty devastating, but when we consider what has happened in the context of why it has happened, it is actually not as grim as you might imagine.

Having spent a lot of time listening to people such as Perry Marshall, Dr Glenn Livingston, Frank Kern and Cherie Yvette (as well as gleaning information from Google itself), it has become apparent that a couple of forces are at work here. Firstly, the FTC is cracking down on the home based business industry in a big way.

It would seem that there is a strong move to clean up the “get rich quick” marketers who extract a lot of money from people who are chasing a dream, and are generally not well suited to work this type of business (these same marketers give this industry a very bad name). This is a very good thing. For those of us conducting our businesses online with integrity and professionalism, this will narrow the pack considerably. It will also protect consumers to a greater degree than ever before.

Google enjoys market share online (a staggering 83.5% amongst a field of thousands of search engines), and the reason why, is because it consistently delivers value to searchers in the form of relevant, current and unique information on each and every search. So you can understand why Google might be inclined to crack down on replicated websites.

This is where a solid understanding of marketing principles is going to be absolutely critical to your success online. You will need to know how to research what your niche is searching for, and how to deliver that information to them in a professional manner. And the principles that underpin the way the search engines function are not likely to change in dramatically in any way, other than to continue to tighten up to protect searchers/consumers when they are online looking for products, services, businesses and information.

You have now joined the ‘Information Marketing’ industry. You will need to learn how to research and present high quality relevant information online, and in doing so, position yourself as a person of value and a leader.

So, in the final wash up, the ending is not necessarily the disaster it first appeared to be. Increase your value to the world, present your business in an honest and professional way, and stay abreast of search engine requirements (by tapping into as much training in the CCPro back office as you can), and you should be well positioned to enjoy a happy ending.

Make today a great one.

Cheers,

Tan